AI-generated transcript of Building & Grounds Subcommittee Meeting

[Unidentified]: Hi. Hi. Hi.

[Kreatz]: Okay. So I see. Okay, Paul. It's there. John. So it looks like I'm just waiting for Chad. But I think, Oh, I think I just saw him come in. Okay. So I think what I'll do is I'm just going to start reading the agenda so we can get started. Please be advised that on Wednesday, May 26 from 5pm to 7pm, there will be a buildings and grounds subcommittee meeting held through remote participation via Zoom. Pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions of the Open Meeting Law, General Law, Chapter 30A, Section 18 in the Governor's May 15, 2020 order, imposing strict limitations on the number of people that may gather in one place, this meeting of the Medford School Committee will be held via remote participation to the greatest extent possible. Specific information and general guidelines for remote participation by members of the public and or parties with the right and or requirement to attend this meeting can be found on the City of Medford website at www.medfordma.org. For this meeting, members of the public who wish to listen to watch the meeting may do so accessing the meeting link contained herein. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure the public can adequately access proceedings in real time via technological means. In the event that we are unable to do so, despite best efforts, we will post on the City of Medford community media websites in audio or video recording transcript and or comprehensive record proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting. The meeting can be viewed through Medford Community Media, Comcast Channel 22, Verizon Channel 43 at 5 p.m. Since the meeting will be held remotely, participants can log or call in by using one of the following links. Medford Public Schools is inviting you to schedule a meeting. backslash J backslash 91360156778, enter media ID number 91360156778, or you can try calling, enter one of the numbers with your mobile phone or landline, 13126266799, that's one of the numbers. enter the meeting ID number 913-6015-6778. Additionally, questions and comments can be submitted during the meeting by emailing kcretz at medford.k12.me.us. And my last name is spelled K-R-E-A-T-Z. So K-K-R-E-A-T-Z at medford.k12.me.us. The email, you must contain your first and last name, your Medford street address, your questions or comments. And so we're ready to begin. I'm going to, you know, of course, start with welcoming everybody for making it today on this very wonderful, warm, hot day. It seems very summer-like today. And so we have a lot of agenda items. So I'm wondering if I could get maybe one of my subcommittee members could just keep an eye out on the timing to just kind of move this along so that we don't go over the time. So if, you know, Paulette or Paul, if you could just kind of keep an eye on it. Yeah. Are we on till 630 or till 7? Okay. 7 p.m. And that's what it's posted that way at City Hall and on the agenda. Yeah, so we got the updated invite last night on that. Okay, just wanted to make sure. Yeah, no problem.

[Van der Kloot]: And earlier, it'd be okay.

[Kreatz]: Exactly. And that's why, you know, if we can keep an eye on the time and, you know, I'll do that. Thank you. And feel free to move it along. I don't mind at all. And so let's start with the roll call. Yes.

[Ruseau]: You want to move a motion to adjourn?

[Kreatz]: Just kidding. A little too soon. Yeah, no problem. Yep. So I can see that Mr. Russo is here. Mr. Russo? Yes.

[Unidentified]: Okay.

[Kreatz]: And Ms. Van der Kloot? Yes. And Ms. Gretz? I'm here. Okay. So there we go. Three present, none absent. Okay. So I'm ready to begin and I'm going to start. Chad Fallon, Mr. Fallon, he is up first. So I'm going to let you take it away, Mr. Fallon. Go ahead.

[Fallon]: Good evening, everyone. Thanks for having me. Definitely one of my favorite subcommittees to join because it's a chance for me to brag about all the great things our school's doing. Kind of ironic, I was out in the yard with my son and we were splashing around with the T-shirt I have on. I don't know if any of you watch HGTV, but demo day, Chip and Joanna Gaines and that show Fixer Upper. I thought how appropriate that I'm wearing this shirt now for what I'm about to present. So anyways, nice to see you all. I'm gonna share my screen. I also have one of my colleagues on the call, Richard Cormio, electrical instructor extraordinaire. He's going to jump in when we talk about a project in his space. Okay, so similar slide to what I had last time, but I think it's just important to remind people that every time we do a project, we take advice from our program advisory council. We just had a meeting last week. We had about over a hundred people in attendance, which was really good. We still did it virtually. Typically when we're in the space, we're able to, you know, they're able to make more recommendations on the space itself and the equipment. We weren't able to do that this time, but we still had productive meetings. I think it's important to notice, to note at this point in my tenure at Medford Vocational Technical High School, we've invested over $1 million into the school. And that's gone into almost every one of the programs that I oversee. And that includes grant funding, private donors, and money from our regular operating budget. So I'm really proud to say that our total investment over four years has been over $1 million to enhance the programs in our space. And we're really proud of that. So update on projects. Whenever I present, I always have an issue with my screen. And there we go. So the former cosmetology, our next project happening now is the former cosmetology space downstairs on the first floor will be converted to the new graphic design program. As the students were removing the ceiling from that space, we noticed that there was some potential issues we wanted to have looked at. So John McLaughlin and his crew were there to help us. He's had some engineers come in and we're waiting on some quotes for some work that needs to be done before we close up that ceiling again. Nothing major. but it's still something that needs to be looked at for some structure. We want to make sure that everything is structurally sound. So with that said, as soon as that's done, hopefully this year we'll be able to maybe do a week or so before summer, and then we'll be starting that first off in the fall. Exterior work that we've done over the last few weeks is we've redone our landscaping in the front of the school. We've repaired a very large cement break that was at the walkway. I'll show you pictures in a minute. We've built a new house in electrical, and I'll have Rich Cormier talk about that when I have the pictures. Basically, this is 12 additional student work booths. As you know, electrical is always one of our most highly sought after programs, and in an effort to make sure students have all that they need to be successful in this program, we've added 12 additional booths, and Rich has designed another house. So in the program, if you've been in there, there's what we call the house, which students actually will wire a kitchen, a living room, a dining room, I'll let Rich describe that more, but we've built a second one with carpentry. Recap of this year is we did complete the cosmetology salon. We'll have a ribbon cutting for that in the fall. We completed the renovation of the programming and web design shop, and we've built additional storage in Bistro 489. Each one of these projects was done by students. Still left for this year is we're building picnic tables for Bistro 489 for the deck, and we're going to have umbrellas in them as well. That's our last project of the year. And then the last thing we're doing with CCSR is we're going to be installing a micro pantry outside of our front door. So here's some pictures. I am super proud of this. This was a long time coming. The front of our school needed a facelift big time. So this was a combination of efforts. It was our construction and craft laborer students, our carpentry students. They were able to kind of design how we wanted it to look. I told them what I wanted. I said, I wanted some different height. I wanted some low growth and I wanted things that weren't going to be so dependent on water because, you know, not everyone's always there. So I'm really proud of the way that came out. This was a project that was amazing. Our cement sidewalk in front of the school was falling apart. And to have this done by an outside vendor would have cost thousands of dollars, but this was right up, I mean, this was just right up our alley. It's actually the construction craft labor students. So they were responsible for, we rented a couple extra jackhammers and we jackhammered everything out of that space, dug it out. and prepared it for new cement. And then we had the cement mixer truck came and dumped it. And these are just a few pictures of what the kids took part in. They were so excited. These, this like a couple of weeks of this project, there was so much excitement. Of course, you know, a little bit of less excitement inside the office as I'm trying to be on a Zoom call and I have five Jack cameras going off, but still that's Vogue Ed, you know, it was great. It was like just a day in the life. So this was a group project for sure. I think my favorite part was the picture on the left. I was out there watching them with this, this float that they were using to make it all smooth. And then they, um, went in with a special tool when all was said and done to make it look just perfect. And there's what it looked like before. And here's what it looks like now. Pretty professional. If you ask me.

[Kreatz]: Wow, beautiful.

[Fallon]: In Bistro 489 one thing that was built that was not built when the space was constructed was storage, and the only storage they had was a walk in freezer and fridge, and like a very small dry storage area so if you remember when you walk into the restaurant from the school, along that right side of the wall was just dead space. So I kind of came up in my mind with, let's just put up a wall, let's do some barn doors. And that's all I had to say for Mark Lumino, my carpentry teacher and his students to say, okay, we got this. I said, barn doors, that's all I want. Next thing I knew they had Harvey doors ordered. They had a wall designed and they had a wall up within a couple of weeks. And now that this picture was before it was painted, but now it matches beautifully, looks great. You'd never even know it wasn't there. So now that's really an additional piece of storage for the shop. Mr. Cormier, please take it away.

