6.5.2024 Fall River City Council

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hereby here Herrera here P here Roso here Samson here president here pursu to the open meeting law any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting or may transmit this meeting to any medium attendees are therefore advised such recordings are or Transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those present and not deemed acknowledged and permissible item number one Madam cler I

don't believe anyone signed up for C time no one signed up for Citizens input time so we move on to item number two continue discussion with the pro proposed fiscal year 2025 Municipal budget first we have City operations the director come down please for City operations when you come down just please state your name and what department you in and your Riz

please good evening Al Ola City operations Seth Aken City administrator thank you Council C4 Council kby yes the only question I have something that jumped out at me is the uh the stiens so actually uh page 141 page 138 um 138 that's the right page yeah so the stiens went up 335 and the snow stien went up 37% it is on one on page 141 sorry I I the the summary of the stiens as

councelor Kilby uh identified shows the percentage increase and then the specific stiens are on page 141 uh I'm actually really glad you brought that up because I wanted to clarify uh a couple things on specifically page 141 if everyone could uh could turn to that um so there is an indication uh of a head administrative clerk um as well as a head custodian both receiving an on call stipend with regard to the head

custodian that on call stipend is listed correctly that is exactly what um that position receives for um the on call nature of that position with regard to the on call stien for the head administrative clerk uh that's mischaracterized so that amount is correct and the total amount for the clerk is correct but uh it's really not an all and call stien as much as it is uh more a service at a rank that person

um was originally in facilities at the time of the reorganization so we're now going back to the end of uh gosh 22 at the time the reorganization took place there was a person who was doing uh several propositions within facilities as well as purchasing um as part of the reorganization the the facilities was taken away from that employee um and moved to its own thing that person was

asked just to do purchasing at which point uh the employee did not want to have any further involvement at all with any facilities including any sort of transition or or Handover or anything understandably um and so uh that clerk at that point essentially took over all of the not only just administrative but also uh the purchasing um dealing with with vendors a whole host of other

responsibilities that were more like a project manager um than a head administrative clerk at that point um there was a stien given for that the job has since significantly evolved and she continued to uh play a significant part in all sort of sorts of building and remodeling projects on City buildings um and essentially continued a lot of what she started going back so that on call

stien is not on call that on call stien is uh really a service at of rank um and there's a service at a rank letter uh that is on file with the mayor uh each time a service at a rank has been granted it's been signed by the mayor with the knowledge of Human Resources so it's all very much above board it's just um Miss indicated in here the total salary is correct the fact that it's

called and on call stien is not correct so I just wanted to call your attention you understand where that jumps out at me of course oh it's it's it's a huge number and it looks bizarre right um so thank you for bringing it up so um the it's okay the next question I had on this is uh I was understand stiens have to well you said it's stiens have to come before us for

approval um it was correct me if I'm wrong anyone yeah that's correct so um that's why if you look through most of the book there's actually very few stiens even listed and the ones that are listed are either subject to a collective bargaining agreement which would have come before the council so uh snow stien I mean that's clearly within either the teamsters or the appsme contract um and really anything else you

would see is either historically goes back far enough to have gone before you uh the head uh custodian stipend uh has gone before this Council um and I think if there's any others that that you take note of let me know and I and we can identify where those have come from but yeah there are no stiens being awarded willy-nilly without the the knowledge of the council uh and where there are

situations where somebody uh is doing an additional duty depending on that person's classification in a union or non-union contract or otherwise um there's a number of different things we can do without getting out of control with sitiens because I think as we know several years ago they were all over the place and we've tried to really re that in significantly yeah that's why the OD

was passed so the ordinance is being followed the ordinance is being followed okay okay I Y thank you thank you C SE seven C proposal thank you good afternoon gentlemen um so first to Mr Akens I know you and I spoke earlier regarding page 141 I don't know if you want to clarify that before I yes talk about it thank you another much appreciated um uh request Council reposo

the um if you look at the bottom of 141 one uh I'm sorry the bottom of the main section where it has the FTE and the names you're going to see five FTE that are listed as zeros um they are not they are not zeros they should be ones um I first thought maybe this was a mistake um and that you know wondered why it wouldn't have been caught so then I went

back several years into different budgets and for whatever reason I still don't have the answer on this and I'll get it to you as soon as I do um these five positions two electricians one plumber two Carpenters were indicated as zeros on ftes positions were funded uh and each year they were carried forward as zeros uh it doesn't make any sense because if you actually um add up the annual salaries the annual salaries

include those salaries for those five positions um but the FTE are incorrect so there should be 16 FTE there uh plus a half for the security guard PM that is um a new uh part-time 0.5 FD position position um and uh the the fact that those have been carried forward at least for 2 to 3 years prior as zeros still doesn't make any sense to me it's a mystery I'm looking into but uh it's how

that happened so those are ones those positions are funded those positions are positions we're trying to hire for um because frankly being able to do that work in house saves money um we spend a lot of money historically uh going to subcontractors for electrical and plumbing work um and uh and carpet Tre and to be able to do that work in house uh makes much more sense uh especially

if we're investing in people and helping the train people uh and allowing them to to do work here the work that our guys already do here and girls is outstanding uh and we uh you know should be looking to hire more of that thank you thank you Council of course so with that said to page 19 of the FTE count um it it lists facilities in the Armory as 15 which I think by my calculations

wouldn't be correct at this point that's correct so the count should be um 16.5 with the two print shop employees as well U so would that bring it to 185 let me verify because the print Shop's now under facilities correct that's correct okay so our initial security guard um should be at 0 five yes um so the so this Mr AG R should be a 0.5 instead of a one correct okay so that would bring

us to 16 plus the two print shop be 18 um so the two print shop are listed here each as ones with uh so there's FTE of two on page 141 in the second section um so we have 11 which actually should be 16 uh then we have two um and then um that that last that last row is not in the city budget correct um so that's that's a a non-issue so the total number

should be 18 18 okay I was just trying to show my work you know I always got in trouble in school for not showing my work so that's okay the teacher agrees that's fine um so essentially then that should be an increase of two from FY 24 yes sir okay just for the clarification of everybody sitting here all right but the appropriation is correct the appropriation is correct which is a little more important in that sense

of the word all right so with that said let me ask regarding when we did speak about the vacant electrician plumber one in Carpenters the idea is that you look to fill them instead of subcontracting because it'd be cheaper essentially in the long run than to subcontract everything is that correct correct okay so the part-time the second security guard that's there what is your intention with that because you know I

know I've met Mr agar many of times coming into the building um do we currently we do do not currently have a nighttime security guard as I'm assuming correct he can only work uh part-time okay so what are your plans I guess do we need a security guard for the night time in City Hall well I mean at at some point we we were initially thinking of uh having that person be more like a

monitor and and viewing what's going on and walking the walking the area and walking around the building and um so that was the thought do you have night time you have nighttime janitors in the building correctly we do we do have a cleaning service and then we do have one person that works for us okay so what is so I guess what is your intention with that now are you looking to fill that or

what are the plans immediately so wouldn't be a night time it would be an afternoon so it says p.m. that's I'm assuming um so Mr agar works until noon um so his his he you know opens the building up uh this would be somebody that would continue to do what he does which is kind of monitor the first four see who's coming in see who's leaving making sure that nothing untour is

happening in the first four bathroom because there is uh activity that goes on from you know there from time to time um and then the handoff at 4 is well either the building is going to be locked um but then there's our our custodial staff monitors okay cool down to the print shop you have the two uh individuals listed there the first one is a job class description what is the second is it the

same um that should be that should be Male carrier uh distribution okay within that's within the building correct okay all right so then my last question at this moment is to you Mr Olivera how long have you been with the city now a little over a year okay so back when back probably a year ago when we talked the first time one of the big things we talked about was efficiencies what have what have you

feel you've accomplished thus far to this point regarding regarding efficiencies within your department if you want to highlight I do I I I do have a list of all the accomplishments that we've made within the last year I I can present that um after this meeting uh I was going to bring it but we we have we had made a lot of accomplishments we try to bring all the uh departments together um and try to

work on uh working on the uh disposal component with the uh the team uh we've tried to do all the upgrades in this building we've made several upgrades uh we are bringing the all our services preed maintenance and bringing that up to up to Snuff uh there's been a lot of things that have been left behind from last time I was here 10 years ago and now I'm picking those things right back

up again uh Prov maintenance is a key component to all our work and uh that's really what we've been doing but I do have a list of some of the accomplishments that we we put together yeah and and the reason for my question is because as I was going through you know the different sub departments that essent entially you're overseeing I do see some crossover of some like two individuals I noticed that are half in

one and half in the other which makes sense to me but I'm more looking to and again you'll present this I guess at a later time is through your actions and through the reorg that we discussed when we went through that process what have we done to increase efficiencies but also like you said that preventative maintenance piece where we're kind of being proactive instead of reactive when

things are breaking down so so I am interested in that and you can present it another time but as we go along some of the themes of my questions will will revolve around how have you made this more efficient how we made this department more efficient how have we essentially done more with less in some ways and especially in some departments that we know and we've talked about many

of times that are uh short staffed you know how how are people coming from one side to another assisting to things that need to be prioritized so that'll kind of be the theme of some of my questions later on so I'd be very excited to make a presentation of what we've accomplished to this point and um at a later dat absolutely are you prepared to do that I am excellent so to you Mr

President if that's possible we could look at a future agenda um we could if you'd like to you could put in the Committee on Public Works and transportation that be great yes put committee we do Finance okay I'll file that resolution that'll be fabulous all right I yield for the moment thank you thank you councelor counc C5 coun pero couple of questions that I have um one of them is the electricity on 139 the

electricity stayed the same at 250,000 how is your electricity staying the same when everybody else in Fall Rivers has gone up I don't know how you can stay the same what page was that two uh 139 very top first item so again so we look at the historical data of what we're paying and what we're currently paying right now and that it's we're we're right in the ballpark at this point so our

electricity didn't go up we we're not seeing that at in the facilities end what we're covering in the facilities then okay is it that we have some buildings that don't have electricity or well again so there's a lot of efficiencies that we're trying to to look into so every chance we get at least in this building and in other buildings we're we're switching off uh lights in at certain points we're making

sure that when we do change overs we're changing over from fluorescent to uh LEDs uh we have sensors uh occupancy sensors and it's all it's all combined with the savings that we have and we just finished a amesco project that allowed us to have those savings at this point well we have lights like these these Square lights there's got to be I don't know hundreds in the Armory are we

using those are we going to be using those somewhere in the city so those lights were a fluoresence that we're giving to the city uh as a donation and the reason why they were donated to the city was because they everyone was phasing those out and those are all phased out at this point so we're not going to use them we can't we can't really do we sell them do we dispose of

them so we just let him sit let's give them back no in the past we've we we've made sure that we asked folks back but it's too late no one's going to take those back so we're going to have to pay to dispose them so the cost us money it's metal and there are no fluorescent B in it so that's probably a recyclable item we're hoping and we'll I'll take a

look at that can we get those recycled uh there's a lot of things in there that I think could be recycled um another thing the amesco project went up a little of 3% that's per our contract when I look at the um cleaning services we have some janitors here some custodians but we also have a private is it worth getting the private how many people do we have on private is it just

those two ladies that I see we I did an analysis on the uh the cleaning services um and we we went out to bid again on that and we had a slight increase um like everything else but we except electricity except the electricity and then we reduced a a a person by uh relocating certain work areas and we had so we're we're okay in in that part but we did add someone last year to work

working for us uh as an employee so we're no one we've had no complaints to this point um after we made a quick a few adjustments well I'm just wondering if it's less expensive to have a private because they tend to go up at a different pace than the city would or if it's better to hire others so that's now how many do we have on our side here there's three we have three uh two

during the day and one at night so the other the other part of that is the efficiencies the folks at night all they really do is clean uh the custodians that we have not only do they clean they move they move furniture they they uh do a little bit of Light maintenance they so there's a difference to what we have versus our uh vendors and they all they really do is just

clean okay now when we talk about electricians and plumbers and I know uh Mr Akin said you know we're putting the salary in there let me just be honest with you you're not going to get an electrician for $58,000 it's not going to happen so do you have a list of all of the money you've spent this year that you've had to hire out electricians and plumbers and on some of those if it's a

big job do you have to do bids on them um What's the total amount we've spent for electricians and plumbers versus raising these salaries and saving us money even with the you know benefits package so we do everything that we do as a vendor we have to uh put out to bid um and we do that annually we'll uh we'll assess what the costs are going to be um luckily we have a a good

electrician really good that we use as a sub um but I can get you all the numbers if you'd like I would just think that there should be an analysis done on that absolutely and see what we can do because I mean anybody that calls an electrician a carpenter you can't even get a carpenter we've had numerous discussions in house to make sure that we we can look at that um

and I can respect that you've had discussions but I've sat in this chair and we've had many discussions but then there's never a resolution people talk talk talk talk but never get the job done I would really like to look into that specifically to see if that's going to save us money and if we have to raise those salaries if you're spending the money anyway you know then we have our own

people to do things and there was something else in here about um I thought I had made a mark on that um rental space garage rentals and leases uh where are we renting now I thought that the the one off of uh Rodman Street we don't rent anymore we're we're renting the Rodman it's off Rodman Street it's almost parallel to where DCM that's almost done right that ends in July yes all right so we're in

June we're in June so it ends in July these are the things that really bother me in the city when they don't think outside of the box and people don't think because the water department just knocked down a beautiful building it was old it was Antiquated for their needs they built a new building and they knocked down a building that we could certainly have used for storage instead we're going to go pay for storage I I

don't understand we're looking into that we're trying to figure out the they look into everything well that it can happen overnight counselor that that we found out several a few months ago um that the lease was they they were going to terminate the lease and we have some plans right now and some uh assessments of what we're going to be doing so uh we do have to house some of the equipment that we that we

have but we're work especially when the council votes and we spend money on getting equipment whether it's DCM the park Department the cemetery Department whatever the cemeteries had um a a footing on bulock street for what 10 years and they still don't have something built there if we're paying money for this equipment we need to make sure that it's properly stored and to be renting isn't something that we should

be doing but when we have opportunities to have city-owned property that we can use for storage and we just pay to demolish it so if I could I mean at this point rental in in my mind should be shortterm right until we can work and finalize well there's another garage up on the top of be street so before somebody knocks it down without even telling the mayor uh you know maybe Seth

if you could Mr Aken just put a stop to that um other than that I mean that's about it I would really look at I mean just one painter for the whole city too so I'll be honest with you the painter uh is he's good he's excellent it it's a maintenance component so all our all our maintenance folks can paint and so that's why it sounds like there's

a one painter but um but do they or are they going to say that's out of ring they won because it's in their description that they can do this this and this plus paint they they're doing a really good job upstairs um remodeling that office uh it's coming out very very nice we have great great employees they're Harding and the new bathroom on the fourth floor was pretty amazing absolutely yeah I was I was designing

that 10 years ago and we finally got that uh taken care of in the SS's office showcase if you go throughout the building some of the work that these guys have done just in the last six months is remarkable you got the there's new BCTC offices that we were reimbursed for from BCTC there's the um the new EMS offices and then the new new EMS offices the EMS offices they're very nice

they're well done um but even outside you know with power washing the building and you know that's preventative maintenance and I'm glad that they're doing that I know they're going to be doing around the apron of the of city hall because you're not going to have black top um outside there's all markings there someone someone cut into that because that was more of an emergency and they just that's a quick

patch uh the one thing that is vital to our operation Mo moving forward is the waterproofing of the decking right up on top that was done over 12 years ago and now we need to do a little bit of maintenance on that that's over the uh overpass correct over the building yes well years ago we were putting salt around City Hall I think po conis was here do you

remember Bob Bob con is but I I was part of the new renovation of this and then we we stopped putting salt when I left they started putting salt again now we have some deterioration really when you left they started putting salt again they put down I told him he couldn't put salt he said no we can then we got a letter from the state saying we couldn't put salt put salt so then they stopped

and then when you left they started putting salt again they started putting salt but that rots everything out yes it does and now we're paying out we're paying for it right now I can't believe you got a letter from the go State you can't do this and they still do it well thank you Mr ala with that I yield thank you Mr President counc to counc D good evening good evening I honestly don't even know where

to start um so I want to continue with the rental so you were notified months ago that facilities was going to have to come out of that rental space correct they building they building condos we're 25 days away from July 1st and you don't have a concrete plan and know where you're going we're waiting we're waiting on some some quotes right now and we are planning to uh move on to that very

shortly um I want to go back to page 141 the security guard PM last year when the city council voted yes to allow to have a nighttime um custodian the purpose was for him to oversee for him to have the keys to the building so that you felt you had somebody in your employee who could take care of what needed to be taken care of tonight you sit here and say you need a part-time

security guard to do what this custodian is already doing that's what it's sounding like absolutely not let me just let me just clarify that our first shift security guard works from 8 to 12 the thought is is to have someone from 12 to 4 when I said when that says PM it means second ship that person will not will not be doing any anything that the custodia will be doing that's the

security for around the building and for our staff and and and employees so my other question on that it was not in the FY 24 budget Mr Akin just said that it's a new position did it go through ordinance I don't remember it coming up for a vote to have to add a position so this is um so if you Mr AGI who has been the security guard for a while was put

in place during covid and I believe at that time was paid for with onetime money U it was either FEMA money or or state money um and then at some point when that money ran out um there was a decision to continue his position which at some point once we um talked to him and found out that you know one um having retired he can only work certain am certain

number of hours a week the FTE that would have represented that position was split into two so that's the history of the position that's the history but honestly I think people just accepted the fact that he was here because I don't ever remember his position coming before ordinance or the council once the OPA funding ran out so I can tell you that I don't think he came before the council

after the arpa funing arpa funding ran out but as a employee he was here before I was I don't know if he ever came before the council prior to that not to my knowledge okay so that might be two problems right there um secondly you said just for confirmation the second person under print services is really the mail clerk because it doesn't State the position so I I just want it to be clear

right so okay so they're not both under the print services um can you get us I mean I'm I'm sure we could find it on our own but you should have easy access to it job descriptions of the people that are under you so if I could just interject um last year we had three people in in in that in that department we reduced a a one person she retired oh I'm sorry I'm

sorry I'm not I'm not talking in regard to speaking in regard to that I know we had a mail room person last year I know we had a telephone operator the telephone operator position no longer exists I'm talking I'm going back to the painting oh absolutely and maintenance people Etc I I would like to see in print what the actual job descriptions are are you friend of the people in page

141 y yep okay we're still there now the interesting thing is in FY 24 the same five positions that are vacant this year were vacant last year not one single person was ever hired to fill any of those positions so we did hire an electrician um and through his uh 30-day uh notice we um he didn't work out uh so right now the positions are still open right uh we could as as

