[Falco]: The 16th regular meeting of the Medford City Council will now come to order. Clerk, please call the roll.
[Hurtubise]: Councilor Bears. Present. Vice President Caraviello. Present. Councilor Knight. Present. Councilor Marks. Present. Councilor Morell. Present. Councilor Scarpelli. Present. President Falco.
[Falco]: Present. All seven members are present. At this time, I'd ask everyone to please rise to salute the flag. I pledge allegiance to the flag
[Hurtubise]: of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.
[Falco]: This meeting is being broadcast live on Channel 22 Comcast and Channel 43 Verizon. Pursuant to Governor Baker's March 12, 2020 order suspending certain provisions in the Open Meeting Law, General Law Chapter 30A, Section 18, and the Governor's March 15, 2020 order imposing strict limitation on the number of people that may gather in one place. This meeting of the Medford City Council will be conducted via remote participation to the greatest extent possible. specific information and the 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 or watch the meeting may do so by accessing the meeting link contained herein. No in-person attendance or members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. In the event that we are able to do so despite best efforts, we will post on the City of Medford or Medford Community Media website an audio or video recording transcript or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting, Hearings 20-343 Legal Notice City of Medford Five-Year Consolidated Plan 2020 Annual Public Action Plan Revised Public Hearing. This is a public hearing. A virtual public hearing via Zoom will be held by the Medford City Council on Tuesday, May 12, 2020 at 7 p.m. The purpose of the public hearing will be to invite the general public and representatives of public service agencies to express comments regarding the city's five-year consolidated plan and annual actual plan for community development and planning. The actual plan contains the proposed use of community development block grant CDBG funds for programming in 2020, which extends from July 1st, 2020 through June 30th, 2021. The consolidated plan includes broad goals and objectives to address priority needs with resources available from HUD, including a five-year strategy for use of CDBG funding for the years 2020 through 2024. The Office of Community Development will be requesting that the Medford City Council authorize Mayor Breanna Lungo-Koehn, official representative of the City of Medford, to submit the 2020 through 2024 Consolidated Plan and 2020 Annual Action Plan application for funds in all assurances and certifications to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The city's applying for $1,574,868 in CDBG funds. Call 781-393-2501 for any accommodations slash aids. TDD 781-393-2516. Medford is an EEOAA 504 employer. At this point, I declare the public hearing open to those in favor of the petition. Is there anyone here that is in favor of the petition? Okay, if you could please have your name and address for the record.
[Alicia Hunt]: Good afternoon, Alicia Hunt. I'm the acting director of community development, 41 Watson Street, Medford. I also have with me this evening, Ashley Williams, who is the CDBG administrator for the city of Medford. I do have a small presentation that I can give the council if you would like me to do so.
[Falco]: Okay. At this point, is there anyone else in favor of the Is there anyone else here in favor that would like to speak at this point in time? Okay. Clerk Hurtubise, has anything come in through email?
[Hurtubise]: No, Mr. President.
[Falco]: Okay. At this point, I declare this portion of the hearing closed. Anyone in opposition of the petition? Is there anyone here tonight that is opposition to the petition? Yes. Are you in opposition to the petition, miss? Oh, no answer.
[Summers]: No, I was just checking. I was just wanting to watch. Sorry.
[Falco]: No worries at all. Is there anyone in opposition of the petition? Clerk, Hurtubise. Any communication or email from anyone in opposition?
[Hurtubise]: There are no emails at all on this topic.
[Falco]: Seeing and hearing none, I declare this portion of the hearing closed. Alicia, if you'd like to present now or make your presentation, please, you can do that right now. Thank you.
[Alicia Hunt]: OK. Mr. Clerk, I have some. I just put the information on slides to make it easier for you committee, if you can let me know if I can share that.
[Hurtubise]: You should be all set now to share your screen.
