[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Uh, let's, uh, let's start it nice and simple. I'll take a quick roll and we can talk about the minutes and get started. Uh, so going down the line, uh, Lois. Yeah, Benji not seeing. Barry. Loretta Kathleen here. Luke not seeing in the list damn I'm here awesome Bob yes Jessica I am NOT seeing neither John Rogers either will this year and Paul I Also, no. Oh, we have one more. Luke is joining right now. Perfect. We're losing people left and right. Has everyone had a chance to look over the minutes?
[Lois Grossman]: Yep.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Any addendums, anything we need to note? Sounds good. Gosh, we have so many new people. Okay, perfect.
[Lois Grossman]: You want a motion to accept the minutes?
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I would love that. I'm not sure if I'm allowed to propose them, but I would second it. So moved. Perfect. Let's go down the line. I think we have some extra folks that just joined, so we can all vote on our minutes here. Lois? Yes. Benji, welcome. Yes, perfect just in time. Barry abstain stand Loretta. Yes, perfect Kathleen.
[Unidentified]: Yes.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Luke.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: I was not there. Thank you.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: A little quiet there. Luke, we're just voting on accepting the minutes.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: I have to say abstain. I was not present.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: No worries at all. Dan?
[SPEAKER_12]: I'll abstain. I wasn't present.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Bob? Yes. John Rogers? Yes. I will also vote yes, Will, and Paul is still not here. The yeas have it, seven to three.
[Lois Grossman]: Will, if I wasn't at the meeting, do I have to abstain?
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I believe so.
[Lois Grossman]: Then change my best to abstain.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: All right. Good catch. Still six to four. We are in the clear. Meeting notes accepted and we can get on with. All the good stuff for this week this month. Do we have any administrative updates? Brenda. Anything we want to talk about.
[Brenda Pike]: The only thing right now. That isn't talked about later in the meeting is so the next meeting is January 6. And I think that might be the meeting where we might want to vote on any new co-chairs. Where folks can say in this meeting, if they're interested and we can have a discussion about it, but maybe we can wait until the next meeting to actually vote on it.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah, we should actually, that'll be the next point of voter. So, be great to discuss co-chairs unless there's anything else you'd like to add in. All right, I think the long and the short of it is. I love being a chair, but, you know, it's always easier to lighten the load and have someone to stand with me and help me out a little bit. I worry that Brenda's doing a lot of the heavy lifting right now, so. If there's anyone who is at all interested in taking up that mantle, helping out as a co-chair, we have a little bit of time devoted to discussing if anyone is interested.
[Robert Paine]: Hey, well, this is Bob. I would like to commend your your duties this year, you've come up to speed very nicely, and you should certainly continue on. If you are not able to be there, I can be a backup, not necessarily a co-chair, but a co-chair of last resort, if you will.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Very reticent co-chair.
[Robert Paine]: Since I've done it now for like three plus years, It was last year I did it for most of the year. That was the fourth year. It's time to pass it on. But sometimes I have, even this year, I did one or two meetings when you weren't there and no one else was there. So I could be a backup of last resort. But I would certainly love to see someone else be a more regular co-chair if anyone wants to do that.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, I see, we have a guest, but I don't, it says sustainability. Is that someone from the office?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Josh Hecker Green. I'm just a Medford resident. That's just my job title in the Zoom.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Oh, fantastic.
[Brenda Pike]: Oh, he's he's being modest here. Josh is is one of the potential new members. Oh, I see. Yeah. Oh, fantastic. And the reason it says sustainability there is because he works in the sustainability as a sustainability planner for the city of Somerville.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Oh, OK. Great.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Nice to see you all. Sorry to interrupt. Don't know. It's good. It's good to hear from you.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I asked. So thank you.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: So not hearing anything, I will say, as Bob can attest, I was a co-chair with Bob, and he ended up doing almost all of the work. I was not a very helpful co-chair. That said, I would be happy to be a support. chair, so to speak. I think I'm, I am already over committed into many other areas of life to be able to really kind of lead on many of the things that we should be leading on. But that said, like Bob, I would be happy to step up if needed, and as needed, and I'd be happy to work with you during the month to prep for meetings. But I have to say, I don't really have the time to do that either. But I understand that's true for many people.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yes, that's completely fair. Yeah, no, I just wanted to devote a little bit of time, see if anyone was feeling itchy and wanted to move up. But otherwise, they're all here. We're going to keep doing good work. Any other closing thoughts? We might just end that section early. Hearing and seeing none. Let's just jump right to Brenda, a discussion on some of our new members. Or potential new members.
[Brenda Pike]: Yes, so we've had four people apply for the committee who are still interested at this point. We had more earlier in the year, but they have joined other committees or have had other commitments come up. So I am talking to each one of them. I think I have one more that I need to talk with. And then Alicia and I will make recommendations to the mayor who will make the appointment. And so we have two seats open now, so we should be making two appointments. And I expect that this can be done in time for the January meeting. So hopefully that the new members could have their first meeting be the first meeting of the year. Seems appropriate.
[Lois Grossman]: I hope, Brenda, that you would encourage the others to continue to come to the meetings. You don't have to be a member. And if they're interested, whenever they can make the meeting, we should encourage them and welcome them.
[Brenda Pike]: Yep, absolutely. And everyone I've talked to so far has said that they would love to work with the Energy Committee on specific topics throughout the year.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I know last meeting we had discussed potentially opening more than just 2 slots. Is that still the case? Or are we hesitant to bring in too many people?
[Brenda Pike]: I think we're hesitant to bring in too many people at the moment. I think Alicia recommended to me that when we make the recommendation to the mayor, we also have an explanation of why this committee is so large. compared to other committees that the city has and the fact that we want it to be large because there are lots of volunteer opportunities and we want a lot of input from the folks in this group. So we're already making the case for why this group should be 14. Good note.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Right, so something I might, I don't know if this will be tangential to it, or in some way a segue, but would love to see for the new year as well. And we can discuss this under new business. I hate to talk out of turn here. As we get new members, potentially proposing some new projects or initiatives or things for these new members to start. To start with this committee and hit the ground running. As we look into the new year. Potentially taking on some new projects that we can get their help with. But other than that, Brenda, were there any aspects of these new members that we can help with? I don't think we vote or vet in any meaningful way, but.
[Brenda Pike]: No, but I'd love to get some just some general a general sense of what you're looking for. We talked about it last time. I know folks were very interested in pursuing a zero waste initiative. And so that's something that we would keep in mind as we were looking at new potentially members. I think we had, I heard that people were interested in maybe having members with other sort of specialties in their professional life than maybe building science or energy to try to get more varied sort of skills included. Is there anything else that you think we should be considering?