[jO3ADh2wzWc_SPEAKER_05]: How are you doing, everybody? So we found out that our program has expanded. Next year we'll probably have around 60 students total. So we needed more space. Right now, the amount of workspaces we had was about 45. So I asked the Carpentry folks to help us out. They had a student who was very interested in CAD. So he designed the new house, which is similar to the old house with a couple of changes. What you're looking at there is the upper left-hand corner is during construction, how they built the walls and how to keep them in place. You see the students working up on the upper right. And then in the center there is one of the designs that Adam Burns and I worked together on, We wanted to give the students an example of wiring in metal studs, because, you know, when you work in industry, it's not all wood, sometimes there's metal involved. So we had the confidence to build a metal stud wall. But really the focus of this and the thing I'm really most excited about is we're going to teach the students how to fish wires into old homes. So what you're looking at on the left is a corner that we put sheetrock. Then there's a piece of plexiglass, another piece of sheetrock, more plexiglass, and then sheetrock that goes down the wall. And the students will learn how to cut a hole into the sheetrock, and they'll be able to see how a snake goes through a ceiling, because there's joists and there's strapping up there. And that's what the plexiglass is for, so they can see what happens to the snake when it's in the ceiling. And then they'll come down and go into the switches. So I think that this is gonna be something unique. I haven't heard of anybody else doing this. And I think that Adam and I have built something here that's gonna be pretty neat. Another good feature is we left one of the rooms wide open and the same student who likes CAD designed a kitchen. And next year, when we get back to school, one of our lesson plans will be how to wire a kitchen because it's a big part of the industry. It's one of the best moneymakers electricians have to be honest with you. There's usually about nine circuits involved, and everything will be to scale because it's big enough to be a real kitchen with a stove and a refrigerator and all that. And he has put on the print where those things are going to go. And this will really teach the students the things that are in the National Electrical Code that have to do with the kitchen, how to wire a stove, how to wire a refrigerator, because it's a little different. And it'll be something that they're going to really enjoy when they get to do it. So we're very excited about this. And now we have all the space we need for our incoming students and the next year's freshmen, because that's always where we run into a problem, is when we have all four classes in the shop for long periods of time. At the beginning of the year, it's exploratory. It's not so bad. But when the freshmen choose their shops, like they have for the second half of this year, we have to make sure that we can accommodate them to make room for this. Actually, I get a little emotional about this. We were able to get our old related room back. For years, the electrical program had no related room connected. And then somehow things happened and they took the room away from us. It became a culinary related room. Well, they didn't really need it. And my friend Dennis, who did pass away, as you all know, before he left, we had made an arrangement to take that room back because he wasn't using it anymore. He was able to use the conference room for his classroom. So one of the last conversations we had was us taking over that room. And now it kind of feels weird being in there and seeing all this stuff and having to move it out. But anyway, we do have our own classroom back again. That's a huge help because now people can work in the shop while we're working in the in the related room and the class doesn't get disturbed by the people using all their tools. So everything's going really well actually. And I appreciate all the support that you people always give us because without you, we couldn't grow the way we are. We wouldn't have the money to be able to afford this. So thank you.

[Fallon]: Thank you, Rich, and you may or may not be aware that we have asked this year which is really exciting for us we've asked for an additional teacher and electrical. So we're really, we're, we're stepping up to the likes of the bigger vocational technical high schools in the state and we're asking for three teachers, which is only going to enhance the program even more. And Rich, I just want to publicly thank you for your leadership and your dedication to the program, because not only are you a graduate of the program, but you're just somebody I can rely on. And it's nice to have you and the kids. You guys are always impressing me with what you do. So great work.

[jO3ADh2wzWc_SPEAKER_05]: It's nothing.

[Fallon]: I know. So that's a brief update of what we've done. I'll take any questions if anybody has them at this point.

[Van der Kloot]: Kathy?

[Kreatz]: Yes, Ms. Van de Koot.

[Van der Kloot]: Well, first I just want to say thank you for the great presentation. It's great to see all of the projects. I'm particularly excited I have to say I think that that new house and you know the what you've talked about with the kids being able to learn how to do the kitchen. and how to, you know, cut into the drywall, whatever. It's just fantastic. So really exciting. I can't wait to see it in person. And the outside of the house of the school looks, by the vocational interest, looks so much better. So thank you for, thanks for all you do.

[Kreatz]: And I definitely wanted to just say the presentation was phenomenal. And all the projects that are going on with all the different programs, the construction, craft, labor, and the carpentry students working together on the outside project with the cement, that is unbelievable. It looks beautiful. The landscaping, it looks wonderful and very exciting to hear about the electrical program expansion. and the collaboration with the students working on CAD and just that's so interesting that we're gonna be the first to actually be part of wiring and teaching the students how to fish the wires through and to be able to see it, that is so exciting and so unique. It's wonderful. Everything you just shared today is unbelievable with everything that's already completed at the vocational school. It's just, it's looking beautiful. Thank you. Yes.

[Ruseau]: Thank you. Yeah, this is all very exciting. And I know my son absolutely loves the rotation this year through electrical as a ninth grader. I have a question about, obviously I'm not an electrician, but are there any specialized things in the electrical program related to, you know, solar and car chargers and all of those things that I think of as new, but if you're an electrician, they're just electricity, I'm sure. But is there anything in our program for those, or is there a need for something like that?

[jO3ADh2wzWc_SPEAKER_05]: So as far as the solar panels go, we don't really get into that much because what we found out is they don't really use apprentices for those jobs. When they need an apprentice, they go out and hire a carpenter and call that person an apprentice so that they can do the work of putting the panels. I'm sorry, my grandson's crying in the background. They can do the work of putting the solar panels up on the roof. So we do want to do some, we have a couple, we show them to them. What was the other thing you asked about? Yeah, electric vehicle. Oh, yeah. So a couple of years ago, we installed a charger. Yeah, I use it. Yeah, there you go. So we installed that a few years ago with the help of the city, they had a grant. And if they get another grant, we'll do that one also. And actually, the other day, I did take them all out there to show it how it works and show them how to calculate the kilowatt hours. I think they charge you 25 cents a kilowatt hour. So we went over all that and we are going to add to our program a little bit more about that because the mandate saying that the gas engine vehicles will be gone in 10 or 20 years or so. And there's a code rule now that you have to put an outlet in for a car charger. So yes, we are covering that. Thank you. We're also doing voice and data work. When we built the new robotics program, it was the first time the school had let us install the Cat6 data wiring. And the kids installed 66 points, which is 120 punchdowns. And there were two mistakes. When they came to certify, there were two mistakes out of that whole thing. So yeah, we're trying to expand as much as we can. We're trying to keep up with the times. Thank you.

[Fallon]: That's great.

[jO3ADh2wzWc_SPEAKER_05]: Yep.

[Fallon]: I especially liked right after the electric car charging station. One of my favorite days was when Ms. Alicia Hunt, our director of energy and environment came to you and it was taken by a car that was not being charged. That was fun. I was a little thrilled that day. So sorry again, Alicia. Any other questions for me? Okay, thank you guys.

[Kreatz]: Yeah, would you be able to share the presentation with us via email? Sure, I'll do that right now. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. And thank you both. Mr. Comeo, thank you so much for being here. Thank you, Mr. Fallon, for being here. And always enjoy hearing about all the projects going on. Thank you. Thanks. So next we have Mr. McLaughlin and it's, so agenda number five, Medford High School front entrance, letter, sign, and walkway. So at our last meeting, we discussed in great detail that, you know, it was recommended by the superintendent that it's very difficult to know where the front entrance of the school is. We need an official main entrance with a sign designating the front entrance. And I and I know, you know, there's been some talk that, well, we're going to have the visionary committee form. But even in the short time, it's very important that we have an official sign on Mefford High School, you know, to just note Mefford High School. So at our last meeting, we asked John if he can get us estimates and some sign pictures. So we got a collection of we got an estimate, which I will share that Right now, one moment, I'm just going to get that open. And I did share with everybody via the email. I'm just going to go to the area where I have to just quickly open up the estimate. Okay, while we're doing that, John, did you want to maybe just go over anything while I'm just locating that estimate?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Hi, sorry. As usual, our house is busy as well. So basically what I did is I did, I brought in a company to do a little bit of design work and try to get some pricing information on, you know, obviously signage for the front of Mefford High School. And I was kind of, I was actually surprised at the pricing information. I thought that it was, You know, I thought it was a lot, but anyways, it really looked good. I just figured it to use it as a starting point to push forward or whatever, not push forward or just a starting point for a sign at the high school.

[Kreatz]: And I just put the estimate up on the screen right now.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: So- Yeah, so that's one of them. There was, I think there was a few of them because they were done by, obviously by design. So I initially told him to, you know, give me a few different scopes at a few different price points.

[Kreatz]: So they're ranging, it looks like from 21,250 and, up to up to 26,850.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And you had mentioned that, you know, for those at first, when I when I had first got the estimates, or those two estimates, and when I first got the estimates, I sent them over to the mayor's office, and I sent all of it to her all the pitches. And she looked at him and she liked those two particular signs, which was, I think it was like one in four, I think, in the estimate. So she liked those ones. And then when we got the pricing back, it kind of fell off my chest. So I went back to the guy and he said the basic sign, Mefford High School basic sign was just going to be probably about a little over 10,000.

[Van der Kloot]: Can I ask a question?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Yes.

[Van der Kloot]: And of course my phone's ringing at this point, but my question is, I've just seen the phenomenal work that our students are doing at the vocational school. And I'm wondering whether there's a way for this project, designing a sign, whether it makes any sense to, to ask Chad, and I don't know if Chad's still on, you know, is there between our different shops, is this something that, you know, a sign, I know there might be a timeline, so if the desire is expediency, maybe it takes too long, but I just wondered

[Fallon]: I'm sorry, I just can't have my video on at the second. But we did talk about this. John knows we're willing to help. We felt it was a little bit beyond our scope at this point. So I think that's why he went out for bids. But John knows we'll always do whatever we can to help. I just think it was a little bit outside of our realm.