[Alicia Hunt]: Yeah, there we go. Thank you. So the members of the council will remember, and for the new members, our community development block grant funding every year requires that we submit an annual action plan, and the director comes before you and submits the funding. Every five years, we also have to submit a consolidated plan that is our five-year strategic plan for how we will be spending money over the next five years. of CDBG funding. This is a process that was started essentially a year ago, and I just wanted to just very quickly give you some highlights of that so that you're aware of the background for this, particularly for the new members, but also because this is only done every five years. There is a five-year consolidated plan we'll be submitting to the federal government that was introduced to the public in mid-March through a public meeting that we held, and has been on our website and available from Ashley since then. That plan is 101 pages long because of the formatting that the federal government requires in it. So very, very briefly, I have a few slides to tell you. It includes the process at how we came to here, a needs assessment of the community, a market analysis with demographics, and a strategic plan. The needs assessment was started around this time last summer. This time last year, we are part of a five community coalition with Malden is the lead agency that revolves particularly around our home housing funding. So they hired a consultant who went out they did a needs assessment. which included stakeholder interviews, web-based survey, public sessions, including March 11th, and then today, public comment, which has been open since March 11th, and Ashley received comments. And then we are able to incorporate any comments that are submitted today. We then look specifically at our non-housing needs. The consortium looks at the housing needs, the needs that were listed by the consultants who did the review, and just very quickly, public open space, recreation, facility improvements to make facilities comply with public safety and access standards, preservation and protection of environmental and historic resources, Um, updates to facilities, including firehouses, public schools, libraries, shelters to persons with special need and neighborhood facilities. Improvement to streets, water and sewer lines, flood and drainage, sidewalks, curbs and gutters, parking lots and tree planting. And then activities to assist businesses, including storefront revitalization are all things that were identified over the course of this process that are allowable expenses under CDBG. They looked at public service needs, which included transportation for those in need, affordable childcare services, access to food and emergency services, transitional housing, life skill building, supportive services and advocacy, English as a second language classes and job preparedness. The strategic plan that is in the 101 page plan, The first goal is to support the expansion and preservation of affordable housing. The numbers. The second goal is to increase economic development opportunities. The third is to enhance parks, public facilities and infrastructure. And the fourth goal is to enhance public services. To that end, the We put together a budget for the first year of the action plan. And so this, which was emailed out to the Councilors, the goal lists a description of projects and the amounts. So for the affordable housing for this coming fiscal year, we're recommending and I'll just round $217,000. to increase, that's 14% of our allocated funds. The economic development opportunities, we're recommending 236,000, that's 15%. And this is a place where we would include some of the grants and assistance that we're talking about for small businesses, although we also have additional funding for that. Enhancing parks, public facilities and infrastructure, we're recommending $551,000. It's 35%. That is typically where Medford puts the bulk of its funds is into this category. And then the public services, we are typically, you may all remember, limited to 15%. This year because of the health emergency that cap was lifted. So we're actually recommending 16% this year and that meets the needs of the public service agencies as they expressed it to us on that's $255,000, and then planning and administration. and that includes staff salaries, consultants, the housing production plan, and that's $314,000. The planning administration is capped at 20%. I'll then remind you that we had the public service agencies presented on virtual hearing in April, and they spoke to these dollar amounts. And so this is the amount of money that we are recommending because they lifted the cap, rather than nickel and diming the agencies altogether, they requested 16% of our funding rather than 15. And we said, let's just give them the 16% this year, because we're allowed to do that as an exception to the rule this year. Um, so what is not in this plan, and I kind of wanted to call that out, but also share with you is the, um, CDBG coronavirus funding. So we got, we're getting extra funding this fiscal year, um, because of the health emergency. So we did do a grant round to our public service agencies for that. And so the third page on the handout that you received via email, and then I'm showing on the screen now. is what was requested of the coronavirus funding. It is not part of our regular annual plan, but I wanted to include it so that you'd be aware of this. Um, housing families is requesting an extra $52,000 as cm transportation is asking for 12,000. The mold and why, and I must point out that they've, they run the mystic community market which is our largest food pantry in Medford. They're asking for just shy of $62,000 from the coronavirus funding. And we've determined that Medford's are you okay program that's being run out of City Hall. We, we spun that program up without knowing how exactly how we were going to pay for it because we knew we needed it in this emergency situation, and we can fund it through this program. And so that's $21,000. So those are the recommendations of the community development office and the mayor for this year's annual annual funding for this community development block grant. I'll just stop there.
[Falco]: Move for approval, Mr. President On the motion of councilor Knight. Councilor Bears. On the motion council Knight, seconded by Councilor Marks, Councilor Bears.
[Bears]: Thank you, Mr. President. Alicia, just a quick question. Are we voting on the additional stuff that you just presented to us or is that coming at a later time? The COVID stuff.
[Alicia Hunt]: I apologize, I had hit mute. I'm always nervous that my children are gonna make noise while I'm trying to speak with you. It's not, it does not include the COVID funding. I don't believe we're actually going to need a city council vote on the COVID funding. That's my understanding right now, but I wanted to present it to you so that you would have that information as well.
[Bears]: Got it.
[Falco]: Thank you. Any other questions from the council? Okay. Clerk Hurtubise, any questions that have come in through email?
[Hurtubise]: There are no emails on this topic.
[Falco]: And it doesn't look like anybody else wants to speak. On the motion of council and I seconded by Councilor Mark. Please call the roll.
[Hurtubise]: Councilor Bears. Yes. Vice President Caraviello. Yes. Councilor Knight. Yes. Councilor Marks. Yes. Councilor Morell.
[Falco]: Yes.
[Hurtubise]: Councilor Scarpelli. Yes. President Falco.
[Falco]: Yes. And the affirmative zero and the negative the motion passes. Move suspension of the rules, Mr. President. Thank you, Alicia. On the motion of Councilor Marks to suspend the rules, seconded by?