Council mentioned it's not easy to find a plumber or electrician and we just and we just did hire um the two Carpenters from uh from inhouse so on page 13 clarification the council mentioned it's not easy to find these people at this price that's a point she was trying to make $544,000 absolutely yeah just want to make that clear absolutely so on page 139 other Professional Services

$200,000 I'm going to assume so I will ask you to see if I'm correct or not correct that is the dollar amount in your budget to Outsource for the electricians Carpenters or whoever else that we don't that we don't have that we need no that that that's that's more for Design Services or for that's we I also take care of the capital projects in the city so if there's any Design Services

if there's any additional services for uh asbest if there's any Professional Services that we need to look into we're using that those funds for that right now we have if you look

now wouldn't some of those things go out be under an RFP sure but that's just the budget that so um you know if you're doing Design Services to either design you know something um you know a new system uh in one of our buildings or you know something that that we can't do in house right um that budget is what's going to be used regardless of of whether it goes

out under an RFP you know given the the cost threshold um so if something comes back and the bids come come back that's one of the budgets that they might be drawn from if a bid is awarded yeah so then let me ask you let's for the sake of argument let's say you have another department they don't have that budgeted they need an RFP they need some type of design done where does that funding come

from so Council when I first started we we put out an RFQ which is a request for qualifications I drafted it we put it out now we have Architects on call uh we don't have to do that again for the next 3 years I also did that uh in RFQ for OPM Services Under 1.5 million for any type type of capital projects you need an OPM so we we we received three

vendors we have those on call and we're using those right now so those that's really what we're using that for the RFQ is a request for qualifications they people uh put their requests in we go through the designer selection board the designer selection board picks those folks and we can use the whole city can use that whether it's schools uh any any any Department in the city can utilize

that on the same page buildings and grounds repair and maintenance you have three line items that total $335,000 the first question would be why there's three line items um and secondly when I look again at other departments under you I don't see anything close to those kind of numbers so what differentiates so we oversee all all the buildings in the city uh whether it's the police the library the yry city hall

uh council chambers so we have all the repairs for electrical we have the plumbing in there we have uh any type of pest control any type of uh where where the central the central point for all those type of services the other thing too is I I design all the the projects if there is any projects and for example if I go out for pest control I have to

bid that out so we do all that in central operations at this point so we are we we are the umbrella for all the other departments in in uh Parks cemeteries and DCM so if there's a procurement that's going to happen we're going to we're going to be the ones that that follow through that so I don't think another department would have a budget for that because it's not their responsibility it falls

no but they but they do have they certainly and we'll getting into that later they certainly do have repair and maintenance issues that they should have a reasonable budget for absolutely but if it becomes a facilities issue that becomes ours MH yeah um I want to go back again to that $113,000 on call stien that's not an unall stien yep um can we get that defined in in document form because the the it was

kind of H kind of interesting and difficult to follow the the conversation I mean it was purchasing it was on call it was I can't remember all the components to how how you explained it sure um can I can I just interject here we we with with that stien that person is also taking care of capital projects that folks just are not understanding at this point the capital project so right now

if we do a project say for a school department that school that though the documentation comes in we actually make those payments she's the one that processes that so there's the msba mass School building authority that that she has to cover I you don't have somebody on the on the school side that does the msba City buildings so they do they do the application but we have to take care of

some of the project the the purchasing the opms get paid The Architects get paid and the contractors get paid so we take care of that that's that's historically how it's always been that used to be one of my projects uh before when I was here so that's that's how the city operates we she is really the person that I give the information to and she and she processes that so outside of the school

department what capital um items projects have there been because since we've had Opera funding all of our capital projects were removed from our

budget so right now we're working off of so we have the Leon Street that we're working on right now uh and she's paying the architect she's paying the opms off when we received that u in any type of Grants she's working off the grants i i i generate all the documentation um I review it and then I Pro she does the processing for it we have the central fire station that we're working off a modernization

project we have the central fire station facade that we're currently this was a project that I took on um uh prior to me uh I I took this on it was already in process uh the fire Museum that we're working off of um that's a CPC project uh there's some pointing issues at the library that we still have funds that we need to work on uh we're working off the Nagel Auditorium roof right now that uh

is U is a necessity we're working on phase two which is the sprinkler system we have the uh Fiola ear Mark that we're working off and then we're trying to Modern modernize Pearl Street in Third Street so we have some projects in CU um and those are all things that um a necessity for the city so with all due respect I have to ask you on your $115,000

increase so I address i i i i as an individual and I've spoken to many many people and anybody that I say we have an employee in the city that got a $1 15,000 raise and they all but pass out well first of all that's with all due respect kind of an irresponsible narrative to put out there because it's not true and I said it yesterday it's just not true these are placeholders

based upon conversations that were yet to have happen um and there is no one getting a $155,000 increase in the city okay can I just ask you one question because yesterday you mentioned you have cpis you have colas I forgot the third category um when you look at this position where is it um annual salary 155 total salary 155 so if your annual salary which is your bottom salary is

155 then in my world your salary is 155 it's not 40 with the total salary is one of 155 waiting for adjustments so almost every salary in here anticipates save for the police and the fire so so all right let's just go through the unions right Teamster police and fire those cbas are done we know what a salary is going to be for FY 25 no questions asked all right um with

regard to any askme employee or any non- askme employee whose salary is tied to askme so we have contract employees whose salary traditionally every year goes up whatever the cola for asme is going to be that collective bargaining agreement expires at the end of June we've been negotiating for several months uh I believe we as of probably tomorrow we'll have an agreement in principle they'll take some time to

ratify it but at the end of the day we we will have a sense of what that is all of those when the budget was submitted in February required kind of a guess right a sense of traditionally what do we think that that Co is going to be and what do we think the increase is going to be based upon that tra that historic um information and then you have people

with CPI there might be 10 people in the city that actually have contracts with CPI um maybe more I'm just I'm I'm estimating at this point I I went through the budget I think I saw six but that's okay so I'm I'm it's just semantic it's yeah it's it's it's six to 10 people um and that is going to come out in January right so we're we're you know putting together a uh a budget for

July not knowing what the January num is going to be guessing at it um you know a month ago everyone thought it would be about 2.5 I heard today it could be closer to three by the time we get to January it's probably going to be back down to two point something again um and then you also have the people that don't have CPI and this is Mr Olivera over

here he doesn't have CPI he's not tied to ask me he doesn't have anything in his contract other than a starting salary and a term so he's he's in here for a couple years he started at 140 that was before the council was ratified um and the idea was that he's been here for about 18 months got no increase in that first year possibly the mayor would say you know what you should have gotten

something in January we'll do something retro maybe not who knows that's between him and the mayor um and then this budget is going to bridge over the next January so you're actually looking at two possible raises there's probably a couple people in in the city that have that situation where they haven't gotten anything they may get something or the mayor just say might say you know what

you're fine you're going to stand Pat and uh you know uh whatever the cola is for asme is what we'll give you uh but that hasn't been determined yet so somebody put in $15,000 um over the 140 that he was hired at uh it is not a real number it's simply a placeholder and I would say those placeholders exist throughout this budget um because as Bridget has said

over and over by the time we get to the second or third night of talking about this budget the numbers are already moving right it's a very Dynamic landscape that we're looking at I'm not saying it's wrong but what I'm saying is is you know this is a really Dynamic landscape um that is the case especially where some of these raises colas cpis just aren't determined yet so there is nobody getting a $115,000 raise yeah

because that would be over 10% it would be totally irresponsive over 10% is pretty significant yeah crazy that's a good word we can agree on that word um I have a question also last year when you came before us the first time um you had said you were going to have a riog within the riog did that ever happen and and and what were the changes that were made it

has not happened yet oh has has not happened yet okay um is it going to happen I'm

hoping let me see I might be at the end of my questions temporarily um water and sewer charge it's only 35,000 um water SE CSO charge on page 140 for it is that one building how how are the water how is your water and sewer charge assessed I mean we know in the Parx Department it's a quarter of a million dollars which I've never understood your your department is 35,000 um there's others that are 5,000

they're all over the place well we we communicate with the water department and that's those are the numbers that we get we we have not the last year we did not exceed that so uh we feel comfortable with that okay so but you did have discussions with Mr furland this year in regards to to setting that number because I know last year when I asked the question um I was told well

our department heads were told to do that I asked did they do it the answer was well I assume they did it so I'm asking again this year did we we we haven't expected any type of increase and what historically that's what we've been paying for and that's what we put down okay for now thank you I'll yield yeah thank you Mr President so I want to I want to go back to what you

were saying because I'm I'm a little concerned uh Mr aen so did you say I I get the ask me contracts I get the individuals that are union bargained and all the other things right but did you say that there are some uh department heads or individuals that are contracted employees that might be getting paid X but in this budget that is being presented their their line item isn't showing their exact salary it's showing

something that might be anticipated that the mayor wants to give by the council's consent the latitude to offer a department head whatever within that amount so if you have an employee that's making this is just an example sorry you're here $140,000 but in the budget it says 155 so that g gives the mayor the ability within the salary line in the administration to transfer between salaries or give a raise if he he so

pleases so there's a couple questions within your question yeah um to understand this I do understand I'm I'm trying to understand I know you I'm trying to all right sorry I will try to help thank you um so the the last I'll start I'll go in reverse the last question is does it at least in theory give the mayor the leeway to to work with in what that increase is and I

would say sure um I think anyone who knows this mayor knows that the uh whatever increases are given are going to be modest conservative sure um you know that is an ongoing conversation and most of the folks in the gallery uh have had the conversation and he's he's quite Frugal I get that quite Frugal I'm not trying to to go down that road I know I know I just I just for for uh editorial

purposes I wanted to make sure I I acknowledge that in in this particular situation uh and there's there's Maybe a few of these of these folks in the city where um you know based upon a lot of unknowns when the contract when their contract was signed they may have a threee fouryear or three-year contract at at the most um and that three-year contract is going to set a starting salary and then to be determined in

subsequent years um there is no specific uh raise indicated in the contract um and that could be for any number of reasons and um I would say that that whatever is budgeted is not in any way based upon any promise made to that employee is not in any way made uh based upon any expectation that employee has of any specific raise it's the idea that they could receive a raise based

upon the fact that they're in a subsequent year of the contract and that that conversation is going to be had with the mayor but why wouldn't that come when their contract's up for Renewal so um their was a effort at some point to normalize all the contracts um and those six people that um councelor Dion identified with CPI that was the the push for a while so it was either Public Safety

where they have specific salaries each year over three years or in U in Government Center folks with cpis each year out of out of the control of the mayor or anybody else whatever the federal government sets the CPI is what it was um but there was a couple that for various reasons and I don't know necessarily what those reasons were CU I I wasn't necessarily part of all that negotiation they were given a starting

salary and there was no subsequent years uh uh negotiated when that's when that contract was set um I can't speak to what the reasons were I I think I would I would guess and this is purely speculation uh based upon what I know about how City Hall Works um is that the position position was either a new position uh and there was some question as to you know what is this really going

to look like how is this person going to um you know like what they're doing and how is the city going to like what they're doing and is this is this going to be a good fit um or um you know this may be a much bigger job than what we're expecting and we may need to go to the council and say you know what there's more money needed for this position I

think it's more the uncertainty of certain positions that probably led to that but that's again speculation all right there's a very few of those well well if there is just one to me that's a little concerning because so so I I come from a an understanding doing this for the short time in my life that I've done this is that the budget the school department has the ability sometimes get

carried away with and I've been critical of this in the past of how they determine present their budgets they'll say a teacher is getting paid $65,000 a year but that teacher could be getting paid 85 or that teacher can get paid 45 I don't agree with that process C and I don't agree with the the presentation of that process because candidly we should know as the council who approves the

appropriation with this budget what the actual salaries are now I want to make one thing clear I'm not saying that the administration or the mayor or the department heads are going to be getting a Fluff of money because the council approves it we're not in those times those times aren't here but what I struggle with understanding is if there are individual department heads who are tailored at a price why can't we put

their price in there and if there's a CPI adjustment just like what we talked about in the general government line item in the budget why wouldn't we just put the actual total that that individual is getting if their contracts up for renewal in the middle of the year then we can note that in the budget with the actual amount everything you're saying makes total sense um I think in the situation we're

talking about here this is an anomaly where for whatever reason there was not a I'm going to use the term again a some certain identified in each of the subsequent years after the first year I don't know why it's uh it's probably not a best practice which is why it's generally not done um and every time we renew a contract um my urge uh to the mayor as well as uh Corporation Council

ramsy um the chief of staff and uh C Alman is to put CPI in uh to me CPI is the best way to avoid any appearance of any sort of favoritism any sort of anything it's a it's a number that's set by the government and it's tied directly to inflation okay so um two things uh and I want to get into this because this is bothering me now I I I'm going to

want to know what department heads are in a in the budget with an inflated salary in the presentation that is here so if an individual is getting paid 140 but their budget line says 155 I'd like to know what that dollar amount is and who these employees are because that's fluff in a budget if you ask me that's giving the ability for the administration to do what they want within the salaries and not essentially

pay the employee what they're documented they're paying them for example if I am a department head and I see a municipal budget that is passed by the council and it says I am getting paid $140,000 under my name and I'm getting paid a buck and a quarter I'm going up to the mayor's office and in your office and say Where's my where's my 140 because you presented to the city council that this individual is getting

paid $140,000 sure okay can I um clarify what you're asking me for I sure okay can you go to page 92 92 92

sure okay all right so that's me all right so in that one it clearly shows an annual salary and then an estimated CPI there's a very low chance that that CPI is in fact going to be that high right are you looking for clarification on even those because that shows an annual salary of 1497 that there's no way I would expect to get one because the CPI won't be that

high and two what I make right now is the actual annual salary on the leftand side okay do you want me to clarify those ones because I I think those show the the two distinct pieces your CPI percentage is how much in this budget for every individual um does each is does each contracted employee have a different CPI in their contract no they CP whatever the CPI so what is the percentage of CPA

that you would you uh calculated for in your specific they use 3.5 everybody 3.5% okay so see that makes a lot more sense to me that you can budget a CPI of 3.5 if it is because if it's two well there's going to be some adjustments there's going to be some free cash funding through at the end of the year however in this specific example this example has a salary that's your

take-home yep right it's not showing $15,000 higher than that it's showing what it is this is the right way to do it okay in my opinion so so I'm you're helping me understand what you're asking for because I want to make sure I deliver now page 122 if you don't mind because here's an

alternative okay all right so the reason I picked this particular group is none of them are union employees all right right so within those numbers of annual salary those are not the current annual salaries of some of those folks and what it reflects is an annual salary plus a sort of a guesstimate at what an increase might be once the asme raise goes through these some of these folks are

actually tied to that but it doesn't specifically say it because it's kind of this historical thing I mean to interrupt you m taken I don't care about the asme contracts or anything like that that is something that we have no control of you essentially do we do by sign you know authorizing contracts but if if you if you're giving yourself wiggle room on asme or fire or police we

can talk about that when that department comes what I'm trying to figure out is if you have specific department heads that are getting shown that they're getting paid X yep I want to know and I think the budget should be fairly documented on what they're getting paid in the year now if a contract comes up with a specific individual at the end of the fiscal year or in the middle of the

year if you go you know month-to month or however you do your contracts with these individuals and it needs to come up then it should be should be documented in the budget that department head a is getting a $115,000 increase Y in this fiscal year by contract okay I can do that because I mean it's concerning overall that we're looking at I'm really curious to see how many people are here in this I mean you only

have so many department heads and most people are covered under asme in specifically in this building but I I really like to see that but just to be clear I'm not raising asme because of the actual asme raise there are just some employees that are not in asme but whatever raise they get in the ear is tied to what the asme raise is it's just an historical thing under whose rule is

that it's I'm going to I'm going to say a phrase that almost makes me want to just lose my mind when I hear it but it's the way it's been done in the past right I I don't I don't necessarily know where the history comes from but but there is tradition here if I'm a department head Y and I am I am a contracted employee within the department and I'm getting paid $100,000

a year yes and then I have within my department 15 employees that are all ask me and they're getting a 10% increase are you then giving the department head a 10% increase because those 15 asme employees within their Department are are getting a 10% increase by bargain negotiations if it's truly a contract department head no if it's a con if it's a department head that is tied into to ask me cool how would you have a

department head tied to ask me contract I don't understand that and that's it's been done counseling that's what they have been doing on not all occasions but on some occasions on most occasions so a good example is the building inspector all right so the building inspector is not per se a contract employee like he does not have a contract the same way that I have a contract like with a

certain term that expires and it has to be renewed so he is appointed by the mayor his salary is agreed upon right and then the raises that happen in that salary are largely tied to the apme raises but but his his salary is attached through ordinance so if you have that specific example you got to the a an individual like the building inspector who might be getting paid you know $650,000 a year or

something let's just call it that well worth that I'm just saying that's what it says an ordinance not not all those positions identify an ordinance that they that they're paid at this at a certain but there's a level of protection is what I'm trying to say here I see what you're saying by by from the council's point of view and from a checks and balances standpoint that you have an individual

who's getting paid X it's either by contract which states in in ordinance that that is a contract contracted employee y that gets approved by the mayor and then the council and then funded by the council and then you have that specific individual who is by ordinance and whether they have a step process or not it's still there so I think over time it it is not as clean as that and that's maybe one of the issues

that feels so confounding uh and I'm not trying to make it difficult no I I'm not trying to make it difficult either I'm just trying to get we'll get past this and I think you should provide us a list of who these people are for our next meeting so that we can look at that if you can get it to me prior to through email and share with my colleagues

that'd be very helpful can I just make a point to your point Seth there was a time when people were getting those raises and they were going beyond what the audience was allowing them and we had to have the ordinance committee come back and readjust the numbers of what their cap was because they were not in compliance with city ordinances and all of those salaries had to be fixed it probably should not have been

done without doing the ordinance changes first but that's the Catch 22 is what do you do first do you give them the automatic percentages that the union gets to the department head or do you set it before the ordinance first make those adjustments so that he'll be in compliance with city ordinances and the salary won't exceed what it says he should be making by city ordinance we

had to do that a couple years ago to fix a lot of ordinances that were out of whack because they were automatically being given highest salties yeah and there was a there was a big Push by a prior Administration um and I know the council really didn't trust the administration at the time and they said well we want to take all these people and take them out of ordinance and make them contracted employees and the

council was like wait a second we're not going to do this because we want to see what the ability is in terms of what you're going to be giving these department heads so put put that for what it may I'm really intrigued by that and I'm and it's it's concerning to me and I'm also concerned to see how long it's been going on but we'll talk about that when we get the information um Mr

ala thank you and I'm sorry for my long-winded comments uh on page 138 in your budget um I want to speak to your overtime I see that you put $440,000 which is a 40 47% increase year-over-year uh and overtime within facilities now when I go to the quarterly update book that we have here I'm noticing that you exceeded your um in in the fiscal year that we're currently in now your overtime by a good

