Climate Equity Council 04/29/26

AI-generated summary. Written by gemini-3.6-flash from the transcript below, which is the record. It may be incomplete or wrong; it does not report votes. Every item links to the moment it began.

The Medford Climate Equity Council reviewed upcoming community environmental events, discussed a youth employment proposal for city gardening and tree care, and received updates on municipal energy initiatives and high school sustainability goals.

0:00 Approval of Minutes — The council approved the minutes from the March 2026 meeting.
0:24 Meeting Schedule — The council maintained its next meeting date for May 20, 2026, with flexibility to adjust the schedule if needed.
2:18 Department Internships — Brenda Pike announced that Tufts University interns will join the planning department in May to support council administration.
3:30 Community Events Review — Council members reviewed a calendar of spring events, including local cleanups, recycling drives, swap meets, and a planned June 9 Senior Center workshop on third-party energy suppliers.
31:02 Youth Gardening and Tree Care Initiatives — Staff outlined plans for a grant-funded youth employment program focused on raised-bed herb gardening at City Hall and volunteer tree watering with Trees Medford.
37:52 City Environmental and Energy Updates — Brenda Pike presented updates on Electrify Medford, real-time school air quality sensors, a Tufts Park playground survey, revisions to the municipal energy aggregation plan, and LEED certification goals for the high school project.
1:01:02 Soil Contamination and Testing Outreach — The council discussed raising public awareness about lead contamination in residential soil and promoting soil testing and raised-bed gardening.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Okay, folks, let's start with approving the minutes from the last meeting in March. I motion to accept the minutes.

[Brenda Pike]: Yes, so it's scheduled for May 20th. I was going to ask that we move it to the 27th because I'm having surgery the week before the May 20th meeting. I might be back, but I might not. We have an event that night. I know. I heard that in the previous meeting on the 27th, right?

[Brenda Pike]: We could do that, or we could keep the May meeting for now and just cancel it if anything happens.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: Yeah. So the 20th? May 20th, yeah. Do we have something on Michigan?

[SPEAKER_07]: Oh, yeah, I was trying to reschedule it for the 27th, but you have something on the 27th.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, yep. But we can keep it on the 20th, and then if I If I can't make it, we could reschedule it, or you guys could have the meeting without me. You don't need me to have this meeting.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's cool. We can decide when we get closer to the date. Sounds good. I think I started my program the 26th, and I believe I'm going to be having a class on Wednesday, so I'm going to try to see if I can come in person, but if not, I can join them online. Like, starting after May 26th. I just wanted to put that out there.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, or we can take a look at rescheduling if there's another day that can work for everybody.

[Brenda Pike]: Um, oh, I have an administrative update. Um, so we're just, we're going to have some new interns starting in the planning department, um, starting in May. Um, and I'd like one of them to start coming to, to these meetings and sort of start supporting with like minutes and agendas and things like that. Um, so yeah, I think they might be able to come to the May meeting. We'll see, but I think that would be really great.

[Brenda Pike]: They're all from Tufts. Yeah. I think they might all be from the UEP program in Tufts, the Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning. Who will be around for the summer? The summer and then also part-time throughout the year too. Yeah. It sounds like all of them will be able to stick around for at least a year. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: Yes, so I have a slide, but I saw more events that I didn't have on my slide, so we can talk about that too. Let me share my screen here. Hala, do you see that? Yes, thank you. Okay, good.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: And then I'm just making it larger for everyone here. Okay.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay, so the Citywide Cleanup is this Saturday. I don't know if anybody is like signed up to volunteer for that or anything, but

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, you're right. They are all going to be at the youth summit. Yep. Is it the same time the Citywide Cleanup is?

[Brenda Pike]: And the youth summit is? Yeah, we need to be there at 12. Okay, but so if there are kids that were like, if there were like high school students who are like participating in the cleanup, they could then go to the youth summit.

[Brenda Pike]: Because I know the high school students have to get a certain number of volunteer hours too. So this is a good opportunity for them to do that. Okay, there's an electronics and textile recycling fundraiser for the, the, the parent teacher and tonight. Yes. Actually, let me pull up our events calendar too. So I can make sure I'm getting. Well, I don't know what the prices are for that, because this is paid as well. Yeah, that's true.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: It's not the DPW yard. I didn't say there was a cost for the cleanup. You know, bring your stuff, but I didn't know there was a charge.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: Yeah, yeah. No, I mean, it's got materials in there. You don't want to just throw away. You want to make sure that they're disposed of properly. And then, yeah, also May 2nd, there's the Youth Summit. Is that held at the high school? Oh, no, it's at the McGlynn.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I'm trying to open our event thing. Oh, you have your computer.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: Will you summon the Andrew? Yeah, that had been pretty hot. That was last year.

