3.8.2022 Fall River City Council

also please come to order for the public hearing madam clerk call the roll counselors kadeem here romero here here lee here bellatier here pereira here proposal yep and president here we have one item for on the public hearing the five-year capital improvement plan your emotion open motion open second motion open made by counselor kilby seconded by counselor dion all those in favor all right any opposed so voted

are there any proponents wishing to speak on the five-year capital improvement plan any proponents are there any opponents wishing to speak on the capital improvement plan any opponents hearing none your emotion of clothes coaching to close second second clothes of not

counsel kilby all available in favor hi so voted

city council committee on finance now come to order madam clerk

here person went to the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible so anybody signed up for citizen's input madam clerk no

you signed up you want to do it before or after it's up to you no i'll wait sure yeah item two is transfers and appropriations

if we could have the city administrator come down

molly gets that i just want to announce that council camara is on a work trip out of state this evening and he's not able to join us tony aiken good afternoon good evening good evening i feel like i was just here you are welcome back thank you very much um i apologize i'm a little i'm less organized than i'd like to be this evening with regard to um so the first item before says

transfers and appropriations from item two which is the mayor in the order appropriating 685 000 from ems stabilization fund to ems fund capital that's correct i apologize thank you for uh that assistance uh madam president um so there are two um items that comprise this entire appropriation one is a forestry truck uh the other is an ambulance um i'll take the forestry truck first um this is essentially a

four-wheel drive uh ambulance uh that also has certain uh firefighting rescue and other emergency services capabilities imagining that on the reservation we have what i believe amounts to about 13 square miles of forest here in the city of fall river last year there were a number of rescues that were made out there in the forest there were times when ordinary fire apparatus had to actually go

around through adjoining towns in order to get to the place of a rescue because ordinary fire apparatus are not able to go on the roads that go through those forested acres or those forested square miles the fire apparatus that's being replaced with this expenditure with this appropriation is a 2005 forestry truck that ultimately came to the end of its life there was no way to continue getting it to

be operational and useful and so there is an appropriation before the council to purchase a new forestry truck that would allow there to be rescues and ambulance purpose as well as uh firefighting purposes accomplished in the 13 square miles of forest in the city of fall river it would have no cost to the the general fund it would be through the ems enterprise fund and i would ask uh if there's any

questions there i can pause or i'll go on to the question of the ambulance counseling c4 counselor kilby just no questions but just by your comment i know um over the last number of years this council has heard from some residents out there jordan citizens of put regarding the need for access in case of emergency i mean so we still have an extreme amount of open space in the city and um replacing the 2005

for goodness gracious so uh um totally support the uh the purchase the transfer into purchase thank you counselor and seat five council lee actually just because of what the council has stated um this is more relatable to the fact that the roads are really bad shape out that way and you we're purchasing we're looking to purchase a new truck which i'm not against at all but for the longevity purpose of this new truck

is there any kind of conversation about how we can make those roads better so that way we can so something like this can last longer as well certainly um so so i think there is certainly conversation about how to make those roads more accessible especially if they're going to be accessed by more and more residents which then of course creates a greater risk of emergency and need to respond to

the emergency uh the problem of course is that um in that particular area we don't want to get into like a wholesale uh paving operation because that of course and and and so there's kind of this happy medium so the conversation is being had it's something that i have discussed with our planning department uh and with dcm and with a number of folks that might be involved i do think that that solution is

probably a little bit ways off but it's certainly something that's being contemplated down the road i think we're going to need again i don't want to pull away too far from this but down the road i think we're going to need to know what what the plan is for that so that way when we have things like this to approve we know that we're not just going to sort of

bring it you know bring it to the forefront and then have it damaged you know and and not have the longevity that it should have something like this truck or something like anything else that goes out that way so thank you thank you anything further from the council no councilman c1 thank you madam president just um i'm supportive of the two items before us just uh i guess a general question in terms of

policies that we have uh in with regard to the stabilization account for ems so i know for water and sewer we we had just put together or the administration put together a policy with the use of the stabilization account and just quickly looking at it i mean the balance is pretty significant it looks like we have we're according to the fy 22 budget um we had about nine million dollars of

revenue coming in so if you look at you know what's going to be left of the two point let's call it 2.5 million that gives you about 25 of revenue that we expect to come in which is a good good number but do we have a policy in place for ems or are we in the process of putting together a policy that would establish a minimum fund balance so that when these

types of requests come down the council does have at least an understanding of okay you know here's what the bad the minimum balance is or this is what the balance is and this is what the policy would state in terms of what we would like to see as a minimum balance to make sure that we know how much we can spend or should be spending from us i don't fiduciary responsibility madam president can we

have tim come down to all of our yes counselor who may add i think i think it was more of a question i guess if seth can't answer it i think it's more of a probably a cfo response but i don't know the answer um and i sometimes think it's the most important thing is when you don't know the answer just say it um if the director does know the answer to

that is there a policy sir it's like track you just have to hurdle it i think tim i believe tim could hurdle that rope if he had to yeah he could uh the answer the aliens are have i don't know about the policy but i know on the inception of the enterprise fund when mayor sutter's administrative administration started it we had to maintain 13 of our annual budget in our

reserve fund that was the number that he gave us okay but i don't know if it's a policy or i can't speak on that but that was that was the numbers we worked on yeah so if we could just um you know if you could just send something to the council whether or not we have a written policy and again i recognize the policy comes from the administration but i think it just helps counselors you know

support these capital items that are coming down knowing that we we at least are being fiduciary um you know we're being responsible in terms of long-term planning so making sure we're not drawing down on these accounts but also recognizing that this is what these accounts are for um so that we can make educated votes that's all without a yield thank you anything further from the council no

thank you so the second item is an ambulance um so very recently just because of the the unbelievable number of calls that these ambulances go on i think it was 26 000 last year individual calls that our ems personnel responded to they're uh obviously wear and tear on the on the trucks uh ordinarily their leases the rare opportunity to purchase one that was available they're very rarely this