[Lois Grossman]: Did you all see this morning's Globe? There was a front page story on state leads way in cutting food waste. It was restaurants composting. I was hoping they would mention that Medford is a composting city that just passed the new ordinance and so forth. They didn't quite get to that. We are leading the way in this regard because we do have a composting program for the city. If any of the new members are interested, they could start assembling data and publish whether it be on Facebook, whether it be an article in the newspaper or a letter follow-up, whatever, ways to bring this to more people's attention. Somebody needs to talk to the compost collectors. How many households are now doing it? with what regularity, what problems they're seeing, what figures they have on tonnage. If somebody's interested in that, they could really dig in and bring it to the attention of more people in the city of Medford.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Thanks, Lois. I agree. I think that composting is one of the keys to reducing issues with waste. I'm sure the city has some of that data, and so it could be that working with the city, the committee could gather and market, so to speak, a little bit more of what composting is doing for the city.
[Lois Grossman]: I was on the committee, the waste committee last year that brought this about. We talked about it and endorsed it and they carried through with it.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: That's great.
[Lois Grossman]: So this was in large part a citizen initiative, and we need to capitalize on it.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: I would love to also along the same lines, though, further support the zero waste or waste reduction goals. And among those, I would love to see Medford find useful ways or effective ways of limiting plastic. Certainly single use plastics, but plastics in general. And it is a very complicated challenge. And obviously, it requires some easy solution, not easy solutions, it requires alternatives for people to maintain their kind of comfort and ease of use, ease of life. Plastics play such a huge role in making our modern life work. And we do not always have easy replacements for what they're doing. But that said, it would be great if we can help to build the pressure and the network of alternative solutions that are out there and promote what can be done to reduce plastic in our environment and in our bodies, et cetera. Since there's plenty to talk about there.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I had an issue about that. It's not reducing plastic, but as I understand it right now, black plastic does not get recycled. And most of the, a lot of the takeout that one gets, the bottom is black plastic. I assume there's no special black plastic lobby. So there's no interest on the other side. It's just a matter of- Oh, there's plenty of interest on the other side. Okay, well, then I'm wrong.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, it's a useful place for petroleum waste products to go, so to speak. If it doesn't go into a useful plastic container of some sort, then it is toxic waste. That someone has to pay to get rid of it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Is that why it has to be black plastic?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Oh, I don't know. I mean, I'm speaking a bit out of turn. But if you think about it from the standpoint of the energy production fossil fuel industry. Sure. There's refinement that goes to making a variety of things. Black plastic is among them. But, you know, if those source materials are not all used in one form or another, then it is waste. And it is technically toxic waste that needs to be dealt with in one way or another. And right now, plastics provide a very convenient place to put a lot of fossil fuel material.
[Lois Grossman]: Are you saying that black plastic is a particular?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: It is just one of the many plastics that are produced in the process. And if you think about it like a rainbow, the source material can be divided up in many different ways. But the more refined or recyclable plastics utilize, I guess, more valuable raw material. whereas the black plastics and the less recyclable are different materials. I don't know if it's fair to say that it's less valuable or less refined.
[Barry Ingber]: This doesn't sound right to me. I mean, it's because the black plastic is I mean, if you look at the running arrows that pretend that the stuff is recyclable when it actually isn't, it has the same code and the same name as white plastic. That's just the color that's added. That has nothing to do with what type of plastic it is.
[SPEAKER_05]: So, I saw a TV article just like three days ago that was saying that the black plastic is made out of things like television cases, electronics cases that are black. That's why it's black plastic, because you can't make black plastic into white plastic. You know, if it's black, you've got to kind of say black. And the biggest problem with it is electronics have fire retardants in the plastic case.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: There are other chemicals.
[SPEAKER_05]: Right. So these fire retardants end up in the black plastic. And that's why it's not really good to use black plastic for, um, uh, for like food, food type of, you know, like to go containers.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Really? Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: That's what it said on the article. Now I was a little, I felt that the science was a little off in the, in the article, it did seem like it had some real good hard evidence. So I was a little suspect of that. So that didn't seem right to me. So I'm taking that with a grain of salt. But I do know that black plastic starts off as black plastic, because like I say, you can't make it white plastic.
[Barry Ingber]: You couldn't make black plastic into gray plastic.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, maybe by adding a lot of white plastic to it. Yeah, I guess you could.
[Brenda Pike]: We might be getting a little off track here, but what I had heard about the reason black plastic is less recyclable is because the sensors in the automatic sorting facilities like we use here can't read it because it's absorbing the light. It's not reflecting it. It's not really reflecting it back, so they can't tell what kind of plastic it is.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: That could be manually sorted, but yeah.
[Lois Grossman]: The point is, there is something we can do, our committee. Yes. As Loretta knows, the tree committee, one of the members did a survey of businesses up and down Mystic Avenue to try to get them to take more trees, to plant more trees up front. I'm not saying that we have to do anything with trees. I am saying that, again, some of these new people, if somebody has a particular interest, to go from business to business, restaurant to restaurant, and talk to the owners, and do you use black plastic or white plastic? Can you use aluminum? Can you use paper cartons? Directly approaching different businesses to see if we can't explain this to them and encourage them to come up with another alternative, how much more would it cost, for instance?
[SPEAKER_12]: I have a quick question on all this too. I mean, Medford has a plastic bag ordinance. Is black plastic not included in that? I'm looking at it right now and I'm a little bit confused. Is it like non-compliance with the ordinance that's an issue? Is there maybe something larger here that should be a priority of this committee to try to have that be a bit more broad? I've lived in multiple cities that have plastic bag bans and it's never been an issue.
[Barry Ingber]: The black plastic, Dan, is hard plastic. It's like number two and number five plastic generally. It's just like takeout containers that can come in white, they can come clear, they can come black. And they often come black.
[SPEAKER_12]: Okay, I guess I mean if I go to the corner store by me, they'll put stuff for offer a black plastic bag. Is that against the ordinance?
[Barry Ingber]: The bag is unrecyclable anyway, so it doesn't matter what color it is.