[Van der Kloot]: From the lighting perspective or from the installation? I'm curious what part of the project was the most challenging to you, Chad?

[Fallon]: Well, because we weren't sure what kind of letters it was going to be. Was it going to be one sign? So I think it was a little bit unclear at this point. And so that's all I can say about that. I think we're always interested in seeing if it fits and if it fits into what we're doing, we're more than happy to help. John knows that too.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Oh, absolutely. No, no, no. Chad, Chad, you know, obviously, I mean, he was the good news part of the meeting on the second half with the bad news, I guess. So whatever you want to call it, but, uh, yeah, no, Chad, Chad in the, in the, uh, they actually helped us this afternoon as well, uh, down by the front entrance, getting some mops for us. So.

[Van der Kloot]: Yes, yes, yes. Do you wanna, like, I guess one of the questions is kind of getting a sense from the committee what we think, you mentioned the mayor like number one and four, is it possible to put them up right now?

[Kreatz]: Yes, and that's what I was, I was just waiting for just that conversation to finish up and I'm gonna share the next screen. One moment, let me just click on it. I just have to navigate, I just have a lot open, so I'm going to the area. Okay, I think it's right here. Okay, here it is. Okay, I just have to, I'm getting it ready here. I'm ready to do it right now. Okay, let's see. Okay, right here. Okay. Okay, so with the help of Dr. Cushing and Dr. Maurice and Ms. Susie Weiss today, they put together this slide presentation, which I'm gonna show you right now. And it has the pictures that John McLaughlin shared with all of us in the email. So as you can see right now, I'm showing you pictures one and two. Can you see that okay? Can everybody see that okay?

[Van der Kloot]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: OK, good. All right. And I don't want to move along too quickly. So I was just going to pause it right there for a moment. And now let me move on to the next slide. And I can make it a little bit bigger. Let me just see if it might be too small. Let's see. It can either be 100. Oh, zoom out. Zoom in. Zoom out. Oh, sorry. Wrong zoom. Yeah, sorry, I think I did the wrong one. Making it smaller zoom in. There we go. I'm getting right now. One more time just to make it a little bigger. OK, this is much bigger. OK, so as you can see. There. They look very similar, but I think it's just a different font. So here is number one. And then number two. And this is number three and four. So three and four look very similar. You know what the difference is? Is that the M is in the white on number three and the Medford, like the Mustang M is in the blue background on number four. And then five has the white background.

[Van der Kloot]: I don't like the white background in the middle.

[Kreatz]: Okay, okay, that's good. So as part of this, and I was going to ask, I don't know if Dr. Cushing was able to help, but what we were going to do was to do a poll, but I'm not sure if we're able to do something like that. I know it was very last minute, so I just wanted to ask Dr. Cushing if that was something that we would be able to do, but if not, it's not a problem. It was just something that I thought of very last minute, I was at a meeting yesterday and we did a poll and on the zoom call and it was, you know, it was interactive and I said, Oh, maybe we could do that for this meeting tonight. And there's number six. It's the blue, it looks, you know, with the Mustang traditional. Number seven, this is just the standard Mayford High School sign.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And then it looks like- If you can see that sign, it's cut out so that the cement is the letters, just so that if you don't, if you can't see it that well, in case you were gonna make a decision, that's exactly how it is. That's the cement. So it's basically just the frame.

[Kreatz]: Oh wow, that's really neat.

[Van der Kloot]: And then it says home of the Mustangs on it underneath.

[Kreatz]: And let's go to number eight. And this one looks very similar to number seven.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: It's just where it says home of the Mustangs is a little different.

[Kreatz]: It is a little different, just slightly different.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Just where it says home of the monster.

[Kreatz]: I can see the line goes all the way across on number eight and it stops a little bit on number seven. Okay.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And just be aware too, while we're looking at these, they're not lighted signs. So just so that you know, there's no, they're not lighted.

[Van der Kloot]: Not lighted, okay. But we could shine a light on them.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: For sure, yes, we can add lights on the building somewhere up or below or below it or above it or however. Now that sign right there is obviously the etching on the window would be done as well. And then the Mustang pride over the door.

[Van der Kloot]: I don't know on this one, the things that I think it's, you've got the horse in two different places. I like the Mustang pride over the door, but maybe if, I mean, if we're gonna use this rendition of the horse, then maybe I would do the etching on the window, but have one of the plainer signs over it. I mean, I don't understand why we would repeat the horse twice.

[Cushing]: So if I could jump in for, so this is not an official logo of the Medford public schools. And so like, I think this would be a significant shift. I would, my recommendation would be to stick with the M logo that has actually been updated by the CTE graphics department. But the other thing too is, I mean, if you wanted to go with something like this, I think that's fine. It's just, it would be more of a significant shift versus what is there now. The other thing I wanted to mention is the first five signs that you put up were designed to be backlit by LED.

[Van der Kloot]: Yeah, so I'm not wild about this new logo. What I do like, I like, depending, the home of the Mustang's right over the door is, you know, I prefer we stay with our old logo.

[Kreatz]: I like the old logo. Yes, Mr. Russo?

[Ruseau]: Based on the feedback we've been receiving around the school name change, I'm wondering if we shouldn't find a way to engage the entire community in a poll of some sort and let them choose. I mean, I don't think we can put a logo on a ballot. I don't know that the format of ballots allows for anything other than text, but I'm uncomfortable deciding something that's important.

[Van der Kloot]: So I disagree with you, Paul, if I may, Ms. Cathy? Yes, Ms. Van de Kool, go ahead. I mean, if we were to reconsider naming the high school at some point, that would be when we did a very large project, if we were going to ever go that way. I think for this one, the idea was simply to get a sign on at the front signage as soon as possible. We see, I mean, Involving the whole community to make a decision about whether they like this sign or that sign to me is similar to sort of involving the whole community and whether we want this paint or that paint. I think this is in our purview that we can suggest, you know, we might want to involve all our colleagues or the mayor, whatever, or, you know, but to go further than that, I mean, I don't think this is a community issue. I think this is coming up with a good design and getting it up over the door.

[Ruseau]: I don't disagree in principle, but the renaming of the Columbus is absolutely explicitly in the law within our purview. The community disagrees greatly. that we should be making as such a decision. So I don't know where to draw the line, but if it's what's in our authority, then that's fine.

[Van der Kloot]: So Paul, we're not renaming the high school. We're putting a sign with the high school's name on it.

[Ruseau]: And spending far more than we're gonna spend on the Columbus renaming. And the principal argument against the Columbus renaming is we can't afford it.

[Van der Kloot]: I think we could also say that's a can of worms too.

[Ruseau]: I'm just not willing to vote to spend $25,000 on a new sign when there's already signage that isn't perhaps adequate. I'm not going to disagree with that. But I think if we're going to spend that kind of money after the number of communications we received about spending money on a sign about another building, it seems really tone deaf.

[Van der Kloot]: So the question will be the cost of what we got as bids surprises me that it's so expensive. And I think that's the issue is to say, hey, we like this kind of, this is kind of what we're looking for. How can we do it in a less expensive way? Can it be done in a less expensive way? I mean, I look at the letter on the vocational school, and I think it looks pretty good. How is that done?

[Kreatz]: So Dr. Cushing has his hand raised, and I just wanted to mention that in this particular project, we're not renaming the high school. Medford High School doesn't have a sign on the front entrance. There's no way to find the front of the school because there isn't a sign. For some reason, when the school was built, they just never put a sign up. I had discussed this with John McLaughlin. So what we're doing today in the committee and what we spoke of in the last meeting was that we would like to have a sign to designate the front entrance of the Medford High School. So we asked John McLaughlin to get some estimates. So some of the pictures that I shared were a little bit more in detail but then we could just go with a simpler sign that just simply says Medford High School without a logo and just leave it like that and we could you know once you know the vision committee is formed in the future that sign can be taken off and then put in another place in the new high school or the new renovated high school at some time in the future, which might not be for 10 or many years later. So I just wanted to provide that clarification about what we're talking about on this meeting agenda item. But Dr. Cushing, go ahead and then Mr. McLaughlin after that.

[Cushing]: So one of the things that in speaking to a signed installer about this project One of the complicating factors is the height off the ground and the medium that it's being mounted into. So that's just a complicating factor that kind of adds to the complexity of being able to do this work. You know, and then if we are to get electricity there, that, you know, could that be something the city electricians could help with to help defray the cost? Could that be something that, you know, the CTE students, Mr. Cormier, who was on the call, might they be able to help us to get to a certain point with that power to help defray some of the cost? So those are just some of the things that, you know, the location of the sign and those types of things can impact that cost. Mr. McLaughlin?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And just to add to it now, that's only one company. That's only one designer with a bunch of different designs. I mean, there's plenty of companies out there. I mean, you know, we could have graphic arts design assigned and then have it made or see how we could have it made. Or like Chad said, maybe a possibility that the students may do it, or we can send it out to a sign maker and have it done. I mean, so that was just basically, I had one company come in, draw up a bunch of schematics, just so that we could get an idea or a starting point on where we could go as far as the signage goes and different types of signs. And I was curious to see what he came up with. And I like some of it and some of it, you know, obviously, you know, It's not maybe necessarily my taste, but that's really it. I mean, we certainly have a whole way that we can go in whatever way we choose to pursue it, but it was just a starting point, I guess you could say. And I know Peter has a company too that he has been in contact with as well. And so I guess that's it.