readily available uh so the second appropriation is to purchase an ambulance that would give us a little more redundancy and resiliency in order to make sure that when ambulances do go down it doesn't put the residents of power over at risk anything from the council on that counselor yeah uh so i think you spoke a little bit about it so are we gonna retire one completely or use it as a reserve or no no so the

truck that's getting replaced that'll be the current rescue three that'll be placed in reserve it's currently it just came back from repair uh but it's still a decent truck for a reserve it'll definitely serve the city as a reserve it's not you still feel like it would be able to get the yearly inspection for the absolutely it'll pass yeah definitely absolutely now just in terms of from your standpoint and i know the

mileage and the wear and tear that we put on it especially in the in the city what's what are you looking for in terms of a replacement for for these vehicles so my turn is usually four years after four years the trucks are you know just based on running 24 7. it's like a police cruiser about 20 000 miles uh 20 000 pounds you know it's just constantly going so at the four year mark

it needs replacement the suspensions are usually shot the diesel to the turbos uh the fuel systems start going and that's when we start getting issues with the state inspection when it comes to the mechanical side of it but so should we expect to see one every year just in terms of replacement like where are we in terms of what your current fleet is so we're in we're in decent shape right now um dang not

do the covet we were able to um get some at least some ambulances under the uh fema reimbursement but it had to be a lease so what we did is we leased the ambulances and placed the payments in for reimbursement so we got two which covered went for two years i did two year leases so those two uh leases will be paid through fever at a hundred percent on the covert

reimbursement so i i personally and when we're putting together the budget if if we can build something within the operating budget because i know your revenues are higher than your again your expenses that you on a yearly basis whether it's a year it's a lease and we have you know maybe every three years or or maybe we we purchase two and we're paying a lease of i don't know let's

just call it so if you look at 40 000 a year in whether it's fiscal year 22 or the new budget coming down if you look at the rental lease line that's where our built-in uh replacement replacement purchases is perfect okay without a yield thank you counselor anything further from the council anything further attorney thank you thank you director thank you item three is a discussion

request from the father of the public schools for approval to submit statement of interest on march 25th 2022 into the accelerated repair program the massachusetts school building authority for the stone therapeutic day school at westall this was referred february 22nd 2022. mr pachico hello everyone good evening good evening mr pacheco

counselor i took care of the uh the issue with that typewriter it's a okay i appreciate that thank you mr pachico so um school department had looked at the wiley school um a year ago a year and a half ago actually uh to do what we're trying to do right now and that is to give us a little more space we're in dire need at a few of our schools but none more

than at the stone school and the services that are provided at the stone school are essential to uh to so many families so this the wiley school is a single unit school it is um eight classrooms two classrooms in the basement that is a possibility but we have four on each floor and um that is the primary goal the building is not handicap accessible and that will be a project that we will take on internally

to do some of that work we were very successful at watson i'm sorry at watson with the um with the abb board in giving us a an extension on the work that needed to be done at watson um to allow us to do the ada work um outside of msba msba does not get involved in in that side of the of the work so we were able to do that work where currently um

in fact we had a meeting today with the faculty about when the elevator is going to go in and it's going to be starting in about three weeks and then a handicap ramp in the front of it along with a bunch of other renovations at that school so the wiley would be similar except it's a two-story so it it is a a little bit on the uh easiest side financially

the soi uh for the wiley is a new roof uh boilers redundant system and um windows wiley of all of our schools the windows held up much better than the others they didn't fog over um the mechanisms were not quite as bad but they are a window that is uh 30 34 35 years old and it's time for change they're not weather you know proofed as well as they used to be a lot of the

mechanisms are are very difficult to uh to open and close the windows so they do qualify for msba funding so the goal would be to start with the msba hopefully with the approval tonight the our application would go in i'm guessing that first year after covet so to speak they will be a lot of applications that we'll be up against we stated our case as it is inside of the need the deci and msba

know the need that we have in the district and the work that's going on in the stone school is basically second to none it's um the uh as i like to say that uh mary ellen shaw is uh as an angel among us for doing the work that she does with the students she she has there and those families are very grateful every day that we have that ability to do that in fall river and not

an out of district placement so that is the the crux of the wiley school again it is um physically sound um structurally sound it um it does require the three key items on the accelerated repair program that msba office and then it will be a lot of in-house work moving forward on that we will tackle on the school site thank you mr pachico this is actually just on for discussion it's in the full council agenda council

vice president good evening how are you um now i understand i'm well aware that this is simply a statement of interest i know there's nothing monetarily attached to it um i don't disagree that obviously everything you're presenting are needs something that should be addressed and there's no doubt you do need additional space especially for the k through 5 etc my question is moving beyond this yes

with the significant ester funding that the school side has received over the last couple of years will there be any contributing funds from the school side beyond this for whatever residual amount of monies have to be put into these projects so i not being kevin almeider and chances are he's listening to this so i i won't speak for him i would say that we've taken on quite a few projects over

the last few years a million dollars at talbot on the parking lot and drainage improvements 500 000 at henry lord boilers different item we're putting two boilers into henry lloyd right now for half a million dollars um we do have a little under 15 million dollars planned of renovations to henry lord including windows that we're doing with esser funds we have talbot that we're doing quite a

bit of work in on the hvac system and we are working on the nagel auditorium where our sped department was relocated to during the demolition of the old durfe so i don't believe that i can say without a doubt that we're going to use funds but we've been using funds and projects we understand that um that the city has a lot of projects in line um you know to say the least and

you know with diamond uh coming on board so where we will do what we can um to do that um the next phase after this you know acceptance is feasibility or uh schematic design uh which is about 300 000 um can be a lot less we've done it for a hundred thousand but we're earmarking 300 000 of which 80 is reimbursed for reimbursement so we'll be on the hook