[SPEAKER_12]: It sounds like there might be an enforcement issue.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: So there's also, so this is actually an issue with a lot of cities and states that have passed plastic bag ordinances, is that it was initially for those really thin Plastic bags, and they usually have wording for things that are thicker or could be reused, but they found that people don't really reuse the thicker plastic bags either. And they're just harder to process in any. Fashion, so I think there is a recommendation to be made to update our city ordinance. But that I can put a pin in that because we do have a waste reduction section coming up that might need more time. So. Might be worth putting a pin in that conversation just for another 20 minutes.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Thanks. And yeah, and to just close out my initial point as plastics of all types is what I'm after. So yes, it's great that we have a plastic bag ban. It would be great if it were It would be great if we were also, to Lois's point, understanding what else could work for businesses, what else could work for residents, and help to encourage non-plastic alternatives as well as limit plastics that are not as much as we can, I guess.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I have a question along this line. One of the things we've had trouble recycling in the past, I don't know if anybody takes this, except for some supermarkets, it's the plastic wrap that comes on large containers like tissues and toilet paper and- Stretch plastics. Right, and sometimes supermarkets would have a little bin. I don't know if they actually recycle it, but I was wondering if the knowledge with this group, is there a recycling, you know, place that takes this anymore?
[Lois Grossman]: Whole Foods must know the answer, Loretta, because they take stretch plastics. Yeah, but do they recycle?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: As do some stop-and-chops and Shaw's.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yeah, but do they recycle it?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: And the answer, I don't know that either.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I'm asking the group. Does anyone know if it's recycled?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: I do know that construction plastics, wraps similar to that, technically are supposed to be recycled, and that there are similar collection groups. Whether or not it actually makes it to recycling facilities and what those recycling facilities can do with them, I don't know.
[Lois Grossman]: I'd be willing to work on that particular one.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, so my thought is that, you know, part of this is education. A lot of people don't know that it could be. I don't want to talk about it. It can't be recycled. And so next time I'm at stop and shop, I can ask the manager, do they actually recycle it? Or is it just a convenience for people to bring it into the store to get rid of? I know we have Trove Green provisions that does a lot of recycling, the retail store in Medford, they might know, I'm sure Alicia and Brenda might know. But yeah, I had heard that some of the stories don't recycle it, it's just a convenience for people. So with that, if we could elaborate that to include that in some event in the future for people to bring or find somebody that takes it, as a bulk event to have people drop off. That would be one way to reduce waste.
[Lois Grossman]: Claire was taking black plastic for a couple of years and then she stopped. Her recycler was no longer able to take black plastic.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yeah, but I'm just talking about the clear wrap. I have a huge bag full. You know, it's amazing how much you get, like it just happens. Like if you buy water in bottles, not that we're supposed to be doing that, but you know, it comes in plastic.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: So what I'm hearing, and again, I'm going to think we return to this issue. We can return hopefully to new member discussions as well. But I'm making notes of potential projects to undertake, surveying Medford businesses, looking at potential ordinances and updates and initiatives that can help with our waste reduction that we can return to in a little bit. I do want to kind of round out what was meant to be a new members discussion. If there's any other aspects of that we want to touch on before we move forward. Clearly, we've touched on something important, so it'll be good that we return to our waste issues in a moment. But I want to round out our conversation on new members as well.
[SPEAKER_12]: Really quick, and I'm sorry, I know I've missed a lot of meetings. With some of the stuff going on in life, but we have that spreadsheet with a lot of priorities and initiatives. Is that still being updated or do we have, like, a central place where. These ideas are being kept.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I have them currently in my notebook and unfortunately, due to my summer busyness, I have not been updating that spreadsheet. Although. I may just make that. make a grand return in January so that we can continue just keeping our thoughts in order month to month and in between these sessions. I wanna make a note of that.
[SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, I think it's, we have a lot of discussions that kind of go down the rabbit hole. So it's nice to have a place where everyone can see some of the higher level ideas.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yeah, I'd just like to add, Will, that we used to do this in January and start thinking about it in December and send out a spreadsheet of what the members are interested in working on and forming, you know, subcommittees, you know, that would work on projects that we're interested in so that what Dan was saying is important to have so we can review those ideas and options. I love that. And maybe add some more or not.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah. I will make sure that makes a grand return.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: And we used to present that to the mayor too, for her, you know, invite her in January, February, maybe beginning of the year. Bob knows. Right, Bob? We used to have advice.
[Robert Paine]: It's nice to be able to talk to the mayor because we serve at the mayor's pleasure, I guess.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right, right. And so if we have these ideas that we put forward, these are the things she usually approves of. She may add things that she would like us to work on.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Love that. Yes. Filling out my notes right now. This is really helpful for me. Yeah, this will be good.
[Brenda Pike]: So in the past, the mayor has come to, you know, maybe one meeting per year. Is that what I'm hearing?
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yes. Like, uh, January, February, once we get, especially if we get the new members in and we get an agenda, um, what would you call it? A plan, somewhat of a plan of action of ideas of what we're going to focus on and she'll come and, um, you know, review that and maybe speak about our work or anything she might want us to work on, like pollinator gardens or composting. So I know she was awarded just in the past week or two, Brenda, some kind of award for composting. Brenda? Oops.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, let me pull that up.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: She got an award for being a leader in sustainability.
[Brenda Pike]: And it was about- The National Recycling Coalition gave her an award as an outstanding elected leader, specifically focusing on the composting program.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right.
[Brenda Pike]: Yep.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: So she might, you know, I'm not speaking for her, I'm saying that maybe she would want us to concentrate on that, to develop it more as Lois mentioned. And Luke?
[Brenda Pike]: Yes, we actually haven't hit our goal for the first year of the recycling program, which was 6,000 participants. I think we're still around the 5,000 mark.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: And just to add, you know, what Lois and Luke were saying, it would be important, and I know that we have the new economic director and his assistant, I can't remember her name, sorry, but to get them, I've always felt in the business side, to get the chamber involved with this, any kind of sustainability or environmental concerns. So, as long as it's with your idea, you know, it may be good to contact the chamber for help to reach out to. I'm sure the city could give us a list to a restaurant and some businesses.