[Kreatz]: So as part of this demonstration, I asked Dr. Cushing if he could help me with just launching a poll so that we can just get some feedback of preference for a sign. So I was going to do that right now. I will click, launch the polling, and then I'm going to screen share again the signs so that everybody can see them again. So if you could just bear with me, I'm going to click on launch the polling. And this is just to get some feedback. Ultimately, we'll have to bring this to the whole committee to hear what their thoughts are, but this is just a starting point to get to the next step. So hold on a moment. I'm going to click launch polling. Okay. So now I'm going to then click screen share and go back to the pictures. So if you, everybody, can you see the poll that's in progress right now?

[Cushing]: So I just need to withdraw the co-host permission from everyone so that they can actually vote.

[Kreatz]: Perfect, thank you. Thank you, Dr. Cushing.

[Cushing]: And the other thing too, I think one of the things today that might be good is, and maybe that's not the purview of this group, but for us to get a dollar amount that you are comfortable with, so that we can start going through and making those types of calls and that type of work.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Yes, because there's certainly procurement hurdles as well in certain amounts of money that we, you know, you can spend, but you need to, you know, have three quotes. And so it's a little bit difficult with a sign, cause you, you know, you want three quotes for the exact same sign. Well, I don't know, you know, if everybody makes the exact same sign, but it's still procurement rules that we have to follow as well. Excuse me, Pete, sorry.

[Kreatz]: I'm sharing the pictures again. Can everybody see the pictures?

[Cushing]: You're doing great.

[Kreatz]: Okay, perfect, okay. Mr. McLaughlin. I'm going through them pretty quickly, but I'm gonna go back up again so you can see them again. Just thinking about what I like my reference to.

[Van der Kloot]: Which one's that?

[Kreatz]: This is number six.

[Van der Kloot]: OK.

[Kreatz]: I should tell you, this is number seven. This is number eight. This is number nine. Number 10. This is number 11.

[Van der Kloot]: Can you do one, two, and three again, Kathy?

[Kreatz]: Yes, of course. Here is one and two. They are on the same slide. Show one. Very similar. I have a hard time figuring out which is, I think they're both in my, the way I look at it, I can see they look the same. And here is four, here is three.

[Van der Kloot]: Okay, wait a minute, where's three?

[Kreatz]: Three is right here. Oops, sorry, I went too fast. I clicked off of it, sorry. Wait, here we go. Three has the white background for the logo M. and then four has the blue background, the logo, and five has the blue logo background with white from Everett High School.

[Cushing]: The thing is that, so everyone knows is, I mean, you know, there are certain elements that you can mix and match in signs here. So there's some that, as member Van der Kloot said, there's the sign over the door, there's the applique to the window, and then the main sign up on the concrete facade. So in speaking to one of the sign companies, the overwhelming majority of all of that would be able to survive any renovation in the future or be reapplied. Obviously the appliques to the windows would be something that would need to be replaced, but what goes up can easily be taken down. It's just, there would be, no matter what you do, there would be a cost, you know, kind of, if you're doing a renovation, the cost would be baked into the renovation as to the cost of taking down the sign.

[Ruseau]: Peter.

[Kreatz]: Yes.

[Ruseau]: Mr. Russo, go ahead. Thank you. I'm not sure what renovation you're talking about, but I mean, if we do a new- Potential. Okay, if we do a new high school, I'm not sure $25,000 is part of the conversation. I concur.

[Kreatz]: Does anybody need me to show the pictures? Do you want me to stop the screen share and everybody can take the poll?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Can I just see one and two again?

[Kreatz]: Yes, you may. Yep, let me get up to one and two. Yep. Okay, so here is one on top, two on the bottom.

[Van der Kloot]: On this one, we can only vote for one, correct?

[Kreatz]: It looks like they are the same. Yeah, they look to be the same too. I'm looking for differences.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: They're a little bit thinner.

[Kreatz]: Yeah, exactly, I think, yeah.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: There's a little bit thinner.

[Kreatz]: Yes, the font, it must be the font. Yes, I do see it now. what it's like a little bit, you know, a milder font on number, it looks like on number two, a little bit more dramatic on number one. Excuse me. Sorry. And then here is three, four, and five. And this is number six. And then this is number seven, number eight, number nine, And number 10, and then, yep. And this is just, I think this was an extra one, number 11. So we just have the 10 of them on the poll.

[Cushing]: Yeah, it would only go till 210. If somebody really loves number 11, I would say, I've re-enabled the chat. You can throw it in there.

[Kreatz]: So I'm going to stop the screen share right now.

[Ruseau]: Yeah, I need to see six again.

[Kreatz]: Okay, let me do it again.

[Ruseau]: I'm looking at the documents we received. So those are not numbered the same.

[Kreatz]: Let me do this screen share again. One second. Oh, I'm disabled right now. I'm sorry. Dr. Cushing. Yeah, no problem.

[Cushing]: Should be good to go now.

[Kreatz]: Okay, thanks. Okay, here we go. Oh, and what did you want to see again, Mr. Russo?

[Ruseau]: Number six.

[Kreatz]: Number six, okay. And here is number six.

[Ruseau]: Okay, then that wasn't the one I wanted to see. Number seven, maybe?

[Kreatz]: Okay, this is number seven.

[Ruseau]: Okay, thank you.

[Kreatz]: You're welcome. Does anybody else want to see any I'm not hearing anybody. So I'm going to stop the screen share and then I'm going to take the poll myself. Okay. So did everybody get a chance to take the poll? Okay. Very good. All right. So, um, And Dr. Cushing, I'll need your help. I don't know how to see the results.

[Cushing]: That's all right. So we have option two has 17% of the polling. Option six has three, I'm sorry, 50% of the polling. And what I was reading there, option seven has 33% of the polling. Okay. So option six is the winner in this group. But, you know.

[Ruseau]: Well, we probably should use rank choice voting and drop below us and have everybody vote again.

[Cushing]: So option two would be dropped, option six and seven would be there. I'm going to end the polling and go in and create a new one real quick. Actually, I'll tell you what, let me launch polling.

[Kreatz]: And I'll bring up the screen share again.

[Cushing]: All right, so your only choice is option six and seven. All the other choices are there, but for ease, six and seven.

[Kreatz]: Can you show us six and seven? And I'm going to do the screen share. Dr. Cushing, could I have permission to screen share again?

[Cushing]: And there you go.

[Kreatz]: Thank you. OK, so we are just looking at, oops. Oops, OK. six and seven okay so let's take another closer look at number six spend a little time next i'm going to go over to seven so is seven another cut out one seven oh okay uh mr mclaughlin could you answer that question number seven

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Let me just, could I just look at it real quick? Because if it looked like the cement, then yeah, that's cut out. So I can't see it from here.

[Cushing]: So in my recollection with the one who submitted this sign display, that would be, it's cut out. It shows the concrete behind and there would be an option to add LED blue, white, whatever color you want. behind there so it would shine and illuminate kind of like a backlit sign.

[Van der Kloot]: So the thing about this then is that it's not showing the blue and white colors. It's showing the blue and the color of the school.

[Cushing]: It could also be painted behind if you wanted to. So you could paint the concrete white and then that would show through.

[Kreatz]: And here is number six again. Does anybody need more time on these pictures or do we want to just proceed with the poll? So I'm going to stop the screen share and if everybody wants to take the poll. And did everybody get a chance to take the poll? I think that's good. Dr. Cushing, go ahead.

[Cushing]: Nope. I was just going to let you know that 67% of the people on this call voted for option six. Option seven, it has now changed, is now 57% and 43%. So yeah.

[Kreatz]: Okay, excellent. So, you know, the reason we did the poll was we wanted to kind of narrow down, you know, what type of sign would be preferable for Medford High School. As part of this evening's agenda item, you know, as Dr. Cushing said, is that we want to kind of narrow down a price. So we want to have something very similar to what's showing in number six or possibly seven if we were going to share six and seven with the full committee. So, you know, I'm thinking, you know, in terms of figures, you know, like, let's say you know, 15,000, like, I mean, I would like to hear some feedback from my committee members to put a sign on Medford High School that would be able to be transferable at some time in the future, you know, would that be something that I could, you know, we could possibly, you know, kind of decide on this evening or 15 to 20, you know,

[Ruseau]: I just, I'm not particularly interested in whether it's transferable. I just also have no interest in renovating the building. So I don't think that for me would be part of my calculation. And I am not sure if that affects pricing. I also, the subcommittee can only make recommendations if the full committee decides. So I feel like if there's two options, the full committee really should get both options at least.

[Kreatz]: Yep, yep. So I think what what I was trying to say and I'm sorry I didn't mean to say that I'm making the decision, I want to, I want to make a recommendation to the full committee. So, if we want to definitely move this project into the full committee for them to see both number six and seven. And, you know, I guess, you know, we can give the estimate that we currently have that Mr. McLaughlin has received from I believe it's from white. That was a picture from white lights. Is that correct, Mr. McLaughlin?

