AI-generated transcript of City Council Public Health and Community Safety Committee 02-10-26

[Emily Lazzaro]: Is this on or not? Hello everybody. I'm calling to order this meeting of the Public Health and Community Safety Committee, February 10th, 2026 at 6 p.m. We're a little bit late. Thank you for your patience. Mr. Clerk, can you please call the roll?

[Marie Izzo]: Councilor Callahan. Councilor Leming. Councilor Scarpelli. Councilor Tseng. Present. Chair Lazzaro.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Present. Five present, none absent. This meeting is called to order. Today we are discussing paper 26-031 offered by Councilor Callahan. Resolution to Require Law Enforcement Identification and Protect Fourth Amendment Rights. This paper was offered recently in our regular meeting. And the intention was for us to hammer out whether we can discuss ordinances, orders, policies, and resolutions to these effects. And that's what we're gonna discuss here. ordinances or orders or resolutions written yet, and that's why we're meeting in this committee session to talk about that. So I assume Councilor Callahan would like to speak on the topic if you're ready. Councilor Callahan. Wait, sorry.

[Anna Callahan]: There we go. Thank you. So essentially, for background, Many residents have reached out to me with concern about law enforcement, like federal law enforcement agents being in Medford and doing things that are not constitutional or that are frightening. And so they're looking for some way that we as city councilors and as a city administration can provide them some assurance that the laws of the United States do apply here and also that the norms that we already get from our own police department will also be followed With respect to federal agencies and so essentially what I did was I took. There ideally will be three pieces to this. There are only two that you can see in this motion. I'll talk about those two first and then I'll talk about the third. The first piece is law enforcement identification and public trust. This is essentially about law enforcement not wearing masks purely to cover up their identities. And it is based on some legislation that is up currently at the Massachusetts state level. So our goal is to have it reflect what the Massachusetts state policy or law, legislation says, even though that has not passed yet, but we are modeling it after that to ensure that it would be valid in the state of Massachusetts and here in Medford. I can read that quickly because it's quite short so far. It says a law enforcement officer shall not wear any mask or personal disguise while interacting with the public in the performance of their duties except for A, medical grade masks that are surgical or N95 respirators designed to prevent transmission of airborne diseases and masks designed to protect against exposure to smoke or toxins only during a state of emergency and B, as part of gear that is necessary to protect their faces from harm only during the performance of tactical operations in which the gear is typically worn. That's the first section. I'll give a little bit more detail in a sec. I just want to go over the three sections quickly for folks to get oriented. The second section is about Fourth Amendment protections. It says all law enforcement agencies exercising their authority within the city limits of Medford shall abide by the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States of America. Specifically, A, no law enforcement officers shall seize persons or property without a judicial court-ordered warrant, and B, no law enforcement officer shall enter a domicile or other privately-owned building without either permission from the property owner or a judicial court-ordered warrant. So those are the two pieces that I provided some text for. The third piece is essentially a piece that I'm looking for legislation. I did find some in California, but I'm still kind of researching to find some example legislation. and it would require law enforcement personnel to have something on the outerwear of their person that identifies either or both their agency or their sort of badge number or name, some form of identification, unless they fall within certain categories, they're on a special task force, there are instances where they, if they're an undercover operation, obviously, The whole point is that they're not going to be having that identity on the outerwear of their uniform, but that under normal circumstances, that it be the norm in Medford, as with our Medford Police Department, law enforcement, that they do have some identifying information about either their agency or themselves. So those are the three pieces. I think that the stage that this is at is a stage where we're still looking for models from other cities or from Massachusetts State to look to ensure that the wording is correct and that it does work. Pardon me. here in Massachusetts and for our city, and also to get advice from the ACLU, from our own police department, from, you know, staff here, and just continue to get advice to ensure that this is something that's enforceable, it is something that our own police department feels fits their policies, and that the ACLU feels is, you know, reflective of what they believe is upholding First Amendment rights and Fourth Amendment rights. So that I think is the stage that we're at. So right now we're looking for comments from everyone, city councilors, the public, in terms of those three sections and their importance and how we should tackle this going forward. Thank you.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. So it sounds like there are, it's a very kind of broad, and there are a lot of opportunities to try different things, but there isn't a lot of precedent. So there are a bunch of different opportunities, and it's for like, we're at the stage now of looking for feedback from different people.

