AI-generated transcript of City Council Committee of the Whole 08-15-23

[Nicole Morell]: Okay. 6 0 5 community. The whole meeting Tuesday, August 15 2023 at 6 p.m. It's called to order. Mr. Clerk, please call the roll.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Present Councilor Collins present Councilor Knight Council that is absent. Councilor Scarpelli, Councilor Tseng saying is on the way. President, uh,

[Nicole Morell]: By present, two apps in the meeting is called to order. There will be a meeting of the Medford City Council Committee of the Whole on Tuesday, August 15th, 2023 at 6 p.m. in the Medford City Council Chamber on the second floor of Medford City Hall and via Zoom. The purpose of the meeting is to discuss the proposed waste hauler ordinance, paper 22-605. The committee has invited DPW Commissioner Tim McGibbon and Alicia Hunt, Director of Planning, Development and Sustainability to attend the meeting. For further information, aids and accommodations, contact the city clerk at 781-393-2425. Sincerely yours, Nicole Morell, Council President. So at this point, I'm actually gonna turn over to Councilor Collins, who has been working on this proposed ordinance in the subcommittee prior to it coming to Committee of the Whole. And so she'll bring us up to date on where we are now and what's before us.

[Kit Collins]: Thank you, President Morell. So tonight we're going to discuss proposed updates to Medford solid waste ordinance and this is, we're getting towards the tail end of what I'll told has been a fairly, a fairly long term project if you trace it back to its beginnings. with the discussions on the solid waste task force which were convened to be discussing how to make sure that the city's next waste hauler contract is the best one for the city in every way. During that discussion with a group of stakeholders which included myself and other community residents, some strategy consultants as well as Commissioner McGivern and Director Hunt. One of the many recommendations that came out of that process was that it would be advantageous for us to pair the request for proposals for a new waste hauler contract with some updates to our solid waste ordinance to align it better with current state best practices. So this ordinance revision process is kind of an out shoot of that. Where we started was with some mass DEP template language that's recommended for you know, just municipalities across the state to bring them into alignment with current best practices for waste hauling in Massachusetts. This includes essentially better modern language for aligning municipal waste hauling practices with to bring communities closer to zero waste and keep things streamlined and align with the current, certain current waste bands of which there are several. So that was our starting place. The Solid Waste Ordinance as it's currently on the books is clearly was written several decades ago. I think as we find often when we're doing these ordinance revision projects, it's just that there's a lot of pretty dated language to clean up, not just to modernize it, but to make it actually more useful. And in this case, useful, not just for city staff, but also for contractors that the city has to work with and residents and businesses. So that is a big piece of it. And then the other major chunk is just updating the solid waste ordinance so that it is in alignment with current state best practices. And again, this is to help us be positioned to get the most advantageous solid waste and recycling contract that we can both in the short term and in the long term to just improve that foundation, make it more legible for residents and businesses to perceive like who should be doing what. And then I also had a third thing but I forgot what it was. So I'll also mention that in conjunction with these revisions that we're going to be proposing and discussing today. We've also gone through and made sure that these proposed updates are in alignment with the Board of Health's regulations for permitting waste haulers and everything that goes along with that, because there's a lot of overlap in places where the Board of Health regulations point to the ordinance and vice versa. So we've made sure that the Board of Health is also working on revisions on there, and just to make sure that language within those two buckets of information are not contradictory and aligned with each other.

[Nicole Morell]: Thank you. And will you be sharing or will Commissioner McGibbon or Director Hunt be sharing a document we can look at or for the proposed changes? Or I'm sorry if it's something in our packet we missed.

[Kit Collins]: Oh, no, I certainly can share my screen or I can shoot the most current version of the document over to of our department heads if they'd like to throw it up on the screen. We have, and just to just at top I'll say we have, we can certainly go through the proposed ordinance, just what we have to bring up to speed, our fellow Councilors who haven't been a part of the subcommittee process so far. We did come out of our last subcommittee meeting with just a few specific points of discussion for this meeting in particular. So depending on what other folks want to do, we could just do the overview first, or I could take us through the ordinance and then highlight those specific points for conversation. I think it could go either way.

[Nicole Morell]: It would be helpful to get just a brief overview first, and then go through those specific points.