[Brenda Pike]: Junk in the trunk is just a, it's like a swap meet sort of thing where people will bring their cars. And the idea is that you can just walk around from trunk to trunk and take things. Yeah. Yeah. So it's like a giveaway. Explain that again. So it's like a, it's like a swap meet or like a, it's kind of like the free flea market that we talked about, except people do it. They'll just like bring their cars with stuff in the trunk.

[Brenda Pike]: We'll pull it up here. So it's going to be right here in the City Hall parking lot. Awesome. Yeah. They've held a few of these, actually. It's like the Everything is Free Medford group.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: Do you register? I love that. Do you register for this? No. You just show up?

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, as far as I know, yeah. 10 to 1130. Oh, you know what? It does say vendor registration is required.

[Brenda Pike]: Thank you. And it's not just in your trunks. You can set up like a little table and put your stuff on there or whatever, but yeah.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Like anything doesn't specify, right? Yeah, because those formation places, they don't take everything, you know, like when you go, so it's good to have places like that.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: You said you're trashed. You're trashed as well. What did you say?

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: And you're just... One person's trash is another one's treasure.

[Brenda Pike]: This says, please don't bring large items that you're unable to remove. And you have to take away anything that other people don't take at the end of it. So, yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: Unless you can take it away again on the top of your car afterwards. But yeah, there are a couple of events like that where we're trying to like get people to share, to share things with other people rather than throwing them out.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: You know, when you're talking about, um, you know, how I can get it, all the communities involved, you know, with events like this, I can see my Brazilian people be interested and bring their junk. Yeah. I mean, like, um, maybe think about, you know, I'll, I'll see if I can share the fly and stuff, but like for teachers, you know, Does it have a lot of, wait, there's a flyer for it?

[Brenda Pike]: I don't know that there's a flyer. There's a listing on the events calendar.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I saw the pre-marked one, but I couldn't find the joke on the trunk.

[Brenda Pike]: There's a Facebook event. Yeah, but I don't see any flyer. It looks like it's all online. Oh, here's the official Facebook page for it. Oh, I don't see a flyer. Do you need a flyer to share? Or is it possible to share a link?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Because I was thinking to translate, you know, so people can understand. Yeah. And it's all free.

[Brenda Pike]: Um, it's everything is free Facebook group. That's that's organizing it, but they're on the event for events calendars where they have the listing to. Okay, so also may 9th is the disability fair. Anything we should know about that. Are you involved in the planning at all?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Okay. I think with all the issues with places, you know, with the schools, I think that's what it kind of related information.

[Brenda Pike]: May 13th is the Planning Department's rain barrel pickup event. People have to sign up for or buy rain barrels by May 3rd this weekend, and then they come pick them up at the high school on May 13th. Did you have an event on the 13th as well?

[Brenda Pike]: Oh, okay. I was asked, I was talking to Patrick about whether you guys could volunteer. that day if you wanted to. But that's the last day to help with the pickup of the rain barrows. But it's the last of your meetings before the Haitian Flag Day event. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: OK, I'll send you information. Um, we have 70, 74 people so far have bought rain barrels. Um, and so usually what happens is there's by like five 30 ish. We have like a pretty long line of cars that are there to pick it up. And so we're just like trying to get them through as quickly as possible. So they're not waiting too long. Where's that? Oh, the high school. Yep. Just outside in the parking lot there.

Okay, so yeah, so the 16th is Haitian flag day. I will not be able to make it to that because that's the week that I'm having my sinus surgery, so I'm going to be out of it.

[Brenda Pike]: It starts at five. Well, so the event, the high school, it starts. People can start picking them up at five o'clock. It's five to seven. But we get there around four o'clock to set it up. Hi, Samira. Thanks for joining. Um, I also for the Haitian flag day, so I won't be able to be there, but, um.

[Brenda Pike]: But, um, Ruth and Zila said that they might be able to do an electrify Medford table at the Haitian flag day event. Um. And I'm seeing if there's somebody else who could help them, because they're not going to want to be at the table the whole time. They're going to want to be out, like, actually participating in it.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Do you have any new flyers that you want to maybe translate in HTML that you can use that day?

[Brenda Pike]: We have the utility bill checkup flyer, which I think is probably the best one to use for that. Um, what sort of activities do you think would be the most useful for them to do there? Like just having like the dollhouse there, um, induction cooktop. I did get another one after I lost my, I lost mine. Yeah. Yep. I have. So I have another one. Yeah. I thought it probably thought it was free on the sidewalk. Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully they're using it.