[Anna Callahan]: So I think it's important for us to be able to do that. I think it's important for us to be able to do that. residents I have talked to feel like it's worth repeating because clearly it is not being followed in other cities. And so it deserves repeating that in our city. This is the law. This is what we expect. And there is precedent for that as well. I know that some of our gender affirming care ordinance was in fact reflective of current state law, but the purpose of putting it into our own city law as well was sometimes state law can change. So we wanted to make sure that it was in fact a law in our city, and so I think there is precedent for having some replication of higher level federal or state laws that are in our own ordinances.

[Emily Lazzaro]: And could there be maybe something written in for mechanisms for enforcing the breaking of the law in that manner?

[Anna Callahan]: So this is a great question, and I think this is one of the primary, one of the major questions for us to tackle. I think there are two ways to go about it. One is that we simply use this You know set of ordinances or policies or whatever you know we decide that it needs to be to simply state. This is what is expected of law enforcement in our city and we leave it at that and then after that we also work on something that could be a set of policies it could be you know could have a different form that. asks or requires the administration or the police department or some other set of people to do certain actions. So I see those as potentially separable, whereas this simply states this is what is allowed in our city. but asking for action might be separate. That's kind of where I would lean, but I'm also open to the other possibility, which is that we pass it all at once. You know, all of those are part of the same piece of legislation that we tackle in this committee at this time, and we pass it at the same time.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Okay. Noted. I am seeing a hand from Councilor Scarpelli. Councilor Scarpelli.

[George Scarpelli]: Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Councilor Callahan. I've talked to a few people that have reached out and I appreciate that we're looking to get the information from making sure that law enforcement shares their input and then we also have the legal The legal response to make, make sure whatever we put forth has has, um, you know, some teeth and, um, but, you know, I, I look at this and I was, I bring this forward because the discussion I had with 1 person was in law enforcement and. the fact that when Border Patrol or ICE or some FBI agents that in the past before these type of situations that occurred that the reasoning for wearing these masks really for it was meant to keep their identity from at times was told to me for drug cartels because the fear of retaliation to that specific officer's family and any threats they would have moving forward, which is, I think, a reasonable process and understanding that. But I just wanted to share that, that was shared with me, but I think that, you know, could it be something that we can also, you know, if this doesn't follow through, could this be something that we could use as an ordinance to say, well, we can't, okay, the issue is that the answer is we can't allow or deny the wearing of the mask, but could this be something where Um, law enforcement comes in outside the city like ice that they have to report to our police department that they are here and there'll be masked. So it gives us another level of process that then we can maybe have a mechanism in place that, um. our officers then can, you know, make our residents feel safe. So I hope, you know, I'm just trying to look at different options as we're vetting this out, like Councilor Kallion said, and just getting, you know, feeling this process out, just looking at different avenues that if one doesn't work, how can we look at another option that has some teeth to it that really, again, is really to bring our residents a feeling of comfort and I think that, you know, just spitballing here and just sharing some thoughts that I wanted to bring forth, but thank you, Madam Chair.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you, Councilor Scarpelli. Yes, I think that there are probably a lot of semi-rational reasons for this, but I think it's also, there's something, there's something, a very reasonable expectation of law enforcement officers to undertake a degree of risk when enforcing the laws that we do sometimes celebrate law enforcement for taking on that risk because there's an obligation to put yourself in harm's way. And sometimes that means you have to be brave to stand up for the laws of the land. And if what you're doing isn't actually following the laws, then there may be more of an a desire to hide an identity, and I think that's what people are seeing more often, and that's why there may be more of a concern around hiding an officer's identity, because if an officer is confident that what they're doing is correct and right and noble and truthful, there shouldn't be a desire any desire to hide in the shadows, and there should be, and that's why this debate is taking place. Councilor Callahan, I saw your light.