for 60 you know 70 000 depending on how much we use um and i again i can't say that that would be something that we would pick up but i believe that um with a little arm twisting we may be able to do that and move the project to that next level which will be the full design and construction phase and then we will see where that lands i put some numbers together

just so that we have for conversation purposes i'm the wylie is going to be about 4.2 million uh i'm sorry 5.2 million of which 4.2 should be covered by mspa but as we see with other projects what we're eligible for the 80 20 to usually turns into the 70s or high 60s so we could be on the hook on that building for 200 million on the wiley 200 i'm sorry

two million i got dirty on the mine two million um and that in itself is a is a lot a big chunk of of money and of course we're all looking at and of course we're all looking at increases in everything on earth with with the situation and and things that are occurring now right um so that tends to escalate costs as well yes but that's where we stand with the wiley so my guess is

is that um beyond the feasibility schematic design portion um we will be on the hook for about 5.2 million total of which msba will probably reimburse us um in the low fours you know high threes kind of reimbursements which should end up in between 65 70 percent because there will be as there always is some non refundable correct non-eligible ideas that are going to come up if there's any uh hazmat um the roof is hot

if the caulking on the windows is hot uh the the uh asbestos in the boiler rooms all of those items um certain percentages may be covered by mspa but most of the time um they don't get involved in abatement okay thank you i mean i i'm aware that in the last couple of years you the school side has contributed to many capital uh improvements it's just a conversation is worth having and anywhere we can partner or

make it easier i think is something that we should uh we should have those discussions and try to make it as simple as possible thank you with that i yield thank you anything further from counselor at seat seven counselor yeah the only question i have ken you have the wiley school now it's being used for storage yes correct because i think we put a lot of desks and jizz and what's

going to happen to all the stuff that's in there so most of that stuff i don't want to say most of it a good portion of that's been already moved into trailers if you notice durfee's upper parking lot on ray street we have a half a dozen trailers there um so some of those trailers are empty um or half full we're gonna move some of the stuff from wiley out of that out of

the wiley completely empty the wiley and then it'll be ready for construction and this therapeutic school um is going to be an offshoot of the one at west it will be yeah so it will be an additional it's just another campus it's the stone school at westall it'll be the stone school at wiley well the good thing about you know having a therapeutic school in fall river isn't just for the spa river students but you also

can get money from students who are coming from out of town you can get you know 50 60 80 000 a year per student yes um because they need these therapeutic schools um i don't i don't have a problem with either of these to be honest with you the only thing is um how much is the feasibility study going to be for for both of these projects it would it wouldn't be higher than 300 000 my

guess is that it should come in we've had them as low as 100.

um 150. the the the msba sets the dollar amount right that both the opm and the designer um can charge to do this work but there's also consultants that are not necessarily figured into that cost that may you know raise those uh that number up so we we've been successful in keeping the number within that budget and making sure we stay under the 300 000 but um that's the number any anyway

at that 300 000 is there any reimbursement that comes in 80 so it would be 60 000 on the feasibility on the feasibility schematic design yes would i be out of order to ask you if you could ask the members of the school committee if they would pick up the 120 for both of these schools because they do have some extra money at least if they did that sure that would be helpful if we

truly want a partner that would be helpful with that i yield thank you mr pacheco welcome counselor and c day counselor two questions mr pacheco yes this new school um what grades is that house or will it house it'll be a k i want to say it'll be k to four but it could be k to five our current stone school is k to twelve okay so the the the um

this kind of school fills up it it it relieves you know two or three students at a time it would fill back up again so what we're hoping is is that it'll allow some of that um fluctuation to level off um and it'll be better for you know for everyone open the space up a little bit more yes and to counselor pereira's thought as far as audit district placements how many do we have

i can't tell you that right now i i want to say that it's uh probably five okay so we're probably anticipating we may get more with the opening of this yeah we may okay we may we we service our students first and foremost but we will take uh if we have open seats we do have a mary ellen shaw the principal um has a pretty good handle as to what she usually gets for growth

and she will make sure that we always have spaces available for four of his students excellent thank you very much thank you anything else from the council on item three council kadeem thank you madam president um so when you talk about the total cost of 5.2 and i know that's just estimates but that's for the total package of what you anticipate for roof boiler it's just those three yeah

this is strictly arp okay my guess is is that uh as far as um the ada accessibility we could run uh touch on the four million for that so that so when it's all said and done again rough estimates nine million ten million dollars but we'll be around nine million for the total for that building right okay um and i was just going to ask and i know we were talking about in

you might not be the person but we do service out of districts for those we do we do yes okay all right um what else do you have and i know we're going to be talking about this but what do you anticipate in terms of current building projects that you see within the next you know maybe five years or so coming down is it just these two buildings or so these two buildings would be the only

ones that i feel would be msba of the eligible the the um henry lord is a year and a half away from being eligible we're going to do the windows at henry lord with arpa with the esser money however we may and it's not a very large roof area but we may want to do roofs at that building we will be doing boilers and and chillers and unit ventilators or a complete hvac system will go under

our essa money but there may be one piece of that that we may want to go to msba for which would be the roof um now is that hvac just henry lloyd you're talking about henry lord and taliban and we're also changing all the controls um the bms systems in all of our schools okay um as part of of the essence all right yeah and that's where i was going to ask just because i know

we've built these schools and they're all coming offline at the same time in terms of warranty so i was just kind of curious as to where where that is so outside of these two right now then you know obviously these are the only ones that you feel are eligible for msba monies yes um yeah so the only other projects thorin would be doran's still 10 years away if there's anything that needs to be done at door

and we are going to do some some small we'll do bms at um at doran and um we did replace the chiller not too long ago with doran so doran isn't in bad shape we may have a boiler which we could do in-house um at the door and the only thing that i can think of dollar-wise um that would be not eligible for us is going to be the playing fields