[Brenda Pike]: That's a great idea. And outside of the restaurant and the plastic outreach to restaurants and stores, I have done some outreach to the chamber about EV charging stations in store parking lots. because I think that might be the next area where that would be really helpful for Medford to have is, you know, outside of the municipal parking lots, which is what we've been focusing on having them in, like, you know, the Wegmans parking lot or the Whole Foods parking lot or things like that. So I had sent a memo to the chamber and talked with the economic development director about it, sent it through him. And I'd love to do some follow up about that as well. So, you didn't really get any bites for that 1st outreach.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right. Well.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yes, I'm frantically taking notes. This is all very helpful.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: You know, some of the senior members have a lot of. Memories of, you know, what we've done in the past.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: So, no, I'm still very new to new to the committee. So I appreciate the having the. The understanding of what's worked in the past, so I can keep expanding and making something that works. So, seeing this conversation on new members has kind of run its course and gone every which way, but. I think it's good. We move forward to the next section. Before I get fully sidetracked and work on 8 other projects at once. So, I'm going to throw it to Brenda. We have our climate policy updates. That should be attended to.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, so 1st up just a quick update on electrify Medford, mainly about some events. We were at the winter preparedness event on the 14th, which was a great event. A ton of people came people were lining up. before the doors opened because there were there were lots of giveaways of like coats and hats and things like that. So it was a it was a wonderful event. We didn't get a lot of interest in Electrify Medford, although that's the audience that we definitely were. We're really trying to target, but. Um, so it's a wonderful event. It might not be the best place to do outreach for that program. Um, we might need to do like smaller, more targeted things in order to really be able to talk to people. Um, we're going to be at the winter extravaganza on Wednesday. Um, that's four 30 to six 30 at city hall. Um, Incidentally, I also made a little gingerbread house with little Hershey bar solar panels and an electric vehicle with a Twizzler cord plugging it in and stuff and having the Electrify Medford flyer next to it and the display. Um, and I'm going to have a little, and I donated a little, um, Christmas tree for the raffle as well. That's Electrify Medford themed with lots of little like LED light bulbs and things like that on there. Uh, so that should be a really fun event. And then in January, January 18th, sorry, 16th, we're going to have an Electrify Medford event at the library. We might have a brief speaker at the beginning, but mostly I'm thinking of it as more office hours. So people can come in and have the opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation with coaches, having them at different stations around the room. So it's less sort of a, advertising event and maybe more of a practical one where people can get some advice right then. Moving on, the Andrews and McGlynn HVAC upgrade project. So we're getting the schematic design package December 10th in preparation for school committee and city council meetings in December. And then we'll be doing an RFP for a construction manager at risk, which we hope will be able to on board by the end of January. so that we can pre-order equipment, because we're anticipating long lead times for that equipment, and then have the work actually done this summer. So fingers crossed that that schedule works out really well and nothing slips as part of it, because we really do want to get that work done by the time kids go back to school in the fall. We're working on a school bus electrification plan. I think I mentioned this before. We're working with Power Options through a grant from the Mass Clean Energy Center. Our buses are owned and operated right now by Eastern Bus. And we're going back out to RFP for bus service in 2025. And so part of what we're doing through this plan is looking at ways to incorporate a preference for a vendor that has electric buses as part of that, or will commit to incorporating electric buses into their fleet as part of that RFP. But so this plan will be getting recommendations for buses that meet our needs based on the length of our routes and and things like that. And then what charging infrastructure would be needed to support those buses. And we're looking specifically at Eastern Bus's lot in Malden right now where they park them. But we know that we're going to have a big high school construction project coming up, so we'll probably want to include bus parking and charging in that high school project as well. I think that's it for that one. Mothers Out Front is very interested in this. So I know as we are moving along with this, they have been and will be very vocal about the need for electric buses in particular. Medford is updating our hazard mitigation plan. This was last updated in 2017. And actually it has to be updated every five years to qualify for federal disaster aid. So this is an important thing for us to do. We're working with ACBC Consulting on the project. They're kind of taking the lead and herding all of the cats involved in it. This is a year-long process with public meetings planned for January, June, and September. So at each stage of the process, they're sort of stopping to get feedback from the public. So I'm sure you'll hear more about this as we move along. But do you have any initial feedback to pass along about what can be incorporated into the hazard mitigation plan? A lot of the discussion right now is around sort of what are the hazards that we're currently seeing or be moving forward. And then what sort of resources people are currently expecting to use in any sort of emergency situation and what additional need is there. for resources. So any feedback that you have around that, either now or at any point, feel free to email me.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I thought the city has a building that's going to be used as an emergency shelter, sort of a place that we can go to for cooling or heating. But I don't know if it was built or renovated yet.
[Brenda Pike]: So we were looking to or we are hoping to do a more robust or what we're calling resilience hub. But we haven't found a location for that yet. There have been a couple that we've looked at that have fallen through. Right now, what we do have is the Andrews Middle School in the event of emergency could be used as an emergency shelter. We're actually just finishing up an electrical recircuiting project there right now to put more circuits on the emergency generator. so that it can be used for that, because right now, or before this point, it had emergency lights to help people exit the building and things like that, but not really a lot that people could use in an outage that would actually make it work. So we just finished that recircuiting project, and we're actually having a meeting with MAPC, the Metropolitan Area Planning Council, and they're going to look at the building and assess its ability to be used as a shelter and what else the city needs to do in order to prepare to use that as a shelter.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: When you mentioned hazard, is that environmental hazards? I'm thinking in the summer, it gets really hot. Sometimes we don't have enough air conditioning. we need to go to places that are cooler when the temperatures are 98 and 100. So I would think that would be an important priority because like the library closes. I know the police station is open sometime, the community room there, but there weren't too many options, you know, for
[Brenda Pike]: And some people aren't comfortable going to the police station and yeah, yeah, things like that. Yeah, so yeah, definitely heat, flooding, any sort of, or cold, honestly, heavy snowfall, anything that might knock out power.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right, like charging your phones and tablets and having extra outlets at some place. I don't know where. Maybe the Andrews Middle School. I don't know. I would think that a school could be opened partially, but I'm not familiar with the layout of the schools, so that if there is a high heat event or a power outage, we could go there.
[Brenda Pike]: I think the issue is that the school could not be in session while we were using it as a shelter. I think it would be reserved for use in an event where it's an emergency situation where schools are not in session because it's an emergency situation and it would be used for a shelter then.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, that would be interesting to look into. Somebody at City Hall might have already, like if it was open after five, like five to 11 on weeknights.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, it's interesting how much that building is used on weeknight, especially the gym, which is one of the areas we would be using. The gym and the cafeteria are the main areas that we'd be using for the emergency shelter.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: In the summer? In the summer they're used?
[Brenda Pike]: There are, yes, there are camps and other things that are, it's surprising how much the school is actually used. Yeah.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, anyways, that's probably on a list.
[Brenda Pike]: The only other thing that I had on my list here, the Climate Equity Council expressed an interest in doing something around green jobs, maybe a job fair, maybe partnering with mass hire, something like that. I followed up with our economic development director, and I think he has some concerns about this because he's done these sorts of job fairs Um, and at his previous the town that he was previously working at, um, and he said it's it is a lot of effort. Um, and we might not have the resources right now to do it. And if it's not well organized, it can be a. It can be a bad situation where you have businesses taking time to be there and not enough people showing up, or you have a lot of people there and you don't have the right businesses to match with them. It is a lot of effort, and so that's something that we're looking into. Is that something that we can partner with somebody else to try to organize something like that in Medford?
