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[Bears]: Finance Committee meeting, February 27th, 2024. Mr. Clerk, please call the roll.
[Tseng]: Vice President Collins. Present. Councilor Lazzaro. Present. Councilor Levin.
[Dickinson]: Present. Councilor Tseng. Present. President Bears.
[Bears]: Present. Five present, none absent. The meeting is called to order. There will be a meeting of the Medford City Council Administration and Finance Committee on February 27, 2024 at 6 p.m. in the City Council Chamber at Medford City Hall, 85 George P. Hassett Drive, Medford, Massachusetts, and via Zoom. The action and discussion items for tonight's meeting are, there's just one, paper 22-494, Resolution to Draft a Budget Ordinance for the City of Medford, initially proposed September 2022. There were five committee meetings in 2023, in February, March, October, November, and December. And we are now meeting on it once more. I think we've ironed out pretty much all of the details. I'm going to quickly just share my screen. Give me one moment.
[Dickinson]: If you have not, I'm going to share my screen.
[Bears]: All right, so this is our agenda item, and you can see if folks go to MedfordMA.CivicClerk.com, you can find all of our meeting information here, our action and discussion item for tonight, all of the committee reports, a variety of documents attached. We're going to be looking at the latest version, which I'll just go through. which we sent to the administration. The administration did send back a response. But in general, this is adding to our Chapter 3 finance. It's not changing anything. We're adding a purpose and intent of the article, but then not changing any of the existing provisions. It adds a new Article 5, annual budget process, and a new Article 6, budget needs assessments. You can see all the tracked language change here, but essentially this would create quarterly financial reports and meetings where the city council will meet with the finance director 60 days after the end of each quarter. What would be discussed would be previous quarter accounts payable warrant by month for each month, the year to date budget to actuals report on audited, where available, any updates on state certifications and revenue forecasts. And we would hold a committee or subcommittee to review the 2nd and 3rd quarter financial reports no later than 60 days after the end of the quarter coordinating the date and time of the meeting with the finance director to attend. Then we get into the budget process. Essentially, we outlined this in a resolution last week for this process, but we would start with city council budget recommendations, members of the city council submitting individual recommendations for consideration by the full council by March 1st. So folks get your recommendations in by Friday. What should we discuss in a resolution, then we would consider those recommendations as a council and submit them to the mayor by March 22. Let me jump back up here. We would start having, after that, some preliminary budget meetings between April 15th and May 15th with the mayor-designee, finance director-designee, relevant department heads. The mayor is providing an estimated budget allocation to the Medford Public Schools by March 1st as well. And we're working with the administration to schedule these meetings. The mayor finance director shall provide a schedule that contains the order in which they're discussed based on staff availability and administration priorities. Those meetings would also have information for those meetings, including the annual operating budget for the previous year, the department heads budget requests for the upcoming year, and then a list of any new staff programs or services requested for the upcoming year. following that, those meetings, so we'd have the recommendations of the council, preliminary budget meetings with department heads and the mayor and the finance director, and then the mayor would submit a comprehensive budget proposal by May 31st of each year. And after that, we could request, the council can request additional budget meetings to review specific proposed department budgets. The mayor, budget, finance director, designees may also request additional meetings. And the comprehensive proposal would contain total expected amount of general fund revenue, including the expected property tax revenue, expected state aid, expected local receipts, as well as the proposed annual operating budget for each department. And then as we discussed previously, including just simple top lines of This is how much of the budget is paying for things we already did in the previous year. Or, for example, how much of an increase is coming is just paying for fixed cost growth, like union contracts, or the increase of the trash contract, etc. And then how much of any change is paying for new programs or new expenses, and that can let people see. very simply that most of the time, even when budgets go up in a nominal dollar term, it's really just paying for something that we were already paying for in the past because the cost of that has gone up year to year. And then there were 2 other items, which I know that the previous committee that ordinances and rules committee. Has been pretty insistent on, and the administration has been insistent that it's not really it's a capacity question to be able to do these, but there's 2 items 1st is section 3105. Which is reviewing the progress to include additional funds and the comprehensive budget proposal. So, we would like to see if possible, and we've had folks can read the committee reports. I don't think we have to belabor everybody with the. Having the discussion for the 3rd, 4th, 5th, or 6th time necessarily tonight, since it's already been had, and it is already written for the record, but the subcommittee previously, and we'll see if that is still where the committee is really would like to see more of the city's total spending and revenue included in the budget process, including our enterprise fund. uh, capital improvement plan, revolving funds, grant funds. Um, and so in lieu of including that understanding that the capacity is not there in the finance office, there's a section here that would say that the request that have the annually no later than October 15th, the mayor finance director or designee