[Anna Callahan]: I really want to thank you for your comments, and I very much appreciate your way of thinking. Just really want to assure everyone listening that, you know, we want this legislation to work really well for our police force. So they're the first people we're going to be asking about, for example, like, you know, times where they would either need to wear some kind of a face covering, what are times where they might not, by their own policy, they don't have identifying information. So that will be one of the first things that we do is to work with them and try and understand what is going to work for them. So I very much appreciate your your approach here, and that is the approach that we'll take. And I'm hoping that by the end of tonight, we actually have kind of an actual list of who to reach out to and what questions to ask. Thank you.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yeah, I think that's a really great policy. And that's why it's kind of nice to be having this conversation so early in the process of discussing how to move forward. Councilor Tseng.

[Justin Tseng]: Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Callahan for introducing this resolution. I wanted to say at the last regular city council meeting that I'm fully in favor of it. I applaud you for taking action on this item that so many of our residents have been asking for. And it really shouldn't be too much to ask for law enforcement. to follow the Fourth Amendment, to follow our constitutional rights, respect our rights, and to follow the rules and build trust with the community. And I think that trust component is why this is so, so important. It's an additional component to, you know, I think a lot of folks in Medford, outside of Medford, have been talking about with regards to the intentions behind the masks. But I think the trust component is the next step. There's so many immigrant families right now who want to reach out to NPD, they want to be able to reach out to City Hall, and especially when it comes to the field of law enforcement, these The behavior that we're seeing from the federal level is really hurting trust with law enforcement at all levels. And even though we know that they should feel free to call MPD, that they should trust their you know, police officers when they need to, when something serious happens and they need to reach out, that trust isn't always there. And when a Medford police officer is out on the streets, you know, trying to get information, trying to work with the community, too many folks are feeling scared of that. And this, I think, this resolution or this ordinance would help to build trust with our community, just like how our welcoming city ordinance does, just like how a number of the other things on the city council that we've been working on and have passed are trying to do. With respect to this, with the details of this ordinance, I think Councilor Callahan, you're right that we should be asking our police officers for their input. not least because there has been a federal court ruling as of yesterday on California's similar anti-mask-slash-visual-identification law that I believe the Massachusetts effort is somewhat The opinion has both good and bad things. Essentially, the opinion says that that if the law is saying that we require law enforcement of all levels to identify themselves, that's OK. But because California's law specifically targets what the anti-masking part specifically targets federal law enforcement, that is discrimination against the federal government that goes against the supremacy clause. Now, I don't really see anything in what is in our agenda packets that specifically targets the federal federal law enforcement, but I think it's something for us to keep in mind. I haven't had time to delve into that opinion, and it is just an opinion out of a district court in a different state, so it's not controlling precedent, but it's something for us to look into to make sure that we are understanding that opinion really well and making sure our whatever we craft goes along with it. Looking at California's argument, it seems like if this is kind of, you know, generally applicable to state and local law enforcement and then incidentally sweeps in federal law enforcement, that that's probably okay. But you can't directly target federal law enforcement, maybe to the chagrin of many. So I haven't had time to delve deep into that opinion. It just came out. So happy to help with that effort. But again, none of that is to say that this is not an important effort. This is a very important effort and we need to build trust with our community and make people know that they are safe and that we will keep them safe in the city.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you, Councilor Tseng. I agree, yes. I mean, all of these are data points, I think, for where we would move forward, and we would just have to think about what we want our outcomes to be and how we think we could best achieve them for our locality, for our needs, exactly for what we're seeing on the ground, though it does shift constantly. But, you know, what is the best move for our situation right now? Councilor Callahan.