amount is that why there's an increase there there is counselor and what what's happening is that because we weren't able to uh fill some of those positions we did have some salary savings to utilize for some of the projects that we had internally uh there's been a lot of work that we've been Modi modernizing the government center and and other locations so do you all right so that

was this year that's this year and so we just we I I visually uh noticed that this would be a perfect time to increase our overtime line because of the work that we do in house okay but the work you do in house but you you still you have more employees you have this you have the you don't have any open FTE we do we we have plumbers carpenters and um electrician

electricians I know you do but I'm saying that you don't have any they're non FTE positions but they're still budgeted positions so you're going I see you're taking a drop in your in your in your salaries from 9:15 to 909 but I'm also trying to understand the the reason why we're just going to incre inrease over time just because of what happened this year when well the work the work

that we do uh we can't we can't do the work during an occupied space so a lot of the times it's after hours for on weekends so that's that's really where the the work is when you look at the prevailing wage rate versus our hourly rate that's a major savings um so the work that we're doing for that overtime I would say triple that um for prev uh prevailing wage rates but you you have a

savings and salar so you'll transfer within your own Department if necessary correct which you've done we have you expect to do that again this year we're renovating the whole building that's our hope okay all right snow stiens I'd like to know how these work because I noticed that in the fiscal year that we're in now we budgeted $113,000 in snow stiens and you spent $133,000 in snow stiens so

are these all all these employees are they all employees that are in apme in your department yes okay so how does that work if it snows you get a stien per snowstorm or is it just you get a stien if it snows ever you get a stien so if it it snows an inch if the individual gets paid $1,000 they're getting the, so there are if it doesn't snow there are some rules

that if they don't show up then there's percentages that they they get or they don't get but for the most part if there is a snow event they all show up and get their stien and that was bargained for the increase that was bargained those rules have have been unchanged for cont there's an increase here in all the snow stiens within all the Departments oh I'm sorry yes the increase is anticipated but

not done it's not a complete it's not done so are you going to if it if it for some reason it's up or down with your abme negotiations are you going to come back with a supplemental I think we might have to but I I I would not have um in good conscience asked the CFO and her team to put these numbers in if I didn't believe that we were very close

to an agreement okay and the other thing is just lastly on in this department and then I'll yield the um electricity I know my colleague to my right was questioning whether or not $250,000 is enough money for electricity you've only spent $93,000 is as of the last quarterly update which to me equates to $10,000 a month you have $250,000 of electricity and the next three months go

by at the same average that you're going at $110,000 a month that's only $124,000 for electric so you're not going to need to spend especially with dormant buildings like the bank Street omry the same amount of money within that's only one building so every every year we we pretty much even out at at 250 at least that's what my staff has told me and that's what we're that's what we're looking at historically last

year and I will I will make sure that we'll look that over uh and get that information back to you but um again so there is a cycle um when when we're catching up to the invoices so that's probably what what the issue is at at this point you can clarify that for me I would appreciate that I yeld thank you thank you councelor Samson she's next after me councelor I was GNA say I'm

sorry I thought you said she was first no she she's next after me president Camara thank you Council thank you Council Mr Aliva yes I have a question I'm over here usually when the council president going to ask questions has to relinquish the floor and come down and just ask questions I don't have a lot of questions but I got a couple of questions since we're talking about how this is all being put together and you

have five employees that were vacant last year and the same five employees are back again and are you planning on hiring them again or you looking to hire them or because it seems like you realize you're not going to be able to hire them that's what it seems like to me again so we're hope we're hoping that a reorder happens and that that uh we can upgrade the dollar amount on on those folks because we're talking

electricians we're talk talking plumbers and we're talking cooperatives right but those Folks at the rate that they're currently in every time we talk to someone we interview someone they're not making that amount of money but if if they basically said if you raise it to a certain point sure that they would be interested no I agree with that yeah no so let me ask you a question when you

put this budget together what did you how did you base it what did you what how did you put the budget together did you go by last year's numbers that's part of it and then historically what our next projects are what are we doing what type of work we're doing how are we're going to be procuring and how we're going to get any increases in the procuring and so were you instructed to

go to a zero based budgeting and stuff from the bottom up on what you need no okay because that's the problem we years ago used to do it this way for as long as I was on the counc the CC for quite some time and the budget was always well I've had $250,000 in this line item so I went 250 well might go up a little bit let me put 255 and they

would do it that way and then few years back we went to a zerob based budgeting just tell me what you need tell me how many employees you have how much you want to pay them what electricity bill is zero base I asked earlier today if we were going to put in earlier not today when we decided this they said are we using a zerobase budgeting I was told yes correct that's the intention yes

well not the intention he was never instructed to go zerob based budgeting well again you you what happens historically you have to see what what increases on I understand understand that no I get the point but starting from base zero and working your way up every department head should start at a zero base budget that's what we had done for the last three or four years or at least I wasn't here for two but prior to

that we moved to zerob based budgeting and every Department came back here with what they needed to run their Department from the zero up it works we're seeing things here now and part of this problem is counseling C6 is right you got money in there that well maybe we'll use it maybe we're not going to use it that's not zero base that's maybe we're going to use it maybe we're not going to use

it and if we don't use it hey we'll have some money left over at the end of the year but in the meantime the taxpayers have to pay the bill and then we have Surplus at the expense of the taxpayers who are struggling so I would have liked to have seen a zerob based budget from every Department Ed says this is what we need and this is what we want to pay

this individual and this is where we're at are you referring to a zero base on on expenses or your your salary what all all your fixed cost items absolutely all of what and then whatever projects you need capital projects we've been doing them with Opera funds and stuff but zero base for the entire budget correct everything your fixed costs what your expense anticipated I'm not saying zero

base you know your electric was same as last year and it's going to stay the same so you think you can have the same that's fine but if you think it's going to go up you put what you think is going to go up my point is you don't put someone's salary in at $115,000 higher expecting that let me get it passed so the money will be there if we need it

and if we don't we'll have it in free cash at the end of the budget year that's not zero base councelor I I didn't put that do that dollar amount in I'm not saying you did I was just I'm just curious as to how the process was working and how what the instructions were so that we could come to this council with a zero I was under the impression this was going to be zero

based budget throughout and that people would be instructed give me a zero based budget as it was in the last two three years when I was here prior just before I left that's what the instructions were so I would respectfully disagree that this is not a zerobase budget there are some unknowns and we've tried to anticipate the unknowns but past we've had zerob based budgeting we've had zero

based budgets with unknowns and you can departments can do that we've did it three years ago four years prior to you being there I'm sorry but when I was here the last time prior to me leaving that's what we did for like I think three years in a row we went to zero base it was tough and there was a lot of things that were cut out of budgets because they weren't

needed that's the advantage of zerob based budgeting so I agree with you this is not zerob based budgeting 100% well no no I'm I'm telling you that aside from the unknowns which is just the salaries um the specific salaries that are not settled right um everything else is this is what is needed in order to run the department without any exceptions so I mean I think reasonable people can disagree as to as to you know

how much leeway you have in in the zero right uh but there are just there are some things that were just unknown at the time that we started this in January and February but I to the council's point right we're showing we're not showing the actual true cost of what the salaries are for some department heads and some employees because you have the other dollar amount in there that's

inflated hoping to maybe possibly give it to them or possibly not give it to him depending on what the mood is I guess or what the performance is or whatever and I'm not saying you know that it's done deliberately to deceive people but it's not zero base and at the end of the year if you leave all those in place and you never use them and the doesn't goes up you're going to have a lot of

money left over that taxpayers are going to have to come up with because you got to raise that revenue and then we'll get it back into the year but it's at to the expense of a lot of people who are struggling that's that's my only Point that's why we went to zero based budgeting uh I don't know I'll find out what year it was maybe four years ago first time we started it so I just want

to touch Bas out and I I think you're doing a good job I really do and I just want to say you know um I I wish we could have just had a better grip and known that you know it's not going to be zero based budgeting as I was told earlier when I asked are we going to use a zerob based budgeting and I was told yes and I don't think this is do you

think this is I stand by what I said no so what is it that you said I'm just that I I believe this is a zerob based budget with certain unknowns all right um other than that I just want to clarify that and see what how it was put together I mean the the vacant electrician and the vacant Carpenter I mean you've had those positions there would it make sense to hire maybe one

electrician and one Carpenter instead of having none and none and bump that s up another 25,000 that is part of my reorg that's that's the conversations that we've had in house and I we're we're in conversation with that because I would put that in the budget I would say okay let's get one electrician one Carpenter you're going from 50 $8,000 let's make it 75 $78,000 you're going to guess what

at least we'll have one in one now we're starting so one of the other ideas that I had is to convert a electrician to a um PL facilities tech convert electrician to a plumet then you can do both jobs correct facilities tech will what what happens is if we have a call uh that there's no heat we have a call that is just mechanical electricals SL light mechanical light electrical that facilities tech would go

troubleshoot and then when they troubleshoot we'll have an idea what's going going on so there are plans of what we're trying to reorg we just haven't gotten to that stage yet all right be interesting I think to hear your plans when they come through and good luck with the ri out what you want to do and that's it for now I thank you councelor Samson thank you um I just

have a few questions um we'll have a comment maybe you can use well um Mr ala um when you do your budget when the dep department has maybe you can answer this Mr Atkins but um do you do them with the CFO do you bring it to her do they go over it with her yeah is it so actually I'll let Al answer that there's a process so yeah so we we look at

historical data we we review inhouse we figure out what were the future Trends we figure out if there's any increases um from there we just I we communicate with the CFO and we come up with a budget so we we we do start neutral um and then we just we we base it off well there was light this year we we uh we just to do a quick assessment and for

each line item and throughout the year we meet constantly to figure out if we're in compliance with that with that budget historical data we we we present that to the CFO and that's where we're at at this point maybe you can use some of those consulting services to go over that zerob based budgeting with your uh department heads um so Mr alera how many departments do you have under

you so we have the parks we have the cemeteries we have the trees we have DCM we have uh print shop mail service and the um security and then facilities do you know how many direct reports you have 90 direct direct reports direct reports uh we just we were light there's a vacancy at the cemetery so there's three direct reports only have Rec reports I find that to be low but um okay in your reorg

because first of all you took the job for what I would consider and I'm just one of for you know a low salary for all the Departments that that are under you um you have three direct reports in your RoR so I I understand why it went up to 155 but I also agree that it's it's it just doesn't look right the way that it was put in there you should been brought

in at that salary um and definitely have been given some type of increase last year um with your reorg that you keep talking about the reor within the reorg what is that is that roring salaries is that reor positions can we eliminate some positions are there some positions in that that we can eliminate save you know tax pay because I'm big at look if the director of operations that is a big

job and that is a big salary and you get what you pay for and I I don't want to lose people but when you reog something there's usually times where you can eliminate positions reorganize them restructure them and actually save money so is that something that's being looked at in the riog can you talk I don't even know if you can talk about it but we keep hearing a riog within the riog and

you know that's what I looking at the organizational structure there could be some really good roring done there so we have had numerous discussions there's been uh it's it's been put on hold uh on several occasions and some were regarding unionized uh issues because there was some changes that were expected and obviously that was the main objective is let's look more at more efficiencies um and find out if there's

any savings and maybe maybe we can utilize some more Staffing from one Department to another uh instead of just saying I need three or four people here let's assess we're looking at and those are some of the things that I'm trying to do I'm trying to analyze each department each division and try to figure out what we can save and how to save it yeah um you know because and I I

don't really really know but we can be topheavy sometimes and so are we topheavy can we trickle some of that salary down because I'm looking at the salaries for your boots on the ground workers and they're so lowow it it it's shocking to me so when are you anticipating doing that rear and when is that reor going to be done I was hoping it would be done last night okay but really at

the end of the day that's a joke we have been in constant communication you're working on it it's in the works 100% okay and we'll be able to see the fruition of that within what do you say two months five months it a year listen I would love to present that to everyone in deta we just haven't gotten to that stage are you getting pushed back on that or is it just you're get you're getting pushed

back from me from you yeah okay well that's why see you know like this is why I love you because you're honest so what can you talk about what the push back is it's really um so I mean I've been talking for the last year or so about all the different um kind of uncertainties that you know are probably out two years or so right so we have Diamond um there's you know

some new requirements for our sewage treatment plant from the federal government that could actually have some substantial cost um you know there's just you know there's a number of of costs that you know we're concerned about and part of that is you know looking at you know real honest to goodness immediate problems like garbage yeah um you know garbage is a massive problem um it started with the agreement

that was put in place you know several you know know years ago before this Administration there needs to be a number of things ironed out between all the different haulers that are involved in that um and we've been working on that for probably a year you know with with at least you know a once a month or several times a month meetings with different folks um probably more often

than that um I think we're close to some solutions but I asked Al to kind of hold off because um you know that's something that sits squarely within his department and if what we're looking at is something that's going to ask his Department to do something different I don't want him to embark on a reorganization of the department and then not have the resources to do what we need him to do to actually uh deal

with the garbage and I will say that his Department over the last year or so actually probably eight months has done a remarkable job inventorying every garbage and recycling bin that we have in the city they were not numbered they weren't inventoried we had no idea how many were out there there were so much more garbage being picked up so many more bins being picked up than was ever

contemplated when the contract was signed and we had no idea how many uh as many people remember under the former Administration it was sort of a free-for-all of bins especially those pink ones um and so we had to get a handle on what we didn't know which was quite a bit um and then based upon that actually start looking at okay you know how much garbage is coming from you know

different areas of the city where do we have problems where do we need to do education and recycling without knowing what the outcome of that was and I think we're finally there um I I couldn't really in good conscience allow a reorganization that might shift resources from one place to another and not do it intentionally do you anticipate within a year being able to to put in a Rog within the riog or do

you think that that's not even feasible no I I actually think we've done the work we need to do uh we're probably going to have some proposals for this Council very soon around garbage and around some of these big issues that that we've been conc heard about um you know everything from you know the big question of how to pay for Diamond to how do we pay for trash to you know all

the smaller things and there's a lot of other smaller things that come after that um I think very soon we'll be able to propose that because now we have a sense of what we need I I will say how many uh how many direct reports do you have I want to see you don't have to answer that but you overly all the Departments I just you do a great job

not an easy job and uh I appreciate the work that you do so thank you Council you're welcome I yield council president thank you thank you councel Council to um so I wasn't seeing the subject of trash came up so the problem didn't start with this contract the problem started when the Landfill closed and we didn't prepare for the closing of the landfill that's when the problem started very true

did it get exasperated absolutely but that's how far back the problem started so 2025 we have two more budgets before the contract runs out with easy disposal we're good through 26 and 27 so I certainly hope by the time we're talking about uh fiscal year 26 we've got this all ironed out we you because if we don't we're going to be in a lot of trouble again um it's kind of weird because to a

certain extent it's common sense you fig you know the lower your tonnage the more you save the less it costs so how do we save tonnage I think there's ways to do it I think there's things that should be considered businesses that aren't that would lower your tonnage but I'll leave that all up to you the cardboard pilot program is that still going what has come out of that so we're going to be speaking to

Charlie denme from DCM very shortly and he I believe he has all that those answers at this point um and I would rather have him present that if you don't mind that works for me um and I guess we can speak further on trash at that time as well uh what was the other thing I was going to say yeah you know I could be wrong there's other councilors here who

can say yes or no this is my fifth budget I don't remember anybody ever ever ever sitting in front of us and saying we have a bunch of salaries that are Place markers I I don't ever remember hearing that before president's been here for a long time I don't know if he's ever heard that before that that it's just a place marker and we don't know where it's going to end up so and I have a

really hard time with that I like specifics and the increases range from 1.6% matter of fact on page 122 all of them were 1.6% increases all the way up to 15.5% another thing you mentioned the other day was the fact that sometime some of them might involve a step well if they involved a step then that should also been noted in the budget so we could have looked at last year's salary this year's

salary that the step right across till you get to the B the bottom line of total salaries um and and I think that's part of the problem it's just it it's just not clear it's not clear it's convoluted um and I'm really struggling with a lot of things in this budget um Council can I just clarify one thing you just stated yes please so I think the 15% came up yesterday or the

day before and I think Mr Akens explained that that would someone that was a part-time position and the salary brought over to a full-time halfway through the year so that's why the percentage that she is now or he is now getting is 15% but that's not a 15% raise from year to year I think there were my saying is correct you want to come down and explain it exactly or not Bridget do you remember

remember yeah if we're talking about the person I think um that person was part-time for part of the Year correct I believe in the elections Department um there may be somebody else and I can all right so I'll stand corrected on that I just want to make it clear I I don't I don't want people listening to this budget thinking that some people are getting a 1.6% and other people are

getting a 15% it's not a fair character I just want to make it clear and okay so the highest one then was a 12.6 and we didn't discuss that one but anyways you're right so I'll stand corrected on the 15.5 um so with that I'll yield now till we have our other departments thank you Council counc t7 excuse me so I guess my only question is what's going to come first the reor

or the reduction of these vacant positions have remained vacant for two years uh chicken of the egg that I guess that's my question because if it seems you two have a disagreement of how this proceeds and I can understand why but at this point do we just say okay let's reduce one of the one of the electricians one of the Carpenters to nothing save some money and then when you get your reor then you can make

those adjustments at that time so so Council we we there is no disagreement I have a plan okay hold on hold on I'm gonna interrupt you for one second clarify you don't have a disagreement he is clarifying he said he has a plan that finish it it's there's there's a there's a lot of moving parts to the plan I have some ideas and we've presented it um the ideas and we're still trying to make those ideas

work yeah I I have actually no problems with the the actual substance of what Mr Al is proposing my answer um was just not right now uh we need to hold off because there's other things that we need to know um and so I mean I guess you could say you know disagree me he wants to do something and I didn't want him to do it but that's more you know that's just sometimes the tension that

exists where um you know where we have limited resources we're always trying to make you know good choices as to how we use those resources um I feel like if you look around the building the incredible brick floor um the power washing like I mean just you the list is is kind of crazy when it comes to the work that uh his department has done I could be happier I could not be happier

with what they're doing and how they're doing it um in terms of the people that they're doing it with and how those are structured under um Mr ola's command uh I just asked them to hold off and and that's fine so that answers part of my question so then if that's the case we're holding off for the anticipation of things to come but right now we still have a position at 58,000 another

position at 58,000 that are funded that depending on how long we hold off could be funded until the end of the fiscal year and that's hundred you know $6,000 carries over I mean I think you know it wouldn't it would actually probably be wise if you know Mr Oliver and I have a conversation and we come back with an amendment to bring that to three positions one plumber one Carpenter one

electrician at higher rates uh I think this Council sees the the reason to do that and it might allow us to actually get some folks in to do that work and and and that's my next statement is going to be if you guys you want to get away from subcontracting out and essentially spending more money if you were to make the amendment increase the one electrician increase one Carpenter to a reasonable salary that could be