[Kit Collins]: Sure. And also I wanna pause before I boot up my Zoom screen to invite Commissioner McGovern or Director Hunt to provide any extra insight. If there's anything I missed, you know, you've been an integral guiding force in this process. So just if there's anything to add. Nope. Great, thank you. Feel free to interrupt me if you think of anything. I'm just going to open up my Zoom screen so I can share the ordinance. Sorry for the wait. Yeah, thank you. I'm just opening Zoom on my computer right now.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Great.

[Kit Collins]: Thank you. Okay, so I'm gonna try to do a fairly succinct overview of the ordinance. So I'll certainly pause for questions and additional comments at the end, but if any requests for clarification come up while I'm zipping through it, just wave at me. So we took care to try to align this updated ordinance with what's currently in our Code of Ordinances. Most of what is currently in the ordinances just deals with what is waste in Medford and what should we do and not do with it. So at the beginning here, Article 1, a lot of this is still in Medford. the current standing language that we use for removal of waste material or debris and section 72 kind of goes on. I'll have some suggestions later on in the meeting for how to update this language because it's some of the kind of last remaining difficult to understand language in the ordinance. This is essentially saying, you know, hey, people of Medford, don't leave trash in the streets. Then we get into Article 2, and this is where we took the most guidance from the MAS DEP template language and guidance from the task force and our subject matter experts on how to have this help manifest a better waste hauling system in Medford and better conditions for future waste hauling RFPs. This is really similar language that we see to a lot of other municipalities in Massachusetts. This ordinance establishes minimum requirements for the systemic collection of solid waste and recyclables in order to comply with state mandated waste bans along those lines. It defines people and things related to waste in Medford, such as commercial generators of waste, residential generators of waste, leaf collection. It points to several state level waste hauling related things like the Mercury Disposal Prohibition Act, all of these sort of state level acts and requirements that municipalities have to also adhere to. et cetera. I'm not going to bother going through all of these, but feel free to pause me. In discussions in subcommittee, we decided that it would make sense to have this updated ordinance go into effect on July 1st, 2024, because that is the likely date that a new waste hauling contract would go into effect. So it makes sense to have that align with when either a new hauler or a new contract is actually starting work in Medford, so that there wouldn't be sort of a messy overlap of waste haulers having to change their standards in the middle of a contract or at a seemingly arbitrary time. Something that is also newly articulated in these proposed changes is it makes it much more clear that recycling is mandatory in Medford and how that will happen. The previous version of the ordinance was not very clear on, I personally feel that there is some contradictory language around how mandatory it is and where the burden for doing that falls. So first section in this division, in order to protect the environment, promote recycling and be in compliance with based around regulations, we establish a requirement for the mandatory separation of recyclables from the solid waste stream. And the city will inform all generators at least once per year that recycling is mandatory. It goes through which departments are responsible for promulgating requirements and standards around what trash and recycling is picked up and how, so here it points to Commissioner of Public Works for container requirements, how recycling should be separated, separating leaves and yard waste, composting should that become more relevant. Then it goes into the permit that is required for haulers. This is also substantially updated. A lot of this just makes it clear what of the permit requirements point to the Board of Health, since the Board of Health promulgates permits for solid waste haulers. So this kind of creates signals for waste haulers. that this is a process that goes through the Board of Health, is overseen by the Board of Health, enforced by the Board of Health. And there are some new measures in here, which are also recommended by the state around how haulers must, log and record how much solid waste and recycling they are picking up from each generator per year. This is to allow municipalities to better track our progress towards waste reduction, which is something that is very aligned with many of our city's other plans, progress towards zero waste and the Climate Action and Adaptation Plan. This is also something that I think is just very useful information for a city to have for a lot of purposes. I think the thing that I probably forgot to say at the top is that one of the reasons it's really good for us to update our practices and better aligned with overall state best practices is that doing so makes the city more eligible for more state funding to offset the cost of waste hauling in Medford. So passing and then enforcing this ordinance will do that and also Using the leverage and the new standards in it to hasten our progress towards zero waste also puts us in a better position to, you know, essentially be receiving grant assistance to pay for the cost of waste hauling and hauling adjacent things. Next, bundled service requirement. We've discussed this in our meetings around the request for proposals for the new waste hauling contract as well, and this is really aligned with the goals in there. This makes it clear that waste haulers that are seeking a permit to work in Medford must provide solid waste collection, sorry, if they're providing solid waste collection, they must also provide recyclables collection. If you want to haul waste in Medford, if you're going to pick up trash, you also have to pick up recycling. There's a provision that if you want to only pick up recycling, you can do that. But essentially, this is to try to make sure it stays cost effective for every generator of waste in Medford, no matter what type of building that is, to get recycling service. Enforcement goes back into what departments oversee what parts of the ordinance. The Board of Health can inspect trucks. They also issue regulations around violations of the ordinance. They're kind of the enforcing body for much of this. Here we have kind of more on the permit side, points to penalties that are overseen by the Board of Health for any failures to adhere to the permitting requirements.