[Anna Callahan]: Thank you. I in no way want to rush the city councilors, but I know there are people in the audience, and I would love to make sure that we have time for the public to weigh in on this as well. So I certainly want any city councilors to speak first, but if we can. Of course. Thanks.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Seeing no other hands from councilors, Councilor Leming, are you? You're good. Yes, we can move to public comment. If anybody would like to speak on this paper here in person or on Zoom, you can raise your hand or you can come to the podium. Which one is the podium, nine? Thank you. Please state your name and address for the record.

[Patrick Clerkin]: Patrick Clerkin, 14 Bennett Place. So I actually had three comments, the first of which had to do with Part B on the law enforcement identification and public trust section. And that was the phrase typically worn for referring to the gear and the masks. So I generally try to reconcile law enforcement and what law enforcement deals with in tactical reality versus the rights of citizens. With this phrase, typically worn, it seems like we're in uncharted territory to some extent with what's happening right now. So I don't know the degree to which typically worn could be used as kind of a loophole for this is not typical what we're dealing with right now. How do we even really define this? current crisis that we're in. So that's just one thing that I wanted to draw attention to. And the second thing is, me personally, I don't have a legal background. So I have an understanding of, OK, American citizens, they have certain rights under the Constitution and under state laws and etc. People who are here on visas, you know, I thought that in the case of the tough students, the tough student that was abducted by ICE, I thought that students had certain rights, but I guess we're once again testing these things. But when it comes to migrants who aren't officially recognized as citizens of the United States, that to me is, I actually don't know the degree to which these same rules apply. And that's something that I'm trying to get clarity on, myself, I think many of us are trying to get clarity on. Maybe it falls under broadly the Geneva Convention or something, like certain rights that aren't, I don't know what rights are guaranteed to a category of person that isn't officially identified as a citizen that is also in that country, not on a visa. And then the third thing is just, I wanted to call attention to some of the, Some of the things that police officers generally face in the line of their duty, I think it's not stuff that we see in the day to day. So I think it can sometimes be difficult to understand why some of the decisions that they make are made. And I've seen dash cam footage, or not just dash cam footage, but body cam footage that is now publicly available on YouTube ever since the movement to have cops wear body cams. And some of it is pretty shocking. It's not to say that they have to deal with these instances every day, every time they go out, but they find things like, or they encounter things like showing up at an accident scene and the vehicle's on fire, the person's trapped inside, they have suspects run from them and cross the highway and get hit by trucks. They find, they chase after people who are speeding and then the bike goes off the road, the person gets decapitated. There's all kinds of grotesque stuff that officers just encounter. And one of the things is, should a cop be able to break the law to enforce the law? Should they be able to go over the speed limit to chase someone who's going absurdly over the speed limit? These are, I don't know, questions with some degree of moral answer, but there's also a lot of open-endedness to them.

[Emily Lazzaro]: You're at three minutes. Thank you so much. Thank you for your comment. Just one quick thing to address is when you mentioned you weren't sure how migrants are protected. Everybody is protected by the Constitution regardless of immigration status. So the Constitution, the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, protects all people no matter what. All amendments to the Constitution and all Everything in the Constitution protects everybody or it should it's supposed to. Councilor Callahan or Councilor Leming excuse me.

[Matt Leming]: Yeah, just to address Chair Lazzaro's point further, this was debated in a 1993 Supreme Court case, Reno versus Flores, in which Justice Scalia at the time pointed out that the Constitution uses the word person and person's not citizen, which means that any person who is within the United States bears those same constitutional rights, so that is, a very settled legal question the Constitution applies to anybody within the United States or our jurisdiction.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Seeing no hands on Zoom, we can go back to the podium. Micah, if you'd like to state your name and address for the record.