so does the scoop doesn't hear that i'm sorry i didn't hear that it's going to be what it's going to be the playing fields at turf the playing field yes okay that's the athletic complex thank you is that the new ones or are the current ones that are it's um it's going to be the the football stadium the practice field slash softball varsity and we may depending on how things go with the upper field the new

field up top um depending on what the prices come in on on the um on the turf itself the carpet we may need help there but the others where um the other particular schools were in pretty good shape so those um so the fields themselves the the football field the practice fields that's just going to be the carpet right so the the under the yeah so i think we

may have so as as usual when you pick up a carpet there's going to be some right you know issues that you're going to have you may have to bring in a little bit more of that subsurface we may have a drainage issue if we find that that subsurface is washed away for reasons other than you know natural so that is something we'll look at but the curbing is good

so we will be looking at a new you know a new carpet for the most part right so that the base is pretty good okay yes um and just i guess while we're on it so did we do the i'm um a blank on the on the park um bretland park did we do that that turf at the same time as their um we did it after durfee yeah but

close right it was uh i think it's two years difference not mistake uh so in terms of capital improvement planning the school committee they review the capital improvement is there a capital improvement plan that goes before the the school committee that's reviewed completely in terms of building projects and priorities the current plan was not presented to the school committee the one that you

have now that came down um with ms sahari okay so that plan they have not seen do they review though do they typically review a capital improvement plan for on the school side um we we do on the building side on the left we have not yeah we have not done any of that of the playing fields or anything like that on that particular plan it's not actually with the exception of durfee there is no

um field maintenance or i'm sorry field replacement um on that capital plan okay so outside the fields the buildings do go to the full committee whether it's through a subcommittee and then the full committee for review of the subcommittee has seen the the capital improvement plan they have not seen the update okay last year's but they have not seen the uh 2022 that you have okay now thank you i yield

seat council proposal mr pachiko what buildings do we have now left of old schools that are not being used is there any there's two so uh the wiley is one that is shuttered um and the uh stone school on globe street okay any plans for that one at all the original plan for that was that we were going to incorporate a new structure around keeping that building in the center piece and building a building around that

you know in a kind of a a circle so to speak and we would make that um a kindergarten center or it could be another uh elementary so we have the south end uh elementary schools are you know a busting at the scene and um if we did not have henry lloyd as as a uh as a community school we would be in trouble um but um the vivaris is 800 strong 750ish and um

we could desperately use more help in that and doran again the community school that's picking up you know the slack there so it it at some point we we picked up 200 students this year in the enrollment and um that's a lot um and depending you know the age groups the kindergarten was higher than it was last year but where um we we will at some point and our efforts are class size reduction so we're fighting

you know with the initiative with our enrollment um so we do need some space and the the problem with the um with the msp process is so long so with 12 years into uh 10 years into the durfee you know soa from soa to finish and that's how long you could say that in elementary would you could shorten that up by maybe a year maybe two but that's a long time to to try and hold off

that class size reduction initiative it's it's tough so we will be looking um we're going to currently put out uh an rfp um for both rental uh lease and purchase uh to see what shakes out in the city to see if there's room for some expansion at the uh at the younger grades and see um where that would take us thank you thank you thank you anything further from the council on item three seeing that we

refer made by council pereira seconded by council raposo all those in favor any opposed you guys have it item four is discussion the request from falberg public schools for approval to submit statement of interest on march 25 2022 into the accelerated repair program of the massachusetts school building authority for the robert l madirus resiliency preparatory academy this was also referred february 22 2022.

mr pacheco so um 290 rock street the old costillo martin the old durfee the the resiliency prep academy is um had a new roof put on an msba project five roofs actually and um it also had um boilers new boiler system put in the boilers that were in that building one was still coal-fired with the coal shoot and we kind of got away from that a while ago can't get anybody to do the cold work anymore

so that building is two thirds of the way through the arp project pars the arp process so this is the final leg of what is eligible through mspa and that is the windows there's 390 windows in that building the they range in size from doubles there's a few triples a few larger windows in hallways smaller windows it's a variety of windows however um we probably couldn't find five windows in that building that you

could see out of they're frosted completely it's uh you really don't know the weather outside until you open the window a little bit and see it's in desperate need of windows for both fuel efficiency and um for operability so those most of those windows don't open those that do we've put stops in them so that they don't go up too high only now we're only allowed to have windows open up four inches to begin with

but that is the state of of the windows in that building and again um as with the last project the um the amount of ineligibles on that building could be greater than um with the wiley just because of the location of the window and all of the work around that window so the lentils will probably all have to be replaced um there's some brick work underneath those windows uh some re-pointing would have to be done maybe

some removal some of the um window sills so to speak that is bad um then they're they've moved over the years with with the constant thoring and freezing of water getting behind those due to bad windows and so that that building my guess on the cost of that particular piece is 5.6 million for the window replacement of which we will be in the same shape as the other building where we're going to be

even though we're in 80 20 my guess is that we're going to be between 63 67 on our reimbursement so that my expectation is that mspa's portion of the rpa will be about 3.6 million and our share will be a little over two and the same the same for the um the feasibility schematic design we would be looking for that 300 000 as a as a placeholder to do that initial work if we are selected um

for uh funding councilman seat seven council prior i just have a quick question on that i know we're talking about you know money for schools and what have you and i know with all of the schools that we built the green silvia spencer board and those are all coming offline so the money we're paying for them is money that we can possibly take from the budget for diamond but

to look at some of these costs that are coming in when you'll get the money when the these will be done we as a council sit here usually and complain that we need to and we hear from our constituents we need to take care of the buildings that we own well to take care of the buildings that we own comes with a price and if we're in a position now to get

some money in and cost us less you know that's what we need to look at and you're not going to get an answer from them on this statement of interest for how long so the statement of interest is due march 25th this has to be in by march 25th march 25th and um my guess is sometime in june or july okay we'll hear from them good that's good to know i will ask this