submit a report to the council. regarding the progress towards including those items in future comprehensive budget proposals and then that'd be followed up by a meeting between a council meeting with the mayor finance director or designee to present that report and answer questions and also consider updates to this ordinance if there are new procedures to be included. And there's also a similar item, you know, initially this proposal had started with not just a scope of having a budget schedule established by ordinance, but also this idea of budget needs assessments. So really trying to determine what our medium and long-term operating and capital expense needs are so that we can understand when we're spending money on a capital plan or when we're saying, you know, trying to understand what it would take to provide an additional level of service or a higher level of service for a department. What is that going to cost? And, you know, through our discussions, it's clear that the resources and staffing levels in the finance department would need to be increased in order to accomplish that goal. And also that in some aspects, we would be breaking new ground That's, you know, some communities, most communities don't necessarily have the resources to put together reports of this nature as well. So, in a similar fashion, the latest draft from our December 2023 meeting just also includes that annually, same dates and times the mayor finance director designee can submit a report regarding progress towards creating these documents. And then we would have a meeting to discuss those reports if needed. And the administration also shared a response. and generally believe we're very close to being in agreement with the current draft. Main concern are those two sections regarding the annual reports. As stated in past meetings, we're not equipped to take this responsibility on presently and recommend that the committee defer discussion on these items until after at least a year so we can assess how things are going. Resource constraints are going to be tested and not having capability for those sections. is, you know, it's not there. And driving this point home, the capital improvement planning process takes over a year to complete. And so that's just another item to add in there. We hope the committee will be amenable to these exclusions. We're all trying to work together to better our process has been attainable. The mayor and I do not want to set up our departments for failure given our role in the organization. We believe we have the best understanding of their resource constraints. So that's kind of where things were left. I did send another message saying, at least my understanding of the prior committee, is that if the report simply says we still can't do it, then that would be something that you know, we've had a lot of discussions on this. I think we understand the position of the administration that the resources, that this is a resource, this is a resource intensive act and the resources are not there. So that was just, but that was just my personal opinion as one Councilor. So, but I just didn't want to put that out there. And so that's a summary, I think in a few minutes of everything that's happened up until this point, I will go to members of the council, but since I did read some responses from the administration, I do want to, let you chime in if I've mischaracterized anything before we move to discussion by the council. So recognize the Chief of Staff or the Finance Director at this time.
[Nazarian]: I'm happy to defer to the Finance Director if you'd like to start. I don't have anything specific on my end at this time.
[Bears]: Thank you.
[Dickinson]: Push. OK. Well, nor do I. I think you've adequately summarized what's been going on in our general position on this. It's that we'd like to get the ball rolling, but we don't know how the ball rolling is going to actually pan out. So before we're like, looking way forward to say, you know, these are obvious things that we want to get in there. So the question really is when we go to an October 15th report to the council, it may simply be, okay, we managed to do X, Y, and Z, but we're still not there to do, you know, move on to the next stage of that. That would be our concern is how rigid the council wants that documentation to be. Because obviously, once something is set in stone, it's set in stone in an ordinance. And we have to comply. So if the council is thinking that this is simply an update on progress towards these goals, then yeah, that's That's understandable and doable. We want to keep everything we vote on, that you vote the council votes on, going forward to be something that everybody feels is achievable. So that's my main concern, given the people I've got to do it all. So that's where I am.
[Bears]: Thank you, Director Dickinson. All right. Discussion by the council. I saw Councilor Lazzaro.
[Lazzaro]: Thank you. Thank you for that summary. It was really helpful to hear everything laid out in that way. I was just a question for the chair. Given the communication from the chief of staff, it sounds like because of the capital improvement planning process for this year, it sounds like maybe this is a one-year delay in that one portion, would that be something that we could have an understanding that that would maybe be something that we could just set aside for the first year, and then we could approve everything going forward? Or on a yearly basis, we could sort of say, oh, there's one portion that we need to delay, and just an understanding that there may be various things that come up, but everything doesn't have to be There's no penalty if something happens and we can't necessarily see everything as clear as day. It's not like we're doing taxes and you get audited and you have to pay a fee. I think that understanding that we're all working together on trying to get the most transparent process possible and share all this information with the people of Medford so that there are no, it's not a surprise when we have the budget season upon us, that being the goal of everybody, then I wouldn't see any problem to understanding that something, especially in the first few years, may take a little bit longer or may have a couple of bumps in the road. I wouldn't anticipate that being an issue on my end.