[Nicole Morell]: That's the overview. Do we have any questions from Councilors before we get into parts you wanted to highlight for discussion. Sina, do you want to continue to flag those parts, or do you want to take over at this point?

[Kit Collins]: Certainly. I'm happy to run through them. I'm just going to stop sharing my screen so I can look at my notes. So just in terms of the table of contents, the things that we had discussed prioritizing at this meeting, Sorry, I was looking at the wrong section of my notes. Okay, so during the subcommittee process, we sent these proposed changes out to a list of waste haulers that operate in Massachusetts, more than 40 companies, just to solicit their feedback, get their insight on the draft changes. We sent that to, like I said, 40 vendors. We got back two pieces of feedback. So those have been reviewed by our department heads. We can certainly, dive into those at this meeting just to go over what some of those vendors had to say and get some feedback on those as well. Like I mentioned, I have some amendments I'd like to propose for updating the language right at the top of the ordinance, that's still in its very dated form. And then the two last things is that there are two placeholders that we should just address in this draft before we advance it to the full meeting of the council, which is a really small section in the dissection on permit. requirements, I think, where we just have a placeholder for how we're referring to industry standard tables, which is a part of how waste and recycling is estimated by the haulers. And then I think we have a vestige from the MAS DEP template language in a section on legal provisions. This has been promulgated by the MAS DEP. It's been looked over by our procurement office. Language really similar to this has been adopted by many municipalities. in Medford, I'm sorry, in Massachusetts. So I just wanted to make it a group discussion whether we should, whether there's any value in having a space within the ordinance for legal provisions or if that is made irrelevant by the process that we've had and the fact that this goes through a process before it's put into MuniCode. Any, sorry, I'm doing your job.

[Nicole Morell]: No, it's okay. Any discussion from Councilors in response to that? Shreya, I mean, have Director Hahn and Commissioner Forgiver provided their recommendations as far as these? Have they provided them, or would you guys like to provide just some insight on how to make the decision for these last discussion points?

[Alicia Hunt]: Push the button. Thank you. Did that work? Yes. When I stand here, I can't see the red light that you can see.

[Nicole Morell]: Oh, really?

[Alicia Hunt]: Good afternoon, Alicia Hunt, Director of Planning, Development, and Sustainability. So we received the comments from the haulers that you had received, and we sent them to DEP. And then we got some comments back from DEP about them. One of them they thought was interesting. One was from a national organization, NWRA, which, sorry, I have to keep flipping to see what things stand for national waste, da, da, da. But basically their comment was that they really wanna see things pushed onto the generators rather than on the haulers for enforcement. Of course, we like to see them both. DEP points out that our ordinance actually has penalties for both the people who generate the waste and the people who haul the waste, and that that is very helpful DEP also let us know that the standards that they put together, this draft template, the policies from the state were actually all developed in conjunction with this national organization, National Waste and Recycling Association. However, that the executive director of said organization has turned over since they worked with them. And it's quite possible that the person who submitted the letter to us was not aware of the extensive outreach and stakeholder engagement that the state went through to develop this template and their recommendations to the city. So they just really wanted to, the state wanted us to look at and point out that we are actually have fines in here on both ends. If you put out the wrong stuff, recycle correctly kind of things. Those could be fine as well as the hauling. I understand that Councilor Collins had some additional changes from the last version that we had seen, but I don't know if I've seen those changes to comment on them.