[Brenda Pike]: I've done in the past is just boil water because that you can you can do that over and over and over again without burning anything. Yeah.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Maybe get the form from the library and show that they also have those things for people to borrow on them.

[Brenda Pike]: just like maybe like bring up the library website or something to show where they can.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, but they do have a flyer that shows the stuff that they can work on the library. Oh, they do. OK. Yeah. Because maybe like you can take more home to try, you know.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. That's a great idea. When I'm doing the energy coaching, people are always really happy to find out that they can borrow it from the library to test it out before having to like make a big commitment.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: That's kind of tenanted. I don't know. I have it in my calendar at the community center, but I haven't been able to find anything. I haven't talked to anybody about it.

[Brenda Pike]: OK. OK. Oh there's also there's a youth climate summit um at in Somerville. It's like a statewide youth climate summit that's being held there. Same. Yeah.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: Do you have any of those games that we had like the bingo game? Yeah we still have that.

[SPEAKER_07]: Yeah you guys have it right in your yeah in your cupboard closet yeah.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: can we borrow that because i feel like um during the nation event a lot of the children are like yes they're in the gym doing nothing arlene asked me about making like a like a trivia game right oh i can do the the wheel that we have too yeah it's a lot that oh nice yeah we have any games for the climate

[Brenda Pike]: The bingo game was the one that we had made up for that with like the ball that had the different things and then the trivia questions. Yeah.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I know. That's another thing. to be doing the game with the children. When we sit down to go through the list of the stuff, the help that you need for the event. And then we added a part like, you know, entertainment for the kids and put a bingo idea.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. But if we want to do that at the Electrify Medford table, we could do that too, right? Like we could be using that to talk to, to entertain the kids and then talk to the parents about the program too.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: Unless, well, that small hallway is going to be crowded.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Oh, okay, okay. I think it will be more appropriate, you know, bring some giveaways that the kids can be entertained with the game while the parents are talking, you know.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: What about something like Kahoot, you know, like how we did at the airport? I mean, we can do a lot of games. It's like, who's going to do it?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, if it's something smaller that is on the table, I think it would be easy because that way everybody's just in one place. You know, even though I love the fact that you have the gym over there, unless we have big activity going on for the kids, I don't like all the kids running around over there and then the family over here, you know what I mean? So we are all together celebrating together, you know. That can come up, you know, I'll look online for some ideas for the wheels and then I'll set off that, you know.

[Brenda Pike]: Samara says she thinks Haitian Flag Day is at Andrews, not McGlynn. Yeah, that's at Andrews, right? Yeah.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: Oh, well, I got the flyer. I'm wrong. Because I didn't have anything.

[Brenda Pike]: This is probably left over from the last meeting. Sorry about that. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for catching that.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: It's not that you're a bunch of the robins. I'm going to the high school. Yeah.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Oh, I'm going to switch to a hand. It seems like they used some of it.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: That's what happened to me in the mistletoe. Where did you go? Oh, you went to the high school. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: Um, okay, so let's keep going. So May 17th, um, we, Arlington is actually having an EV and e-bike event. So I thought people, if they're interested, might want to head over to their, check them out. Yep. Yep. So you have people from the community are just bringing their own vehicles and bikes and you can talk to them about them.

[Brenda Pike]: No, I won't. I'm still going to be out then. Yeah. How long is the recovery? Because I think I need to do that too. It's at least a week. Um, I spoke to someone the other day who was out for like two and a half weeks cause he had some complications. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: Thank you. Um, I don't know off the top of my head, but I saw, I did see the flyer. So I will send that out with the minutes when I send that out. I think it's probably at the high school, but I'll double check that. May 23rd is the free flea market at Tufts, so it's a similar thing, except it's going to be indoors. It's similar to Junk in the Trunk, except it's going to be indoors, and people don't have to stay with their stuff. They can just bring their stuff, drop it off, and then other people can come and take what they want. And then at the end of the day, whatever's left over is going to go to the MIT Furniture Exchange. So the students who are moving in can go there and get like all kinds of stuff. Yeah. Larger stuff too.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: I still don't know what they see. I could draw constellations. If they work.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Well, every time I want to see it for free, I'm not carrying that because I don't know if it works. No, it works.

[Brenda Pike]: And then on May 30th, we've got the Medford Bicycling Fair, and that's going to be here at the pop-up park, the Clippership pop-up park. Now, what is that? It's just going to be a bunch of bike groups, and I think they're going to try to get the e-bike lending library to come.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, you can borrow it for I think a week at a time. Wow. Yeah. And they have different models. So you can even like try out different models and see which one you like better. Yeah. Yeah. E-bike lending library. Yeah, it's actually, it's just out of some guy's house in Porter Square. And he had an extra e-bike, started lending it out, and then got some, like, grant money to buy more and buy more. And so he just has a bunch of them that he lends out to people. And now they're officially a nonprofit. Yes.