[Bears]: Thank you Councilor Zaria and to Director Dickinson's point at this point we've stripped out anything beyond just saying we'd like to see this let us know every fall how how well we're doing or how not how far we've gotten how not far we've gotten depending on where we are. Council Vice President Collins.
[Collins]: Thank you, President Bears. Thanks as always for being here and collaborating on this with us. Same to the Chief of Staff. Just to echo what my colleagues just shared, I think the You know, I certainly share the concern. It's very important to not be legislating something that we don't know is within our capacity or beyond our capacity. And I definitely appreciate the focus on that as we're still crafting this in draft form. And I completely agree to me the intent of the language that's currently in that section of the ordinance is just to create kind of some sort of timestamp for a check-in. I know the term report usually connotated as like a very structured, very detailed, like it must have X, Y, and Z type of document. To me, the intent is just to make sure that once a year we have some kind of record of here's where we were last year, here's where we are this year in terms of are we approaching it? What new tools have we developed? What is our sense right now of what we might need to get closer to that goal? And not some sort of mandate, not some sort of, you know, if it doesn't have this section, then it's invalid or something like that. A fairly, you know, the phrase I would use, I wouldn't put this in the ordinances, I would be pretty comfortable with this being as formal or as informal as possible. capacity allows it to be while we're trying to get this annual process off the ground. That's important to me is just knowing that we're going to have some kind of document and some kind of check-in in the fall every year that allows us to chart our progress towards the better information and the sophistication that I know the administration is already working towards and that we're eager to support.
[Tseng]: Thank you, Vice President Collins. Councilor Zang. Um, I think to my fellow Councilors points, um, I think this is meant to be a lot more, I guess, more informative and less scary than it sounds. Um, the. I, I believe that the council is already. Taking a step back when it comes to what exactly this report entails and the details that has to entail. I think where we've become over the last few months, much more open minded as to what the broad definition of a report and what types of information we're seeing. And as President Bears said, the. the committee at the very least. As a councilor on this committee, I would be also amenable to the report just saying, the city does not have the resources to do this at this moment. This is not a feasible option. I wonder if there is a way to reduce maybe any hesitation or fear that the administration might have and yet need a compromise on this topic. Along the lines of what Councilor Ilazaro said about finding dates of effectiveness that work for the section that work for the administration for the section, maybe delaying it a year or putting in the words. Instead of saying just a report to council regarding progress towards and resources necessary to do X, Y, and Z, to say a report to council regarding progress towards, resources necessary for, and the feasibility of including. x, y, z. And I think that would be maybe slightly broader and yet still get at the same spirit of what the council is looking for. And I know as Director Dickinson, you said, you don't know what council we're going to be working with in five years or 10 years. Maybe that adjustment in wording will give you guys more leeway in terms of what you can do legally with an ordinance like this in the future.
[Bears]: Any further comment from members of the Council? Any discussion from the Chief of Staff or the Finance Director? Madam Chief of Staff?