[jO3ADh2wzWc_SPEAKER_05]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: Yeah. Okay. So we have the estimate from white lights. I'm not sure exactly what you know, estimate goes with number six and white estimate goes with number seven. Would you be able to tell us, Mr. McLaughlin, or would you have to reach out to them and you could get that by the next year?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: I'll have to get, I'll have to get the pricing information. Cause I think I had one in four at one point. And then I think the basic sign, he just told me it was going to be like a little bit over 10,000. Now we're just a basic Medford, you know, Medford high school sign. So yeah. So I can certainly reach out to him. I did have communication with him today, so I can find out, you know, find out what option six, the price is on option six for sure.

[Van der Kloot]: What is the sign made out of?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: You know what, I honestly, I don't really know what the materials are, but that's certainly a question that I can, I don't know if it said it on the quote or not, if the quote was that in detailed, but I can certainly find out what the material is. Okay, Kathy, we're probably more, it's probably, you know, it seems to me like modern plastic. So modern, you know, on that idea, some of the work that I've seen that they have done.

[Cushing]: Dr. Cushing. You know, I just had a very enlightened idea, basically fly into me. And I was wondering if, would it be worthwhile for us to put this out to our student body? and for us to really, you know, see, you know, take a look at the top three vote getters, right? And have them really take a look at it and see what they think.

[Kreatz]: I just kind of- I love that idea. You know? Yes, I think that's wonderful.

[Cushing]: And I happen to know the student outreach coordinator, so I would be able to really connect with the student body and to see about this.

[Ruseau]: Is that what you say? No, you know yourself. That's good. That's therapy for you. I would just ask that we do in like the top three are the yeah, I like never Vanderquilt I was uncomfortable with the other logo. And we don't it didn't make our top three so we don't have to get into the reasons. But

[Van der Kloot]: I think at the same time, I think it's worthwhile having a little bit more of a chat, maybe with construction, I mean with carpentry and electrical. To me, this is the kind of project we can, what letters were done on the vocational school So I think both, I think, Peter, I think it's a great idea to involve the students. I think that doing some pictures around the school saying, which one do you like, you know, and it would be fabulous. I know it's late in the year, but I think that would really be the best. And I think if there is, you know, a way to see if there's any idea more about how to create the sign without spending that much.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And just so that, you know, two graphic arts could design the whole thing as well. So, I mean, we have options, you know, we do.

[Kreatz]: Okay. So, so for, for this, then we, are we, is there like a recommendation to have Dr. Cushing do a poll with the student body with the three top signs and Um, Mr. McLaughlin, would you be able to, um, reach out to, um, you know, the carpentry construction craft labor, Mr. Fallon and, um, the, um, you know, graphic arts to see if it would be something that they would be able to do. And, you know, if it's definitely not, then we still have, you know, the sign estimate that we got. And then once we gather all that information, um, you know, we can then you know, have another, I guess, another meeting at another subcommittee meeting to talk about the feedback.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Yeah, because when it when it comes to the vocational school, obviously, projects have to align with their curriculum. So I can certainly check in with with loosebag Nola over in graphic arts. and whatever we need to do. I just basically just need my marching orders and we'll go out there and do what we gotta do.

[Kreatz]: Okay, so at this point, we're going to keep this in subcommittee. Is that what I'm hearing from my committee members? Say that again, Kathy? Are we going to keep this item in subcommittee at this time until we get the poll from the student body, and just clarification from construction and craft labor and graphic arts.

[Van der Kloot]: There is a question about timing. And I'm not sure we're clear about what the timing should be. Do we want it in place so it's there for the opening of school in September? Or is it more important to cut costs, include the student body, et cetera? So, so far what I'm hearing is we want to do a little more exploration and we're not ready to give an okay to a 20,000 plus sign.

[Kreatz]: I think that's what I was hearing from some, I mean, some of my committee members. I was, you know, I was asking for, you know, a ballpark figure, but it seems as though, you know, from what I heard was that maybe, more exploration. I would be amenable to having it ready for the first day of school, if we can do that. And we can maybe get the polling information from the student body and have it ready for the June 14th meeting. And we could share out the results with the full committee. I would really like to really move forward with this project. you know, I would like to make a motion to do something like that. So motion to get the polling from the student body, Don McLaughlin reach out to just, you know, find out for sure, can construction craft labor do it? Yes or no, you know, with graphic arts, Mr. Fallon, he did speak already. And he mentioned that it was out of his realm with what they could do, but maybe there are some things that they can do that could cut some costs.

[Van der Kloot]: Yes, and with the pricing, the pricing may be just the manufacturing of the sign. I don't know if it included installation. And then the other question is if it included the electrical work. So I don't think it did, but I'm not certain.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: The pricing information, it definitely didn't include the electrical work, but it did include the installation.

[Van der Kloot]: You know, this is where we really need a company to step up and make a donation.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: I don't know if the class of 2021 has had time to raise enough money to get their little logo on the bottom, right? Gift of class of 2021.

[Cushing]: I think Mr. McLaughlin, we have to say this sign a gift to the class of 2021. We don't want anyone to think they gifted the high school.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Yeah, you wouldn't want to be responsible for that gift. Thanks, Jeff, for saving me.

[Van der Kloot]: OK, Kathy, I think it's 6.04 now.

[Kreatz]: So Dr. Cushing, do you think it's possible to get the polling done before the June 14 meeting?

[Cushing]: Yeah, we can definitely do it next week. And what the way my thinking about doing it is, you know, I have to go back and look at the options. But I would say if there's that top sign option, and that last option with the bottom give kids multiple choices. So if they want to kind of like make, you know, the sign a little bit different, but then it just puts more ownership in the students hands.

[Kreatz]: And then we can just, you know, I'd like to just motion that we, um, to, to show the committee members, um, the sign ideas that we've, you know, visited this evening and we can hear their thoughts and we can share the results from the student body poll. And we can talk about the pricing estimates that we received, which will, you know, um, and we can go from there and Mr. McLaughlin, anything that you can find out any additional information, you know, please, you know, let me know, reach out to me. Um, I appreciate it. So is there a second on that motion to share this with the full committee on our June 14th meeting?

[Van der Kloot]: Second.

[Kreatz]: And so I'm going to take the roll call. Mr. Russo? Yes. Ms. Van De Kloet?

[Van der Kloot]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: And Ms. Kreatz? Yes. So we have three in the affirmative and zero in the negative. So the motion passes. Thank you. Okay, so we're going to move on to the next. And the next discussion was just john McLaughlin was just going to go over some of the work that they did on the front entrance to just, you know, kind of rejuvenate it. Mr. McLaughlin, if you could go over that.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Oh, sure. A couple of years ago, I had the landscaper come up and You know, obviously down the very, very front of the driveway at Steve Miller driveway in the left side. If you're coming up the driveway towards Medford High School there is a monument there and over the years we've tried many, many different approaches to try to, you know, put some flowers down there and You know, just try to make it a little bit more appealing just as you come in the driveway about I think it was about two years ago I met with the landscaper. And we put some more hardy flowers down there, I think that there's some there's some pitches that you have, but I mean it comes down to, and I will say to that aggie aggie to. in the forestry department came up and they, you know, they did some trimming in the area just to try to open it up a little bit. But I will say, I mean, our biggest problem is obviously water and getting water to that area, whether it, you know, obviously sprinkler, I mean, it hasn't rained right now for like almost two weeks. So, I mean, there's been nothing to rejuvenate it. So we just basically just kind of been doing the best we can Today, Chad had some of the vocational students, we have bought some mulch and he spread some mulch around to get it ready for the summer. And I mean, it's just, it's just, you know, it's a cost factor, obviously, to to put a sprinkler system down there or whatever. And then it's a maintenance factor. And then, you know, a lot of times in the winter at the corners is where they pile the snow. And a lot of times that ends up being where the snow gets piled up. But basically, I mean, we've been just trying to do the best we can to make it a little bit better. We just repaired the fence on both sides about a month and a half ago. So that's about it. That's really all I can add to it. unless there was some type of, I know I have spoken with the DPW and they may be getting some kind of a tool that digs underneath sidewalks so that, you know, maybe there may be a sprinkler system option at some point, but I don't know any pricing information or whether the DPW could, even help us at this point, or whether they did obtain any of the equipment to do that stuff. Because we also met with Chad, because Chad, at one point out in his courtyard in the vocational side, they had sprinklers that I think they got destroyed by the science lab project when they were digging out there. So he, you know, he, and he mentioned it earlier too, as well, how he, you know, wanted to get higher to air plants that don't need as much watering. Thank you.

[Kreatz]: Yeah, thank you, Mr. McLaughlin. And Dr. Cushing, I do have the pictures that John shared with me. Would I be able to do the screen share again? Okay. Okay, and so these are the pictures that Mr. McLaughlin sent to me. I think there's just the one here that I brought up right now. That's one angle. Let me go here. It looks absolutely beautiful. I couldn't believe it. Oh, we're gonna get to that. Sorry, I'm ahead of myself. So that's one angle. There's three just different angles, but it looks so beautiful. I can't believe it. And let me just bring up another one. Hold on one moment here. Oh, here we go. Okay, so this is one of the picture here. This is all three of them together. Okay, very good. Okay, so what you can see is there was right here. I'm kind of like with my mouse showing you there was a broken fence and we reached out to the mayor's office and the city engineer's office and I believe the DPW was able to help assist with that and get that section of the fence broken. That was broken.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: We did hire a McDonough fence to replace it. And Aggie actually, Aggie Tudin actually had the forestry come up and eliminate any of the trees that were potentially near it that could fall and damage it.