[Kit Collins]: You haven't yet. Sorry about that.

[Alicia Hunt]: Thank you. So I'm unable to comment on the new changes until she presents them this evening. Just wanted to make sure I hadn't missed something, because we've got a bunch of different projects going back and forth. And I don't believe that we have sent this to legal counsel to review. We wanted to have all in this complete what the council wanted, how we wanted it to be, and then send it to them just for form to make sure we're wording everything correctly. Because it's based on a DEP template, which they had thoroughly reviewed. We don't really have any concerns about it. we do like to and I'm happy if it gets voted out tonight and then just send it to council to see if there are any edits they would make to this, and I would actually defer to them on whether we should include that. Often you'll see sections like that legal section, and then you would just see the word reserved under it, and that makes it exist in an ordinance so that if you later wanted to come back and put something in there, you could. I would just defer to them as to whether that was the best way to handle that. Is there anything else you wanted us to comment on at this point or we're waiting to hear the additional changes?

[Nicole Morell]: I just had a question at this point based on you're talking about the recommendation about fines on both sides. I mean, that's in addition to, I believe there's fines at the state level from bulk, is it the state level from like bulk producers of waste, like something like Tufts, like as far as like contamination, that's like separate and exists

[Alicia Hunt]: I mean, that is my general understanding. It is my understanding that at the state level, while there are waste bans, which says you cannot throw a recyclable material in the trash, they only enforce it at a very high level. So when the recycle truck or the trash truck goes and empties its load, there might on occasion be a state inspector who looks at it and says, wow, there's a lot of recycling in here. We're going to issue a fine. I understand that there are very few of those inspectors employed by the state. So it is extremely rare that they actually even look at the loads. But that's the level at which the state is issuing fines. So they might fine the hauler who might have it in their agreement to pass it back to their person they are working for. that they hauled it from.

[Nicole Morell]: Thank you. And then just one other question, I guess, for either Councilor Collins or you, Director Hunt. Consideration for Redford Public Schools as far as how many updates would impact them or force like a change of policy of something they're already doing that will require more?

[Alicia Hunt]: It really shouldn't change anything. We've actually been working fairly robustly. So it got a little drawn out because of the pandemic with the schools to increase the recycling that they do. But my office had actually gotten a grant to the schools use the same residential toters. We have now, we have received but not yet installed dumpsters for five of our six schools for recycling so that they would be able to recycle the same volume that they have for trash. We're in the process of getting that instituted. And actually I'm really excited as a quick aside, The person who worked with my office to do the zero waste assessment of the schools has now actually been employed by the school system as the new director of food services. So I do expect to see some continued synergy and there is absolutely excitement there to increase school recycling and composting. Perfect.

[Nicole Morell]: Thank you, Councilor Collins.

[Kit Collins]: Thank you, President Morell, for those questions. And I would say, you know, I went through the ordinance pretty quickly. I think the headlines here for me are just modernizing our solid waste ordinance to make it a modern document, making it more clear that recycling is the intent of the city and the goal of the city and how that will happen, who enforces that, and making all that more clear. That's the headline of these updates to the ordinance, just to pull us out of the weeds for a second and make it more clear.

[Nicole Morell]: versus affairs.

[Zac Bears]: Thank you, Madam President. And just in terms of specific things that we're working on tonight, it's just are there specific requests from the comments from the waste haulers to make any amendments? No. Okay. And then there's just this legal provisions piece that's just blank. And then you have some suggestions on the first section, and those are the only decision points we need to be looking at tonight. Pretty much. Okay, great. Thank you.

[Alicia Hunt]: Councilor Collins, there was one other item in your email. Sorry, I was just checking.

[Kit Collins]: I think it's the piece around industry standard tables.

[Alicia Hunt]: Yes, and so one thing that we looked at is that it just seemed to be best to take your recommendation that we say a standard table provided by the Director of Public Works, not created by. In your suggestion, it said created, and he may or may not create the table, but he could provide the table. I'm sure he has much better things to do than create a table. But in a big picture way, I think we would prefer to say that it's a standard bill provided by the Commissioner of Public Works so that if standards change or tables change or this one's not available anymore, we don't actually have to change our ordinance, but that he can say this isn't the standard anymore, let's now use the new standard.