hired for you're still gonna have a net savings you're not gonna you're not going to spend $16,000 you may spend 80 90 it's still a net savings for as long as you guys will eventually figure out what this reorg looks like so I think somebody said the chicken or the egg right I think right now if we can save some money in this immediate moment and then when you're ready to do this

reorganization that you're stating then we'll make those decisions then but for the immediate let's amend save some save some cash and move on and then get the people you need in we have talked about a highb reor in and we're there's a lot there's a lot of talking out here when are we make there's a lot of work going on at the same no disrespect to you 18 months when is the decision going to be

made to to my council's point when can we make the decision and move on that's my question to you correct do I have an answer no I don't have that answer okay um I do have someone that I report to understood and that's what we're there is no guys we're circling the wagon again I mean councelor he already said he' like to have it in tomorrow he's being getting pushed back by it they

disagree on the priority of the riok that's simply very simple it's what the disagreement is not about the RoR it's about the priorities right at this moment understood Mr President Mr raen so with the suggestion I just made about an amendment which I love by the way thank you love it would you be open to a doing that and B presenting that to us in the immediate yes sir and then we

could further this discussion to see what that looks like and I think it's a win-win for everybody yes sir absolutely awesome thank you I yield thank you C I'm just curious is that much different from what I said when I said we had and we had two electricians and we could scale it down to one each implement the salary a little bit and hire those people right away is that different from

what you're being told it's almost identical to what you said for some reason I just I understood it the second time better and I don't know how that happened it's really no disrespect Mr President no no no I just want to make sure that I mean I think I'm he Echo no you're you're absolutely right I just I was hesitant to to make that suggestion because I don't want to be changing

things on the fly but um did I say with a smile your suggestion all the the collective suggestion makes a tremendous amount of sense C C5 thank you sir I think there 277,000 for two electricians two plumbers two carpenters and a plumber that's the amount of money that's in there divide that up to which way you think you're going to be able to hire somebody good I have a friend of

mine whose son is an electrician he makes $150,000 so they're making good money um you know it's true um trash lately in the ordinance committee when we put something through we'll say we want a 60-day CH around on this to come back to us because sometimes it goes there and it stays in the dock hole so on trash you think you'll have something for us within six months I think I'll certainly have a proposal

that that we're going to ask the council to support yes six months I think probably soon because uh councelor Dian and I are on the trash committee we've met twice and I think John Perry was still here he was so but if you want help with this uh Plum electrician let's put together a committee a couple of us can figure it out for you so just to be clear that those positions do need to be bargained

so the way that they would appear in the budget is as proposals for three positions down from five and then the actual wages themselves would would be B I mean we'd get it past because I don't think the union is going to turn down a higher salary for those positions but it would need to be bargained so it wouldn't be able to happen immediately but it's probably something that we could start hiring for maybe in August

but it we're making progress forward that's we're making progress forward kind of standing there with and we're institutionalizing that those positions at that higher rate now because we talked about trash are we also going into some DCM stuff or was that just we kind of went off the I I kind of took us off the rails I apologize so I'll wait because I have stuff for there okay all right that I yield thank you Mr

President there being no further questions I believe get the right slip out we can move on to Community Services any questions yes I do count seat 7 we inspectional Services inspectional Services Community Services first one will be inspectional Services correct department half the way if I may so inspectional Services is is a separate Department from Community operations within Community operations

we have the different uh trees streets and highways DCM so I just want to be clear who we're calling can we do um we're doing Inspection Services right now great but he just said that it's he's not overseeing that to go with but I mean Al can take a break he probably wantsies it's because it's on the agenda trees as that DCM we're going to do inspectional Services counc okay y it's

right on it's it's right on your agenda councelor I know I was budding in I apologize no you're good it's all good we're all saying the same

thing even how you doing good good evening Glen can you st your name Mr hathway so people at home know who you are exactly please Glenn hathway Building Commissioner with the city of for River inspector of buildings coun seat 7 I think you were called on the first time thank you sir good evening Mr hathway good evening so first question clarify the difference to me and it may sound silly but the difference between

the automobile allowance and the gas allowance Das salaries so is it the gas allowance is built into their salary how is that separate from the auto I'm assuming that these individuals don't have a city vehicle and you also compensate them for gas for using their personal vehicle is that correct yes sir okay so please we're giving the the employees are given $1,200 a year M for the use of their personal

vehicles and a year or I don't know two years ago a year and a half ago um the city decided to reimburse us for fuel rather than give us fuel from the central Fuel Depot um with that said each employee including myself um gets a stifen in our paycheck every paycheck uh for $300 uh 100 is out of the 1,200 for the yearly use of your vehicle and the 200

is the use of your car or your truck or whatever you're using uh it's reimbursement for uh fuel you said by every paycheck is that by by by we monthly by weekly by weekly so you get $500 then no get 300 so every every so you get so you get 600 a month no yes are you sure about that yeah it's 12 it's uh 300 it's $300 um every paycheck that's

$600 a month yeah now it's I think it's 300 a month 300 a month I'm sorry yes once a month y okay sorry no no it's okay just want to make sure just hit to clarify CC seat 7 yeah thank you to the city administrator so the idea behind that was to control what was coming out of the the gas Depot essentially was that the rationale here that was the

rationale okay and as far as the gas allowance versus using the depot net savings net increase what are your thoughts um probably a net savings um but there was more than the money there was it was also trying to reduce traffic uh into in and out of the DCM gate um because it's you know so I me there was a couple reasons there we did add the 12200 uh a year um in order to kind of

think about wear and tear um more than gas um the conversation that's ongoing is if the folks that use their personally owned vehicle and are receiving a gas stipend um are willing to track their mileage uh on the job you know for you know City purposes only um and show that that mileage is actually significantly more than what they're getting we're absolutely open to having a conversation about increasing that but

we're not going to do it unilaterally we want to actually do it Based on data yeah which makes sense because and then I look at the line by line item here and essentially you took 12 $24,000 from autom B allowance and made it the gas allowance that is yeah it was it was reorganized for this year y okay cool the next question is a few lines down as the other Professional Services

an increase is 67% not page 189 for those following along um we increased about $88,000 and it's called it's coverage for the inspectors during vacations do you have enough inspectors because based on based on the increase tells me that you don't is that is that a fair point tell me if I'm wrong it's okay no well yes and no so we're at a we're we're we are I am at a point where uh I

have considered asking for another building inspector um but that's not currently where that money is going or being used for um currently it's used if there is an inspector out uh on vacation on sick leave and we have to hire a substitute an alternate uh which would be for electrical mainly electrical because we have two plumbing and two building yeah fall together no two building I mean uh two building and

two Plumbing inspectors and one electrical inspector so five yes so if the electrical inspector is out correct you need to do what sub out no we I have two alternates you have within the city within the well there they will come in and work for the city as an electrical inspector and that comes out of that line item yes okay so that would be D the other Professional Services okay yes

so all right that that makes that makes a little more sense to what I'm saying um so going back to my question and I think you kind of answered it so you're in a position to ask for an additional inspector in what regard what kind I have been considering I have been considering and it's not in this budget uh to ask for another building inspector because the uh city of for river is booming it's uh as

you're all aware um the city is experienc uh an enormous amount of growth and um things are getting busy and it's getting uh sometimes overwhelming to deal with complaints and and do your inspections in the course of a day uh as many inspections as we do a day uh we have that many complaints and the complaints could be anything from anything in my department uh fences uh obstructions uh so can I can I ask the

flip side of that then if there are so many inspections to be done we reduce the overtime budget by 50% so my overtime budget has been reduced because I've uh they have transferred Min uh not minimum housing but uh food of milk inspectors from my department to the health department that was a major reduction in the overtime uh the overtime being uh used as far as building inspectors are concerned is fires or

emergency um in uh events if there is an event on a Saturday or a weekend and we have to inspect the um will do that uh that's overtime most of it's emergencies okay so to Mr rean I know you know just foring to the health budget for a minute we don't see any sort of line item for overtime there for inspectors who could be doing that work outside of I mean like the food and Mill

inspector perfect example of somebody who's not necessarily going to work money through Friday right so but we'll we'll touch that later on sure we'll address that um on page 190 if you could please you have not it's not vacant it's labeled TBD to be determined so is it determined or is it vacant which one it's vacant okay how long have both these positions been vacant for since Lisa golden

retired at the uh beginning of the year so the senior sanitary inspector was Lisa yes okay and then the TBD wire inspector so Dave retired also and we had trouble filling the position um reason being reason being pay mainly uh salaries were increased uh across the board for the inspectors and um it made a difference we had uh a couple of people that uh were willing to apply we've since rehired an

electrical inspector okay he's two weeks into the position you recently hired an electrical inspector is that what you just said yes okay but as far as the wire inspector is concerned that is the electric that is same thing so that person is hired and as far as the salary is that the amount that was agreed to yes okay so essentially you have now one position left it's leisa's old position

correct now correct me if I'm wrong Mr rean isn't this the position that is proposed to be moved yes to health yes okay regardless of where that stands where do we stand with hiring that person we waiting for the possible move to health if we're able to move to health it means that we can take advantage of a shared services Grant and then provide an inspector at no cost to

the city it would only be three fifths of the time because we would share that we would have that person for three days out of five that's right um and share them with with two other towns who would each have it for one day um but we're we're trying to figure out if there's a way that we can that that would actually alleviate some of the burden uh well at

the same time not having to take on additional salary and if if that were to happen are you suggesting that essentially this 46,4 64 essentially would be less in a different department that's correct okay so it would come out of here it would go to health and it would be three fifths essentially of that amount roughly no it would actually be it would be none of that it be zero it' be grand funded

complet okay fair enough all right and to Mr Hathaway going back to the vehicle gas allow does any of your department have vehicles at all no so no no inspectional vehicles at all none is that how historically has been yes that's odd at least to me all right fair enough my thank you thank you thank you come to T6 thank you um so I've always stated that this is a this is a

department that I feel personally is such a engine in this community you know they they work so tremendously hard so much goes through in terms of New Growth building permits building additions uh you know any of these developers who want to build buildings everything goes through these this department and I always have stated and there's nothing I could do really do about it here as a

counselor that the department is doesn't have enough resources in my opinion it needs to properly run this city this large with the development that we've seen I've stated this prior to when the developments weren't getting to where they are today we have the Waterfront we've got all these all this construction I mean it is mind-boggling to me um how much goes through this department year in and year out and uh

to get things on tax rols it has to run through this department so with that being said um I have always maintained another position within the department even though there's far how many vacant properties do you have now it's far down it can't be much uh last check it's around between 75 and 825 and that's way down in comparison to when you started as the building inspector 460 some 460

now those and I've said this before again so I'm sorry if I'm repeating myself back in the old days when they had 400 and something under a prior building inspector and when um Mr long was the mayor's assistant or whatever through CDA or something like that there was a real vetting process in place for um the renewals of vacant properties because we charge $500 per vacant property in the first year and then

there's a renewal again every year thereafter okay his Department it is impossible for them to be able to manage 10 20 30 40 50 75 vacant units or dwellings um when they have to go get new you know he has to go shut power off he has to meet the police department Etc I think that specific account and I said this to um the prior building inspector um prior

what was it Mr bisco before he left that it would be nice for this department to have a revolving account for him if he has to go and cut grass board a building and do everything like that do you have that yet Mr hathway I do have that comes from and where does that money come from and how much is in it there's uh and where is it cuz I can't find it it's

in um it's in a separate sheet in the budget and it's under uh I can't tell you the page because I didn't bring it but um it's uh Bridget could help me with that because it's there's a come down there's a um a two $200,000 maximum for demolition in that that we could go out and contract for right okay and then I believe the other one is 20,000 in the maintenance account which would be

cutting grass and bought up of vacant properties um why wouldn't that be under the can you tell me where this is so those were set up as um revolving account revolving funds so um they're not part of the general fund budget there is a times where there's money budgeted to transfer out of the general fund into this but we've discussed um with Mr Hathaway so right now in the demo special revolving fund there's $78,500

limits on the revolving funds okay so when this happens there's a you know an invoice goes out to these the property owners of these blad properties and then they either pay the the fee or what should happen is it then gets put on as the municipal tax Lan right okay so the money should get recouped eventually right yeah so right now this in this budget we didn't put to budget any money

into to transfer to the revolving fund because there's a a balance in there and we we really want to get tighter about that and we want to make sure that we're recouping all the costs back that we are spending and who's responsible for recouping those costs is what what well it's it's a combination between between the treasur and collector's office yeah so I mean M obviously we're not going to figure out

the dollar amount of that he spent and like cost it out for you know how many boards and everything so that part of it falls on um Mr Hathway's department and then they would be responsible and we actually talked to the mayor today about doing a training with his Department um so that we all know that we're following the process and that we're legally doing it so we can legally put the lean on I

mean I just want to comment this is great progress in comparison to where where we were at you know four five six seven eight years ago uh when it comes to making sure that the building department has the resources to do that but that that's challenging in in its own sense too because if the building inspector only has $78,000 how much was those balances again please So currently eight it's uh 78651

and that is in what line and revolving um that is in his demolition demo account and then you have the preservation one the vacant lot account well that's what they've called it

for vacant properties which we use okay we if we incur or the city incurs an expense associated with any property I don't care what it is like putting people in hotels you have to shut building down I cut the grass I fix the fence I bought up the building or I clean the property whatever that bill is I lean the property I know through a municipal lean which Bridget is referring to and

at the time of sale we recoup that money that could be years that could be years that's not so if you lean a property today you might not get this money for four five 10 years correct right it's a municipal lean unless you take it to tax sale you're not going to recover that that's correct and that's been uh the protocol forever that when I got here that's how it was done and that's how

it's continued however there at one point we were putting leans on at the registry of deeds also based on the dollar amount and that cost us money it cost us $125 I believe uh to put that type of lean on and that would be collected at the time of sale also and the uh reimbursement of re of recording that lean and removing that lean was added on to the tax bill okay okay so we the city

always gets their money back someday eventually okay eventually correct does that get back into your revolving account yes yes okay do you have yes or no do you have enough money in your demo and vacant property revolving account to do your job without hesitation currently I have an enough in there because we've re we've sold some property or we've we have sold property and recouped some money from the sale so

you have enough resources to be able to right now right now but you're a you're a you're a you're a building away unfortunate circumstance away from having to board up a mill or something like that that will deplete your demo account so yes we did also so a big it's not sustainable well so a bigger project like what you're speaking of would be a a different case that this these are

more of the smaller routine cases and we did talk about identifying some of those bigger ones and I mean some of those could be far larger than we would be able to transfer out of the general fund to cover that so something large happens uh you you would come down to the council or within within your own Department transfer money to him so that he could do it yes but if it's something

that's like in the millions of dollars right then we would be having another conversation okay so so we I I if I can just Enlighten a little bit we have I have currently a residential home that is uh or was uh assulted for demolition um I do have the money in in the account to demo uh fortunately uh anir has come out of the woodwork and has presented themselves to um the City attorney and

they're reviewing that so demolition um may take place through the owner if or they may Revitalize the property uh but either way they have to hurry up uh so um if if I had to go after a piece of commercial property such as the police station or uh another the building of that size uh we would have to come before the council with a presentation uh with a with a dollar

amount because it's going to be well over what I have budgeted uh in my account don't don't you feel that if you had the ability and I know it would be taking away from local receipts but don't you feel like if you had the ability to utilize your vacant property account that would run through the revolving account instead of local receipts would be much better for you to work off and continue to follow up no no

so his when you run those V when you invoice for those properties that goes back to his revolving account what's in his local right yes and what's so that that is a new thing yeah that's that has they do come back to me we make sure of that I I asked Brenda my head clerk yes to when I know a piece of property is sold uh within a couple of weeks I ask

her to review and make sure that any monies that was collected from that has been transferred back into our account because uh Ian collects it in the collector's office and everything is going smoothly that way okay good well that makes me feel better CU I've always felt that it was always something and I'm happy to hear that that those vacant property fees are coming through back

into your department to help support you because it's incentivizing your staff and you to follow up with vacant properties and make sure that properties that are vacant are registered correct yeah you're saying I think you said something different you said vacant property fees that's what I'm saying okay that goes into a a Revol account that I don't see yet the the maintenance of those is two different things that's

well all right in in the past I've gotten I have a line item for that for 20,000 um it's this year I think Bridget and I discussed it to bring it down to 15 uh th000 due to the fact that I didn't use it all last year so she didn't want me to go over and get into trouble I want to make sure we're not talking about two separate things when

the city has a vacant property it's by ordinance that the the the city can charge a vacant property owner uh a institution an owner $500 for the first year of a vacant property it needs to be registered and it needs to be uh returned to the building inspector's office that $500 and that one specific one and then there's many you said there's 75 that goes where does that go through the general fund or does that go

through the revolving I'm not talking about preservation I'm talking about f it goes where to the general fund I believe well I would have to confirm that okay I'm just curious about that because I I think it would be worthy for you this is a executive branch management dis discussion but I think it would make more sense if you have 75 vacant properties at $500 per property per year and that might go up and down

it should probably be within the building inspector's office so that they are incentivized to ensure that they follow up to get that money so his reserve account can go up if that's just running through the general fund into under local receipts there's really no incentive for the building inspector's office to follow up to make sure property a that got is a vacant property on December 1st December 1st of next

year is vacant you're going to get the other the $500 again I can assure you counselor that that is not taking place the bills are going out we are collecting the money and it's done on a yearly basis the problem with the 72 houses that we have they've been vacant for 15 years 20 years there is nobody living we can't find the airs the one I just talked about for demo um we're

shocked of these people have been living locally and they just never come forth now that they heard that I'm going to demo the house they decided to come forth come come up front uh so that that's one thing but most of these people are are dead and buried and and there's just nobody around sure um the city t uh attorney which is uh Matt Thomas has a lot of these in lancau Lan

cau's taken forever y uh some of them uh one of them up off of uh New Boston Road recently um somebody purchased through uh the research of their private attorney and the house has been put back on the tax or will be put back on the tax R being rehabed now and how long was that vacant for 10 years probably 10 years years 10 years so did we get $500

per year per property when they Clos so it was a huge bill that the sellers had to pay to to get clear I think it was I want to say in I forget it was and where did that $500 per year go did it go back to you order to go it goes to Ian and Ian distributes it accordingly but it doesn't go back to your department well that's I'm not positive about that okay

so let's find out I'm really curious because Mr Hathaway saying that he doesn't see it it goes to this well so what happens so obviously The Collector collects it and then the collector will reallocate out in any interest that is due to the to the accounts that have been identified of where it needs to go I just unfortunately don't know absolutely everything I and I respect that I just want to I would like to see