[Kreatz]: Thanks, Maggie. Thank you, Aggie, I see you on the call here and I have to, I keep on doing this with the pictures. Wrong picture up again. And thank you, Aggie, for everything that you did to help with this project. I know we were emailing and Ms. Montello, I don't know if she's on the call, but she was extremely helpful and she brought this to my attention and she said, there's a very nice, easy, quick way that we can beautify the front entrance corner would be by fixing that broken, fence section and then just, you know, beautifying it a little bit with some, you know, like with the mulch or with some fresh plants. And it looks beautiful. I really think it looks absolutely beautiful. When I saw the pictures today, I couldn't believe it. I said, oh my gosh, it looks so nice. And then I was doing a little bit of Googling myself and, you know, because we have, you know, a lot of the same situations that we have at the high school at my house. We don't have much irrigation. So, You know, it looks nice and I think some low maintenance, natural looking flowers, you know, they look really nice and I'm hoping that we can keep it looking that nice where it's like the front entrance, everybody sees it and it's the first thing they see when they come to our school. So I'm so happy with all the work and all the help that we got on this. Thank you, Mr. McLaughlin and Ms. Agitudin, thank you so much. I really appreciate all your help.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: If I may just add, Kathy, too, and I think Aggie can correct me. As far as trees at Mefford High School, I think within the last year, we've planted around 16 trees. I want to say around 16 trees, brand new trees that working with Aggie, they've planted up there last year.

[SPEAKER_08]: Yes, John. If I can jump in here, congratulations. It really does look great. I went by the entrance today, and it's such a refreshed look and so welcoming. Thankfully, the dead trees were removed, the fences fixed, and the plants look great. There is one shrub on the right, a small rhododendron. I think that's gone, John. I think that can just be taken out.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: I didn't want to put that one in the picture, but yeah, you're right. We can replace that rhododendron.

[SPEAKER_08]: Yeah, yeah. But the others are lovely. And I will say, I believe we planted 18 trees at the high school in the last year and a half. Last fall. It also, for Arbor Day, which was last Friday in April, we planted five red maples along the island on the west side of the school, of the high school, and a Princeton elm at the front entrance. So I checked on them. They're doing well, miraculously, because we've had no rain. But John, if it's possible for people to get water into those gator bags on the trees, that would be very helpful. But I'll ask DPW if they can include, if they sometimes send out the night watchman to water. So if the watchman can come by and fill those gator bags, I'll see if that's happening. Because that will really help. And if they're there, maybe they can water the plants at the monument, the new plant.

[Kreatz]: Perfect.

[SPEAKER_08]: Okay.

[Kreatz]: Yeah. Thank you so much. Thank you.

[SPEAKER_08]: Great job, everyone. Great job.

[Kreatz]: Thank you. Teamwork. Thank you. Thank you. Does anybody have any questions?

[Ruseau]: I just have a quick question for Aggie. Does the city plant many maples? I feel like when I walk around, I never see maple trees in any of the newly planted trees. And I walk a lot. Is there, do we just not plant maples for a reason? Do they get too big? What's the deal?

[SPEAKER_08]: Good question, Paul. As a matter of fact, we plant, I think mostly, it could be the majority that we plant are red maples. We plant, we go for diversification of species, which is the correct environmental way to do it. But I think we planted 24 varieties last year, which is great. of trees, and we had about six different types of red maples. And of course, we don't plant Norway maples, which are the invasives. They're illegal to buy or sell in Massachusetts, and those are... But we do have lots and lots of red maples. We don't plant them under wires, so... Okay.

[Ruseau]: That might be... Yeah, I'm in the hillside, and every... trees under a wire, even all the new trees. So maybe that's what it is that, you know, cause I was, I'm just walking around and I listened to an audio book about maple trees and I'm like, but I, and that's why I was observing all these trees that were planted in like the last decade. And I'm like, I couldn't find a single maple tree to be, to be found, but I think it is the wires.

[SPEAKER_08]: I'll have to send you a map so you can find them on your walk. Generally we plant flowering ornamental trees under the wires. because they don't get so big and we don't have the issues that arise when they get matured too big.

[Kreatz]: Mr. Cushing, I saw your hand. Go ahead, Mr. Cushing.

[Cushing]: You know, if in the future there are any sugar maples available, you know, the, you never know the CTE program might offer a horticulture program in the future. And that would offer, you know, one thing that students would be able to, you know, learn how to do the sugar mapling and things like that. And, you know, I'm actually being serious as across the Commonwealth, there are many communities that there are many schools that are offering horticulture now as an option. And so anything that could be native close to the high school might be a positive benefit. just something to possibly think of. I know you can tap other maples other than just the sugar maples, but that is the more traditional.

[Van der Kloot]: Peter, that's a sweet idea.

[SPEAKER_08]: Paulette, you're so with it.

[Van der Kloot]: I'd like to have us have a horticultural program, but that's a topic for another meeting.

[SPEAKER_08]: Right, and avora culture too. I always try to encourage young people to go into that. Anything in the forestry related fields is very exciting and especially for women, a great career for women. But yes, some of the trees that are the red maples that were newly planted on Arbor Day, two or three of those are a cross between a red maple and a sugar maple, so I'm sure they could be tapped.

[Kreatz]: Are there any more questions? It's 6.17. Okay, thank you. Thank you so much, Ms. Tootie. I really appreciate you, I'm sorry, Aggie, for being on the call today. I really appreciate everything that you did. And Ms. McLaughlin, thank you so much. And so, yep, so we're gonna be moving on to agenda item number seven, Medford High School restrooms. So we spoke about this over several meetings and the mayor had made a, resolution on the February meeting that she would like to have the high school bathroom project started. So I wanted to know, where are we with this project? And did the bathrooms go out for RFP, the ones that we voted on to get rehabilitated go out for RFP?

[Murphy]: Harmon Zuckerman, PB – David Ensign, PB – Michael Leccese, PB – David Ensign It's primarily been held up in my office based on the conversations that we've had with some of the folks at the city, but I do anticipate that an RFP will issue prior to the conclusion of the school year.

[Unidentified]: Okay.

[Murphy]: Fiscal year is really more what I'm worried about than the school year, but I anticipate that will be, and the hope is that the work is completed over the next three months.

[Kreatz]: Okay. Thank you. Because I do want to make sure that, you know, ideally it would be, ideal if we could have the work done over the summer while the students aren't in school. And I understand there's a lot going on and it's your first budget year and it's just, I can't believe how fast time's flying and it's already the end of the school year. So I really appreciate if we can get the RFP out as soon as possible so that we can get the work going over the summer months.

[Murphy]: Absolutely. We agree.

[Kreatz]: PB, Harmon Zuckerman.

[Murphy]: PB – Harmon Zuckerman. PB – Harmon Zuckerman. PB – Harmon Zuckerman.

[Kreatz]: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Murphy. We're moving on to agenda number eight, the solar speed signs, and I think you already saw a sneak preview of this of the site, because I accidentally shared it, so I'll share it again. So hold on a minute. And so Mr. McLaughlin sent me the picture. And the speed sign, it's installed, and I'm sharing the picture now.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: That's directly in front of Methodist High School, right at the corner, just beyond the crosswalk. Now, there's also another one up in the back in the vocational school. behind where the cabinet shop is, and it's pointing up towards the back for people coming down from the field area. The third one will be installed at the Andrews Joe. Joe has some time off that he was using, but we discussed that he knows exactly where he's gonna put it. So I'm anticipating at the Andrews in front of the Andrews coming from Riverside Ave will be installed shortly.

[Kreatz]: Okay, thank you very much. Does anybody have any questions?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: And we have set the 10 miles an hour. Excellent, thank you.

[Kreatz]: Set for 10 miles, okay. Does anybody have any questions for Mr. McLaughlin? Thank you, Mr. McLaughlin, really appreciate the pictures. Okay, so we're moving on to agenda item number nine, the Medford High School hot water system. So this item, we haven't discussed this item yet. I did find it in the city of Medford's capital improvement plan on page 41. And, you know, I asked John McLaughlin if we could get some estimates, which he did get and he shared with us the estimate from Urban and Sons estimate for the hot water system is $171,644. And it's, you know, this is something that, you know, we will need to replace. There currently isn't any hot water in Medford High School. So we're gonna need to definitely replace this before the students return to the high school in September. So Mr. McLaughlin, I'll turn it over to you. If you could, you know, maybe just, you know, go over everything with us. I would appreciate that.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Sure. So basically the heat exchanger inside a 50 year old hot water tank rotted out to the point where it's no longer useful. So at this particular time, the back half of the building, the kitchen, the pool, the gym area doesn't have hot water. So I, our contractor, Irvin Plumman, I sent for them for a quote. And as I was sitting back and thinking, I thought of our friend, Alicia Hunt, down at City Hall, who gets grants and who looks for rebates and does all that happy stuff for us at the schools with our lighting and our Andrews School and projects. And she is actually on the meeting. I did have a, I did go, with Josh from B2O yesterday. And he had a team of engineers that were scouting out the location and scouting out the high school for, you know, for the replacement. I think Alicia, you can jump in whenever you would like.