[Nazarian]: Thank you, and good evening. I don't think I said good evening when I first greeted the council, so, or the committee. So I think most of the things have been stated. You know, I appreciate the collaboration by this committee, the prior subcommittee, the council in general on this subject. You know, I feel I'm, probably should reiterate some of the concerns I've expressed. They've already been stated, so I won't spend a lot of time. I continue to be concerned, and it was stated by Bob, and then... Acknowledged by Councilor Tseng and I appreciate that. I just want to make sure that this committee understands that. Some of the concerns that I've expressed that we've expressed collectively at these meetings come from a place of wanting to make sure that we're not. putting future councils and future administrations in conflict with one another. You know, we recognize that this council or this committee may be agreeable, and presumably the council, hopefully, we would hope would be agreeable to a very simple report. But I think there's been acknowledgment by this committee that, you know, we have resource constraints that are perhaps even more challenging than other communities. essentially discussing the codification of an ordinance that would create, you know, I realize that there's nothing like that would occur if something didn't happen. And I appreciate that sentiment very much. I do point out, though, that it becomes law. And once something becomes law, we are legally obligated to follow it. And we're going to do everything in our power to follow it. So, you know, we would never willingly or knowingly attempt to break the law. And that's what this becomes. It becomes law. We're not talking about something that's optional. We're talking about something we must abide by. We shall abide by. There may be no necessarily penalties, but that doesn't change how our administration operates when it pertains to those kinds of things. So with that comes some uncertainty, right? We're going to present, hopefully, a good opportunity to collectively establish an understanding on how the budget needs to be laid out by what timelines. You know, and as we establish other criteria, for instance, you know, one aspect of this budget ordinance, this law, will be that the city shall ensure that the city council receives the accounts payable warrant on a, I don't recall if it's, I think it's quarterly basis. We've been trying to keep up with doing it monthly recently, but I am behind a few months right now, and that is on me. So once this ordinance goes into place, I can't be behind. So I have to drop something else. and I must follow that. Something else that's not required by law has to be put aside, and I have to follow this. Now, at present, many of you, all of you, I'm sure, know that I'm presently supporting the elections office, so there's a lot of laws that need to be followed there, too. You know, I don't know what happens in a scenario where we have, you know, a lot of different laws we have to follow all at the same time. We may have to figure out how to support the process to ensure that, you know, some other department or some other staff in the mayor's office, for instance, is dropping something that they're working on to support this. So, again, just. Not here to necessarily present a very large argument, but just to put everyone on notice, make sure everyone understands that, you know, what we're talking about is wanting very much to ensure that not only promises that we keep are kept, because that is obviously something we strive to do, and by agreeing to an ordinance like this, You know, we're essentially making a commitment, but it's also law. So those are my comments, and I appreciate everyone's time and energy that's gone into this. Thank you.
[Bears]: Thank you, Madam Chief of Staff. Any further comments or discussion? Seeing none, is there any member of the public who'd like to speak? on Zoom as we don't see anyone here in the chamber with us. You can raise your hand on Zoom. Seeing none, Vice President Collins. Thank you, President Barras.
[Collins]: I was just collecting my thoughts. I certainly appreciate You know everything that the chief of staff has shared in this meeting and other and others. The, I think the point is really well taken and I definitely appreciate the spirit of, you know, just being transparent You know, I know that these are things that we all want to do, and I really appreciate the clarity around, you know, I know experientially what you want to do and commit to do and what you can do are not always a perfectly overlapping Venn diagram. And I think that, you know, as a city, we see how that plays out with our various challenges and episodes and things that we go through in trying to manage our capacity as a city overall. So I just want to note that that point is really well taken. You know, this ordinance has changed a lot. One thing that, again, and I respect the diversity of opinion about the exact language that this section is put into, one thing that makes me personally feel comfortable is just how flexible the language of this section is. And of course, I've made it clear before, you know, that in my mind, this says, you know, shall submit a report and doesn't really get prescriptive about what that has to look like beyond touching on certain topics. It does bring to mind to me because the Chief of Staff mentioned the Elections Department in terms of, you know, I think this conversation is a lot about thinking through contingencies. What about the years when this report isn't like all that we would dream it to be? Quite recently, the City Council asked for an elections after action report from the Elections Department and that report was not all that we dreamed it to be. So we talked about it and And that was how we took that document and got some meaning out of it by, you know, that spring conversation about, you know, this is what we would like to see in it. Next time, these are the questions that we still have. The conversation that we had about the report, I think, answered a little bit more some of those questions that weren't answered in the text of it. So I just bring that up as an example of um, why I feel comfortable with this language, knowing that, you know, I don't know, like, maybe we'll never have a season of going through this process laid out in the, uh, laid out in the ordinance where it will feel very challenging to do that. Maybe it'll feel, feel seamless, you know, starting this fall, maybe it won't. Um, but if it's not seamless, if there's friction there, if it's challenging to get a report together, if the report, like, has to be very concise, if the report has to be really bare bones the first year, if, you know, we read the report and we still have questions, well, I feel like we already have a model for how that can go. And I think that even just having a simple document to start out with, that's a jumping off point for a discussion in committee or written follow-up, to me, that's still productive to have, even if that conversation is about what's not included. So I just offer that.
[Bears]: Thank you, Vice President Collins, and I just do want to note that the first main article regarding the budget would go into effect. We need to make an amendment because it says becomes effective January 1, 2024, and it is obviously March or February 27, 2024. The second section regarding the, and still this just is just about a report at this point. It doesn't actually outline. This is just a progress report rather than a comprehensive. analysis of budgetary needs that would not go into effect until next January 2025.