[Hurtubise]: Second.
[Falco]: Councilor Scarpelli, Clerk Hurtubise, please call the roll to suspend the rules.
[Hurtubise]: This is to suspend the rules. Councilor Bears?
[Bears]: Yes.
[Hurtubise]: Vice President Caraviello? Yes. Councilor Knight? Yeah. Councilor Marks? Yes. Councilor Morell? Yes. Councilor Scarpelli? Yes. President Falco?
[Falco]: Yes, seven in the affirmative, zero in the negative. The rules are suspended. Councilor Marks.
[Marks]: Mr. President, I move suspension of the rules to take paper 20-355, which is on the agenda tonight. We have the city engineer here to present regarding safe routes to school project.
[Falco]: Thank you, Councilor Marks. Communications from the mayor, 20-355. Dear Council President Falco, and honorable members of the Medford City Council. As you are aware, the city is working in coordination with MassDOT to plan for safe routes to school project for the Brooks Elementary School. The project involves improvements to sidewalks that directly abut private residential parcels. The federal funding granted for this project requires that the right-of-way be in complete ownership and physical control of the city. The survey prepared for the project identify 12 private properties that contain public infrastructure or require a temporary construction easement. In order to meet the requirements of the projects, permanent easements will alter the High Street, Mystic Street, and Walcott Street layouts to encompass the public infrastructure in temporary easements with will facilitate construction of sidewalks. The written offer was sent to the 12 property owners via certified mail on April 2, 2020, and Tim McGibbon, City Engineer, has been in contact with each owner to address concerns throughout this process, starting from the initial contact letter back in December 2019. easements were appraised by a certified general appraiser and those appraisals were reviewed by a certified general review appraiser to establish just compensation for the easements. I respectfully request that the city council vote to approve the attached order of taking associated with these easements at your regular May 12, 2020 meeting and therefore approve the alternations of High Street, Mystic Street, and Walcott Street. The alternations of High Street, Mystic Street, and Walcott Street are approved by the Mayor and recommended to the City Council by the Community Development Board via unanimous vote on March 25, 2020. Mr. McGibbon will be in attendance to answer any questions on this matter. Sincerely, Breanna Lungo-Koehn, Mayor. Additional documents may be inspected in the office of the city clerk, Bedford City Hall, Bedford, Massachusetts. Okay, let's see. We have a city engineer with us tonight, Tim McGibbon. Tim, I don't know if you want to maybe speak to this a little bit, or if the councillors have questions, we can go with the questions. But if you want to lead off with what we're doing, that'd be great.
[McGivern]: Certainly, I'll lead off. And thank you very much for suspending the rules for me here. Wonderful. So I think all councillors know, I think I spoke with just about every one of you between over the last couple of weeks, basically. And this is a milestone in a process that started in November, really. The first letters went out in December, as noted in the letter. And the process is defined by MassDOT what's called a right-of-way certificate. And it's basically any public infrastructure, such as the edge of a sidewalk, for example, which is the case, a lot of the cases with these easements, needs to be within the public right-of-way to have the project move forward. So, most of these easements, the permanent easements anyway, are alterations, minor alterations of the high street layout and the intersections with Walcott and Mystic Street, which are all public laid out, public accepted ways. So, the process as defined by MassDOT as well as our local procedures, you know, You said a lot of it that's written in the letter, but basically we notify all the owners of the property. We did that back in November. I personally interviewed each owner in person to answer questions, hear concerns. We performed title exams as well as the extra step of certifications, title certifications. We also performed appraisals with a special certification, a type of appraisal, and then had those reviewed by basically a third party review appraiser. And then on April 2nd, we made written offers to the owners and we had the Community Development Board also recommended and endorsed the plans for the easements. And once we're approved, assuming that we approve here, it would then get recorded and payment would be tendered to the owners. The, I think there's a couple of things just to note there are basically two types of easements, and then within the permanent easements is two types in there too so basically this temporary easements for construction, and that's for a temporary time period, it's five years, the way we wrote the order. And that allows the contractor to set a form at the back of a sidewalk, for example, or repair a walkway that may go from the sidewalk onto the private property, things like that. And then there are permanent easements that alter the Hyde Street right-of-way. Most of these are slivers of private property where a public sidewalk is on private property. So it's basically a correction of the right-of-way. And then there's one more, and that is we're converting the Hastings High Street intersection from a private way to a public way. So the whole intersection becomes public. So those are a couple of the larger permanent easements. That's it, this is one step and one item and one milestone for the larger Safe Routes to School project that has been going through the different milestones as time goes on. So I'm happy to answer any questions. I also have a bunch of material if we need to reference anything or pull up anything on the screen, so.
[Falco]: Thank you very much. Let's see, we have Councilor Morell.
[Morell]: I think Councilor Knight actually had his hand up first.