[Hunt]: Yes, go ahead. Thank you. So it perhaps would be helpful to give some of you some background. Other than Paulette, I think that this some of the what's going on here predates most of everybody. So we actually had a whole building audit of all of our schools back in 2009 to look at what was there, what needed to be done, get estimates. And it was actually B2Q that did those back then. And they're also the engineering firm that I've been working with on the solar and energy project at the Andrew School and at the DPW. We're contracting with them to do some HVAC management at the police station in the library for now. So I actually said to Josh, you know, you know this building or you have, can you take a look and see back in 2010, we got a green communities grants. And what we got the money to do was to take our hot water systems, both of them off the steam system and put in high efficiency hot water systems. And we hired engineers. We had it designed. And most people aren't aware of this, but most of the building, the domestic hot water in all the bathrooms is on one system. And then the cafeteria and the locker rooms, including the pool area, are on a different hot water system in different parts of the building. So we put the whole thing out to bid to become more energy efficient, high efficiency systems in 2010, 2011. Because it was a big project, it took a while. And it came back as much too expensive. It was way more than our grant was. So we put it back out and only did the front half of the building. So all the bathrooms, so everybody should be rest assured that your kids going to the bathroom, washing hands, they have hot water. It's a separate system in the front half. By front half, I mean everything except the cafeterias and gyms. So that system's there. This system, we decided we just couldn't afford to do it. And actually the back half has one part that does the locker rooms and the kitchen, and then the pool is actually a separate hot water heater. So the pool's hot water is still working, but for example, the showers are not. Thankfully for COVID, you don't see that very often, people using the pool haven't been allowed to use the showers all year. So it's not impacting our current use of the pool, it would under normal health condition health regulations. So anyhow, I basically said to them, we need to do this. The system that's there is from 1969, the hot water exchanger or heat exchanger. So the idea that you would just quick get a new one of the same thing and stick it in there is perhaps not even possible, let alone clearly would not necessarily make sense. So there is plenty of space back in that area There should be no problem to put a new hot water heater in there and just abandon in place the old giant tanks which are quite impressive looking. That's actually what we did in the front boiler room where we have the front ones. The piping and all is such that it shouldn't be too hard to do this. However, we need to size hot water heaters for what we need. If one was to just put in tanks of the same size as the 1969, we would be paying for massive overcapacity. So we actually can't just say, we'll just put whatever that is in. We want to just take a quick look at what is going on with the The locker rooms, how many shower heads are there? What do we legally have to support? So I'm reaching out to the health department just to say like, what do you guys consider still active? Cause it's a health department regulation. And the kitchen, in addition to the kitchen, we, as this is an aside, but hopefully everybody's seen, we got a grant to put in a commercial dishwasher in the cafeteria. So we have to take that into account, the amount of water and how hot the water will be for that. So we need to look at that and what else the kitchen needs and then scale the hot water heaters appropriately. So we're not paying for, you know, double, triple the size of what we actually need in that space. We believe we can manage to not, though adding a bid process to this would add four to six weeks to the whole process. And we need this working for mid-August. So I've been speaking with Josh. They think they can get us a quote tonight for their services and then get it turned around pretty quickly. We spoke with procurement. John had reached out to them about how fast can we get this done. As long as the labor is under $50,000, we can go with three quotes. But like I said, we can't just say put in hot water heaters. We still need a detailed specification. of exactly what they're installing in that location. And then get three quotes on that and have them break out equipment and labor separately. And that will be so that if the labor is under $50,000, we don't have to go out to bid on it. We've talked about an emergency waiver. And it might be possible, but in my past experience with emergency waivers, and things like heating and hot water, you have to just replace like for like. When we had an issue at a fire station six years ago, we couldn't upgrade and put in a better system with controls. They said you just have to put the bare minimum in. So we might have some difficulty here asking for an emergency waiver because we can't replace what's there with exactly the same thing. So John reached out to me on this quickly. We've been trying to move very quickly on this, but I don't wanna lead you astray. I think the $170,000 that it's gonna be at least that much, because I think that when we put it out to bid, my memory is that we had a $250,000 grant, and I remember thinking, oh my God, this came in at double what we have, and that's why we split it. Um, so I'm hoping that we can keep it under $200,000. Um, but we should be prepared that, that this could in fact be, and it's honestly, it's not, not, not a negotiable. Like, can we just put it off because there's not water in the kitchen. Yeah.

[Kreatz]: Thank you so much. And I agree, it's something that we have to act on and I'm ready to make a motion that we proceed with the replacement of the Medford High School hot water system. And we're gonna move this project over to our sub regular meeting for a full committee vote.

[Hunt]: And just to be clear that that quote was just sort of an estimate. So it could vary. Um, and the other thing that I realized you had mentioned and I didn't touch was just grants. Um, we definitely can get a little bit of money from national grid for rebates and incentives on this. Um, we'll try and maximize that. We have some good people over there that we work with on the money side. Um, but I don't, it's not possible to get a grant in this timeframe for something like this, the grant process. So like it, it conceivably could qualify for a green communities grant. but that round opens in September and we wouldn't be notified till December. Like there are no grant opportunities that we could pull off in this timeframe. And we're only eligible for $100,000 this year. So it's, I just wanted to be clear. Like, I don't think there's a way we could get a regular grant. We can get some national grid help.

[Kreatz]: Thank you so much. Do any of my committee members have any questions for Ms. Alicia Hunt or Mr. McLaughlin?

[Van der Kloot]: No, what do we need now to proceed on this? What's our next step?

[Kreatz]: So I made a motion that we proceed with the replacement of the hot water system. So what we do need to do is we need to vote on this in subcommittee so that the full committee can vote on it at our next regular meeting. Okay. So that they can, you know, so they need our full committee vote to go ahead with the marching orders to replace the hot water system. And it is, you know, as Miss Alicia said, it's an emergency. We have to have it replaced by August, mid-August. So we have to, you know. So I second your motion. Thank you. And so, yes, go ahead, Mr. Ruscio.

[Ruseau]: I mean, I don't really. Now, if anybody here knows the answer, do we really even have to be involved or vote? I mean, honestly, they can't do a thing until June 7th. That's every day counts as far as I'm hearing.

[Hunt]: So what, what I'm hoping is that the quote for the engineers to get everything, the specifications and everything done will be, I'm hoping it'll be under 10,000. I know it'll be under 20. So I'm hoping it'll be much closer to 10 and I, John and I have talked. I'm not sure if his budget has that to just take care of it, whether we could get permission as it could be considered an energy project to do it out of my budget this late in the year. I have it left because I was under a funding freeze. And so I haven't been allowed to spend a lot of my budget this year. So that would just to get us to the place where we can have a quote. So I think that I'm hoping that there's the discretion for John and I to go ahead and hire an engineer and get specifications together. So possibly by the time, we won't have a quote for June 7th, but by the time we're ready to get quotes, you will have voted and said, go ahead and get the quotes.

[Ruseau]: Right, but my concern is we have two meetings left. I'd like us, not you, but I'd like us to, I don't know if it's our attorney or the finance people or whoever it is, make a decision as to whether we really have to be involved with voting on this. I know we just do it as a matter of course, but you know, if the RFP goes on June 15th and it comes back on June 23rd and we are actually have to vote, well, then we all need to be told ahead of time we're going to have an emergency meeting so we can be prepared. None of us are like hiding away in Vermont next to a river, which I might hope to be doing. And if we are not involved, I'd like us to not be involved, to not clog the process up. You know, we don't get called that the electric bill this year must have been shockingly higher than a normal year with all the type of filters. Nobody's we've not voted on that. just don't want us to be involved if we don't have to be. Nothing for you, Alicia, but if John or the superintendent can, you know, and that can be done all at once, but if he can get an answer whether we have to be involved, I'm fine with just voting this up and going up to our June 7th to agree to it. But if it turns out we don't need to be involved, we shouldn't be involved. Because we're all obviously in agreement, we're gonna replace it no matter what the number looks like.

[Kreatz]: Yes, and I think Mr. Murphy, I'm not sure if you're there, but I know that we don't need to vote to send it out for RFP. We don't need to do that. But I believe that we do need to vote to approve the spending of this repair, replacement. but I could be wrong. So, Mr. Murphy.

[Murphy]: Ms. Kritz, I'm here. Somebody just shut my camera off. If they want to turn it back on, I'm happy to address that. I apologize. I'm attempting to... There I am, sorry. Could you just repeat the last question? I apologize.

[Kreatz]: Yes, so do we, okay, do we need the full committee vote to go ahead with the replacement of the hot water system or can we vote it tonight and then the work can begin before the June 7th meeting as soon as the specifications are available with Ms. Hunt's office?

[Murphy]: I think that the committee, this is sort of one of those areas in which if the committee does not want us to move forward, you should vote to tell us to not move forward. And if you are comfortable with us moving forward, I think we can rely on the procurement laws as they're written, which are largely administrative in nature, to issue the RFP, eventually get a contract, get someone under contract, and then complete the work. If I think this is, in other words, like, we're going to have to spend money to do this. Our financial position, as you've heard me report in the past, is such that we're anticipating a little, our surplus for the fiscal year being a little north of where I personally would prefer it to be. So we're in a good position to fund this. And I think that we have legal authority to do that. I think the school committee has legal authority to veto it and tell us not to, which I've, based on the conversations I've heard both tonight and previously, there's no indication that that's the case. So I think a vote of confidence and an endorsement in the things that we're going to do is always appreciated. But I wouldn't see this as precedent that in a situation in which a repair of an emergency nature, and I'm not using that term in a statutory sense at the moment, has to get done. I don't think it's that the administration is responsible for coming back and asking the committee for it, provided that there is funding available and we're not taking money away from something else the committee has directed us to spend money on. Does that make sense?