[Kit Collins]: Great, thank you. And so just to make sure I have the note correctly, and industry standard table provided. Was that the word provided by the commissioner? Okay, great. Why don't we dispense with that one now? I can share my screen again to show everybody where exactly we're looking. So we're here in section 7073, permit required for haulers. CA, okay, so we're here in 7073 CA. This is saying that when a waste hauler applies to renew their permit to haul waste, they have to report on a form how many tons of solid waste and recycling that they collected in the previous interval of their permit. This is something that's recommended because allows us to track, you know, if we're creating more trash and recycling in Medford or less year over year. Something that is an industry standard is that for buildings that house their waste in dumpsters, as opposed to, or I guess like dumpsters or any container, they're not actually going to put it on a scale and weigh it, they're going to say, okay, usually a dumpster, if it's a restaurant, it's going to be x pounds per dumpster, if it's a it's gonna be X pounds for dumpsters so that it could be an approximation as opposed to a really cumbersome weighing process, which brings us down to here, the permitted hauler shall use X industry standard table and provide the estimated tonnage to the city. So the amendment here would be to replace that with an industry standard table provided by the commissioner of the Department of Public Works. Any questions before I make it as a motion? No? Okay, I would motion to, in 7073-C-A, in the last sentence after shall use, strike the rest of that sentence, starting with the X. and replace it with an industry standard table provided by the commissioner of the Department of Public Works.

[Nicole Morell]: Mr. Clerk, do you have that language? Councilor Collins, could you repeat, or if you wanna?

[Kit Collins]: Can I email it to you?

[Nicole Morell]: Yeah. Do you want to send it to me through the chat so that I can just read it back?

[Adam Hurtubise]: You have it, okay. In section 70-73CA, last sentence, strike X industry standard table and provide the estimated tonnage to the city, end quote, and replace it with, quote, an industry standard table provided by the commissioner of DPW, end quote.

[Kit Collins]: or I'm sorry, I forgot the part at the end that says and provide the estimated tonnage to the city that should still be present.

[Adam Hurtubise]: I'm having trouble hearing you.

[Kit Collins]: I forgot the and provide the estimated tonnage to the city should be present in my amendment as well.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Should be closing the first line.

[Kit Collins]: I'll just.

[Nicole Morell]: Can you read it in its entirety or just say in its entirety?

[Kit Collins]: Yeah, I'm sorry. an industry standard table provided by the, wait, oh my God, sorry. The permitted hauler shall use an industry standard table provided by the Commissioner of the Public Works and provide the estimated tonnage to the city.

[Nicole Morell]: Okay, so adding and provide the estimated tonnage to the city.

[Adam Hurtubise]: So basically the providing the estimated tonnage to the city, uh, survives from the from the first and stays in the second. Okay.

[Nicole Morell]: So on the motion of Council Collins to make that language change second by All those in favor? Opposed? Motion passes. Any other motions for changes?

[Zac Bears]: I'd just move to strike the legal provisions by empty legal provisions section.

[Nicole Morell]: Okay. On the motion by Senator Bears to strike the empty legal provisions section, seconded by Councilor Collins. All those in favor?

[Zac Bears]: Aye.

[Nicole Morell]: Opposed? Motion passes.