[Micah Kesselman]: Sure. Micah Kesselman, 499 Main Street. I have a few thoughts on the ordinance, which may shock you. But I do want to start out by pointing out that being a cop, especially here, is one of the safer jobs, actually. And one of the more dangerous jobs, by multiple orders of magnitude, is being a black delivery driver. So this idea that, like, Cops don't have the most dangerous job in the world. It's just a fact. They don't anymore. The data says that. That's empirically based. So I should do away with this nonsense. But anyway, as regarding the ordinance, though, I do want to point out and remind everyone that there is a severability clause in this ordinance, as there are with most of the ordinances that get passed by this council. So, can do a lot with ordinances with parts that may or may not be enforceable or may be susceptible to challenge, but understanding that the other parts are likely to survive that challenge because they can be severed. So, but one thing I do think that is, A good avenue worth exploring, and Ed sort of talked about this a few months ago, I think, in one of the general meetings, is structuring this ordinance or an ordinance to create a presumption under which our local law enforcement operates, which gets them to effectively get identification. And I think, actually, groups have talked about this as well and reached out in regards to this ordinance specifically with a similar idea. There is no question under the Supremacy Clause whether an ordinance can direct how our own law enforcement operates. Like that is not, that is without question. So if there is an aspect of the ordinance that says, unidentified, unidentified and masked individuals asserting to be law enforcement are under our policy presumed to not, in fact, be law enforcement until they prove otherwise and the police must investigate and verify accordingly. And that includes getting identification, getting their ID, and that includes also getting, you know, warrants too. And the authorization they have to be performing arrests and detentions. I think it should go even further and include defining what a reasonable, what it means to articulate a reasonable fear that the target or that the person that they're trying to arrest is a flight risk should they not detain them there and then. That is, I'm going to repeat, I've said this many times but I'm going to repeat it, that is the only way that they can, that ICE is allowed to arrest people without a warrant or an administrative order. Like they have to have these things. This is so, And there is a lot of wiggle room on what that means, but I think that's something we can try to rein in, at least within our jurisdiction, of what our cops believe that to mean. So that's my suggestion.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Seeing no hands on Zoom, we'll stay at the podium. Name and address for the record, please.

[Barry Ingber]: Barry Ingber, 9 Draper Street. Thank you, Councilor Lazzaro, for this hearing, and thank you, Councilor Callahan, for bringing this item forth. I understand that this is a first step, so I'm not going to talk about specific language at all. The need is very clear to do something here in Medford to protect our residents from violent and unconstitutional actions of federal agents. I shared this proposal with Medford People Power. Medford People Power is 100% behind it. Also shared it with staff from the ACLU of Massachusetts, and they are supportive. So there is, of course, a question of enforceability in the Supremacy Clause. And I think there's two issues. One is that If you were to put together an ordinance that proved to be unenforceable, it would still have value. Because there's value in the city of Medford, as a city, not just as Anna Callahan, as Barry Ingber, as Michael Kesselman, standing up and saying, we don't like this. But for the city of Medford to stand up and say, this is not OK, is a powerful statement. even as a symbolic statement. But I also think that having an ordinance that can provide concrete benefits for people who are experiencing harm would be the ideal. And so I look to actions like Somerville seems to be taking, where there letting people know that they can call 911 if masked, unidentified people try breaking into their homes or accosting them on the street. And that, at the very least, Somerville police will ascertain their identities. We received, or I received, a proposal for, with ordinance language, from an organization, from Alex Marthews, who runs an organization called Restore the Fourth. And I've shared that with Councilor Callahan. I can share it with other members of the committee as well. to take some concrete steps where we might be able to make a measurable difference. Thank you very much.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Seeing no hands on Zoom, we can stay at the podium one more minute, Patrick.