that happen because it's an incentive for the building dist department and it would allow them to have more resources so that in future fiscal years we don't have to have an allocation in a budget which you might need in future years of 15 20,000 to go back to that Reserve account it will be a self- sustaining a centrally Enterprise account that would work but councel I'm just curious Mr

haway do you have to go inspect those properties every year make sure they vacant or does the treasure who how do we know they're vacant every year do you go physically inspect to make sure they vacant so yes we're constantly continuously at these properties um when I was fortunate enough to become Building Commissioner and uh FAL fiori became the minimum housing director um myself I I inquired

with f if he would assist me in this process um at at the time we had 462 vacant properties and um there were a mess the list was a mess and and there was a several items that was not it was difficult so with the help of Mr fiori uh we have visited or we visited all the properties we cleaned up the list and the list is continuously being cleaned up Mr

fiori um helps me on a regular basis with vacant properties he will identify them uh do some of the research for me uh as far as being vacant are they deceased are they uh is the water bills being paid is this or that taxes and then I will go out and inspect the property and confirm or deny whether it's vacant or not um that's in thank you my job description okay all right if

you could get back to me on that I'll I'll I'll I'll stop my questions now because I'm really curious about this so if you can get back to me um can I just make one comment of course um so we did talk about I mean Mr haway was not there but the city administrator was and we we did talk about that and we talked about having um our city treasurer collector

along with our attorney that um does this do a training and we're going to talk to Mr hathway and identify like two employees to then do these specific trainings so that we can be recouping this because I agree with you the city should be recouping this and it should be self- sustaining and you know keep revolving so it wouldn't be an Enterprise fund it'll it would stay it would just stay a revolving fund but I

think we're all on the same we are on the same Pages we don't want to just be pulling money out of the general fund for those purposes right all right and you have enough resources Mr haway to be successful going to next fiscal year no it need another build top well I haven't asked for that counselor but I have been strongly considering it besides that do you have enough resources thank you I yield thank thank

you Mr President thank too good evening I don't have too much I'm glad he touched on what he did um you have on page 190 um in the 20 FY 24 budget the individual was identified as Administrative Assistant SLC code enforcement now the individual is a project specialist what's the difference why was the title changed uh the responsibility is still the same what I what uh did you say that

again Council please so in the FY 24 budget this particular individual was the administrative assistant forward SL code enforcement that was the description okay and then in the FY 25 budget the description is Project specialist same person same individual it's the head clerk in the office uh Brenda bie y um I I don't know why why the the change nothing has changed okay okay uh it's the same person does the

same work uh of she oversees the entire office she oversees uh vacant properties as well and assist uh with the uh billing of uh properties that we cut grass or maintain um and the everyday Services of the office permitting so nothing's changed other than the job description in in in the budget you so I don't believe she's a union position correct correct yeah so nonunion she's

nonunion non-union all righty and then I just want to make a comment so the um Auto allowance so the asme Union contract um has the clothing allowance and car allowance um and the but I'm looking at excuse me and gas and gas well it doesn't say it in the note it says just the clothing and but whatever but the Asing contract does divide them up but I'm looking at this and I look at the FY

24 budget I look at the FY 25 budget and again I could be wrong but I see they were given nothing because in FY 24 you got $3600 Auto allowance and fy2 you get 2400 gas 1,200 Auto that's 3,600 so your dollar amount didn't change it didn't benefit anybody at all they just simply changed the description and put it in a different column so what was the point I mean these people benefited

nothing well they they got the auto allowance and the gance yeah they had it they had 3,600 in Auto allowance now it's 1,200 in Auto allowance and 24 400 in gas so it's ACC yeah it's the same dollar more they still get the benefit it more accurately reflects the CBA I don't know what you're getting at them I'm I'm I think I'm missing it and I apologize because when I look at it and it says

asman Union contract clothing allowance and car allowance what page are we on page 190 that makes that leads me to believe that the contract gave them something more than they had before but in reality it gave it nothing changed for them except it was it's always been stipulated like that councelor um until so prior to if I may the auto alarm allance has spent $1,200 for couple of years now um as far

as the fuel that's what changed when we were no longer allowed to purchase gas or or get gas at the at the DPW um the city came up with this amount for each individual and that's how it was given it to us and nothing's changed nothing's been increased and nothing's been decreased right so the reality is you're getting the same thing you got before it's just being allocated differently correct okay I just that I

just wanted to make that point with that I yield thank you councelor counc C five just um just a quick question I know that everybody was talking about you know all the building that's going on and dayon houses Etc but a big problem that I find is people that are not keeping their property up in a manner that they should and it's a deterrent to other neighbors and um I call F all the time with different

complaints but we did talk about it in the ordinance committee to look at changing the ordinances so that people are held accountable right now he can go out we don't have anything about you know how high can somebody's grass be I mean do you have to wait till there's rodents in the grass or the dead cat that was on Pine Street in the grass you know and if they if you're going to have somebody from your

department or you're going to hire somebody that's going to come and mold a lawn then it just gets placed you know on a lean kind of for them so when they sell the house you'll get the money back but we don't charge enough to say we're going to go and mow the lawn we don't charge enough so a lot of landlords that live out of town they could kill us go

ahead you mow it it's less expensive than them getting a landscaper so I think we need to look at what some of those issues are um have you had any conversation with the law department on the ordinances that they're doing have you looked at a draft yes and I believe you're going to be seeing new ordinance for some of this very shortly of your concerns however the us as far as my department and me authorizing somebody

to go on private property to cut the grass because the homeowner does not live or the building owner does not live locally and refuses to cut the grass I will not do that okay that the city's not in a business to maintain properties although sometimes it would be good if we did but we we're not no so the only time I'm going on a piece of property to cut grass or maintain the yard or do

something to a building is when it is vacant and there is nobody else willing to to come forth and maintain the property that's thean that we have don't have enough teeth for f to be able to do something so when did I we did say at the last ordinance committee meeting um we've been waiting for this from legal and I think we gave them like 60 days we want an answer back wasn't it we gave

them 60 days to get an answer Bo any what you're asking to cut people's grass or maintain people's job Rous I don't think we should I I agree with you counselor but I don't think you're going to see a whole lot of that happen in the in the ordinance because there's liabilities for that and and and there's property damage that could take place and then the city becomes the the burden

the problem and maybe not us doing it or having anybody else do it but that you know there's some accountability for that homeowner to make sure that that gets done um I think there was an ordinance um in another city that they were looking at as well that seemed to have a little bit more teeth to it C there is a fine that they'll be assessed if they don't that's a certain height so we just

send them a fine they don't do it the fine increases and that's what it is the fines we just don't send out the fines the fines aren't high enough like okay you have so let's adjust the fees let's just adjust the cost of the fs some of those some of uh there is an enormous amount of things uh taking place through fa and the two people that work in minimum housing have done a wonderful

job uh bringing landlords into court and landlords uh uh into uh question for their property maintenance sometimes it takes time because of the court system or sometimes it takes time to get the message to the landlord okay that we are serious and uh we're not going to back off um the F and and the two individuals uh they do an awesome job and Josh have done a fantastic job they

do and uh I can't say enough good about all of them okay well hopefully we'll get these ordinances in to make their jobs a little bit easier where if you check with the law Department there has been citations issued to these property owners and they're entitled to a hearing and if they don't appear the citation is issued uh to where does that money go for those citations general fund uh city

clerk general fund see that should go to building and I do agree with you Mr halfway you do need another building inspector there's a lot going on um and you should get another one and I'm sorry that Lisa left and Dave they were both good and hopefully you'll be able to fill those positions pretty quick fingers crossed yes you may need to up salaries a little if that's the case then we'll talk about that

thank you thank you with that I yield Mr President thank you counc counc Tate um Mr Hathaway I just you said something earlier and I just wanted to know if you could touch on that because I just don't want it to get past you said um there's so much growth in the city and you're seeing that I think it's a great problem to have that you may need another inspector um but can you just touch on

that a little bit that the growth that you need I mean the growth at the well you're going to have the Wall Street in the next within the next couple years that's growth um there is FL countless Mills that's being rehabilitated to apartment units refurbished to whatever they're proposing uh buildings um up an industrial park that's being built constructed uh every building that has a permit or a or uh is

being constructed has to be inspected at various times uh we currently have Diamond uh in the making um I'm there at least twice a week uh maybe maybe three times depending upon the uh weather and the conditions that's going to increase uh as time progresses as the building uh progresses um there is growth no matter what corner you turn in this city um there is an enormous amount of people

that try to get away without permits um I have two building inspectors uh and two Plumbing inspectors and we all work as a team they notify the the building if they see something going on that doesn't have the proper permitting um and we go out and get them uh the problem is is not everybody responds back to us uh in a timely manner uh and when they do they don't like us we're

not one of their favorite people so um with all the construction that's going on in the city uh all the proposed construction uh it might be time to um look at hiring another building inspector to do do you think you have everything you need in your in your budget to move forward are you giving the resources that you need thus far yes uh as far as another building inspector I have not put in for

one uh I have not discussed it seriously considering asking the mayor and the administration for one and I'll take this opportunity to say that um you are such an asset to this city you do a tremendous job you sat up here and you praised your team and the staff that you work with in their hard work and and your job doesn't go unnoticed it's such an important job for the city and you do

a phenomenal job and I want to thank you for everything that you do so I yeld council president thank you thank you councelor there be no further question I thank you for coming down Mr haway very interesting thank you and I also said my colleagues you do do your department does do a wonderful job and I know every time you say the word cease and desist it causes a lot of problems

next we'll have Health and Human

Services good job Tess please state your name for the record hi Tess Cen director of Health Human Services coun seat 7 CC POS on good evening Mr K a few questions for you first is in the department description um second paragraph it talks about in the six-month period ending December 31st 2018 yes so um the the updated Department description that had been submitted wasn't included in the budget

so I can um provide you with the updated description yeah it's a few years old I would say yeah you could do that that' be fabulous um so I don't know if this is going to be changed if you get the updated but going down to page 193 in the section regarding revenues that come from four sources it says all fees page C page 193 Mr President uh third paragraph I guess

it's above the mission um in the second line that says all fees for license issued by the health related inspectors go to inspectional Services if the change were to happen in ordinance Mr Aken is that going to then change yes so those funds would instead of going to inspectional Services would move to Health and Human Services correct okay awesome all right to the point now if you go to page 194 the organization

chart is labeled 2022-23 is has anything changed in your orc chart I'm just going to compare um the one that I have um not significant uh well there there has been a few changes um primarily the addition of the two food inspectors um to the department which happened last fiscal year okay and where obviously I'm working on an old one here but where do where would they Place essentially uh they report

directly to me okay so that'd be the SEC second level there correct okay so can you also get us an updated or chart for your department too I can send that over that' be great um so how many inspectors do you have in total in your current Department two currently I have two food inspectors and one tobacco control inspector that's a grant funded gr okay so on page 196 and to back to my

question from before regarding the O overtime for food inspectors that is included in this budget that there actually is overtime included in the budget it's the fourth line down there's $20,000 included in that correct on page 197 is the um list of employe employees and payroll there the last one I know it's it's Grant funded but does not have a title is that the opioid individual who coordinates that that is

our epidemiologist epidemiologist that's okay I'm not spelling that all the way but that's good enough for sure yeah EP for sure is good enough for me um let me just see one thing on page 195 um needed for medical it's the medical supplies line um I noticed it mention that your clinic continues to be busy as testing requirements have been expanded can you expand on that um and

and so due to the influx of um you know migrant families and and um individuals coming from out of the country um there are additional requirements per dph to uh test certain individuals that are coming from certain countries and are we not getting federal grants for that at all uh not typically for the the turbosol okay so not like how we got federal grants for the co testing no no well that's a

shame um and then the next two lines down is the professional development line it mentions move from salaries to expense in fy17 I don't know if that's just an old description or yeah I believe that's again an an old description I'm not entirely sure why that was included in this okay um and then I'm going to ask similar question about the inspectors is to sufficient for the amount

of restaurants schools everything that we have does two do the job to get adequately everything inspected as it should be done you know Bob and Bobby are are really out there in the community working um you know day in and day out at this time um I believe and they they've have not indicated to me that their capacity that they cannot hand handle the the workload with the two inspectors okay and is at any point

anything subbed out to be done or just those two do everything not for food the two of them not for food excellent and do you have a rough idea of how many inspections they required to do how many they responsible for essentially in the city um per the code they're required to do two inspections of each of of every establishment um each year and how many establishments do you have uh over 600 establishments

sounds like a good sign okay and then lastly on page 196 is the contracted Services line um which is obviously for the fy2 is zero yes and and you know th those are um opioid settlement dollars so those aren't um dollars that the that are City dollars those are uh the opioid settlement monies that are coming through to our department okay for payment fair enough and then the last

question is regarding the youth services um coordinator is that it's a it's a city position but is there a grant that's behind that as well how does that work so Christian works on um yes Christian mcclusky um yes he is a city funded um position but he has two grants he oversees so the Shannon Grant and the SS Yi Grant um so he long long time ago back in the early 2000s was transitioned

from a grant team member to a city employee gotcha but he has Grant resources that allow him to do what he does correct essentially awesome he does a great job I talked to him often so he's great advocate for youth in the city um and one second to Mr Aken the Council on Aging which is under this department correct falls under your jurisdiction okay now now for as far as the vehicle are

concerned correct me if I'm wrong the vehicle that we secured to give medical give rides that is that vehicle that's shared between a few groups yes okay so as far as the gasoline line item there it's reduced by 20% is because it's a shared cost probably because partly because it's a shared cost but if you look in the veterans budget yep there's part of that money is there okay um so because because all of the

administration lives in the veterans but the uh but certain payment for those Services is part partly contributed to by um Council aging through HHS um you can see it in both you can see part of it in each place okay and then lastly to director Curran on page 196 it states conferences $2,000 not planning on attending any out of state conferences so um in part that was uh I had been on

maternity leave during the fall which Congratulations by the way thank you um and a lot of the public health conferences take place um during the fall so again that was not something that I had taken advantage of this this past year gotcha but you will your back yes excellent all right that's all my questions thank you very much I yield thank you coun C C5 counc just a a question on uh the youth service

coordinator who does an amazing job and works after hours many times does he receive funding from another source yes so yes he does receive um a total of $10,000 um 6,000 from Shannon and 4,000 from the SSI grants for the work that he does on those grants Mr Akin is there a way to see if there's any other grant money available through Jasmine um for a position like this you know he is our

youth coordinator in the city and you can't say we care about our youth and we have this individual working a lot and really doesn't get paid for all the work that he does I've always thought that uh that position should pay more um because we do care about our youth and he's the only one you know going to all these meetings he's at uh the domestic violence uh meetings and

does a lot with CD Rec does stuff with a veteran I mean he really he really does I just I know we don't like to increase salaries and we talk about some people here that don't get paid what we hope that they can and I believe that there's a lot like that um but this one in particular if you could see what else um would be um available I mean and there's

no um there's no way that we can just say we want this person to get more you've got to rationalize it I get it but I'm just wondering what grants are out there if there's any specific to that I look to that the um Council on Aging I think that uh the North End I was a little worried about I thought we were going to lose that one if a developer bought it um they're good

South Main Street a lot of people go to Flint is out of control they do a great job up there Niagara I don't see as many people there I don't know why there's not as many and we pay do we pay different rents for all of these places we do and some of the rents are paid um through CDA um and some of them are um paid through State formula grant money well the Flint we

kind of got when we did that project up there that uh we have that space there we can use it for a community meetings Etc that's good but um is I I heard that there's a big discrepancy from one to another like what do we pay for South meain and I know the size is different and what we pay for Niagara what we pay for North Main um because Flint I know we get but

is Niagara really very high is that our highest one have to find out um our our rents I don't want to you know misrepresent what we're paying um we are in negotiations for for at least one of the senior centers in terms of our lease being up um but the you know this it is helpful for the seniors to have um a center in in you know different walking distance or

driving I know most of them in that area Drive um and they do we do have Vans to get people around but a lot of our seniors do drive but like Niagara for example has music on a certain day and people go there and dance um and I do like the footprints kind of lets us know let's uh all of us seniors know what's going on in our community but I I've

just got to tell you that honestly um the individuals that work at these um senior centers really do an amazing job shout out to them they do a great job and now that you have um they transferred and you have uh two of the Health Inspectors working with you uh under you in your department how has that been working out are they housed up with you or are they housed elsewhere

yes um Bob and Bobby are on the fourth floor they're on the fourth floor with you yes they've moved from their previous office over to where mass and motion and Tobacco Control was with the EM you got two good workers there too coming in they they're both great guys but um that's the only thing I wanted to say everybody else I think you know was doing okay but H that youth service

coordinator I just yeah I've done a lot with youth and I think that um that we deserve a little more teachers get paid double you think he should be paid double no I said teachers get paid double with tenure do you just what I think my and so if there's grants i' I'd like you to look into that let me know I'm curious I do yeld Mr President thank you so much thank you

coun de further questions I want to thank you very much for coming down explaining that thank you so much now we'll move on to the library ah I love this one this is my favorite one love the library welcome Le just say your name for the records for hello Liam veral the library administrator hello hi Council C5 Council vice president pero um are you going to be with us long or am I hearing

retirement Bells Are Ringing for you you are here on retirement um I'll work till the end of the year Well I it has been a pleasure working with you and um I did not know all of the services that the Library provided and there's a young fellow who works on the main floor when you come in um I can't think of it was Jeff I was there the day that you came in he was um

showing you all the different resources and ising you your card that day just wish that more people knew the library will do passports for you the library will help you if you don't know how to use your phone or your computer they have um all kinds of things going on there Dave melow with the children's I I mean the ComicCon that they had I never saw so many kids all running all over um

that was a wonderful event um but if you want to get um um passes passes to the aquarium if passes to the aquarium to museums uh you get discounted tickets if you want to get audio books a you can do that all for free to download all for free so you don't have to pay here I was buying AIO books paying online when my city library offers them for free um

there's lots and lots that happen there and um the bookmobile is very successful yes it is and that's wonderful I really think that every penny that has spent in the library we are getting above and beyond thank you the services from them and I thank you for all the work that you have done there great stuff there as you know I just great what else do they do there did I miss something oh the

resource we also have a notary service the notary service yes the Museum passes machs um no we have uh adult bicycles that's what is bicycl bicycles we have hotpots which is very um in demand so if you traveling somewhere and you need a hot spot you can borrow a Hotpot so you'll have Wi-Fi connection wherever you are a hot spot what about the bicycles we have a do bicycles you can check out as well

you can check out bicycles yes we have two I didn't even know that I mean there's so many things that they do it's endless we try to keep up with all the latest trends we also have a uh Game Boy switch you can check out a switch and tons of video games but many different types of consoles and for those people still have DVDs they can rent DVDs out we have tons of DVDs as