[Tseng]: Councilor Tseng. Thank you, President Barras. In the spirit of the work that we've been doing on this committee, I know there are two new members here too, so I wanted to recap a little bit. But when we first had a meeting on this, we had a draft that I think everyone in the room agreed was the model of what a budget assessment ordinance should look like. And there was contention over what was realistic and what was possible. And I believe this draft that we see in front of us today, It's the result of good faith negotiations from all parties on all of those points. And we haven't really thrown anything out of the window. We've just come to work point by point and come to places of consensus and agreement on this. I think we've also operated with the assumption that the committee wants to see all these things in it. and is not ready to move forward with an ordinance without a lot of the components. And I think with that assumption, with that understanding of this draft ordinance, that's where a lot of that good faith negotiation came from. I just want to make sure that, you know, it seems from my read of what we're talking about, what we've been talking about over the last 20 minutes, it doesn't sound like the committee is ready to just toss out this section. of the of the ordinance. And I would, I know Councilor Lazzaro, Councilor Collins, myself, we've all presented ways for us to, on this point, reach that point of consensus, that shared understanding of how do we balance, you know, the administration's concerns and understandings of our are the feasibility of doing a lot of this stuff with the ideals and the moral, I guess, the needs of our community to get this information transparently and for our council to get the information so we can make better financial decisions as a city. And I guess what I'm saying is, I would love if we can engage in that discourse with the administration as to how can we make the section work better. Let's not assume that we're throwing this out of the window. What language changes can we make to get everyone on the same page here?
[Bears]: I would just posit that we won't. And I don't think we're that far apart, but I think I think the administration has made it clear they would prefer it not to be there. My assertion, and I mean this in the kindest of ways, is that we've already thrown out the two sections, and now we're just saying, what would it take to get them back in? That's just putting my cards on the table. We've said, we hear you. It's not feasible. All we want to do is every year check in on future feasibility. So that's just my two cents. If there's word changes that make people feel better, I have no problem with it. You know, that's that's where I'm at. I do have 2 things I wanted to add to the to the conversation. Which is 1. I actually think. You know, I was putting together the resolution to talk about the fiscal 25 budget, and I realized that I think sections. I think section what is currently city council budget recommendations to the mayor should come before preliminary budget meetings because it's chronologically an earlier step in the process. And I just think it might read easier if those 2 sections were swapped. And I'm sorry, I was just reading through this 1 last time to catch any specific. Just technical things. I think the only other one was just that we should change the effective date of Article 5. So that's it, but putting those on the table as well. Further discussion on Councilor Tseng's point or any other technical amendments? Vice President Collins.
[Collins]: The version of the document that I'm looking at is the track changes one. appropriate to make a motion to accept the track changes along with those other technical amendments around the effective date and swapping the order of those sections?
[Bears]: Yeah. So let me... I can go back to screen share. Do we have a... This looks like the document 12-20-2023. Does that seem right?
[Collins]: It was the one in the packet.
[Bears]: In the packet. I think this is what I attached. So you'd be motion to accept all of the track changes in here. And then also to swap sections 103, 102, and 3103. OK. Just to swap the order of sections 3102 and 3103. And then you also have the effective date. What do we want to say?
[Collins]: Section 3154, I think that effective date is corrected by adopting the track changes, but section 3108, motion to switch the effective date to January 1, 2025.
[Bears]: Or should we just do it for when the ordinance is passed? Yeah.
[Collins]: Shall become effective upon passage.
[Bears]: Because we're trying, yeah, that's right. Yeah, that sounds right. Changing the motion to let the article become effective on passage. and 3108. Okay, let's see what happens here. This is a momentous occasion, everyone. We're accepting all of the track changes. Second from Councilor Tseng. I guess I shouldn't press the button until we've voted, right? All those in favor? Opposed? Motion passes. Let's see if my computer crashes. It didn't crash, and it cut a whole page off of this thing. All right, I'm going to move these two around. All right. All of that should be in here now. The article 5 effect on passage the next article not until 2025 swapped and it looks good. I think the last thing is just I know there were several proposals to add additional language regarding the annual progress reports. Any motions on that. All right. Any further discussion. Chief of staff, Madam Chief of staff.
[Nazarian]: I don't want to complicate this, but under budget and procurement, we might want to do a quick cleanup. We presently have a chief procurement officer and a budget manager. So, just since we're already here. I don't know exactly what language, but we can certainly look at it. If this committee is agreeable and that's just simply clean up, we can certainly relay it to the council, the proposed language. Unless you'd like to do it here today, it's up to you all.