[Brenda Pike]: That is a good question that I will also send along with a minute. Is that going to be here? Yeah, it's at the pop-up park, the Clippership pop-up park, yep.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Talking about bikes, like with the fundings that, you know, your office have been used like for the you know, the chargers and everything, have something that may be designated for maybe giving bags to people, you know.

[Brenda Pike]: Most of the funding that we have is from grant money. So, it's really specific, like, the charges is just for charges. Electrify mad for itself is just for electrify mad for programming. So, but I'm sure there are bike related grants out there that we could go for. It would probably be more something the transportation department would do rather than the planning department.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, but I think like when it comes to climate and then they're trying to make people not use their cars and stuff like that, I think there is so much incentive for people to get an electric car than take the bus or a bike, you know, like.

[Brenda Pike]: Well, there are there are discounted T passes based on your income. So there are all kinds of things that people think about.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah. You know. Oh, yeah. Like the I think the chunk of the money is going more towards the electric car, you know, like more than the people with actually no low, low income, like, you know, the people that, you know what I'm saying? Like, it would be nice to have some T-carts to give away, you know, like, and bikes. If you're giving free chargers, you know, like, you know, like, why not? You know, like, I wish we were giving free chargers.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: But we are paying for the charges, right? So it's free for them. It's accessible for the people with the electric car.

[Brenda Pike]: Again, that's grant funded. That's not city money. We're getting grants from the state to do that.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I understand, but like we are under the city. You know what I'm saying? Like we are applying for things to provide for our residents, right?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: So maybe, you know, think about the future, you know, like provide something for the really low income people that cannot afford an electric car. would be willing to take a bike when the weather is nicer to go back and forth or, you know.

[Brenda Pike]: So one of the things that we have been doing for that is getting grants to install Blue Bike Stations. And Blue Bikes also has an income-based discount for people. So you don't even need to buy your own bike. You could just use this to get from place to place. And so we're trying to expand that bike network, the Blue Bike Station network. I just saw an updated map, actually, of blue bike stations. If that's something you guys want to dig into sometime, we could look through it and like see like where they're being located.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: And I want to say, you know, when the weather starts getting nicer, I've seen kids going to school or to programs or, you know, like on bikes. Yeah. Yeah. Bikes, you know, younger. kids, you know, like, I don't know if they're going through whatever they're doing during the summer, but I'm seeing, you know, a lot of use of that. So I think that's pretty cool.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. I don't know what's going on in terms of, like, educational programs for kids around biking and stuff like that, too. I mean, we have a bike commission in the city. Oh, we do? So, yeah. Yeah, we have a bike commission. And then we also have walk Medford that's also. Pretty pretty involved in biking as well as making walking paths more accessible to, um. I don't know a ton of that because again, that's in the transportation department, not in the planning department, but if that's something that you want to dig into. I could find out more info, or maybe have a guest come in to talk to you about it.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: Well, you said that you want us to find out the location where we.

[Brenda Pike]: No, I mean, if you're interested in that, I have a map where we can look at where all the different locations currently are and, like, try to think, like, should the city be prioritizing blue bike stations in certain areas over others. Okay, Stacey, I had this on here as a placeholder. Yeah.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_10]: West metric, yeah, that's when we were going to have and we're trying to do the. The scheme, the 3rd party predatory, yeah, energy suppliers. But I know just recently. Sent out a link for the presentation that we had. So, I was thinking when I saw that, I was thinking that, you know, I would share that with. With Lisa, and hopefully she, you know, she would get it out to the people.

[Brenda Pike]: Would it be helpful to like hold it there as an event? Because you were talking about doing that at the Senior Center, right? Like playing it there?

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Doing like a presentation event on June 9th at the Senior Center. June 9th, okay.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Not yet, but Ella is going to put it in the newsletter for the June events. because i missed it but um yeah i think we should probably get a flyer out about that soon too well just you know so i have yeah so you know they have to hang up and you know when folks come in for lunch or whatever and maybe we can we can team up on us and i'll show it at like the West Medford communities.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, if people have questions about the aggregation or anything, I could answer them. Yeah.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: And that is going to be at 1.30 on June 9th. We'll see you soon. I'm going to be rushing over from school because my class ends at 1230. We'll make it work. I don't know where I'm going.

[Brenda Pike]: I think next step on the agenda, uh, Paula, you were going to talk about the, um, community gardens.