[Patrick Clerkin]: Patrick Clerkin, 14th and at Place. Councilor Leming, thanks for the point of clarification. Just two quick clarifications on what I was previously talking about. One of which is just the nature of field work. Obviously there's police who work in the office, in the station, but there's a lot of work done out in the field. And any work done in the field is by its nature far less predictable. Work in the law that happens in city council chambers, that happens in courtrooms, is much more contained and predictable, but anything out in the field adds elements of complexity and chaos that are hard to predict. So there's different responses in those environments, not always good ones. The second thing is I just urge anyone involved in this consideration, there's a lot of people who are obviously dehumanizing immigrants right now, and I think a mistake that people can make is they dehumanize one group or another to fit a narrative. just like there's othering and there's dehumanizing and there's not focusing on people's lived narratives with immigrants, there's the same thing is happening with policing and police officers as well. They deal with a lot of crises and complexities. Thank you.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. Name and address for the record, please.

[Jennifer Yanko]: Jennifer Yanko, 16 Monument Street. I want to thank you for bringing this before the council and just to say that I give it my full support and I know that I'm speaking for many other people at the same time. I mean, there's really, I can appreciate that an officer of the law's job is by nature dangerous. It's not clear that our police force and therefore any other officers operating in Medford, as indicated in this proposal, can make their job safer by wearing masks and no identification. It seems to me that the only purpose of that is to terrorize the population. So I don't see any. reason that is acceptable, more rational, that would allow us to be more safe by having our law enforcement wear masks and no identification. So it seems to me that this is a perfectly reasonable thing to expect. And again, thank you for bringing it forward.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Thank you. If there is any more public comment, We would be happy to hear it now. Seeing none, I see a hand from a councilor, Councilor Leming.

[Matt Leming]: I definitely think this is a good thing to put into our ordinances. Residents have been asking about different mechanisms to feel safer, to protect residents from the actions of the federal government. I am, I would like to echo some of the concerns that have been brought forth about enforceability and any, and what I'm personally most interested in as a Councilor is any research or, or whatever steps can be taken to, address the situation of we pass this ordinance, federal agents continue to wear masks, what does the Medford Police Department do in that scenario, and how can we be sure that they will read and be taught that federal agents under our municipal laws aren't allowed to come here with masks just for routine matters. So would that look like a local officer going up to them and requesting that they remove their masks? What would be the next steps if that request were refused? Has there been any research done on that in any other municipalities in or outside of Massachusetts. We can't be the only city that's dealing with this. So that is a line of questions that I would be interested in hearing more about.

[Anna Callahan]: Thank you. Great. So I would love for anyone to chime in on to-dos, things to do for our next steps. I did only just right before this meeting receive the information from, is it defend the fourth, something the fourth? Restore the fourth. Thank you. I will write that down. But also I think I appreciate Councilor Leming's questions, and I think one of the things to research is like what does because I know Somerville actually does ask its police department to be involved at least in some way. I encourage people to call 911 and they, I believe, say that they will at least see whether they have a warrant in effect. So what do other cities ask their police departments to do? And what can we ask our police department to do? I think also being in contact with the ACLU and Medford People Power or Safe Medford, both, Save Medford? Great. So Medford People Power. Who else? This is just me asking, like, who else should we reach out to? I would say the Medford Police Department. Great. And if anyone has any ideas, now is the time. We got like five minutes of other sort of next steps in terms of what we research or who we reach out to to improve this for our next meeting.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Seeing none. I do think that that would be maybe something to take offline but potentially but I think that's a great start to reach out to local activist groups and interested parties. There is always the opportunity to email Councilor Callahan as the leader of this resolution. And if if residents do have. Ideas going forward, our email addresses are available on the website, medfordma.gov.org. Google Medford, Massachusetts, and go to the website. And our email addresses are a great way to reach us. And if you have a proposal for something that you would like to see, we are always available to you as city councilors. And that is how we often bring forward things like this. We like to bring forward proposals for ordinances, resolutions, and from residents that request something like this, it's not just from our own ideas. If it's something that's from our own ideas, then it's not a genuine democratic process. We're representatives of you. So, Barry, would you like to, just one more minute? Or you just have a, okay. Okay, one moment. Let me just turn the mic on, go ahead.