question on behalf of my former colleague steve camara um he's probably watching today if not he always had a very big concern for the horace mann portraits and paintings that are there has anything been done with that are they preserved um so they they're not in danger okay uh the new roof is protected protecting them um and the entire auditorium um some of the work that was done with the roof was um some

you know uh pointing of the brickwork above the roof line so that it would stop any kind of infiltration uh from that height and that work was all done specifically with the man murals in mind because that area that roof that sits over the auditorium was the roof that we were most concerned with the water the only damage we've had in that auditorium was from a pipe leak um and it didn't affect it was more off

away from the uh the murals yes well that's good because that that is beautiful and it's part of our history and it's nice to see that it wasn't damaged i'm sure he'll be happy as i am to hear that but thank you very much mr pacheco and i think you do a great job trying to make sure that the facilities department at the school department is always intact and looking for the least expensive way to

get things done so i thank you with that iu madam president thank you counselor counselor and seat five councilor lee yeah just uh just to give you appreciation of the fact that it looks like it's sort of the unspoken policy that you're waiting for um eligibility for for reimbursements before we even bring it to the table that we're gonna try to do you know some of these big projects that cost up to nine million or

so dollars so i just appreciate the fact that what you know that's the sort of the unwritten policy that we're trying to go about that so in ten years from now we're probably looking to you know take care of some of those other ones that do qualify um i just need to repeat on the window replacement you said that it's going to be 5.6 million but correct yes but after reimbursement it'll be just

two yes mspa is probably 3.6 okay thank you but i think they'll uh they'll end up funding us on that thank you agile thank you thank you councillor council and seat council raposa mr pachika how many students are at rpa currently um between the middle and high school i think the enrollment is 189.

i'm not mistaken that building is pretty big yes for 189 students so are there any future plans of what else they could utilize that building for very much like i'm thinking very much like you do in the nagel auditorium of durfee is there a plan to possibly rent out some space maybe in that auditorium once everything is all said and done or so we would um the building currently house most of the back office

for the district facilities and operations are there bookkeeping accounts payable title one two and three operate out of that building transportation operates out of that building so as we build out the nagel auditorium and all of that back office goes under one place our parent information center as that all moves it frees up more space for educational purposes and it also will allow us to um have

the auditorium available for rentals now the auditorium is is a in itself is a project um because it's it hasn't had occupancies in quite some time so we are you know between the um seating that would be upgraded um carpeting uh some work on the walls um all restoration work not renovation work or and then the accessibility so um the elevator car that operates that is tower terrace error

so it's rough um but it works it works it's as steady as anything it still has the closing gate um and and um but that would be upgraded obviously um the front of the building is now accessible and that can get you to the elevator and get you to anywhere in the building so the accessibility pieces have already been addressed um to some extent what we need to do now

is we need to do our stairwells raise the the rails on the stairwells with some some guide rails on the side we do have bathroom renovations that have to be done in that building so 290 is a work in progress it will be a work in progress for the next five or six years i'm sure and with because both the stone schools and this school they don't require redistrict redistricting of the district

because they expect they're specialized correct yes so that won't at all help your processes about trying to offload other schools that are busting at the seams no no and and the the the um right now our our immediate need is preschool so our uh pre-case and unfortunately pre-k's above the first floor is is dangerous to say the least you know we can do it we can make it as safe as we possibly

can but it's not the ideal situation so we want to put our pre-ks at ground level so that they're walking in um with everything whether it's lunch or any kind of outside activity um that there's not a lot of stairs involved and it's more for fire exiting than it is for anything else um because kids climb up and downstairs all the time but with those younger ones um if we had to do a

fire drill um it's very difficult to uh to pull off um on stairs you know multiple stairs so that building doesn't help us in that regard um because it's a uh an up-down kind of setup on that as all your entrances so uh the back of the building is and now that the roofs are pretty much we do have the ability that we could put um two classrooms in that basement uh in

the back which is street level i say basement because it's underground by two stories in the front of the building but in the back it is uh ground level and accessible so we could make uh the back of the building if we needed to and die in need to create two or three classrooms in a hurry we probably could pull that off there but the idea would be now that we have roofs the fifth

floor which hasn't been used in years will come back into service and we may tear our our rpa students from five four and three keep them out of two and one which will allow us some other activities in that lower level where the auditorium is thank you thank you anything further from the council you have a motion to report a full council motion motion referred to full council made by

council raposo second by councillor pelletier all those in favor aye aye any opposed so thank you we have martial news thank you mr chico actually before we join finance we do have citizens input danny robillard address 145 old second street the subject is diamond and city council action

okay

madam president member of the council good evening dan robelot robert 1450 second street fall river before i begin tonight i want to make clear that i speak tonight as a private resident and not as a member of any board or commission or group that i may sit on associated with the city i watched the meeting of march 3rd 2022 last night and several meetings before it around the diamond issue i am

completely incensed and thoroughly disgusted that the council will not allow the diamond matter to go before the voters of the city of florida we had a vote on we had a vote on durfee okay i realized there's going to be no debt exclusion but i believe the city ordinance which states that any project over five million dollars must go before the voters the estimates for the diamond project uh uh