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: Yes. Yes. So, um, our office, the office of prevention outreach has applied for the grant and, uh, it's called the summer youth employment program. So, every summer. the city hires around maybe three to four youth students that can be trained in various public health initiatives so most of it's going to be substance use prevention and public health public health training, but I thought it would be a very nice idea if the youth can learn more about the Medford food system, food insecurity, but also maybe get some gardening education. So we were thinking of doing some herb growing workshops with the youth and looking to collaborate with the gardening commission to use some of the raised garden beds next to City Hall to do some sort of educational programming or gardening workshops there and then maybe if we grow some produce we can donate them. to the Mystic Market, and I'm just, we're just in like the very early planning stages, but just wanted to share that if you had any ideas or thoughts in regards to that.

[Brenda Pike]: That's great. Is this all dependent on whether the grant is approved or is there any part of it that you think you could do without the grant?

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: so i've spoken with katherine before about this uh they seem very positive about getting the grant because they've gotten it in years prior but if we in the case where we don't get the grant um i believe katherine mentioned that there are some funds from the grant that funds our work as connectors that we can use. So I think she mentioned we can work something out there, but I'll have to follow up with Catherine on Monday on our meeting.

[Brenda Pike]: That's great. Have you had a chance to reach out to any of the Garden Commission people?

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: So not yet. Teresa had mentioned that she will connect me with some of the folks there. So I just had a meeting with Teresa yesterday, so I think we're still figuring that out. But I'll definitely have some updates for you next month when we meet. That's great.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, just let us know if you'd like any support with that. Let us know if you'd like any support with that initiative.

[Brenda Pike]: Thanks. I'll let you know. That's great. And then I think you had mentioned something about Trees Medford as well. Is that going to be part of this or?

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: Yes. So thank you so much for the reminder. So I did connect with Amanda. and we will still have a conversation but she seems very on board with the idea of having some volunteers or any of the youth employees to help with tree watering um this summer so also as well like if you know any volunteers that would be willing to help with tree watering this summer you can send them my way too

[Brenda Pike]: You would think that there, especially again, because I know that high school students have to have a certain number of volunteer hours in order to graduate, you'd think that there would be great opportunities to get people involved with that.

[Brenda Pike]: Are you involved at all in like the high school volunteer program or any of that? I mean, you're like the youth and families person, so maybe you're thinking younger.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Because they have all the programs and they kind of like send the kids, you know. I know that the PTOs always request the kids for events, so they have certain amount of hours that they can send the kids. Gotcha. Yeah. I have a question.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: is there can you hear me i can kind of like a flight with the tree um medford is this something that you're planning on doing sometime soon that you could probably have a flyer some kind of information that we could present at the youth fair yeah the youth summit that's coming yes yeah that's a great idea i was about to suggest that i just need to speak with amanda um

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: I am not sure if she was able to meet this week, but I can have the flyers by next week once we meet. Okay.

[Brenda Pike]: And I know there's some general information and maybe flyers out there about the tree watering needs and the planting needs, like the mini forest at Tufts Park and the events that they're doing about that, where they need volunteers. So if you can't get something together with Amanda in time for the Youth Summit. It's this Saturday, isn't it? Yeah. Then maybe you can use some of those pre-existing materials. OK.

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: And then who asked the question? Sorry, so I know. um, where to send the flyers to? Oh, no, what is it? Sorry, the voice is very faint. So I was wondering who asked the question about the flyers?

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I'll find the flyers for you and send them to

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm excited about it. Anything else about that we should talk about. Not for now, thank you.

[Brenda Pike]: I will jump into city updates then. Okay, Electrify Medford, we're up to 245 people who've signed up for it. We've coached 129 of those and 56 things have been done after a coaching session. Most of that is either signing up for the aggregation, it's installing, it's getting a home energy assessment, it's getting heat pumps installed. or getting solar installed in the home. Those are those four big chunks on there. And then lesser amounts, there's signing up for the utility discount rate, signing up for fuel assistance, getting insulation installed in their homes, and then lots of other actions that were sort of less common.

But it's a nice mixture. It's not all people doing heat pumps and solar. We've kind of got like one end of the, I don't know, decarbonization, one end of the spectrum with people who are at the point where they're installing solar and heat pumps and the other end of the spectrum where people are just getting their first home energy assessment and insulation. Um, okay, other city updates, we have installed the 5 outdoor air quality sensors at the, the 5 schools, the 5 lower schools. Um, and that is actually, um, visible to everybody on purple air dot com. Let me just pull this up.

Um, so that you can all see it. Here's the map. And then I will share that screen. So yeah, the Purple Air Network is something that's just, it's worldwide. Just anybody who installs one of these sensors, it goes up on this map for everybody to see. We can zoom into Medford here. So you can see we've got one of the Missituk School, Andrews, McGlynn, Roberts, and Brooks. And you can, dig into the data here a little bit, kind of seeing what times of day you're getting spikes of worse air quality.