[SPEAKER_12]: I have a thought there. I would say that is like one of the main reasons that it makes a lot of sense to increase the size of this committee as well. I think that job fairs are useless for the most part. They're kind of a waste of time. One of the best ways you find people and you let them know what sort of jobs are available in that, especially green jobs, sustainable jobs, anything in energy or the environment is through having people who work in those jobs be an advocate and do outreach. So I'd love to see that as a priority for this group of, as we bring in new people, people who work in these areas go out, talk to people, create a community more so than trying to give resources to job fairs or something like that.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, I would love to talk more about this at some point. Because I have been, when I worked in Boston, we had a few programs that we were funding to do job training and connecting people with employers at different levels from like entry level, like weatherization type things to like connecting small business owners with projects, things like that. But that takes a lot of resources. So yeah, I would love to maybe brainstorm some ways that we can do some sort of connections like that without the level of resources that a Boston has.
[SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, I think getting the right people, people are aware, getting the right people who are in hiring, who are able to make hires or who work for certain companies. There's a lot of companies around the Boston area and especially up here that are looking for entry-level people, are looking for people for jobs that would fit this kind of description. You need to get the right people in the room for that. So yeah, I'd love to talk more about bringing more kind of blood into this committee to help facilitate that.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, that would be great. I see that in the chat here, Josh said that the city of Somerville would be interested in a partnership and suggested contacting Emily Sullivan or Rachel Ned Carney in economic development. That would be a great thing to partner on because, yeah, it's a very small geographic area here.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I'm actually on a LinkedIn group. I can't remember which one it is. There's so many groups around environment and sustainability and they send out a job list for these kinds of jobs, but it's for all over the country. So, you know, just to do Massachusetts in this small area. And that's just one group. I get a couple, actually, from different groups. Luke, there's some group that you belong to. It has to do with Energy Efficient Houses, Passive House, or I can't think of the name of the group, but they send me invites all the time.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Passive House Massachusetts.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Is it them, or is it the group that's larger and they have internships for students to study design?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Oh, well, there's... MassCEC also supports that, but I'm directly involved with Passive House Massachusetts, and we do support education and other kind of internship opportunities.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: And there are a bunch of trainings and other things through... Yeah, there's a link on one of their websites, and it's jobs posted. Yeah. Yeah, that's that is that one.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, same organization.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yeah, so it could be done. But like Brenda said, it's a lot of work to get everyone combined, you know.
[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, something definitely to circle back on. I think that's it for my updates.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Fantastic. In that case, it looks like next on the docket would be Loretta with a TREES Medford update.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Oh, okay. Let me get my eyes on here. I have some notes. So TREES Medford at their monthly meeting, which was in November that Lois and I attended, none of the other members from the committee were able to attend. But that's okay, that was just a monthly meeting. And I had asked at the meeting for the city council committee of the whole, which was November 20th, what they expected to talk about, or if they had any previews of what was going to happen. And I had sent out an email about this meeting to the Medford Energy and Environment Committee. And they thought that just the, public tree ordinance, the tree committee ordinance that they submitted for review, it's a draft, would be discussed. But also, there was some confusion in the post on the website, the city website, for the city council meeting. It showed like older comments from last year from, and older ordinances. So moving to the Committee of the Whole meeting that happened, City Council Committee of the Whole, that was on November 20th, I attended, and Therese Medford was there, Amanda and Sarah and Kim, those are members of Therese Medford, and there were just a few city councilors there. And they discussed, it was confusing. So I'll tell you why it was a little confusing. They were reverting to last year's ordinances. And it was like they didn't have time to read the updated ones that was submitted in July. The reworked ordinances, there were three of them. But I believe the chair or the council had actually taking the old documents and inserted the new changes. So they were showing that, but a lot of people hadn't read it yet. I don't know why, but that's okay. So I think Lois and Stanza were trying to say it was confusing. They really didn't have a lot of time to review what was submitted in July, this past July, the new updated ordinances. So with that, but they did still have some comments. They talked about the idea, I think the thought was that they would at least move forward with the tree committee, the separate ordinance. So the ordinances were split out into three separate ordinances, tree committee, public tree ordinance, and a private tree ordinance. So I'll talk about the tree committee. We were hoping they would move that forward because that would be a lot of help for the city. to help with some of these initiatives that are in the other documents. Tim McGiven, who's the head of the DPW was there and reading through the tree committee draft ordinance that was submitted by Trees Medford and that we assisted with. I'm just gonna read some notes. Tim McGiven comments about that it was somewhat overstepping the authority of the DPW and maybe change the wording that the committee would be providing or able to give advisory support to the DPW because he said there was an overlap of duties of what they were suggesting with the Trade Committee. So the wording would need to be changed So the overlap of duties in the document would be with the DPW in the forestry department tree board. Councilor Scarapelli had concerns from some residents that a new committee would be in charge of these issues that were in the Tribune Committee document. And of course, Tim addressed that by saying there was an overlap and that they really have the authority. So with that, I did make a comment. This was later on. Councilor Scarapelli also had some concerns, and he brought up the private tree units, which I didn't think they would talk about. They didn't talk about it too much, but he was concerned. He was addressing the concerns that some residents had about who this tree committee would be. So he had to leave. He just wanted to mention those concerns. And that was surprising to me and I think, lowest and a few other people that were there. It may be. So, I made a comment. that the idea of the tree committee was to help the city because we do have budget problems and to move these initiatives along to also keep track of the tree canopy and possibly if there is a permitting process, so we can keep track of the tree canopy and know where we need to plant trees and that other committees in the city and commissions or whatever, do a lot of work, which will save the city money if this new tree committee is put forth and started. And they came back with a comment that not the city council, the TBW commissioner, I'm trying to remember his exact words, that the tree committee would be like other committees, like the Bicycle Commission or the Bicycle Committee. And then, you know, we do more of events and education and things like that, not sort of jurisdiction and authority. So he somewhat ended with that. And then I didn't want to interrupt, I wanted other people. So I didn't go back in and say anything. But my advice to Theresa Medford, and I write to them and maybe this committee is that, I remember what Alicia said last year when we had a meeting about this, and she actually brought this up. There's many commissions, boards, and committees that do a lot of work and make these decisions. And the appointees are approved by the mayor. I was trying to allude to that, but I think trees meant that I just didn't have a chance to write to them, say maybe it's as simple as changing it from being a tree committee to a tree commission or the board, the tree advisory board to be able to work with the outline they submitted. So there was quite a bit of backlash about that. But they were very thankful for all the work that Trees Medford had done to present these ordinance drafts. So let me move on to the public one. to make your van had concerns on the public tree ordinance about the budget. And he suggested a cost estimate. He mentioned that last year, but it hadn't been done. So he said he'd try to have one done by January to see what it would cost the city, the DPW to actually do the outline that's in the ordinance to update the public trees. As far as the private tree ordinance, the public to review the public tree ordinance. Remember what I said? It was like they were reading this for the first time all the changes. So they said, Well, this is complicated, even the public tree one. So Amanda has suggested that it could be simplified. They were open to that. And. The building commissioner was also there, and he'd like to more time to review the private tree and she has been working with Councilor Collins on reviewing these tree ordinances. So the motion was made, Councilor Callahan will work with Councilor Collins and Trees Metric and the building department, probably the DPW too, I might have skipped that one, to revise and review the ordinance, and that was the motion passed. So I think they're gonna work on it more before they send it to the city solicitor for review. And then Kim from Trees Medford suggested, which I thought was a very good idea, to invite other towns, building departments, or commissions for a future meeting to explain how they got this done. How did they get their tree ordinance, tree protection ordinance, or tree preservation ordinances implemented? Because it is all new to Medford. So I hope they take that under advice. So that's where it's at right now. They need to review it and they'll go through different departments and try to update it. But I agreed with them, Therese Medford and Lois, and I think our committee, is that if they can just get the tree committee done, And the questions about who would be on the committee, it's not just like any residents, people who are experienced with trees. So if you have any questions, that's the end of my report. Oh, they hope to have some of this done maybe in January after the holidays.