293 million dollars of which four rivers approximate share is 111 to 113 million dollars that is vastly over five million dollars there is no reason on god's green earth that this council should have denied the voters the right to speak whether you wanted a dead exclusion or not i'm perplexed because i listened to just about every member of this body say that they were in favor of the voters

speaking i don't know what changed i heard corporation counsel ramsey say that he believed the ordinance applied i believe the city administrator also said he felt the ordinance applied and then all of a sudden in three votes that was all done and gone it's absolutely ridiculous i think the council some man knows at the voting public i think it's wrong and i think the ordinance does apply and

i think the voters of fall river have a right to weigh in on a project of this magnitude as i say we had a vote for durfee it passed with a debt exclusion whether or not there would be a dead exclusion for diamond the voters of this city every taxpayer and every voting resident are entitled to weigh in on how they want whether or not they want to pay for a new diamond thank you very much

thank you mr overwatch i have a motion to adjourn finance second ocean journey by council you'll be seconded by cal supreme all those in favor all right voted committee on finances adjourned we'll just keep right on rolling far river city council now coming to order madam clerk counselors kadeem here

here pursuant to the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit the meeting through any medium attendees are therefore advised that such recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible but in the chamber please stand for a moment of silent prayer

and remain standing for a salute to the flag i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states

madam clerk the first item before you is the mayor's request for the appointment of paulo j emerald to the conservation commission motion to adopt second emotional confirmed made by councillor kilby seconded by councillor raposo any discussion counselor and state three council vice president dion yeah i think my only question is um are we appealing to the public to see if there are

multiple people or anybody out there who want to fill seats that are open on commissions and boards are we or are we just being very narrow and hand-picking one particular individual you know we've had a lot of discussion in terms of qualifications some boards require more expertise than others some boards and commissions simply a learning curve and i just i'm just not sure on these particular um commissions

that we're going to be looking at tonight that it doesn't require a greater amount of expertise than perhaps the individuals have and i just have a hard time with that we've had this discussion more than once there's been discussion on let's advertise for all the available seats that are open and i just don't know if we're doing that and i and i just have a hard time with that with that i yield thank you

anything further from the council councilman's secretary counselor proposal can i can we have attorney a can come down for a second motion away of the rules motions are made the rules made by councillor pozo second and by council vice president dion all those in favor aye any opposed tony aiken council raposo you have the floor thank you welcome back it's good to be here so to jump on my colleagues question what

it what exactly is the process as far as if we have an opening and a border commission how do we reach out to those individuals or do we just expect them to kind of come forward and say i want to get involved in the process i would say it really depends on the board so one of the things specifically about conservation commission is we have um mr aguiar and ms young now in the planning and um

engineering departments respectively obviously um within planning you have a conservation department and therefore the the commission um so from commission or committee or board whatever you're talking about to to board um the names of people who are interested in serving uh come up in a variety of different ways they can be suggested by the people that are working on those boards or they can make themselves known i

don't know what the case was in this particular situation but i know that it's not a general publication ordinarily it's people that either present themselves or have indicated interest in the past and and then are asked if they're interested in serving once an opening becomes available because i know a few years ago and i know because i submitted myself into it there was some sort of public posting about

openings in in boards and commissions and you could forward your resume to the city hall and then it would be would be uh considered has that happened at all recently i don't know if it's happened recently okay all right thank you i yield anything further from the council counselor at c1 council kadeem uh madam president just through you i i thought we were getting um in the past at least

the last couple of um appointments especially the newly appointments there were at least you know maybe a paragraph or a couple of sentences as to why individuals were getting um put forth as recommendations did i i just don't see it in my packet was did we see something like that or i just see the letter that says madam president members of the council i hear by request confirmation of the city

council madam clerk i thought there was another letter that accompanied these no just the appointment letter we didn't receive anything additional sorry that's my error counselor team there should have been another letter that went with these and we did request that from the administration to have that um come down with any appointments okay and i know they were submitting it at some point so okay

i'm sorry when the clerk said that there was a letter i thought that was the letter okay i just based on that i just won't be supporting it um not that i'm not in support of the two individuals that are before us just we need a little bit more information without a yield i would agree with you counseling i would also agree with um council vice president prior to you being on the council councilor steve kamara

would often speak on this topic and really urge the administration at that time to send down folks that had expertise in the area of the boards or commissions that they were being placed on i know these two people i'm sure they'll do a fine job but i know myself i don't know a lot about conservation or sewer to be an expert on either of these boards and and those are the the kind of folks that

we need on these boards attorney aiken i would really uh urge the administration to put out some kind of um notice to the residents again like they did do in the past council proposal you're correct i know that you applied for one they did do that in the past um so that we can get people that might have experience on these boards um at the table counselor and seat five councilor

lee just just uh just wondering and i could i won't pose it unless you know we want to continue discussion but i don't have a problem with tabling this if this was a clerical error and you know we need to see the paragraphs people need to see the information i don't have a problem with tabling this and moving you know moving it to the next meeting so that way we do

have that reading material that we need to make this decision um otherwise i you know i i'm not looking to reject or anything like that but i do think it is important that we have that documentation um just for you know for the purpose of being in council will be making that tabling in the form of emotion i am not right now no because other councils have their hands right on the table

there are counselors that would like to speak so if you'd like to keep it we can yeah like i said i'm not making that motion i just wanted to make you know put it out there that i'm not against it if we if we get to that point so with that i yield thank you council cable your motion to tables yes i made a motion a table second motion table made by counselor

kill will be seconded by councillor pereira all those in favor all right any post madam president this will be before us uh next week at the next meeting yes i'll make sure it has the information with it very good thank you thank you if i'm a madam president yes um i want to thank you for that insight uh i think certainly makes a lot of sense in terms of a more transparent and inclusive

process i'll take that back to the administration and uh uh hopefully at some point in the near future give a report back to the council as to how we're addressing that it's a very real concern thank you perhaps you could report back when this is in front of us at the next meeting certainly thank you uh madam clerk item number two the next item is the thank you attorney request for the confirmation of the

appointment of laura jean washington to the sewer commission ocean table second motion table made by counselor prayer second by account councilor kilby all this in favor opposed so voted thank you sir thank you madam clerk communication from the mayor in in order that reads that the sum of 685 000 b in the same is hereby appropriated from the ems stabilization fund to the ems capital

to purchase a forestry rescue truck in the amount of 350 dollars and a four ford 550 for an ambulance in the amount of three hundred and thirty five pounds motion to approve second second attorney we're all set thank you that was just for that item thank you made by can you stay oh you want him to stay i'm sorry sorry you stay for this one motions wave the rules motion wave of