So 640 in the morning, that makes sense. Yeah, 7A, 7AM. So you can kind of see when school drop off or commuting times are happening here. It's interesting, it didn't really hit me until I saw this, how many of our schools are relatively close to the highway. And so on days when you have the wind coming from the west, you can really see the impact on the air quality at the schools.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: So that's what it is right now. The green shows like that. Yes, this is real time. Oh, OK.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. So it's not bad right now. It would be other like when the wildfires were happening, for instance, you would have seen these in the orange and red. Yeah. And then during the summer, when it's especially hot, the pollution kind of gets held down by the high pressure systems. And so you will see much worse air quality during hot summer days. So yeah, so heat is not the only negative impact to people during the summer. The bad air quality can be really a serious issue for people with asthma in particular, but it can affect everybody.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: So is that something that people put on the top of their head, their houses, to track those things? How do they track this?

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, you can. So the sensors go sort of at head height, because they want to see where people are breathing it in, basically. But this is just, it's plugged into an outlet outside of the schools and mounted on the side of the building. Yep, and so, like, 1 of our electrified Medford energy coaches, this is his house. Actually, he has it in his backyard, but you can just see the difference between, like, along the river where there's like, good air quality compared to, like, some of the other locations in the city. Not that it's a huge difference right now, but at other times of day, other times a year, it can be huge.

So I'd love to incorporate this into any education that we're putting out to people about summer preparedness. Yeah. Because it's a resource that people can go back to. And they could say, oh, should I be careful today? And especially if somebody has asthma and it's a really bad air quality day, wearing a mask when they go outside is a good idea. Yes. or sort of limiting the amount of athletic activity they're doing outside during times like that.

Okay, jumping back to the updates. Amanda from our office is putting out a survey about the Tufts Park playground. I know she talked to you guys about the redesign that they're doing for that park. It's only going to be open for a couple of weeks. So she wants to try to get the word out as much as possible during that time. There's going to be future. opportunities to to make edits to it. But for this initial bit, it's just an online survey. It's only going to be out for a little while. She's also going around to a few events to to try to get people's feedback. But I'll send you the link to it.

[Brenda Pike]: I know she was having a hard time getting something translated quickly. So what she's doing is she's going to put out information with a link that goes to a page that will just like list out the different languages so that she can start now. I think she has English and Spanish and maybe Creole or not yet. And then once she gets the other language, she'll just add them to that page. So when people go there, they'll have the other languages when those are available.

But what are some ways that you think that she should use to get the word out about this with non-English speaking communities?

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: For me, it's always social media. Social media. WhatsApp.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: we can share in our individual like whatsapp groups that are big speaking um maybe even like going around and posting like flyers with the survey qr code in many spaces what would you think of as community spaces in that area like the tufts park area

[Brenda Pike]: Oh, it's not near Tufts University. It's like the Tufts Park. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, Colette, it is right around there, isn't it?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah. And a lot of parents drop off their kids and miss a pack and, you know, and then walk over there. I've seen that a lot.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Um, but you know, um, the details are very good to distribute the flyers.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I think just few places have a board where I can put it. Normally they put it like in the fence or, you know, the trees or whatever they can find.

[Brenda Pike]: Maybe inside, but I don't know if the pool, I don't think the pool is going to be open while this is, uh, the survey is still available. But yeah, she could definitely post things on polls around there or something, yeah.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: What about the yard signs? Just around the area over there?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: There's a lot of people that walk their dogs and stuff too. Yeah, it's a nice walkable area as well.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay, so I'll yeah, I'll send you the flyer and the link to that and everything. So you can share it. And if you have any other ideas at any point, let us know. I wanted to mention that we are filing an updated aggregation plan. With the Department of Public Utilities, it's really just because they changed their guidelines for what the plan should be. So we just have to refile our existing plan to meet their guidelines. But since we're doing that, I want to make a slight change to it and automatically enroll anybody who's on the utility discount rate into our lowest level of the aggregation, the basic plan. Because there are a lot of people that don't even know that there are multiple. They don't even know they're on the aggregation a lot of time, right? So they definitely don't know that there are multiple levels and they could go down if they wanted to. So, yeah. So that's what we're planning to do. When we put the plan out, we need to have a 30-day public review period for it.

So we're going to be putting it out on our website, social media, and have physical copies here. We'll also, I think we'll want to do like press releases and have information at events and stuff about it because it's a good opportunity just to let people know that this exists, especially if they're on third-party suppliers and switch it over. So it's kind of a good, it's a nice push for this, right? We can kind of publicize that we're doing this update to the plan and then also get people's attention about third-party suppliers at the same time.