well we have a whole room full of DVDs maybe one of the Committees should get you to come in and go go over every single thing that the library has to offer I agree I didn't know that they had that many things to offer and I've been telling everybody that I meet you know you can get your passport there do you know you can do that um but thank

you and I know there's a lot of work involved in doing that but you have a great great team down there certainly everybody is is fantastic but and I have no problem with your budget I I wish we could give you more because I really see it happening they do printing too so you don't have to go to Staples it's cheaper at the library and faxing and faxing yes

thank you so much you thank you for all the work you and extend that to your staff I as a counselor and I'm sure I speak and coun just C just you know the internet is now on computers too yeah it's good they do a fantastic job but thank you so mucho thank you hot spot was good yeah I don't know they had that it's good stuff and you know what else they have they

have this thing called the liby you know how much money my household is saved my wife doesn't go to Bar you can get all the digital books on the Libby app through the public library you know how much money I've saved for my wife I know I only I had I just got it and I have saved money she's probably watching right now very upset with me I just said that that's okay question for you it's

talking about the digital subscriptions to the Libby app yes what how does that come to a cost the city through the library is that part of your budget it's part of our budget um where is that found educational supplies Okay cool so that is that the whole no it's also the the computer line which is our sales Library Network um some of that is included in there but we buy stuff through overdrive on our own

in addition to what we get through our Network okay and that sales network is how far is that reaching at this point I believe there's 72 libraries that are in the sales network I could be wrong on that in Massachusetts yes okay so we Bor from any of them gotcha which is good because it gives expansion of resources so my questions are about the bookmobile okay so I I'm happy to say that our the

school that I am principal at participates in it and has had great experience with it thus far what happens when it breaks it's brand new hopefully be still under warranty if that's the situation we did have some issues with our generator but that has been taken care we did it gotu in front of my building that's why I'm asking this question service than taken care of yeah so it's under warranty right now but correct

maybe Mr Aken to you if the vehicle were to break down is that taken care of internally by another city Department yes yes that's the I don't know I got to figure out the distance here um yeah that's taken care of that would be taken care of uh probably through DCM um you know if we can't we would probably try to find a book of about how to repair a bookmobile which may be

available a book through the library or on the hot spot or on the hot spot um as far as the winter months is concerned because obviously the bookmobile came out spring summer um is it the plan for the bookmobile to run during the winter months as well it's going to run 12 months a year it's going to run all year long um if there is a bad snowstorm obviously it wouldn't not be going out

at that point okay but as long as the weather is good enough yes and do you have a sense of statistics as far as via the bookmobile how many books have been checked out by children in the city we do I don't have that with me though okay I'd love I'd love to know because my next question is going to be if it's so popular is there a idea of a possible

second bobile no I don't think we're we're ready we're we're still doing the groundwork kind of getting um this is all new for us it hasn't had a bookmobile the educat excited about it that's why I'm I'm asking the question so all right fair enough down to your um payroll budget so page 203 um if you could just clarify what the line item shift is uh that is Union negotiated through ask me if they work

in the evening okay so that's exactly what that is that's indicated in the line item of shift premium correct okay and then overtime obviously is overtime so that's included there um as far as a reduction of orbit time would was there a modification Library hours that changed that no the reduction is because now I'm fully staffed oh well it's it's even better that's great news yes it is yeah okay

um and then last thing is just the org chart in 201 it's labeled organization chart 20122 I'm assuming that's not correct lab say 25 it says do on the top right here I mean the bookmobile drivers are there I'm good that that was just an error then okay time but I guess my only question on that is I notice only not the correct one oh the bookmobile is there okay yeah but the only thing

that's missing from there is you have the two bookmobile drivers where does the head bookmobile individual stand on this chart above the two drivers so it's missing so that block is missing okay so can you get us an updated yes or chart that would be fabulous one I have thank you very much and I'm going to keep using that Libby app and save my household some money I Yi thank you

thank you councel counc C4 Council kby yes just really quick um congratulations on your retirement thank you and I think you um have really moved that Library forward dur forward during your your tenure um so we all have fond memories obviously as grown up children kindergarten I know I do field trips different things so I'm calling about the the just asking about the condition of the building cuz there was an issue

remember with the roof and yes I should maybe facilities I should asked the question we are there every day it is on his list um the reference room the roof was repaired but the leak did not stop it wasn't from the roof they said it was coming in through the building so like the building I'm glad pointed so if you went to our reference room you will see the water damaged um unfortunately after

it was all painted and stuff so there's still damage to the room itself but the roof has been repaired and that's not weaking well the roof wasn't repaired again the roof was replaced repaced and the Damage continued because the problem was that the drain in the corner not the roof if you recall I went there and saw it and said it and we had people in the library and no no disrespect for you

lean but other people I remember Jim gney came down and came down and says you know fix the roof fix the roof and I tried to tell him it's not the roof and we spent over a million I call Out Mr President putting a new roof on it and I said you're going to put a roof on here go right ahead but it's not going to fix the problem cuz the problem is in the

drain and I was sat right there and I told them that and they were upset and it was unfortunate but I can't believe they still haven't fixed the drain when they did the roof over so it's it's okay now is it still leaking it's still leaking oh boy that's that's not right but it is it's not right it is on I'm GL again I'm glad I asked the question so let me I'm not

that should be a priority for all of us that is a beautiful building and you know what water does to a building yes yeah you come down sure they also do ancestry keep thinking the things go research so so there are some pointing issues that was a hasn't been completed so we we notified the uh U RGB who's the architect and they're going to be getting over there to uh to draft up the

plans to get back and repair that typically those buildings if if is as the Scupper in the drain the water leeches in there or wind driven and it just damages during the winter so that's that's on our our radar and we are going back with the architect yeah so what is it still there it is what it is I mean it's important so how many years has it been 40 years in September that it's

been leaking oh no in retirement mode already that's that's a private congratulations on that I wouldn't have priv right after the roof was done so that's going that a good one I believe it's been five years yeah five years yeah okay it happened right away all right um thank you does Mr Gibney know that he still leing yes he does is he oh I'm surprised he hasn't called yes he

is okay thank you I you Mr President and I do recall uh you making that point yeah yeah I do it for a living yeah I Y thank you counselor there be no further question that's say lean you know good for you I I I was um very proud when you became the director of the library um yes Brad you and myself we all graduated the same class and uh you did a wonderful job

there good job enjoy your retirement she was so good I stud my BS moving on we are going to Community maintenance Cemetery okay I have something

on Charlie could just give your name please and what department you would so the people at home can know who we're talking to Charlie Denby the director Department Community maintenance all right counc in seat seven Council proposal I believe you had your hand the yes sir thank you good evening Mr demid good evening nice to see you first I'll start with the uh cemeteries here um on page

146 we have vacant director and vacant so let's start with the director this what is the status of the director of cemeteries great now there well as as you know there isn't a director we have a uh Mr Martin right now it's filling in uh as the uh tree uh tree supervisor in uh inim uh uh pot time director so he's temporarily filling that spot and while the uh Mr ala is uh working on the reorg

okay back to that reorg so Chris Martin is right now working as a supervisor um so we are um working with him he's also the um the tree wooden um and that's because Mr Pino is no longer with us correct correct okay well he left he left U few months prior to him leaving now he left he was the assistant um planner correct and that so that wasn't filled so Mr Martin is

temporarily taking on that those roles and he his payroll is found in the trees payroll in the trees which we'll get to later okay cool um so on page back back to page 146 so we discussed the director as far as the vacant position in cemeteries what is the vacant position the V the vacant position of uh that's a uh u a general Labor's position general labor okay and uh normally uh we all

pretty much across the DCM in uh in uh Park cemeteries well at some point or another we'll have a vacancy and uh we'll pick someone up someone retires someone moves on um in uh right now in my in my uh in public works we have four um different reasons but there's one there and uh eventually we'll fill it and how long has that position been unfilled um I would have to check with

Mr M that has been filled we just we just filled that um about a week ago okay and is the Sal is the salary on the total is what was given correct and is that Union position that's an absolute position Okay cool so then back go to page 145 um under C Cemetery salaries under other rentals and leases there's an increase I guess my big question is what are we leasing that we don't that we probably

should own uh page 145 145 about in the middle section other rentals and leases just curious it obviously went up $500 which is not a lot but I'm just curious is it a situation it's something we just don't own yet as far as a capital item is concerned or we we don't have that answer right now Council we don't have that answer but um if you could we will we'll get

that over to you because again I'm just more curious if is it can we not lease and get it if it's going to cost us $3,000 type of thing so yeah if you can get back to me on that that would be great um and then when you define down a little bit more other grounds keeping supplies it's an increase of 5,000 Mr Dem if you want to touch on that groundskeeping supplies that's

normally materials they use for uh groundskeeping tools uh and normal Supply seed uh um just normal everyday materials okay mainly because the cemetery has expanded a little bit Yeah they have expanded especially the new section yeah that would that would would be account for that because you have oak grve oak grve we have uh North barrial ground those are the two largest portions but the new section down in uh

Oak Grove that would account for more seed and Loom okay keep in mind the prices of that item has gone up as well yeah yes on that lease Council we uh that was that's for a conx box that we uh we leasing for um materials and Equipment can you tell me what that is I don't know it's a conx but it's a metal container that we we store either equipment or uh or

supplies gotcha I didn't know what that was I'm sorry the shed listen I'm a school principal I don't know what the hell that is um and that that um box I guess I'll call it is stored near oako Cemetery at the uh at bollock street bulock street section okay Okay cool so we don't have a situation where that equipment's kind of hanging out to get wet and get destroyed if it's if it's a

specialized piece of equipment that it'll be boxed up excellent all right and then as far as capital items for the cemeteries and I'm probably going to ask this question a few more times were there Capital items that would have been in this budget that were removed that are a priority capital items that are not in the budget or yeah that that may have been in the budget that were removed

obviously for constraints that are are of concern to either one gentlemen I mean define capital capital products that you're talking about it's a general question were there any Capital items that that Mr Demi may have asked for that was removed that he really needs so when you say that are you talking through equipment you're talking sir so yes so there there was a vehicle um it's it's been uh it's

um and then is a front end loader that was it's also being procured right now so we're in good shape as far as that's concerned correct did the council get the list from attorney hum today of capital items that was sent out yes yeah okay we did get it Mr aan do you want to touch on that while we're on that conversation sure yeah good um so that is a uh up to the- minute uh

comprehensive list showing by arpa tranch so as the arpa money was distributed uh there were different um Appropriations made for for different items uh and that includes all of the capital items equipment as well as Rehabilitation of certain facilities including Leon Street um so you can see that um within uh City operations which includes uh Park cemeteries uh DCM um Solid Waste there was a number of

of items that were are either in the process of being purchased or have been purchased correct and and I appreciate attorney I'm doing this would it be possible to then take this Capital Improvements of City operations and indicate where these equipment where this equipment went to as far as your subdivisions cemetaries trees Parks whatever may be get you that okay I appreciate that no problem and

then one more thing that I had that I can't remember what it was going to be I'll hold for now I'll yield thank you thank you councel councel in seat 8 Council Samson I want to go right over to um page 169 right to the community means this is a this is another area that I have a concern with and I think it's more um with the administration Mr Den uh and again it's

it's not the person in the position it's just it's the position this the director of community maintenance has a a massive undertaking to say the least they have a lot of Staff they have a lot of departments under there I'm new to the council and I can't all of my constituent calls usually wrap around here I usually get calls for sidewalks trash um I can't tell you how many times

I've called Mr Deni and this is where all the complaints come from and he always answers the phone he's always got his guys there I'm just one I'm new I can't imagine how many other calls come in this is where the calls come I find that his salary again doesn't line up so you have people getting salaries and um cost of living increases coal is it's not built into his contract whyever it's

not in there but this is a a department that I really when you're looking at the Rog for your next budget that I would think that should be reconsidered and for just that department head if we LED Mr Deni now he is a great asset because he is Fall River through and through he loves the community he loves his guys his women that he's just great um with that salary if he left I don't know who

you would get in that has his passion and his worth ethic to do the same thing and so you know I would as you're looking at your reog and you're looking at maybe not failling positions combining positions I really hope that you take a look at this salary and uh is that a sustainable salary if if he leaves and New Bedford picks him up or Totten picks him up um who's going to

come in for that that has that work ethic and so it it it pains me to see the disparity and some of the um salaries for some of the Departments and especially within these Community maintenance type of positions um his just it just doesn't add up to me and um he's been with us for a long time and it just it it just the rhyme and reason just doesn't make sense here and so I

just I just wanted to point that out and as you're working on this riog you know that's something to take into consideration as we're looking at that position and not the person and that position I just I just think that it just doesn't line up with some of the other salaries and for the workload that comes in there um the community really depends on this department and that position and uh I

just wanted to state that fact so that's all I got for now I will yield council president thank you very much thank you Council counc six counc P thank you um I I got my question answered from a lot of these um Capital items but going into next fiscal year when you have no oper for Capital items within this department more than any Department how are we going to find ways to

duplicate 1.9 million of money that would essentially have been an operational budget if we didn't have oper if want to start on that one I mean I certainly can but I don't want to take away from so I mean it's something that we're going to have to work on the maintenance component to keep those vehicles uh working in uh pre condition and and Equipment um so there is there's going to have to be some maintenance of

those those equipment but we're buying some time at that point by buying the equipment new and just keeping it maintained and just at some point start phasing some of the older stuff out and just making sure that we procure some of the newer vehicles um so that doesn't really answer my question um what I'm what I'm really asking is for the removal over the last couple years because Opera awarded the cities the

opportunities to use one-time Opera money and remove Capital needs from the budget so we took out all the capital that generally speaking would have been in our Municipal budget correct it is not this year it will have to be next year if this department needs any Capital what are we doing to make sure that we're not we're taking two steps forward with with all these great updates and repairs but we're going to

take two steps back if we don't budget next year so my question I guess is how are you planning to add millions of dollars possibly within your departments on one-time money that generally speaking we didn't have to worry about in your Municipal budget the last couple of years so a couple things um I mean you're looking at Al but I can answer of course yeah I know he just

raised his hand that's why oh Fair Al do you want to jump in I mean I'm glad to answer I mean again so that's that's that's part of a pro perative maintenance program so you we we purchased all these new vehicles today and our goal is to make sure that so whatever whatever was ordered is going to supplement the whole department or department so next year we probably don't have to add so many vehicles into

a capital line item so we're going next year we should be fine I mean that's that's the plan the following year is now you can stop phasing in some of the older vehicles and placing some of those into the capital items okay let me just add to that sure um all right so so I think at the start of your question you said what are you going to do to to

replace $1.9 million of that you spent this year on Capital items uh or what are you going to do to find $1.9 million and I think the premise of the question suggested that that every year we need to spend that much and I think that over the last three years effectively um with arpa we have purchased enough new items and replaced enough items that were in disrepair and instituted enough uh I

think Common Sense approaches to maintenance that were not in place I remember my my first year as City administrator um one of the big things that was brought up is is we don't have nice things because we don't te we don't take care of them right uh and one of the things that Mr Alla and Mr denme I think have done uh brilliantly as well as some of the other department heads um

that are here here I see uh Nancy Smith um we have a working Foreman in the cemeteries um Mr Martin who's also doing a wonderful job is to Institute preventative maintenance uh but that's not the whole answer right that just maintains what we've got um I do think that uh it's not you know less than a year that we have before we start need to be replacing things we probably have a two-year window which is why

immediately um attorney hum is working out starting with this this list a comprehensive list of okay what have we bought when are we need to replace it what's the effective life and usefulness of those things um and then actually checking with each of the Departments to understand is our effective life estimate actual like are we using these things more than we expect or less than

we expect um and then that's going to create a schedule for purchase I will tell you that right now um there is a plan for what we will need that is emerging and will probably be done in the next 30 to 45 days it's something we're actively working on there is not frankly a meaningful plan on how we pay for um because there are many things up in the air and right now we cannot afford

uh to replace all the stuff we bought with arpa um without making some really serious uh cuts and other terrible choices yeah and and that's my that's the point I'm trying to make is that we we we I've been an advocate or not of an advocate of utilizing one time money if you take the $2.3 million of free cash that you're using to balance this budget and let's just say you use $1.9

million uh that would have generally been speaking you would have to put in your budget last year this year next year let's just call it a million dollars that's $3.3 million of onetime money that we're going to need to find next year I'm not saying you need a million dollars worth of capital needs but we're going to need to start getting back into the habit of putting in our budget like we did prior to co having

the department heads to allow them to be successful so that if they need a backhoe or if they need equipment they can do so because those days are going to come back and that's what I'm trying a pull from this discussion our game plan today is okay we've got the money but that that slush fund is going away so buying new equipment and maintenance is huge Mr Oliver I commend your your

your your mindset on that that's that's enormous but what do we do going forward about putting that in our budget that's the big aha of the day that we don't have an answer for there is no we don't have an answer for yet that's fine but I know you're thinking about it and it's discussions the biggest thing is how do find new revenue and the biggest way we find new revenue is starting by looking

at what we're spending and figuring out if we have to spend that garbage is is the is the absolute critical point the other one is how are we paying for diamond and if we're expected to pay for it out of the city budget I don't think that there is it's not just a question of Capital Improvements it's a question of personnel it's a question of of critical positions it's it's not just a

question of looking at certain positions and saying that guy's underpaid it's a question question of whether or not that guy still works here um it is a absolute massive burden that we're looking at and you know I don't want to get you know I probably will whatever criticize for using the word burden but you know burden is is a financial term as as well as it is a subjective term yeah of

course um there is a responsibility we have to provide the best vocational education we have I I will never say otherwise I think Diamond you know whether you think it's a good investment bad investment whatever it's a necessary investment okay so we're doing it uh and it's going to be incredible when it's done but understanding how we pay for it um is the biggest thing we're facing

right now and uh I would hope that as soon as this budget's passed the council is open and willing to work with the administration in putting something before the voters to figure out how we're going to pay for that without actually cutting FTE and not buying really anything close to to what we've either bought in the last three years or before because none of that's going to happen every Department that comes

before us is going to have to come to the realization that what what has been over the last 5 years isn't going to be what it's going to be for the next 5 years that's true and I think you're doing a great job of uh uh probably delivering that to your necessary department heads but the slush funds going away we have to figure these things out and I don't know how we're

going to do it I just don't know so U we we'll figure it out I guess um but I yield for now thanks thank you coun no one said this work was easy councilor in seat five Council vice president pero a couple of things uh the cemetery is Mr Martin getting paid service out of rank he is he is why have we not made him director yet of cemeteries and trees have and make

that one thing is that what you're thinking about in your rior of the Rog there is definitely a riog and that that department is definitely involved in it because he does a great J job there um he's got a great staff and you said that there there was a vacant position um but that has been filled been filled okay now um in the tree Department there's one labor and a Forester how much are we paying we

bought a a stump grinder didn't we we are we have yeah who's using it the staff is we we use a councel yeah so DCF going out to remove stumps no the the tree depart the tree department does well you have two people you can't operate that by yourself so those two people go out and do that what have we spent this year on Stump me removals and things because the uh additional