[Kit Collins]: The last remaining thing on my list was to present some of my language recommendations for the first three sections of the ordinance. So if we're okay to proceed to that, I would read off again more slowly those sections as they're currently written. share my screen once more. So first I'm just gonna read once out loud the first three sections of our current waste hauling ordinance. Section 71, removal of waste or debris. No person being an owner or person in possession of real property in the city shall suffer or allow the use of this property as a gathering place for waste material or debris such as papers, rags, boxes, branches, cans, broken glass, broken boards, discarded furniture, and abandoned or unusable motor vehicles for more than seven days after having received written notice from the chief of police or the director of public health to remove such material. Section 72 is on a similar theme. No person except as authorized by ordinance of the city or order, regulation, license or permission of the city council or other board or officer of the city. There are two duly organized except an officer employee of the city or for some public purpose or you shall drop, place or throw and suffer to remain or cause to be dropped or thrown in or upon any highway, street, land, square or other public place in the city. Any ashes, cinders, glass, crockery, et cetera, or trimmings thereof, post, pole, stones, earth from cellars, lumber, et cetera, offensive manner of any kind, or any leaves, cut grass, brush, or any such materials from private property, unless such leaves, cut grass, brush, and such materials are properly contained and placed for collection by the city on scheduled collection dates. I'll stop there, and this is what I would like to propose instead. So this would be to replace the first section. No private property may become a gathering place for debris, refuse, discarded or abandoned items or other waste. Any prop... Yeah. No, it's all good. This one is just a Google Doc. So this one would be to replace 71. No private property may become a gathering place for debris, refuse, discarded or abandoned items or other waste. Any property owner who has received written notice from the Medford Police Department, Code Enforcement Officer or Medford Public Board of Health to remove any such material from their property must do so within the timeframe directed. My thinking here being, I think that the laundry list of every configurable piece or type of garbage is not necessary. And this expands the agents in the city that can request.

[Nicole Morell]: Does the previous version mentioned timeframe? Sorry, I'm just going from memory. That came out of... No, so does the current one does not mention timeframe, right?

[Kit Collins]: So section 73 does.

[Nicole Morell]: Okay.

[Kit Collins]: So maybe I should go through all of these because some of them are a combination. Oh yeah, you're right.

[Adam Hurtubise]: So if I can, do you want to replace 7 and 1?

[Kit Collins]: My thinking was try to combine the useful parts of all three of these into two sections. And then perhaps there's no need for a third.

[George Scarpelli]: I think the definition would be streamlined so that our representatives would do that, but you know, we have residents that, you know, with one person's trash, another one person's treasure. So I think that might pose some sort of concern. I know that, you know, not that I dislike, but I think it's important not support this, but I think that would be the question that we would have. So thank you.

[Nicole Morell]: I think that's a fair point. Is that something that came up at all?

[Kit Collins]: I think that's a fair point as well. I think that what seems ideal to me coming out of our conversations is how are we not making such a laundry list that it actually boxes us out of enforcing around specific things like, oh, well, that's not included on the list, so it doesn't count, but still having a list that illustrates the concept that is understandable.

[George Scarpelli]: I agree with the changes, I think that encompasses in the people that the departments that we have that have to enforce that, we'll deem that to be questioned, the questions that need to be answered. It's just that I think that the question we're gonna come about is the resident themselves that says, wait a second, you might look at this as trash, but this is my art. So I think that that has to be just vetted a little bit more. I think that, but like I said, I wouldn't oppose that. I just think that it'll be more problem on the body that has to enforce it.

[Tim McGivern]: I just wanted to maybe provide a little bit of context just because we've been talking about this for so long. So my understanding of trash is more exclusionary. So it excludes things that can be recycled. And it doesn't really dictate what trash is defined by. So I think I just want to make that point. So someone's art certainly can be someone else's trash. But it's a matter of, will the hauler take it? If it's put in the trash and it's not an excluded item, the hauler will take it. whether it's somebody's art or whether it's their trash.

[George Scarpelli]: Right, but I believe that what I'm confused with is what we want to change the verbiage of what the ordinance states. So I think that what needs to be called and what needs to be enforced, if it's not being called, it's not being enforced, so it doesn't matter. I think that's confusion in some way. I know it sounds easy to people that have been working with us for the last 20 years, but I think that I'm just bringing up a question that you'll have from a common resident.

[Kit Collins]: Well, Councilor, I think that you bring up a good point, that it's more streamlined to say, will they haul or deem this trash or not, than it is to say, if a code enforcement officer goes to a cluttered piece of sidewalk and says, please pick this up. And somebody says, well, pick up one.

[George Scarpelli]: And that's the defining question between what Tim is saying, what we're saying. I think that's the only sticking point that was articulated well there by our DPW director.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Thank you.

[Tim McGivern]: it's a really interesting topic. And the only other thing I would say is, is what is waste? And so it is saying that, like, if it's somebody's waste. So I suppose, unless it's breaking another rule, that there wouldn't really be much enforcement action unless it's defined as waste, whatever that is. So, yeah.