the rules made by council kadeem seconded by council raposo all those in favor welcome to the table sir good evening good to be back we have a motion to adopt made by council of the second by council kilby discussion counselor dean thank you i apologize i just i missed this in the discussion that we had with um finance committee so the forestry truck when i when i first read i read it

quickly it seemed like it was in terms of a rescue but is this forestry truck also a fire fighting vehicle like is it typically when i hear about forestry trucks it's it's trucks that are equipped to fight fires so i and the only reason i ask that is is the fact that we're taking it out of the um ems stabilization account so i guess i'm just trying to figure out how that would fit

with the use of the stabilization account if it's a firefighting vehicle as opposed to a rescue certainly um so the way the truck is set up uh it has a it has a rescue cab cabin cab uh if you will uh a place that can facilitate ems personnel doing uh rescue and ems work uh within the the inside of the truck it does also have some firefighting capability uh but the

main purpose is as a rescue and emergency vehicle uh in an all-terrain situation um i was asking in the uh interim the chief and the director of ems a little bit about the the road situation out there because i have fairly limited experience out there on the reservation and those are mostly fire roads uh that are that are mostly dirt roads they exist purely as fire breaks and for that sort of access so this four

wheel drive capability is necessary and from what i understand there's approximately a dozen rescues that happened out there i believe last year um and they were rescued as opposed to firefighting operations and this would have been the vehicle that they would have used okay so we we just we feel well past the litmus test of trying to get it from the or using utilizing the stabilization account for ems to cover

this yes uh however i i want to be very clear and i don't want to you know i don't want there to be any confusion uh there is an aspect of this that is similar to the vehicle that was purchased for the police with ems funds which has a sort of an emergency services component to that it just happens to be armored this is a similar type of situation it happens before wheel drive has some

firefighting apparatus but it's predominantly rescue vehicle okay thank you i yield thank you counselor in seat seven council pereira what i'd like to add is that the reservation has created a lot of trails for people as well and people are utilizing those trails somebody falls sprained an ankle breaks a leg this vehicle can get out to that trail to help that individual as well and that

was something that they didn't have and there was a problem getting ambulances out there and mr labassia has done a great job in opening up and expanding a lot of those trails there so um you know i certainly would support it but just wanted to add that in thank you i yield thank you councilor councilman c3 council vice president dion yeah within the body of the letter from the ems director and the fire chief

it does state that the requested unit will have forest fire capability also to ensure the department is capable of extinguishing fires within the reservation and other inaccessible areas so it does have the um it will have a firefighting capability there's no question about it but the predominant ability is as an ems ability just just for whoever is interested in addition to this there is an atv that is equipped with

some cargo capability that's owned by the fire department for use on some of the smaller trails but until this there really was no way to traverse long distances on the fire roads because that atv just wasn't fast enough and didn't have enough range so this is going to really allow them to cover the entire 13 or so square miles of the reservation and also it seems that both i guess both vehicles but um

to make it more expedient in terms of people who are injured getting to the appropriate vehicle for transport for medical purposes as well yes in order to get them out of the uh the forest environment and get them to uh full-scale medical care settle yield thank you thank you anything further from the council counselor just i just want to clarify so i support you know the purchase of the forced

forestry vehicle really what i'm questioning is when you're looking at an enterprise fund obviously the enterprise fund is for ems so that stabilization account should be spent specifically for you know ems related activity so that's why i just asked for you know whether or not we think it can pass the litmus test because if not if it's if we think it's a 50 50 then i think 50 should come out

of the city stabilization account versus the enterprise fund um or whatever percentage that is but if we're confident enough that it's you know an 80 20 split then um i'm fine with it as well i just wanted to kind of articulate why i was asking the question certainly uh no that was my first question when i got the request uh and in fact when i went out to headquarters to look at the

that off-road and some of the specialized vehicles they were even talking about it then um and my understanding this is predominantly a rescue vehicle okay i yield thank you thank you anything further from the council saying nothing it would be a motion to adopt or should adopt me by oh i'm sorry we already had that on the floor didn't we madam clerk motion to adopt has been made and seconded all those in favor

opposed so voted thank you attorney akin thank you madam clerk committee on ordinances and legislation at a meeting held on march 1st voted unanimously to recommend that the accompanying proposed ordinance be passed through first reading this is a miscellaneous traffic ordinance to pass the threshold second motion to pass through first reading made by councillor kilby seconded by councillor lee any

discussion all those in favor any opposed so voted committee on ordinances and legislation at a meeting held on march first voted unanimously to recommend that the accompanying proposed ordinance be passed through first reading this is a traffic fine for violation of emergency parking prohibitions due to weather conditions second motion to pass through first reading made by councillor kilby

seconded by councillor pereira any discussion all those in favor any opposed so voted committee on ordinances and legislation at a meeting held on march first voted unanimously to recommend that the accompanying proposed ordinance accompanied by an emergency preamble be passed through first reading second reading pass to be enrolled and passed to be ordained motion to pass through

all readings with an emergency preamble second motion to pass through all readings with emergency preamble made by council vice president dion seconded by councillor raposo any discussion all those in favor oh you need a roll call a roll call on the emergency preamble yes

and the emergency preamble would be a motion to adopt counselors kadeem yes kumara dion yes kilby yes lee yes pelletier yes herrera yes proposal yes and president-elect yes and the ordinance would be to pass through all readings i make that motion motion to pass through all readings made by council vice president dion seconded by councillor raposo all those in favor aye opposed so voted

we have a miscellaneous traffic for um passage through second reading and enrollment questions second motion to pass through second reading and enrollment made by consular killer seconded by counselor kadeem any discussion all those in favor any opposed so voted item number seven is a proposed ordinance relating to the director of human resources we have a proposed i guess an amendment to this

or recommendation i should say from corporation council it should have been included in your packet um if the council so chooses to use the corporation council's recommendation this would be a passage through second reading and enrollment as amended motion second as amended counselor motion to pass through second reading and enrollment as amended made by counsel kill me second about council