Services contract for tree repair maintenance it was pulled out of the 24 budget but it's in in 25 for $320,000 maybe we need to hire somebody else maybe two more people is cheaper than paying $320,000 where's our minds at guys was that was that a was that a grant counsel that is I believe that was a grant there is a million dollar Grant right now for tree trimming um there's a uh and there's

some new new uh new trees uh grant for new trees so we're we're working off that um so right now we uh we we lost um Mr pirano and he's had to fill us in as best as he could good um he was the tree Warden now we have Mr uh Chris Martin as the tree warden so there's some transition that we're going through right now and the hope is to make sure

that we we get up to speed as fast as possible well you know we did get a grant and they planted a bunch of trees yeah Greening uh the Gateway cities that Grant is still active and it's wonderful that they planted trees but when you plant trees that needs to be maintenance so you planted all these trees all over the city and we 've got two people in the tree Department can

you tell me how that works so they're not th those those those two are not actually doing any maintenance foot for that they're they're taking care of the the older trees how about the auis did the auis say these are the trees you should get that won't fall that have absolutely like root nothing has been added or or maintained except with the Consulting of the arest and does the

tree Department look over the trees down in the south then it's as Tree Farm we have a tree farm did you know that Al we have a what we have a tree farm we do oh you knew that we do yes so who handles the tree Maryanne Wardell I don't believe the tree farm in sou 's active any longer I I don't believe it's been active for some time well it should be it was a

good thing yeah it was but then you can't do it with two people who are cutting stumps and now taking care of trees yeah I I I the trees now are stored on bulock street and we they pretty much store them they're fairly close to when they're going to be planted that will be the you want to beautify the city you got to have people to do that yeah and to maintain that no I age

um the concrete crew that you have how much concrete work are they doing they're working every day full crew are they just doing sidewalks are they doing sidewalks like sidewalk piano they poured 11 yards yesterday I think it was eight today they were going to pour tomorrow but tomorrow is raining in the forecast so they're going to pour Friday tomorrow we'll do sa now would they be able to pour Lafayette

Park no I won't do Lafayette but because what it will do it's a large large job right and uh it will take us weeks months and it will take us away from service in the residence on the small jobs so that one you'd have to yeah bid out bid that job out that one we'll have to we'll have to send think of ways to get money Mr deadmeat Clean Up that yard the yard you

have ambulances back there fire trucks back there I have been asking that that yard be cleaned up if you can't do it I will go to Mid City I will ask them how much they're going to pay us for this I'll hire a tow truck to bring it up I'll help I wish that was the answer can I can I can I can I comment on that we um we've been working through a surplus

program that we have right now within the next week or so uh We've identified U items that have to go out as Surplus we can't we can't just legally get rid of or discard anything uh until we put it through a a surplus program so the vendor that we that we've selected it's zero cost they'll come on in they'll assess they'll they'll put it in the uh and advertise it and and we'll uh we'll

get a profit out of that instead of if you send it to MX City you're not going to get you're not going to get a dime it it's going to be peanuts well before I knew people that bought a vehicle there at auction for $50 and went to Mid City and sold it for 150 correct we're not we're not doing that we're going to follow we're going to follow uh procurement laws and we're going to why

no more auctions we can't do auctions anymore we are this is going to be online it's going to be online auction oh come on people in Far River aren't going to go online auction have an auction right there that day people go down they bid on stuff and they get they do both C they have it people there and online at the same time do they do both they could if if it was a requirement

that we would we wanted to do that is just a labor intensive to to actually have someone there and and and and do an auction so there's a there's a cost to that we had two stoves three three stoves they were so pretty that uh Alan Rumsey took pictures of him remember Seth when I was in the May's office and he had pictures on can we focus more on this the online auction

it is the online auction got us like $300 that could have gone to the library and everybody would see it and it was beautiful pristine condition made in Taunton that was 350 I think you would have gotten more money than that and I've had and I've had uh auctions that I've made triple or quadruple the cost by the auction so so it's lucrative uh and instead of getting $100 will probably get $1,000 so it there's

there's a benefit to that and we're meeting procurement laws well those are my suggestions I'd like to see that cleaned out because it's ridiculous there but you're going to end up with more roing than you already have you remember it two years ago you couldn't you couldn't get to the backyard right now if you when was the last time you went back there counselor uh maybe two months ago I don't go in

the back that often uh I went there once to look at the trolley that kind of it away to see if we could get it repaired but then we got a good deal on a now if you go back there there's there's 300 are taken back business cards so it's even more stuff back there I'll I'll take a ride by again y I usually go down there when it

snows say that it's only June I know but that's usually when I go to bring soup C easy with that I Y thank you counc C to counc Di oh boy can't so Mr zenme yes um C everything did you did you um create your own budget yes we we did we create our own budget okay and the budget that's in this budget book is the budget you presented um not the cemetery budget I

did not create I created the DCM budget so in ter streets and highways streets and highways and solid Wass and solid and snow okay now you have in those two departments 46 employees under you 46 FTE Y correct correct it's a lot of employees to keep track of um where do I want to start oh start with trash I'm on that page what is the price per ton right now for solid what

page is that coun what page is that I'm sorry 164 thank you it's 113 113 uh per ton that's actually the scale rate at Republic 113 per ton for solid waste and recycle recycle we are we at a rate of 110 110 per ton at this present time wow it's a amazing only $3 difference now $3 difference and um it depends if um if it's heavily contaminated they want to you want to

charge you more they've been at to this point they've been good but discussions there are some discussions in Solid Waste and Recycling and as uh the city administrator said um it's it's the industry the MSW industry is just it's flipped on its head I mean it's flipped on its head since China sword and everything right now we're in a we're in a position where we're in a very delicate position

I'm just going to leave it at that well there's absolutely no doubt and and two that's the difference between single stream and and and uh two stream recycling one is much cleaner than the other obviously and um if we were back to we we originally started uh uh where we sorted and break out the Commodities and some municipalities across the country are going back to that where they have the separation at the curb you

can separate your Commodities from your actual uh Plastics that aren't worth anything that's where you can break them down at your MF at your at your recycling and it it'd be worth it but it's so much easier to break it down in single stream put it in the truck and haul it away and let someone else worry about your mess and that's what it is that's where we're at the convenient

Society um so let me go back to your pilot program with your the cardboard how has that worked and what are you looking at moving forward we we are it it's worked out well we had a few hiccups in the uh Stafford Road area as as as you know we had one off the Meridian Street area and we set one up off the south end of the uh Stafford Road area um and hancok Dickerson Street

area we had a couple hiccups there on which week they were going to use and then we did our last audit we had 70 out of 100 uh of the Cs that we actually put our hands on were in compliance and they were out other the D 180 Cuts we had out there we had a a a very high uh uh participation rate almost a 100% partition uh participation rate from the

Meridian Street area uh so we uh looking at the next two areas we'd like to expand to um in the cost-saving effort what I would like to do as a lot of municipalities would do when we're discussing um is instead of buying Brown corrugated cards is to reuse the carts that we recovered from the uh the businesses that we removed and use a brown cover on the old blue cards it will save us 90% of the

cost on the CS other towns use the same Cs and just change the lid covers Danny rioo said that yeah and what we do is we can buy a uniform cart of the same size or different size and just they all we have to buy is the lids change the lids and we'll save it a tremendous amount of money so so so this pilot program by by having the um Cod board being picked up

every other week I'm assuming obviously number one has reduced our tonnage it has because it's not mixed in with all the trash all the time corre correct and what what it does is actually we we we went it we save a ton of 110 we bring that truck to the yard that that easy truck we drop it and then we saved 110 and then we collect because the market fluctuates on a weekly basis

so there's a rate each week depending on what the Kamar is paying so we drop it on the ground and then we sort through some of the contaminants with the machine then we reload it into a packer and then we send it off to uh Brockton Republic and then they pay us they send us a check down the road usually like $30 a ton mhm and uh so I mean with the trucking fee they bring it

up there but the fact that they're actually paying for it where we used to go to Mid City and we pay pay to and it was so now we're winning on both sides mhm so uh expanding it yeah we just have to now is County residents and do a mailing and but we'll talk about that again at our next solways meeting now do you find that because again if your codbo isn't clean it can't it can't

be sent to Brockton so are you finding that people um have gotten better over time with that they have is is it a high percentage of uh you know of of clean cardboard versus the contaminated cardboard the after a while they they they get used to it some people will some people we leave them an oops tag we'll check off uh contaminant that was in there we'll leave it most people they'll say I didn't know

that they just didn't know it couldn't go in there so they won't put it back in there um and they'll comply some people they they just they use that and a lot of times they'll just use that cart as another form of disposal for whatever they have because their green cart is full and they're going to use it and that's where we have our major issues and that that's a more direct approach

but uh for the most part it's worked out well it's worked out really well do you find any of the people uh struggling because it's one week is recyclables the next week is cardboard obviously there are people who can fill a recycle cart every single week yeah what kind of a problem is that presented we we we'll provide in certain cases that does happen and we'll provide them an additional recycle card okay we'll give

them we'll give them a kicker card so if they have a card and they really and but we'll we'll go there and we'll audit their their Co mingle recycle we'll make sure it's clean if they got really clean Co Mingle supposed they have a lot of children in that single family and they they're drinking a lot of drinks or whatever it is we will give them an additional recycle cut or if they have a

65 we'll give them a 95 and it solves their issue and then then they can continue with their corrugated so they'll get that extra week with that cut and it'll it'll get them through their corrugated week so we'll give them we'll provide them what they need so they don't have to contaminate that and they won't be left off well that's good to hear cuz that was a concern I had

right out of the shoot when when you went to every other week cuz I know people that fill a cart a week and sometimes they fill a cart and a half a week uh because like you say depending how many children you have and if you're doing proper Recycling and that sort of thing um page 165 I don't think it was brought up but maybe it was the vacancy for uh ad the administrative head clerk

administrative head clerk yes um right now we have actually we have a a vacancy for administrative head Clerk and we have presently uh posted and we're going to begin interviewing for a uh a head clerk um 9A so this one here we have not begun uh uh searching for and uh I believe that may even be part of the VOR but Mr Al might want to touch on that

yeah because you have the one in the uh solid waste and you also have the one in streets and highways streets and highways were actively uh were actively searching for that at this time and the other four vacancies as well yes um I don't think I really don't have too much for you I think that's um I'm still curious about this list um um I mean if I if if if I were to give

you this list right now you'd be able to say uh whatever streets and highways facilities Parks pretty much for the most part can we do that no I'm curious what what Department's got what vehicles car's going to get we can update I would ask that he have the benefit of some time with the list and making sure it's right all right I I don't want to uh put something out there that's not correct and

then we have to correct it the two um Explorer hybrids let me ask at least on that went to what departments I have one and Mr Dem has the other okay um they're that's that's gas and um uh battery yeah hybrid would be um okay with that that's all I have for now thank you I yield thank you anybody else Council SE 7 counc propos going back to um the business Strat conversation has any

analytics come out of that of where immediate cost savings have come out of canceling that program at all I know the last time we talked in subcommittee we mentioned that once it was done they were going to have some at least early information of what the impact is do we have anything as of yet or is it still too early to determine it's a little bit early to determine um so what we

actually have initially like in sort of the first month that we have some numbers is it seems that some things have gone up and so the question is were you know people people taking business trash putting it into home trash and you know trying to sort of gain the system a little bit to to overcome the fact that business trash went away um my hope is that if we actually have a little more

data we're going to see that even out uh and if we don't see it even out um we're able to actually figure out why it's not lowering the way we expect it because we're taking quite a bit of trash out of the out of the stream yeah and as far as businesses that were pulled from the program did you hear from any of them as far as the struggle of trying to find a

vendor to handle their trash as far as a dumpster company is concerned we got a couple calls in the 64 okay uh it was a very minor reaction given the number of businesses we were talking about how many were all together remind me for a minute 3 well in the initial contract there's 300 but we're talking about something but there was about 500 just over 550 actual uh addresses but the

themselves that were actually probably close to a th000 as the as Mr Akin said um we collected a lot of carts I haven't I I want to refrain from giving an actual number but some some hid their carts and some are they just I drove by one the other day actually we' yet to physically collect the carts yeah so as some of them try to put them out our contractor will see them they are very

aware of these uh uh addresses and they no longer want to collect them either so they'll they'll notify us we'll go there and we'll take them full back to our yard and they'll no longer have them but they will no longer service those areas either but um that so it's been effective um and they expected it they knew it was coming I I have to I will give you all compliments the fact that

something that has been talked about a long time and you guys delivered on it so you know I think that's Council Dion I'm sure you can say that how long were you talking about business trash for a long time three or four years it's it's nice to see I finally came to fruition so we worked directly off for one of councelor Dion's lists yes in uh I I remember the actual when she brought

that list forward myself and Mr Kennedy went and piggybacked off it and uh we actually went to Airport Road myself and collected some of the carts she had on her initial list so yeah she did yeah so uh you know again Kudos on that um if we could move to streets and highways for a quick second here um on page 168 vehicle r&m says it's up 33% so about $50,000 maintenance trucks waiting

on new trucks are those the trucks you've already gotten we are we are we are right now uh Miss Oliva just spoke to me the other day he's got queued up some F250s and some 350s I believe 550 550s those are the heavy ones and those are the what really those are the ones that do a lot of the uh P Paving and so they'll be coming in but um we had we

had combined last year three lines that all pertained uh to maintenance and it was a reduction in the number yep so we we kind of felt through it and uh now I believe we believe that this 200 is a realistic number and it's still a reduction from what it initially was so our maintenance division did a great job being more cost effective over the course of the last year and that's

that's due to them uh we when we put our uh GPS systems in Verizon also gave us a free preventive maintenance system that came along with it and they've been inherit into it and the prevent of Maintenance just pops up and he just been sticking to it and I attri I attribute a lot of that to that and uh they got four guys down there that just do a great job that's good um uh two

lines down is something that I'm I'm happy to ask about is the graffiti machine yep so either with you gentlemen can answer this so 50,000 last year 50,000 this year I'm just curious I know I've seen it myself guys out there you know knocking out that graffiti based on what you've done thus far is that appropriate as far as line item is concerned we actually picked up a vendor out of rhod Island that

sells us the material at a third of the cost that we were paying last year nice and um the graffiti crew does a great job and with keeping them even more busy is recidivism they just keep soon as you remove um some graffiti off a large area it just presents a it seems to present them a new palette a blank canvas to go right back it's it's like rolling me up

to a buffet and I just want to get out it witnessed it first but that's what it is and just and within a couple of days they tag it so what we do is we go out photograph it send the police and and then then we just take it down again one of the things I had asked was and Mr Al you you and I went back and forth on this was

the adding of the reporting system on the new City website for graffiti you know yeah so do you know how many complaints were submitted it's out of curiosity I do not not not off the top of my head but I can get you that okay and then I'll ask the next question how many how much graffiti has been removed to this point oh wait I can get you that I'll send you that I'll

I knowbody that Miss Al maybe like three months ago sent me a list of things that have been targeted I'm just curious you know as an update where we are because it's definitely a good investment to keep our city clean is what I'm looking at there um on page 169 going down to the payroll details just the last um few last four um job class descriptions have no people attached to them so vacant

positions we have had issue um hiring in one of the we one of these fellas was with us for a little while he was a CDL driver he left two weeks ago for more money we've had C the guys come apply they see they see our rates and uh they never call us back or um we had one guy when through the whole physical process um background check orientation came down spent the days for safety two

days for space safety train and never returned he sent us an email said hey appreciate the opportunity but it was the wages it's hard even with the now we offer uh free CDL training and and so we're hoping to entice some more people but it's the wages what is the cost what is the cost of the city for the CDL training the CDL training it we have a great trainer uh Vic faras and uh he's a

great trainer and we we we get them at a very good rate very good rate and uh any candidate that comes in they get free training and and normally it would be5 to $10,000 on the outside for someone to come in and for it to go anywhere and obtain uh training for a c so what's the rate I have one question is rate yeah um um I believe it's 15 I believe we pay

him500 per as a vendor per per CDL driver I believe so yeah to be CDL driver and that but that's for him to begin mhm and finish right to the the end and uh it it's been he's been successful and um so and there is no is there no stipulation on on that free CDL training if a person leaves yeah they if they leave within a two year if they leave within two years they have to

reimburse this and we you've had that happen already no the one the one fellow that just left he already he came in with his CDL so he didn't have okay so it didn't apply no all right and then the last three positions I don't know what that is special hme EO 1A can you what is that th those are drivers those are all drivers yeah those are drivers so I'll propose the same thing I

mentioned before to Mr Aken are we in another situation here where Amendment combined increase a little bit save a little bit of money is that a possibility here ahead of the rork this one's a little bit different okay um is it Union is well there's a union aspect to it that and these are Teamsters so that is not being negotiated at this point gotcha okay fair enough it affects many more people um so whereas what we

were talking about before you're talking about a very small group specialized once you start doing drivers you're dealing with CDLs more complicated it's a much bigger group and the cost of the city could be significant it doesn't mean we shouldn't talk about it because we need to figure out a way to get CDL Drivers um but I think right now we're in a bubble um and I think you're going

to see that maybe come to earth a little bit and if we're just in an arms race um I think there's a lot of cities right now that are hiring at premium rates that in the next couple years they may not be able to afford cities and towns fair enough um can we are we all still jumping around like trees parks and all that good stuff sure keep going okay it's all the same

people so all right that's fine so let's go to Parks if we could well Parks AR here yet no not Parks Okay I lied no fair enough fair enough uh back to trees sorry it's all one list here guys come on if you listen you know what let's call it down no I'll do trees finish up with this I'll do trees first done so the the new trees new trees that are

planted that's a contract to be maintained correct excuse me c the new trees that are are being planted like like the ones along Eastern Avenue that's a contract that's takes care of those it's not us that takes care of them right we maintain them yes we maintain them moving forward as of when what's the timeline as of when they planted them yeah we plant them and we maintain them the grant pays the grant

will pay for the trees okay because my understanding in my conversation with Mr Pino and I may I may be incorrect in saying this that there was a certain timeline from when planted to a certain time when there was a contract in place that would take care of those trees well they have they have to take the tree has to take so it has to live yeah so once it's lived and it's it's it's vibrant

it's it's it's on us yeah point of information I don't know maybe if it's getting confused with um a few years ago you had the uh South End where every anybody wanted to get trees could get trees and if you took advantage of that um the first two years you were required to water them regularly to make and maintain them to make sure they stayed alive and they came every year to

monitor it and to make sure the trees were healthy so you might be confusing the two programs that's that's probably what it is and you're probably right thank you counselor appreciate that um now I'll move to Parks if we could okay yeah can we just do one more question here before they leave no come on down please let's just do the parks they're not going to leave they're going to stay

there because they're part of all of it when get his Park's question in we'll be allet change want me pants Oh I would absolutely approve that I would just prer you not have you can ask your par question councelor yeah just give me one second Mr President get to the right page I need to be on here there we go hi Nancy hello there Nancy Smith Parx director thank you um so page