[Barry Ingber]: A couple more organizations would be Luce and other immigrant activist organizations like MIRA.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Luce and MIRA.

[Barry Ingber]: Yeah. Mystic Valley NAACP.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Mystic Valley NAACP.

[Jennifer Yanko]: Do you want to come up, Jennifer? Jennifer Yanko, I'm still at 16 Monument as far as I know. Is there a process like for bringing this before local groups if you'd like endorsements?

[Emily Lazzaro]: Probably if what we want to do is to write an ordinance or a resolution, it would probably be an ordinance if we want to make this an official law. or if we want to bring it to a department and ask that they enact this as a policy, we would bring it to a city council meeting or we would bring it to the department and we would say that this list of organizations has supported this and maybe we would have them come to a city council meeting and speak in favor of it.

[Jennifer Yanko]: So it might be useful to bring this before groups at this point early on just so that they can follow the process. I would say so, yes.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Okay, great. Thank you.

[Anna Callahan]: Councilor Callahan, do you have anything to add about that? I think what I can add is that I think I like the idea of bringing it before different groups and as long as there are, you know, only at most two councilors from this committee there, I think we can actually have a meeting where we discuss and brainstorm and all of that stuff, which from open meeting law, we have to make sure that no more than two of the people who are sitting on the council in this committee are in attendance.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Another thing I would recommend is our next committee meeting tonight is Resident Services and Public Engagement Committee and that committee holds listening sessions. If there was perhaps a listening session on this topic and you wanted to bring it up, make that a topic focused listening session, we could do something like that where a committee member could, you know, offer that opportunity to many groups together. Yes.

[Anna Callahan]: I suspect that this, because it's very focused just on this ordinance, it's a little bit, and I would have to be there. Too focused. I think it makes more sense, and Justin and I are the co-sponsors of this ordinance, so it would have to be the two of us. Really more of a meeting. I think it's more a meeting that we, we can call it a listening session if we want to. It doesn't really matter what it's called, but I think it should be specifically focused on this topic.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yeah. It's really, it's more like what you, it's just the label, like the packaging for the conversation. But we've hosted listening sessions on things like zoning because there's so many swirling concerns about it. When we were rezoning Salem Street, we had listening sessions because people had many, many questions about that particular topic. And some Councilors went and hosted the session and answered questions and heard people out. That was considered a listening session because it was like, give us all you got on zoning. And in this case, it's more like, tell us everything you'd want to include, but it's more like a roundtable discussion meeting thing than a listening session. Because it's what this group of people would really want to see and trying to include everything. But okay, great. Do we have any motions on this paper? I can give you one more minute.

[Micah Kesselman]: I'm just going to make one more suggestion, too. Go ahead. And that is to also consider reaching out to other city councils in neighboring adjacent cities to see what they're doing. Because Somerville has their own thing, right? But I think that was Wilson's executive order, not the ordinance.

[Barry Ingber]: No, executive order, yeah.

[Micah Kesselman]: But they might be working on similar things. And I think it would be really great if the greater Boston area cities could sort of harmonize this type of local action so that it's the case across all of the cities.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Especially because federal agents walk over city lines all the time.

[Micah Kesselman]: Yeah, I mean the difference between Somerville and Medford, like down by Magoon Square, people don't know where they live half the time on Broadway.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yes, true. Thank you.

[Anna Callahan]: Given the time, we have another meeting in three minutes. I was going to move to keep the paper in committee and adjourn.

[Emily Lazzaro]: On the motion of Councilor Callaghan to keep the paper in committee and adjourn, Mr. Clerk, can you please call the roll?

[Marie Izzo]: Councilor Callaghan.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yes.

[Marie Izzo]: Councilor Lemon. Councilor Scarpelli. Yes. Councilor Tseng.

[Emily Lazzaro]: Yes. Five in favor, none opposed. Thank you very much. The meeting is adjourned.