[Nicole Morell]: Thank you.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Thank you.

[Nicole Morell]: Councilor Collins, if you want to continue.

[Kit Collins]: Why would I? Okay, so wondering how to proceed.

[Nicole Morell]: I mean, I do wonder, I mean, maybe that's a good question. I know it's supposed to go through legal review. Maybe that's a question as far as like, opinion wise from a legal standing or legal standing with regards to enforcement. Just clarify, define every single one.

[Kit Collins]: Yeah, in terms of next steps, maybe it's better if we kind of review what's currently on the books and at least have a discussion of does this seem useful or like some change should be made. Perhaps in the time should this be voted out tonight, perhaps this is something that we both could look at and say, this is going to cause a problem or reading the text, this gives the city enough to go on or maybe there's some middle ground that we can arrive at.

[Nicole Morell]: Yeah, I mean, Councilors have any thoughts? I mean, my thought would be, I would be curious to get the legal review and see what that says. I would feel fine voting this out tonight. I don't think anything is such a tremendous change. I think there's things we could kind of go back and forth on that I think we could probably do in a regular session that wouldn't end up in a change that's so substantial that people would say, oh my God, why is this happening tonight?

[Zac Bears]: Right, and I mean, if I may, the two, basically, right now there's three sections. One is saying, You can't turn your lot into a trash yard. The second one said, you can't throw trash on streets and sidewalks or parks. And the third one says, don't put your coal out on the street. You know, so some, I think that's where some of this is coming from, right? We had a really fun, uh, conversation in the Ordinances and Rules Subcommittee being like, yes, please do not drop your ashes, cinders, glass, crockery, scrap iron, nails, tacks, stone, you know, etc. on the street. And maybe there's an easier way to say all of that that is less outdated. But I don't, you know, I wouldn't mind just one more time seeing what you had suggested, but I don't mind maybe sending along what we have now, plus what you had suggested and seeing what legal counsel, maybe they have some sort of form language that might line up with something more modern. But in general, I don't. I don't think we're far up. I think we want to maintain the intent of what exists here, but say it in a way that it's easier for people to read and understand it, and that it's more related to the issues that we have today versus when this was written. I'm pretty sure all of this predates the 74 revision, 1974 ordinance revision. Yeah, they're coming back.

[Kit Collins]: They're back. They're back. Yeah, we waited so long it's relevant again.

[Zac Bears]: We shouldn't do this. Not a lot of centers in scrap iron lately.

[Nicole Morell]: Any further discussion or do I have a motion? Or Councilor Collins?

[Zac Bears]: I can just quickly read. I just didn't get a chance to fully read your suggestions, Councilor Collins.

[Nicole Morell]: Do you want to share your screen again?

[Kit Collins]: Yeah, absolutely. So let me know if this is big enough to read. I think it's not. It's not. Yeah, there we go. So up top is the language that currently exists. And then folks just give me a shout when you can scroll.

[Zac Bears]: I have the original in front of me. Great. You're basically just saying, let's get rid of the long list of stuff and have a different definition. I think, yeah, I would be fine with a motion to yeah.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Like I said,

[Zac Bears]: Right, so maybe the motion is to refer this out of committee, refer to legal counsel and refer to specifically to DPW health and building just on any further comments on section 70-1 through 70-3 and include your suggested language as potential. Yeah, include your suggested language for potential inclusion.

[Nicole Morell]: Thank you very much. I have a second on that second second right? Council columns will give a third moment to pick that up.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Mr. President Bears moved to refer the paper out of committee, refer to council and refer to DPW for comments on specific session sections.

[Zac Bears]: DPW on Section 70-1, 70-2 and 70-3. And code enforcement. Yes, sorry. And the Board of Health.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Okay.

[Unidentified]: Yeah.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Okay. Got those initial changes.

[Nicole Morell]: So on the motion of bears second by concert comments. All those in favor.

[Adam Hurtubise]: All right.

[Nicole Morell]: Opposed passes.

[Adam Hurtubise]: Motion to adjourn.

[Nicole Morell]: On the motion by Susan Baird to adjourn, second by Councilor Pollen. All those in favor? Aye. All those opposed? Motion passes, meeting adjourned.