[SPEAKER_11]: So Loretta, can you hear me? Yes.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Hi, Paul. Is that Paul?
[SPEAKER_11]: Hello, it's Paul. I'm sorry I've been a bit of an absent member. I'm dealing with a lot of stuff. It looks to me like there is a resistance to have any tree ordinance. Oh. Okay.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I don't know what, you know, what trees method has done a lot.
[SPEAKER_11]: I'm not discounting what they've done. And I, yeah, what it is, is that it's a lot of work. And
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I really, we have new city Councilors. I mentioned this at, Paul, I've also missed quite a few meetings too, but I did, I've got more involved in September, October, November, and I have been attending meetings. And the problem is, you know, the cost to the city, but also, Our group is more knowledgeable about sustainability and the environment and the trees. And we've worked with Trees Method and we've worked with Aggie Tune at times, whereas the city council isn't. And I had asked at the, this is December, sorry. I'd asked at the November meeting that more of our members show up. to support this city council, the whole meeting, so that we could provide comments if needed. Even though Trees Medford is the lead on this, you know, they don't tell us and they don't have to tell us everything they're doing, but we wanted to support them since we worked on this project with them. It was just Lois and myself. So it's really important that more people show up that have worked on this and This could be a whole meeting in itself to talk about all the nuances. But we have more than 20 towns in Massachusetts, maybe 30 now, with some kind of tree preservation ordinances. And they were in the tree report, and they've grown since then, that this committee worked on. And I don't know if these city councilors understand that it can be done and all these other cities started with something. It doesn't have to be, excuse me, sorry. impossible. We can start somewhere. And that's why the tree committee had offered, well, Trees Medford had mentioned that the tree committee can help with these costs. So it doesn't cost the city a lot. So at this point, um, I think it would be a good idea to have other cities involved. The problem is the staffing for the city, which I understand, um, that they just don't have the GIS engineering people and the DPW to map the trees, and they don't have a lot of this, so we can start small and do something.
[SPEAKER_12]: I mean, maybe a dumb question. When I go to trees, when I look at the trees website and we have been thinking about, you know, potentially putting a tree on the sidewalk in front of our house. A lot of it just comes back to. Send an email to our tree warden. I'm hearing you talk about committees and commissions and staffing and all of that, but I feel like I haven't really heard about the tree warden. Isn't that what that person is? A lot of what you're talking about, isn't that their responsibility? It sounds like the city has a role that is responsible for trees and for this.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, this is something that has come up. big question answer. We only have one. I'm trying to be very professional in my answer to you. We only have one tree warden. And for decades, decades, that forestry department has been understaffed and under budgeted for. So she handles all the trees that are public. So when you're talking about Trees Medford, that does not have to do necessarily with planting a tree in front of your house. It's the city, that's city property. So you'd go to Raggy Tudor. But yes, Trees Medford does also have events where they provide trees to people, but it's not for city sidewalks. It's for residents to plant on their private property. So Trees Method is a separate group that has become a non-profit that helps with the education and information of trees.
[Brenda Pike]: Sorry, I was saying I would I would second that the DPW has been under resources under resource in this area for a long time. They have a large backlog right now of of just tree stumps that they need to remove so that they can plant a tree in the space where the, the old tree was and I. I think it's more than a hundred tree stumps that they need to remove because it's just been building up year after year. So I think they're maybe having a hard time doing some of the more basic things that are under their responsibility. So they're having a hard time thinking of taking on more with the resources that they have.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right. So Trees MedFed has worked with AgD2 to help in certain areas, grants. So I think that Mayor's going to be coming out with something, because I saw the email, actually, that they just had over, I think it's 100 or more trees delivered to MedFed. I think they came in last week or the week before, and they're rushing around planting them in South MedFed. Oh, I can't remember what school, does some, Hormel Stadium had a whole bunch of trees sitting here that came in that they'll be, those are city trees, but they are addressing the stumps too. It was like up to 400 stumps just a couple of years ago. So they need help. And so when you think about a tree committee, That's part of ordinances that are throughout the state in many cities and towns. So when they write their tree preservation ordinance, it always includes, I shouldn't say always, but more than 50% of the time was the tree committee as part of that one big ordinance that helps with, you know, reviewing trees and reviewing land clearing and all these other things. What happened was that the, Let me think back, because it's been going on for several years now. I think it was the city council, or the previous building commissioner, said that the ordinance they submitted originally, which was a few years back, should be split up into three parts. And that's how we got three separate, instead of one big ordinance that talked about private treaties and having a treaty committee, it was separated into three. So it sounds like they're separate, but they sort of work together. And that went to the legal counsel for the city to evaluate, and they wrote their comments. And then they came back last November, the city council, and asked for Trace Medford and the Energy Committee to read through the older draft tree ordinances and the city solicitors comments and building, you know, department and other city comments to revise it. And that's how the energy committee got even more involved because we work with trees methods last year. And then they submitted new drafts, um, in July to the city council. So Dan, I don't know. Did I answer your question?
[SPEAKER_12]: Uh, I appreciate the response. I didn't really, I'm still a bit confused, but thank you.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Well, yeah, so public trees are under. The city trees are under the department of the forestry department magnitude and trees management. It's a separate group trying to have a tree. preservation ordinance and start a tree committee. They wouldn't be, they could recommend, you know, members of the tree committee, but it's up to the mayor and, and input from the DPW forestry department, you know, who those may be like a arborist, a certified arborist.