[Bears]: We want to try it now? I'm seeing some nods on taking a look at it now. Sure. All right. I love it. Let's see what Muni Code says. All right. One second here. All right.
[Nazarian]: I don't know how easy this is going to be and just looking at it right now, because it would seem to me that the chief procurement officer should, you know, have certain responsibilities and then the other responsibilities should fall into the finance director and not necessarily into the budget manager. Because we wouldn't necessarily expect that the budget manager would attend all city council budget subcommittee meetings. That would be something that might be, you know, would be something that we would, you know, The various sections that were just discussed have potentially alternative expectations versus this. So I don't know how easy this is right now. We can certainly take a stab at it. Maybe stab's not the right word. Take a bite at it. But I recognize it might not be that.
[Bears]: So just reading this. No, I appreciate that, Madam Chief, so I just want to read. So we have the Chief Budget and Procurement Officer, appointment term or authority. This is pretty, you know, some of this looks like it's from the pre-1987 charter era. So I don't even know how much of this is, you know, holds water under the current charter. or exactly what the updates were. But yeah, I definitely agree with you. Some of these seem to be obviously procurement, and some of them are budget related. Some of them are affected by the other sections. It looks like these, section 2932 and 2933, Those, I don't know, yeah, this is pretty technical and it looks like it gets pretty deep into procurement law. And I don't know if it, you know, are we currently producing an annual report of the cost of all supplies furnished to each department or officer? Is that something that's happening? Do you know, Bob?
[Nazarian]: Question.
[Bears]: All right. Any thoughts? So it seems like maybe we can't do this right now. Council Vice President.
[Collins]: If this is just a simple finding the right term for the position and swapping it in. I personally would feel comfortable doing that from the floor, even if we refer this out to regular session tonight.
[Bears]: Yeah. Yeah, if you guys take a look through this and you have suggestions. we can just add the modernization pieces on the floor.
[Nazarian]: Realistically, if I may, I didn't mean to interrupt anyone. Realistically, depending upon the timeline of the council, it may be something we have to circle back to. If the council wants to move quickly on the ordinance, it may be that we just aren't able to modify these sections right now.
[Bears]: Got it.
[Nazarian]: Just to put it out.
[Bears]: Yeah, and one of the things that we've been, you know, put out in the council governing agenda document is having just generally each committee review the ordinances that fall under their committee's authority for just general upgrades and updating. Because we found a lot of times, you know, going through, I know I did, I let snow and ice removal, Councilor Collins let on solid waste. There's just a lot of anachronistic language in the city ordinances that really needs to be updated. We can wrap it up in that process at some point too. But if the administration has proposals on this outside of us, finding the time to just generally review ordinances, I don't think I for one would not object to taking a look at them and trying to incorporate them.
[Nazarian]: Thank you. I appreciate that and appreciate just the opportunity to open this up today and take a quick look.
[Bears]: Yeah, absolutely. All right, so we have our amended document. Are there any further motions? Vice President Collins.
[Collins]: I would motion to report out of committee as amended.
[Bears]: On the motion of Councilor Collins to report this out of committee to the regular meeting. Seconded by Councilor Tseng. When you're ready, Mr. Clerk. All those in favor? Opposed? Motion passes. Anything else anyone wants to do? Vice President Collins?
[Collins]: I'd just like to thank Director Dickinson and the Chief of Staff for meeting with us about this so many times, this term, previous term, and for working through it and coming out with something that we can get a start on and I would motion to adjourn.
[Bears]: Thank you, yeah, and I would echo those comments as well. We have done a lot of good work, many meetings, lots of edits, and I will go to Councilor Tseng.
[Tseng]: I would also like to echo those sentiments. I know Councilor Collins, President Bears, and I have sat through many of these meetings on this ordinance. I just can't overstate how important this is for Medford, how much time we spent on this. I think we've created a product that our city can be really proud of. our residents can be very proud of as well. That really moves us forward as a team, all of us, in our goals of reaching more transparency, making better decisions for our city, creating more reform. I think this is the kind of positive spirit that so many residents have invested their faith in our government for, and I really want to thank you, Director Dickinson, our Chief of Staff, for working so hard with our committee on this.
[Bears]: Great, any further comment on the motion to adjourn? Councilor Collins, seconded by Councilor Tseng? Oh, seconded by Councilor, I can't, sorry. I should have spoken up. Councilor Tseng, all those in favour? Opposed? Motion passes, meeting is adjourned.
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