[Ruseau]: Yep. I want to be us tying you down. This has to happen.

[Murphy]: Yeah. And we're talking just to be just so I'm I know we're spending money. I would say it's a good practice for me. But this is the water heater we're talking about. Yeah, I think for the water heater, the Curtis Tufts boiler, the generator and the bathrooms, I think you should assume that these those are fees are all going out the door prior to the conclusion of the fiscal year and that we will be tapping either the the surplus funds or the capital improvement funds that are currently, you know, have already been appropriated to the district from the city council. And I think in this case, at least in the hot water heater, most likely it would be the surplus funds that we would use.

[Kreatz]: Thank you.

[Murphy]: All right, thank you.

[Kreatz]: Thank you. Are there any more questions for Mr. Murphy? Okay, so we have the motion. We're just gonna share the vote at an upcoming meeting. We don't need their approval, so we have the first and second. I don't recall if we took the roll call vote on this, so please forgive me if I'm forgetting, but I know that I motioned it, Ms. Van der Kloot seconded. I'll just do the roll call vote. Ms. Van der Kloot?

[Van der Kloot]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: Mr. Russo? Yes. And Ms. Kreatz, yes. Okay, so the vote passes three in the affirmative, zero in the negative. Okay, so next we are moving on to similar item, but the Curtis Tufts High School boiler. So Mr. McLaughlin, if you wanted to just touch on this and it's not a full repair, it's replacing sectional replacements. I think you explained it that It's not the full replacement, just sectional replacements. So I'll let you take it over.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: That is correct at this time, it's not a full boiler replacement we found so boilers are made up in sections that are attached together. Each section is attached together. So, we found a couple of them leaking we were able to get the parts and put them on hold this winter when nobody could get parts, we were able to get them. We found them somewhere in Maine somewhere. fire away, and we were able to get them, and then we put them on standby because we did a temporary fix, so that we didn't have to shut the heat off in the building, fix held. So now someone's coming along, we'll be getting ready to do the fix. Well, I don't really know how much it's gonna cost, but I'll obviously ask our contractor how much it's gonna cost. But a lot of the items in it, and just kind of piggybacking on what Dave said, Murphy said, we bring these to you guys because we want you to know that there's a few issues that we need to solve the problems, you know what I mean? So it's not, a question of the vote for this and the vote for that. But we do have the subcommittee meeting so that I can tell you guys what's been happening in our department and things that, you know, that we need to look out for and things that are coming down the pike. Like, you know, I mean, even if you wanted to jump on it and I think Dave already said it, you know, all the RFPs are going to go for those three projects, churner stuffs, the generator, you know, and then I was just letting you know, on the back end that the pool roof, you know, we had a, we had a temporary repair down on the pool roof. I had them come up, I had them come in and have a look at it and give me a price on the replacement of the roof, which will have to be replaced. It has a temporary hurricane bar on it right now at some point. And unfortunately, the price was a lot of money. to replace that section of the roof. Now, we have a temporary hurricane wire on the roof, and you just said the number can be. Oh, I'm sorry. It was 625,000 I think was the quote, something like that, in that vicinity. So, so we have the number we have a temporary fix on it now. It's just the informational that, you know, it's coming down the pike who knows maybe there's an MSBA grant. I mean we were going to try to get an MSBA grant to replace the high school roof but our roof wasn't old enough, but maybe there's something out there that can help us. If not, like I said we do have a temporary fix. I don't believe it's leaking in the pool at this particular point in time. I know that the underlayment, the deck did get wet because of the nature of the problem up on the roof, but it's just, you know, it's one of those things that certainly, does it have to be addressed today? I don't know, but does it have to be addressed? Yes. Thank you.

[Kreatz]: Thank you. So for the, so, you know, I mean, I'm just gonna, process we've been following is like I motion to go ahead with the sectional replacements that you need to put in for the Curtis Tufts hot water heater.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: For the same reason- We already purchased a sectional. So we're just gonna have to pay the labor to have them installed. So I don't know if it's gonna be that much. It might even be an operational budget expense, truthfully.

[Kreatz]: Excellent. Okay, so this was more of informational and so yes, you get to go ahead to to go ahead with the labor. Obviously, we need to get that done. Do we, you know, a motion to go ahead with the labor? Is there a second?

[Van der Kloot]: Second.

[Kreatz]: Okay, so we'll do the roll call vote. Mr. Russo?

[Van der Kloot]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: Ms. Van der Kloot?

[Van der Kloot]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: And Ms. Kreatz? Yes. okay so the next item oh yes you're at 6 45 just for and we are mr mclaughlin already went over the high school roof which was informational information and we have just two items left i believe we're going to make it because We already had a preview from Mr. Murphy and Mr. McLaughlin that the RFPs are going out for the generator. I just wanted to just have the discussion with Mr. McLaughlin and the high school transformer, which he also, you know, gave us a preview at the pre-budget meeting. So we've heard about that. So Mr. McLaughlin, you know, at our last meeting and a couple meetings before that we've discussed the generator and that it's extremely important it's not operational we've got the estimates it has to be replaced if we lose power there would be no heat electricity etc etc so we all agree that you know we want to go ahead with this project and i don't think we need to have further discussion on this because we've already had discussions over the in this school year every subcommittee meeting I've been on with the building and ground. So at this time, I just motion that we proceed with replacing Medford High School emergency generator, which we know is already going off RFP at the end of this fiscal year, I think Mr. Murphy said. So is there a second? Second. Okay, roll call vote. We have Ms. Caruso. Yes. Ms. Vandekloot. Yes. And Ms. Critts, yes. So we have three in the affirmative, zero in the negative. And we have our final item, which is the Medford High School transformer, which we did hear a preview about this at the pre-budget meeting. And the estimate on, this is on a repair, is $19,027. And it's, the transformer is out and And John, could you just touch on that? I know that it's out and it needs to be repaired, but I don't quite really know what a transformer does. Could you just share that?

[Mr. McLaughlin]: I'd be happy to. So the transformer is working. It is working. It surfaces one third of Mefford High School, which would be the main electrical junction comes in and it goes into the transformer. The transformer distributes the power to the breakers and then it goes out and it obviously does one third of the building electrical system. It is working. It is operational, has a leak. There's an oil leak. that potentially years ago, they used to have PCBs in them, whatever. So PCBs were dangerous. So a long time ago, we had the PCBs taken out, and then they put in another oil that may have over time loosen the seals. So what had happened when we did the, I had an audit insurance audit, we have them every year, they had suggested that we test the oil in the system. So what happened was is I waited for them, they sent me a test kit to test the oil to make sure that was okay. The electrician at that time, he went and he looked at me, thought that the oil was a little bit low and he didn't wanna test it with the oil that low. So then I talked to my electrical contractor who turned us on to this particular high power. that would come in and do the service and get the generator going. I just want to, I just have to make sure, honestly, I just have to make sure that the 20,000 meets procurement specs, that I can actually hire somebody and bring them in for 20, or do I have to bring it, put three quotes out there? There's a possibility I might have to put three quotes out there. It's definitely on the radar. And it's definitely going to have to get done. And we're definitely going to, you know, it's definitely going to be just so that you can get a little bit of an idea. And I think, you know, but a little bit of an idea of what goes on in the life of buildings and grounds and in the areas that we touch. But it's certainly something that, you know, we're going to have to take care of it no matter what.

[Kreatz]: Thank you very much. Are there any questions for Mr. McLaughlin on this?

[Unidentified]: Thank you.

[Kreatz]: So I, you know, just following with the process I've been doing, I recommend and I motion that we go ahead with giving John McLaughlin, Mr. McLaughlin, the okay to repair the transformer.

[Van der Kloot]: Second.

[Kreatz]: Okay, and I'm going to do roll call vote. Mr. Russo? Yes. Ms. Van der Kloot? Yes. And Ms. McLaughlin, I'm sorry, I don't know why I said that.

[Mr. McLaughlin]: Yes, yes.

[Kreatz]: Okay, so three in the affirmative, zero in the negative, motion passes. I'm just gonna, I checked my emails. I don't have any emails from anybody. I did get the email from Mr. Fallon and shared the presentation with, I'll share with everybody. And just wanted to note that all the estimates, all the presentations are in the folder that Susie created. Thank you so much, Susie. You were extremely helpful. I had so many attachments and, And pictures and everything was included. And that's it. If there aren't any further questions, I motion to adjourn. Second. Roll call vote. Mr. Russo?

[Unidentified]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: Ms. Van der Kloot?

[Unidentified]: Yes.

[Kreatz]: And Ms. Kreatz? Yes. Okay, the meeting has ended. Thank you

Kreatz total time: 36.97 minutes total words: 5690	Van der Kloot total time: 6.45 minutes total words: 1082	Ruseau total time: 5.79 minutes total words: 1018