[SPEAKER_12]: Yeah, thanks. Yeah, I think the general message is, thank you.
[SPEAKER_11]: So Loretta, how long have we, have we been at this? I'm sorry, how long does it take to get a tree ordinance going on average?
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: On average, or just this started during COVID, so that was like a big blow up, you know, when COVID happened. So 2020, right? Maybe before that.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: I'm sorry to say that Loretta and I did the original tree with the previous chair of this committee back before COVID. That was the pre-report. Yeah, report and then the first ordinance did come out. I guess the first drafts came out in 2022 or 23
[SPEAKER_11]: So your engagement, Luke, and Lorella, were in, I'm guessing, 2018. Oh, yeah. Yeah.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: 2017, maybe.
[SPEAKER_11]: Yeah, that took us a couple of years to write that in.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Loretta, if you are able, I have to admit, going through my emails, I cannot quite tell what the, I don't seem to have the last iteration of the tree ordinance. I do see something from Alicia for October of last year, of 2023. No, no. Go back to November.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: And it would have come from Brenda, because Brenda sent it out to Remy, you see. And there's links in the email. And it says, like, treaty, semantics, committee of the whole. And it has the links to the ordinances.
[SPEAKER_11]: Yeah. So my guess is that it's probably about seven or eight years.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: No. OK, so let's just recap something. So what happened was, Back in 2017 or 18, Luke, myself, Carolyn Meckleburg, who works for the state now, but she was an intern in the office, Curtis Tootin, and I think there was someone else, I can't remember, we decided to, Or someone asks, what can we do about a tree ordinance? This is how it started back in 2017 or 18. And I think it was Alicia said, well, why don't we draft this? And then people started adding their comments. Well, if you're going to draft ideas for one. So it ended up being a research project. And Kathleen McKinnon was really thankful that we did. And she was really nice because she said, wow, that's like a research project. And it ended up being that. So what we did was we researched ordinances in the whole state that were existing and we had all these notes and similarities and it was we did a pre-draft and we found that education was the most important thing. So we wrote a guide Oh God, what's it called? It's on the Go Green Medford website. Go Green Medford. If you click on trees, the introduction to the guide to municipal, guide for municipalities to maintain the tree camp. And it starts with an introduction letter and the actual research project. And it talks about different education programs we found. And at the end, there's a sample ordinance and what other cities have done. And then we had to go back and actually Alicia made a great suggestion. So you should actually list all the towns that have these ordinances under each paragraph, which we did. So we wrote a sample draft ordinance. in this report. And there's a huge appendix too that goes with it. And so that's on ogrebaymethod.org under Tracy. And that was our project from the Energy Committee. And we sent it out to other cities, and we used Cambridge and Brookline, and we used Wellesley, Concord, Tons. Tons of cities.
[SPEAKER_11]: If you'd allow me to interject for two seconds. Other cities have tree ordinances, don't they? Yes, many. Yes. And have they taken as long as Medford to come up with a tree ordinance? What was their battle like? And I know you guys have researched this, and I'm just popping in as somebody who hasn't been involved in it. And I regret that to some extent.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: It took a couple of years. It usually took a couple of years. But some of these cities that have the more detailed ones have a lot more money. And the way you fund this program is through a permitting process. So for example, Cambridge has, you know, guidelines. So let me get back to just, I don't want to spend any more, too much time because we might run out of time if we end at 8. But the way this works is they're funded by the permits that It could be that you're just targeting developers and flippers for land clearing, and that's how it started. So they took our report and they're like, well, when are you going to do an ordinance? When are you going to do an ordinance for MedFed? And we said, well, this is a guide and we're not actually pushing it. We should have something to prevent land clearing and property flippers from clearing the land. But Therese MedFed took it upon themselves to write the drafts and submit it. And I congratulate them because it's a huge task. Getting back to your question about how long does it take, It takes a couple of years, you know, but you can start with something simple, like, let's prevent land clearing on lots and a percentage of lots. So, when they're reading through these documents, if they're not familiar meeting the city council and departments, and they're not familiar with the cities, they have the information. It can be done.
[SPEAKER_11]: So, so, so Loretta, is this is this like, do you think this is an issue that that is is like, akin to having trying to go for the big scoop or trying to have some sort of constrained. You know, ordinance. What is the differentiation there? How do you see this? Are we grasping for too much in this ordinance? Could we whittle it down so we actually have an ordinance going forward and then maybe modify it incrementally as we go along? Or is it like a... Is it like, you know, we need to have all these components in the project?
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Like they said at the meeting, it could be simpler. It could be simpler. So it could be much simpler. We could think, you know, but this is because they broke it out into 3 separate ones. It got a little bit as to how the tree committee would help, you know. That was really surprising to me that it would be an overlap of DPW responsibilities.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Loretta, I don't want to interrupt. I do want to be mindful of our time.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Right. I had also mentioned to the members to show up at the Trees Method meetings. They're only an hour. I think it's the third Tuesday of the month. I haven't heard from them, not that I would, but I will suggest to them to maybe change the title to Tree Commission or Tree Advisory Commission or Board. If it's as simple as a name change, it could be done. But if anybody wants to write with more questions, you can feel free to email me. But I'm just there to assist Tree Smith, and that's what we should be doing too.
[SPEAKER_11]: Thank you, Loretta. You're exemplary. You really are.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Very complicated. I hope I didn't talk too long. We'll see what happens.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Righty. So yes, please. We should feel free, I think, to write to Loretta, get extra questions in. Having looked over the earlier drafts of these ordinances, it's a lot to parse. So I'm glad to have a couple of experts in here to help us out. Being mindful of the time, I know most of us wanted to be out of here by 8. I'm going to look to Bob who had the next, looks like 2 different prompts. 1 on waste reduction, 1 on climate, the climate bill. Are you able or wanting to postpone them? Give a quick summary. What is your preference?
[Robert Paine]: Why don't we move the climate bill to the January meeting a little earlier in the meeting? It only takes 10 minutes, maybe, plus discussion, but I think it's important. So I set out a 12-slide presentation about it, but I think I want to talk about it. So why don't we move that to the January meeting? Not at the end. And quickly on the waste reduction, I'm trying to communicate with Melrose and I think getting the input from other towns and cities that have actually successfully implemented a zero waste initiative, maybe plastic ordinances, hearing from them would be a good step. So I think that's maybe one of the next steps is to get input from other cities on this or other experts should they join the committee. I am no expert at all on it, but I can reach out. I'm trying to see if we can arrange for input from other communities that have successfully done this. That's my current initiative on waste reduction.