150 other repairs and maintenance up $5,000 thoughts my thoughts what I guess the question is why the increase okay on what exactly um the other repairs and maintenance for $5,000 was um there was not uh bathrooms at the Bicentennial Park and my understanding was there was some concern about those bathrooms not being open so there is a porta pooty rental there now and that's the

$5,000 for that one porta potty for the for the entire year M wers and it is the just the bathrooms at Bicentennial not they open for um functions but we can't just open them and leave them unattended so what we do is the pter party when the gentle when the workers come in in the morning they go they open it up and before they go home at in the evening at

2:15 or 2:30 they'll close it up and that part of city property correct yes okay and then as far as that Porta poty is concerned is it closed at what after 5 no it's closed by the men the men go home at 3: oh okay so before they leave their shift the last thing would be to come up the Vault and lock that lock it and go okay next slide item is other

purchase Services again up $5,000 if you could Define what other purchase services are well other purchase services that would be we have an alarm company monitor the building we have um we have a um a chairlift in there mandated because our office is on the second floor so that would have to be um inspected um and some of the other purchase Services would be let me see if I have that me here

um so we also had um a uh playground inspection that came out of our money so that was other purchase Services um Bruce's Saw Shop that would be other purchase services because they're specialized okay what playground was that all of them all of them all of them okay on page 151 FY 24 had 16 FTE FY 25 has 19 FTE so if my figuring out was right you added two laborers and a foreman it actually was

three laborers three so was three labor was Al together yes okay and of the three you added we now have four vacancies right I if you recall when I came before you um previous there was one vacancy yeah but that that vacancy was utilized to upgrade the workers from a $16 an hour wage to a $20 an hour wage and also to pay some Severance of employees that went from Parks to the

school department so in order to not exceed my budget M I had to use that line item vacancy to fund that so as far as those vacant positions are concerned again I'm going to assume that we're trying to find people um back to my original question again what I said before can another situation that we can so those are new positions those are all new um at least a three added um uh

at the um the urging uh of director Smith um she indicated she she needed the additional folks in order to do the mission of the parks um and I think everyone understood that that's she's certainly is in the best position to make that determination so I think maybe we can see if we can hire people uh at that rate because the rate was just increased okay uh and again this would

be uh another one where uh it would be bargained and it would affect many more people than just the five we were talking about in facilities good next next is on page 150 is the Civic celebrations line item mhm can you elaborate on what Civic celebrations that that $445,000 is expended on Civic celebrations is basically your 4th of July it's for your fireworks and uh purchase of some veterans flags that we

use at The Monuments that are in the Parks and that and that cost has not increased at all uh we have a three-year we've entered into a three-year renewable contract with them okay so um right now and and I have discussed that where we probably are going to have to increase that the next time because what they do is the the fireworks and the barge come from that particular set of

money so if the barge increases for the fireworks company the only way they're going to stay within that 45 is to decrease the amount of fireworks so the next time that we do go out which I believe this is the second year of a third year contract second um so the next time we do that we're going to have to increase that cuz it was actually at 40 we increased to 45 so I'm going to

assume the next time we do it again we'll be increasing it again okay and then last is just a comment on page 148 on the mission you got a incomplete sentence there says numerous Memorial greens and monuments and now assume some of the I don't know that probably was when they printed it up okay but I just yeah sorry it's it's the educator me I'm sorry I I was wondering what was coming next so me

too all right that's all I have for Parks I'll for now I'm very eager to see con C5 just a question that I had back to Charlie um the tra the uh trash inspectors that you have we have three individuals that go out and look in these bins correct we have four we we have four including the foreman yes okay okay so there's a foreman for three men that have whatever a check in

trash um how many citations have they given out and what amount of money have we encumbered how much money have we received from that Council I'd have to could I'm not I'm not asking you to have it off the top of your head but can you get that back to me I will I I I will in fact um because for four people that we paying I don't think we're getting that money back in

tickets I get where do they pay the tickets tickets at city clerk's office uh maybe through the president to the clerk she Mrs clerk uh do you know how many Madame clerk have come in and paid on total number of tickets yeah no but are people coming in paying oh yes more than before Oh yes because now they are at um we we take the time to add them into munice so when someone comes for a

permit they'll they will not be able to obtain a permit unless all of their fees and fines are paid so you know I'm glad that they forces and so we entered IM munis and so it's kind of we're we're all trying I'm glad they put it IM munist but if somebody didn't pay that and they needed a plumber and they were com to City Hall for a plumbing permit the plumers is

going to go downstairs and see if they owe anything and then they're not going to get the permit so they're going to have a plumbing problem but they can't fix that I'm sorry guys that sounds really stupid to me because if I need a plumber or an electrician or um doing something on my house and if I owe a a ticket or I owe a water bill or something I'm going to be penalized not

getting a permit I thought we had done away with that that's back again but some of these tickets counil they they come right down to littering uh come down to what H littering they come up for littering they come up for uh bulky items mattresses some m a mattress disposal of mattress $50 in a few couple of mattresses people move out U they don't notify the property owner they just bail

out they'll leave a whole apartment full of furniture right on the sidewalk in uh no paying for and we have to collect it it's a hazard does and then who gets fined is the landlord the property owner the prop and I I don't think it's fair but that it it's so well they're trying to think of any way they can to secure the money back I understand that but but

I think um I think that's I wish that there was a better way I I wish there was a better way um now back to PX um your Foreman I heard he was retired no yes he did retire so you don't have a foreman now I have someone filling in right now service out of rank and we can't just hire that person versus is it easier with service out of

rank or I think we got to make sure that they're able to do the job okay um Lafayette Park I got a call this week about it the the playgrounds there what are you doing with the all of the playgrounds Lafayette I guess they inspected it there was swings that weren't good or something maybe a slide it was all L that I don't believe that was the case there was some

minor things that we did and we did we did make those improvements to Lafayette Park so I'm not sure what they are referring to so that that playground is all set that playground should be yes I'm not saying it's you know 100% you know best playground in town but I'll I'll call you somebody asked me about it this is what I think about the parks I think that we have a lot of

parks that are not being utilized we don't have the little leagues we had before um I was telling them I think um last week or something at a council meeting uh diamond is renting a park in Swan in Swansea for like $30,000 for two years Lafia Park is around the corner from them and nobody uses it like I wish they had um but of course we would need to do some work there but we don't have

enough football fields we got kids being thrown out of you know uh dery because that's like a pristine feeli and it's you know special for games and they rent it out but football fields soccer fields uses are soccer fields too they don't pay for it so they may be renting a field for baseball but they do utilize our soccer field for their soccer teams and they don't pay and where what soccer

field they use in britland but even behind britland there's another big grass area I have a lot of people that want to play soccer can't play soccer I know somebody uh talked to the May and I about the Ecuadorian volleyball that they couldn't get it down C if you have questions related to this please stick T 15 minutes but let's let's let's um talk about what it's all about Parks how we

going to get the money to redo these Parks into what is going to be be usable for people because we have parks that no one is using just you how many people go to Little League games today unless you're going to Maplewood I mean I I think that I don't know if it's you to look at all the parks and see what we can do I think we

need to do I think most of the parks I think most of the parks for the most part are utilized Kennedy Park is utilized um how about Lowa Kennedy yes ler Kennedy is no longer utilized but I have said and this has been in multiple conversations if we're going to put pickle ball courts and we're going to put Ecuadorian soccer and we're going to put splash pads these people are going

to need a place to park so if that's going to be turned into the parking lot then there's a pel of land that we turn into the parking lot to accommodate all of those those um activities because you cannot have those activities and have those people parking on the street they will completely displace those people in the neighborhood and it will not be a good scen so as we're saying we improve

these parks and we do these types of things we also have to anticipate where are these people going to park most of your parks are in the midst of a neighborhood surrounded by three Deckers that have two three and four vehicles in each apartment so it has to be in the plan to determine where are these people going to is there any plan or study with you or the park

board to do an overview of all the parks and deal with parking as well I did put that in this in my requests and and it it it wasn't funded so that's a p peeve of councilor kadim he's been on that for a while he wants a study to be done and I did put it in we've had some discussions and it wasn't in the final budget so that's not something

that would be for me to address that would be for someone else to address why it it wasn't there so I mean should the plan be done absolutely I think you know there are companies that go and say okay this park is 54 Acres it has three usable baseball fields in it it has a a splash pad or this or that it requires this many hours of manpower to maintain

this much and I think that that would be money well invested to be honest I think so too but it's not something that I think we can do inh housee because inhouse you tend to say oh I think we can get by with a little l a little less or whatever I think it needs to be and I think that's what councilor kadim was referring to he's not here tonight I

wish he were and you know what let me just tell outside Source let me just clarify now I forgot to do it earlier but Council came called me he had a prior commitment he could not make it Council Paula is at his son's graduation at diamond high school so he's not here as well so unfortunately I I failed to say that earlier but that's why those two councils are not here today oh

that's right I forgot you know I mean I just just think that we need to take a look revamp it I don't care how it's done to to utilize things more and the other thing is bathrooms drive people crazy because we have these bathrooms we built them isn't there some kind of a system I mean I know in some communities that I've been to you have to purchase a

card and there's a swipe to get you in so you know who's swiping and going in at that time it's like 10% of the population Maybe are not respectful and don't do the right thing but 90% do but those 90% get penalized for 10% of disrespectful individuals and it's we don't have that many bathrooms left in the Parks I'll be no but you have some at britlyn Park you have some at B

Centennial Park you have some in your office yes they had the doors going the right way that would help but with that I yield Stephanie you want to come down please we got 10 minutes left we're going to wrap this up we're not going past 10:00 come back so we have it come down and then if anyone has any questions for traffic and parking as well as snow maral please ask them now um councel

Dion you're next do you have a question do you have your hand up or not for the park Department anybody anyone at the we're going to wrap this up in 10 minutes so they we make the people come back tomorrow it's up to the council I don't want them to have to come back if not tomorrow we it be carried over to Monday sorry come back Monday correct all right yeah because I I think I

probably have 10 minutes just for the Park myself I mean you want her to come back so let me start with this seeing that my the council brought it up I brought with me coincidentally uh minutes from the city council meeting of 2022 Council Pereira asked if the city provided loom for the maintenance of fields so this is very brief Nancy Smith stated that her Department spends approximately $155,000 per year on loom

lime Ballfield clay and Speedy dry counselor Sean kadim stated that he would like to have a capital plan including a vision for the parks he then stated that there may be Grant funds available to assist with the project on a motion made by Council Michelle Deon and seconded by Council Peckham it was unanimously voted to amend resolution number three by adding the following be it further resolved that bids be

obtained and a cost provided to the city council for a strategic master plan for all parks and that it be researched whether open space and recreational grant funding is available for these improvements this has been asked for year after year after year but as she just stated it still is not in the budget to do that so that's just negligence on somebody's part in my opinion so that's the end of that

conversation one page 150 and 15 uh page 150 so the city will look for outside funds to do many of the identified projects we don't have any list of identified projects what are the identified projects I I did provide a listing of identified projects well excuse me let me ask you the same question I asked Mr Den I'm sorry did you present a budget did you compile a budget yes and what

we're looking at is this your bu budget minus some requests yes okay so you had identified projects but they're not listed here yes so does anybody know I had identified a few projects that were possibilities and I was like whatever projects can be funded I'd be I don't have a priority whatever the administration feels would be best funded I have no priority with that it was um I had put $300,000 in buildings

and grounds maintenance and I had put $250,000 for that open space plan and that was on the on the request of the board of par commission as you as you know we had you had them down here as a matter of fact Amber Burns was here with me tonight because we had a a previous par board meeting earlier tonight and if we had been heard earlier she was going to stay um but that

$250 estimate came from um and I believe I've said this before from the uh same people who did the study at the Oak gr Cemetery we asked them for an estimated price of what it would cost to do the same type of study for parks and that was the price they gave us do I think it's a little bit High yes but I think we have to start somewhere I think we

have to put the project out there and see what kind of bids we a pack but I did put in 300,000 and I did put and and they entailed basketball courts they entailed fencing um it entails some drainage work I think I have my original thing here um demolition to that pool building down the bottom because I'm like if we're beautifying the bottom of that Kennedy Park that pool building is unsightly and

it's now being you know they're taking the aluminum off of it now and it's just Jesus turning to a did you by any chance have the door for the shed near the basketball court at Kennedy Park on your list um I don't know how much but someone had someone had called me and said that they had spoken to you and that was something that I've had Mr Alero we've worked we have quotes for

that we do have quotes that's going to be done because we invested a lot a lot a lot of money into Kennedy Park and when I went to the park and I because I live down in the South End so and one day I went by because the people to see see who's playing basketball what they're utilizing whatever and I and here's the door rusted um rotting the door frames

rotting door knobs gone the lock is gone you got one of those little flip the latch things you buy at the hardware store and put a padlock on it's horrible that that landed on my lap I will I will take care of that that's that's something that we were getting quotes that's a specific size door it has to be made so we're going to we're going to get a quote on that that would

be great because Kennedy Park looks amazing and and that just looks like the the the city dump um some of the other some of the other items that um uh Miss Smith mentioned we did we we are looking at getting um some work done and doing an an overlay or repairing the basketball courts we found some funds that we're part of an old um um an old Bond and we're we're going to utilize

that specific speically for that work we've gotten some quotes in now I have to procure that properly and uh work it from there so because obviously $75,000 for maintenance 25 Parks 25 Parks if she's using 15,000 for lime and Loom Etc brings it down to $2400 per Park to maintain what can we maintain with $2,400 when you're talking pickle ball courts tennis courts skate pox splash pads um I mean in this day

and age it something minor is $500 so obviously I mean 75,000 for maintenance is is absolutely it's absurd and and and Council Gade has talked about that many many times so we invest millions of dollars in our parks and we don't maintain anything because we don't put enough money in the budget to maintain our parks and that's a shame just want to remind everyone we're going to wrap this up in about 3 minutes in

order questions we have and whoever needs to come back Monday we'll continue at do you have any money in your budget for tennis course Nets pickle ball Nets basketball nets uh volleyball nets it would have to come out of that 75 and and and what's the cost of a of a of a net for a tennis court just for the sake of argument couple hundred bucks couple hundred bucks so where does the sake of

the argument is and the thing that no one ever can even wrap their head around is park bench is $1,500 a park bench yeah so you replace one park bench you've got $900 to maintain that park for the rest of the year be a lot cheaper if Diamond builds them for us so you know park benches you got people that build park benches all day long at Diamond High

School you all that no I well we have to adjourn I mean I get a bunch more but you keep going counselor keep going you got two minutes um so one of the things I want to address try to address quickly is the issue with the 19 full-time positions so the original page that we received had a total of 77968 that was a shortage of $135,000 because the three vacancies

were not added into the total so today we get a sheet saying funds will be transferred from Reserve if positions are able to be filled so basically they defunded the funded vacancies now that makes no sense to me everybody else has has funded vacancies these three funded vacancies get to the money gets taken away and it's if you fill the positions we'll put the money in I don't know how you do that I don't know how

you don't have positions and fill them oh my God and then when you zero it out you still leave the position there because it's still showing full-time employees so you're listing you have 19 full-time employees but you just reduced it by three and it's not in the appropriation I I just think this is totally inappropriate um and those either I don't know I don't know how you handle it I don't know how you handle it

but you essentially took away uh the funding for three positions that weren't in the appropriation to begin with all right councelor thank you Mr President if I if I may you may miss McCarthy has been sitting here all night long um and I think it would be only fair if we could just line fire her question does anyone does anyone have a question from m m I have one I just have one I do

not small couny 2 can you yield so we can get m m she won't have to come back thank you I will yield till Monday couny five Council vice president the only question that I have for the administration is that there the people in in Miss maa's uh office they both have a lot of seniority so they have a lot of vacation time and they should be able to take their vacation time there's

so much work that needs to be done with signs Halford street is 30 m an hour Bedford Street is 25 that's crazy because the state changed the law that now they're going to be 25 miles an hour so her crew has to go out and do signs all over the city to fix that they're out there they're bringing in money um what's your question for M MCC so I would say she needs another worker and

that uh I'm very serious about so if we could make an amendment to the budget she needs somebody there okay with that I yield thank you coun 7 counc propos yeah real quick thank you for the details in your budget it was very helpful and it eliminated 25 million questions I had good so 53,000 increase in local receipts in traffic I'm assuming it's driven by the new ticketing system that is correct yeah

and what is the plan with the line item that is $60,000 for me upgrades I'm assuming there are additional meters that still need to be replaced to the new system correct how many are you looking to replace in in this coming year so this new this new system is actually the parking ticket enforcement system okay so all of our parking Control Officers are going to receive new handheld devices um we will then

have a direct connect to the registry which is huge that's going to be super beneficial to the city and to the department stream absolutely um we'll then have access access to the registered owners instantaneously um once our officers are out there and they do issue a parking ticket the photo of the violation will come up on the parking ticket as well so that's also going to save a lot of time

as far as appeals um because at that point they're going to see that they are in in violation and they will hopefully essentially pay the parking ticket within the 21 days got it as far as the replacement of the old um coin operated yeah things whatever they're called now mhm um what line item covers that to update them to like the one we have in front of the library for example so the

Met meters correct so we have currently we have 47 kiosks well 46 cuz one was actually damaged due to a motor vehicle accident um as of right now we're not looking to purchase any more kiosks um but we are fully digital on the meters so we no longer have any of the crank meters anymore so are they allal no fully digital I mean just coins it's just a coin collection but it's

it's a digital meter it's no longer the crank meter so no plans to replace those currently no no okay and then if after this meeting if you could possibly get the statistics on those new parking meters as far as the usage numbers all that good stuff you don't have to that now another day would be great um and then the last question was an odd question I think for the uniform allowance for crossing guards mm I

didn't even know they had a uniform to be honest so it's not so much uniform allowance um it's a clothing allowance essentially for any winter clothes any winter coats boots um we Supply them only with their best St so we only Supply them so that's that line item on page 178 correct it wasn't increased um it was $50 it went up to 200 cool thank you very much I yield any further

questions M mcy toj toj before we adjourn is everyone all set with Mr den and Al ala as well or we need them come back on Monday do you need somebody back I think they're all set as far as I ER because we're still going to go back to Parks we'll have to be here right Parks Monday so Mr Den is all set then okay just want to make sure make you're clear entertain a motion

to me second all in favor oppos city council finances now agour see you Monday sorry

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