And I was talking with Steve about putting out a press release around this. And so we'll like link to the video, um, Sierra's this Sierra's webinar and all of that too.

[Brenda Pike]: That's great. Yeah. And it's yeah. And also online anytime people want to do it. Yeah. And I don't know what the timeline is for that. I'm working with the mayor's office on when the press release for it is going to go out. The on-street EV charging stations, the installation is happening now. I think actually all of them are in the ground and we're just waiting for National Grid to connect them. So we're planning a ribbon cutting with the Mass Clean Energy Center who paid for them June 16th.

We have signed a strategic energy management plan with National Grid. So the idea of that is we're just across all of the city's buildings, what are our plans for energy efficiency upgrades over the next three years? And then we talk about that with them and what we could expect in terms of Energy savings from that, and then they give us some enhanced incentives. So I think it's something like 10% more. Rebates from national grid than we otherwise would have because we're and we meet with them once a month and we talk about progress and next projects and things like that. So it's honestly, I think the collaboration with national grid is more use is almost as useful as the additional money is for the projects.

Um, and then I know today we had talked briefly about the new high school, but there are 6 designs now, and they're going to be narrowing those down to 1 by June 10th. And I just came out of before the meeting earlier, I just came out of a meeting for the sustainability group for the high school project, where they were talking about LEED certification, which is a sustainability certification for buildings. And sort of what level do we want to aspire to? Like, what is our goal going to be? And there's like LEED Silver is required by the Mass School Building Association, which is what they're paying for half of the project, a little bit less than half of the project.

And so, but we would like to surpass that and at least strive for gold. And the school committee has said they'd like to see us hit platinum. And so we were talking through sort of what that entailed and whether that would be possible. So we're not sure that platinum is going to be possible, but we're going to see what we can do as part of this.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: What are the requirements? looking for to be approved for platinum?

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. So I mean, it's a pretty complicated rating system with lots of different elements that each have a certain number of points. But I think the big difference between the gold and the platinum would be A, having it be an all electric school. B, having it be net zero, meaning that it generates as much energy as it consumes. So, you know, having enough solar panels on it and just like cutting down the amount of energy that it needs. Yeah.

And then those are really the big ones. And that's one of the reasons we're not sure that it's going to be possible because the pool in particular is tough to heat. So they're talking about potentially retaining the natural gas to heat the pool. And in the the vocational, some of the vocational classrooms might need natural gas as well. So that's going to be all part of the conversation.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: I don't know if they mentioned this, but I'm curious to when construction begins, do they have a plan as to where the students will go?

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, so they, each of the different designs they have, they identify how many like portable classrooms they're going to need and how long they're going to need those classrooms for. Some of the designs would take less time to build. And so they're like, we wouldn't need the portable classrooms for quite as long for it. If this is something you guys are really interested in, we could dig into the different designs at the next meeting.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, no, we went to the meeting. We are taking turns going to the meeting. I think that we have a lot of people that are a little defensive about the high school. I think it's just because they should just be attending all the meetings first of all to get informed. But it happens so many platforms that are giving so much information and no more details. about it. And I think there's just a lot of people don't understand the requirements of the grant, you know, that it's not that because the city is trying to make, you know, this enormous high school, very fancy, you know, like their requirements for you to be eligible to get them out, the size and everything that you need to do. So that's so much more involved that I just wish people would have the opportunity to at least take the time to read a little bit about it. Yeah, or attend the meetings. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: I mean, I know people are I've heard a lot of comments about the cost of it and comparing it to other high schools that have been built recently, but our high school is significantly larger than those and it has a vocational center, which is much more energy intensive. Yeah.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: And when they do, you know, like, wasn't, you know. So many things need to be updated, you know? And just you walk over there, you see things falling apart, you know?

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, but it was very good, you know, the interaction that it can do and the possibilities. We really enjoyed very much that.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, there's a lot more to go. Yep. I wanted to update you on some of the stuff the energy environment committee have been doing. So, um, they sent a letter to to Medford's legislators, um, supporting the massive program. because we had talked about how there's the bill that's under consideration right now that would essentially cut it next year. There's a lot of people who are advocating in support of it. So I can't imagine that that would go through, at least in the form that it is right now, but keep pushing on it. Um, one of the members, uh, started a zero waste Medford group, um, and is sort of pulling together a lot of the, um, events that are already happening and trying to, and organizing more of them. So she's responsible for like the free flea market with Tufts. Um, and then also just sort of pulling together like junk in the trunk and all of these other events that are already were happening, but kind of not centralized. So.