[SPEAKER_11]: Bob, I'm willing to work on you with that. So email me when you Oh, yeah, sure.
[Robert Paine]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_11]: If you want, and I, I'll essentially do what you want. So okay, so just let me know.
[Robert Paine]: Oh, absolutely. Sure. Yeah, we'll communicate but I Somehow, I said, we ought to have a further discussion. That was named as the lead for the waste reduction. But yeah, I have no experience in this, but I have experience in getting some assistance from other towns and cities. And Melrose would be one of the first ones. They seem to have done a lot. So that's my idea on that. So we can just end those two discussion items at this point, unless other people want to join in.
[Brenda Pike]: Bob, are you looking to have someone from Melrose come to do a guest presentation in January?
[Robert Paine]: Well, I don't know what month would be the best. First of all, I haven't heard back from them. In order to communicate with them, I have to send them a form. I don't know who to communicate with. They don't let you email somebody, because I don't know what their email addresses are. Maybe you have some contacts there, Brenda.
[Brenda Pike]: I can reach out to see who.
[Robert Paine]: Maybe you can reach out to them. As you know, when I communicate with somebody, no one responds to me. I can't coach anybody, because they don't think I'm a legitimate coach. So I don't get any respect here.
[Brenda Pike]: Even I'm having that experience, Bob. I think a third of the people... Bob, I respect you.
[Robert Paine]: I know, but people, I get assigned to coach Electrify Medford, and no one responds to me. They're afraid of me. They think I'm a scam artist. You're intimidating. I'm a scam artist. Because you know so much.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I think it's the holidays too.
[Robert Paine]: This goes back to October and even September. I had no luck in getting five people to, none of five people ever responded to me after they signed up for this. And so I just speak out.
[SPEAKER_11]: So I just want to say that in the January meeting, if there is an interest, I can present something on COP 29. And of course, it would be my sardonic input as usual. But that's where it is. So all right. If that's feasible, we can put that in. If not, then we'll go for the February meeting.
[Barry Ingber]: I will let you know. And remember, everybody, that we have Matt Barlow scheduled to make a presentation in February.
[Robert Paine]: Yep. Oh, that's good. And how long is that going to be for, the presentation?
[Barry Ingber]: We can tell him.
[Robert Paine]: Oh, OK. All right. Yeah, OK. All right, yeah, well, okay, maybe if. Brenda, you can communicate with Melrose if they can make January or March. Those will be the 2 options. And maybe they can talk about plastic as well as other waste reduction ideas.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Fantastic. As I'm kind of drafting up the agenda for January, something important to me will be making sure we nail down our projects ready to go for the new year, make sure if we are to invite the mayor along, That we have something to talk about some things we want to get done some initiatives and priorities ready to go. But we will see what we have time for. There's just too much to do so much to say not enough minutes in our hour and a half. Is there any new business people want to discuss at the end of this meeting?
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: I have an update from last meeting. If that's okay, I'll just speak briefly. And this was about the rat poison I talked about with Newhouse Wildlife presenting to the Pest Control Board because they had, of Massachusetts, to reduce the use of escars, rat poison that kills the predators of rodents. And they had another meeting actually with, the Pest Control Board, and many people showed up to that Zoom meeting, and they didn't allow them to speak. So they're very upset about that. And the people had raised hands, and they wanted to comment about the status of their review of limiting rodenticides that kill foxes, wolves, and, I mean, coyotes and all the other animals. Hawks and eagles, so pretty upset about that. I'm not sure where it stands, but it didn't respond. So it's a big concern. I did see an article by CAPE in Wildlife, who actually takes care of a lot of the birds that are submitted to them. to try to keep them alive, they're injured by rodenticides. And I'm not sure, it was a Facebook post and explained really well how the rodenticides really don't work. The rats get used to it, because we have a rat problem in all the cities, it's all over the East Coast because of the warming temperatures, they're just having more and more offspring. And so I'd like to share that with the group, but I'm not sure, I'll have to ask them if I can copy and paste their interesting analysis of it to send to you people, if you're interested in reading it, and how the rats actually get used to it. And it doesn't work, you know, they just keep multiplying. But the animals that are affected and die from the rodenticides, they can not become immune to it at all, the way it's been formulated. So if that's something people are interested in, I'll keep following up with that.
[SPEAKER_11]: I am interested in it.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yes. I'm thinking of playing with the idea of creating some kind of Google Doc or something where we can just put all of this information. As we get these updates, things like those links, then we can read them throughout the month and have them ready for us. Just a space for you to drop that. So I might look into that. For next session next year as we kind of. Streamline our priority to streamline how we how we run things. But otherwise, thank you for that update. I definitely want to hear more as we go forward.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: So you can both, anybody that's interested can follow Newhouse Wildlife on Facebook. They're wildlife rehabbers, and they get a lot of animals that are, you know, from the state of Massachusetts, they're licensed, that are injured by rodenticides, and some of them die, actually, many of them do, and KPM Wildlife, too.
[SPEAKER_11]: It goes to show we know not what we do.
[EO-vAhUJAKo_SPEAKER_21]: Yeah, I was surprised to, you know, throw it into sites don't really work.
[SPEAKER_11]: Yeah.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Alrighty. Any other pieces of business that needs, uh, attending to just happy holidays to everybody before you end up a say goodbye usually ends quick.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Happy holidays. Yeah.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah, happy holidays. I'll see you all January 6th. Is there any final movements that need to be made?
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Motion to adjourn?
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Second.
[SPEAKER_11]: I just want to apologize for not being here a couple of times. Paul, you do what you gotta do. I will attempt to be more present next year. So I just wanted to put that out to you guys. yeah make it your new year's revolution resolution yeah if i have a house um you know then if i'm living in a tent on one of those one of method parks then i'll let you know
[Robert Paine]: Well, I keep watching how their work is progressing. My grandchildren are interested.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: Yes. And Paul, my offer still stands. If you want to send me any engineering, drawings, anything, questions, I'm happy to connect with you on that.
[SPEAKER_11]: You know what? I will do it tonight. Go for it. All right.
[L5Dn-1_BzKM_SPEAKER_12]: So I'll send you the... I want to know how you're heating, what the systems are, what sizes they are, what your manual J is. Somebody should have done one. All those good things. None of that has been... We can work through those. All right. Thank you. Thanks.
[SPEAKER_11]: You all have a good holiday and be safe. Happy holidays.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Thank you all. Take care. See you next year.
[Lois Grossman]: Bye-bye, everyone.
[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I look forward to seeing you all January 6th.