vice president dion any discussion seeing none all those in favor oh i'm sorry i'm sorry before i i'm just trying to see what the recommended change was

does he highlight so i asked them you have the you have both versions yeah so where it says and approve i listed the council it would say and approved by the council and the terms and conditions of such contracts shall be determined by the mayor yes that's the new part yes that's it thank you i yield thank you all those in favor aye aye opposed you guys have it item number eight would be a proposed

ordinance that relates to the deputy police for passage through second reading and enrollment motion still made second motion made to pass through second reading and remote enrollment made by council raposo seconded by council per hour any discussion all those in favor any opposed eyes have it russian soldiers are currently invading ukraine inflicting violence and terror upon millions of people whereas these

recent acts are unjust and unwarranted now therefore be resolved that the city council and the residents of fall river proudly support and stand alongside the people of the ukraine and condemn the violent and unprovoked attacked by russia second motion adopt made by councillor kilby seconded by council prayer any discussion councilmember would you like to speak on your resolution i i think it's

self-explanatory but i just think that so many people are showing their support and i think we too shall show our support i mean i just think it's a travesty uh what people are suffering with that are you thank you counselor no i just wanted to give credit to uh well not not take credit away from anyone but i believe there was a an email that came down the line a little while back from

um from citizen that asked us if we were going to do something like this so i'm good on council of prayer to follow through on it and i as i was going actually it was done before i got the email but no no i wasn't i think it was good yeah that you knew citizens wanted that yeah and i'm not and i didn't want to take anything away from you on that at all um so um

i just it made me look up some things and just to see if there was you know some statewide support as well um we have about 140 million dollars worth of uh funding it's reported that 140 million worth of funding in the uh state pension plan um tied up to um russian companies that we do not want to be in business with so i believe there are some bills and either being discussed or being or being

presented uh soon coming down the line so it's something to for people to keep an eye on um regarding the situation as well that they can support so with that i yield thank you council lee anything further from the council no yep one i'm sorry yeah just one quick comment i thank you kyle spur for for this resolution um we're all paying attention what's going on over there don't run prolong the meeting here but

literally uh when i watch the news of my wife every evening we have our routine um we're we're getting teared up in terms of what we're witnessing the men women and children calling men uh as uh up to the age of 60 to to to uh to fight so it's history repeats itself it unfortunately um and i um it's i know it's has it's affected my family in terms of the news

watching and we don't want to put it off we want to watch it we want to be you know attuned to what's happening in this world but um but um it's it's a sad to see so i hope it gets better before it gets worse thank you thank you counselor anything further no thank you all those in favor aye opposed the eyes have it be it resolved that the attached capital improvement plan is hereby approved by

the city council motion adopt second motion adopted by counselor kadeem seconded by counselor kilby any discussion all those in favor any opposed the eyes have it the police chief's report on licenses motion to adopt second motion adopted by council kadeem seconded by councillor pereira any discussion all those in favor aye any opposed the i summit auto repair shop license renewals motion

to adopt second motion adopt made by council proposals second by councillor pereira any discussion all those in favor any opposed the eyes have it a request from town taxi to accept an application for a taxi cab license motion to adopt abortion adopt made by council proposals second by councillor pereira any discussion seeing none all those in favor aye any opposed the eyes have it have a number of claims

motion referred a corporation counsel made by councillor pereira seconded by councillor raposo any discussion all those in favor aye any opposed the eyes have it with drain layer license motion to approve motion approved made by council vice president dion second signed by counselor kadeem any discussion all those in favor any opposed you guys have it i have a thank you card from the family of joseph martens motion

to accept place on file motion except in place on file made by counselor kadeem seconded by councillor lee any discussion all those in favor all right any opposed you guys have it you have minutes of the zoning board of appeals from december 16th motion accepta place on file second motion except in place on file made by council kadeem seconded by council vice president dion any discussion seeing

none all those in favor all right any opposed the eyes have it minutes of the zoning board of appeals of january 20th except in place on file second motion accept and place on file made by council kadeem seconded by council vice president dion any discussion all those in favor aye any opposed to take 19 22 together the eyes have it i'm sorry council i didn't hear you sorry motion to take 19 and 22 together

please motion to take items 19 through 22 together made by council kilby seconded by council raposo i need discussion all those in favor any opposed emotional adopt check a second or accept sorry what's next do you need to read those up to you the minutes please do we have uh minutes of the city council public hearing of february 15th committee on finance of february 15th regular city council meetings of

february 15th and february 22nd motion to prove all those in favor aye aye opposed so voted the committee on finance at a meeting held march 8 voted unanimously to recommend that the accompanying resolution be referred to the full council for action with councillor joseph kamara absent and not voting this was the resolution and communication relating to the stone therapeutic day school at westall

motion to adopt a job or should a job made by council kilby seconded by counselor kadeem any discussion all those in favor any opposed you guys have it committee on finance at a meeting held on march 8 voted unanimously to recommend that the accompanying resolution be referred to the full council for action with councillor joseph kamara absent and not voting this is the resolution and communication

relating to the robert l madeira's brazilian laboratory academy oh should adopt made by council pereira second segment by council proposal any discussion seeing none all those in favor all right any opposed the eyes have it i'm gonna take a brief recess to sign ordinances that's it

so

which is

do

city council's back in session clerk we have for passage through final ordination miscellaneous traffic ordinance second motion made by cousins proposals seconded by councillor ferrara any discussion what was in favor all right is it opposed you guys have it we have four passage through final ordination as amended the director of human resources ordinance motion so made motion made to

pass as a second made by council raposo seconded by council vice president dion any discussion all those in favor any opposed the eyes have it and lastly the proposed ordinance relating to the deputy police chief for final ordination motion so made motion made by council raposa second second by councillor pelletier any discussion all those in favor all right any opposed the eyes have it motion to adjourn

motion and journey made by council raposo seconded by councillor kilby all those in favor

you