I think that's going to be really useful moving forward. There's also now a zero waste events calendar. So I saw things on there that were like story time talking about recycling at like the Moon and Back bookstore and stuff like that. So there are all kinds of just things around the topic of zero waste. And then for Earth Week, it put together Facebook posts with information about pollinator gardens, donating things rather than throwing them away, Electrify Medford, composting, e-waste recycling, just general recycling, Trees Medford and like the tree giveaways that they're doing, and then the rain barrel, the discounted rain barrel program.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I've seen the recycling part over there. Our cleaning lady for the building, she had some to me and she said where she could go and talk about the recycling. Because she said we need to be educated how to recycle. And she said, do you think I'm wrong? Because like every time I go take the recycling, I see shredded papers, but inside of a plastic bag. So what is the point of that? Oh, that's terrible. And then he said, no, I totally agree with you. And she said, yeah, but if it's not in the plastic paper, some people just throw it in the barrel. And then when the truck comes, there's paper everywhere, you know? So I went online and then I saw that it's not really worth it to recycle shredded papers like that, you know? because most of the time, like, you know, little pieces, something like that. I can't remember what it is, but I can send to you. But then I showed her and said, oh, look, they're saying that, you know, said, yes, that's something that I can give it to all of you so you guys understand. And I think that was something that we talked about this before that, you know, maybe to feed ourselves over here and how to recite and things may come up with the flyer or something that all the employers can know. what do or not do, you know, for recycling. But I thought it was pretty cool that she noticed that, you know, like, what is the point? You're recycling and putting it in the trash, you know?

[Brenda Pike]: A lot of things at City Hall are around that are a little bit messed up, too. So, for instance, like she comes in and empties the trash cans. She doesn't empty the recycling bins. She's not allowed to. No, I know. It's not part of the contract. Yeah. So I'm like, how bizarre that's separated out like that in the contract.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah. Because most of the time in recycling, sometimes people put stuff that should be shredded instead of recycling. And then companies, normal cleaning companies, I had this conversation with her. Cleaning companies don't want to be, you know, have access to information like that. It's trash is trash. Where recycling, oh, I can see that because my recycling bin is under my table with my shredded goals. So that, when it is full, I go and shred everything, you know what I mean? And she said, yeah, but sometimes people don't pay attention to important information, private information, you know, and they throw things in the recycling. So that's why we are not allowed, you know.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I've never heard of that before. But I don't mind, just throw, sometimes it's full, I don't mind. And they said, no, we are forbidden to do it because of this, this, this. Oh, that's interesting.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. Um, I think that's it for my updates. Was there anything else that you wanted to talk about?

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Um, I recently spoke with, um, a resident who was, they wanted to like, um, start planting, uh, you know, like vegetables in their garden. And they, um, they tested the soil. And they took a sample of the soil, and they sent it to UMass Boston for testing. And it turns out the soil had trace amounts of lead in it. So it wasn't really safe to plant. So the other option is to get one of those potting beds.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: The raised bed beds. But the reason I bring it up, I'm just thinking, Like he knew to send that sample to UMass Boston because maybe of the circles that he's in. I'm wondering for like the average resident in Medford who wants to do the same thing, are they doing that, are they taking those steps to test their soil to see if it's safe?

[Brenda Pike]: know to like eat the fruit or the vegetables delicious soils coming from yeah um i have a raised bed in my backyard for that same reason because back in the day there used to be lead paint on the outside of the buildings and so if the paint flaked off it would be like closer to people's houses it's uh would be more contaminated yeah yeah so i wonder if like we should be maybe like

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: have more messaging on that? Yeah. Is there already messaging in place? I'm not certain.

[Brenda Pike]: I don't think the city has put out any messaging around that, but it might be worthwhile looking at what information the Board of Health might already have.

[MCM00001615_SPEAKER_08]: I just didn't think so. Now that's scary because one of my cousins There's the group that came from Haiti. They're planting some stuff in our backyard that my aunt never used to do. So I'm wondering if those soils don't have lead.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: That's scary. Maybe it does, maybe it doesn't. But it's worth to make people aware that this could be an issue.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, because it could depend where people live. This resident lives like in in west in the lawrence estates so kind of near like the where the 93 is yeah so oh so leaded gasoline back in the day too could be contaminating that yeah it would be like certain it was more affected or if like maybe if the building like you said it's going to be slightly yeah so i i just wanted to bring that to your attention because i can I remember it hurt so much, you know, and so.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I know that one of my kids, when she did the test for lack, you know, and came high and then the doctor said, well, how's the house? You know, and he said, no, it's, we repeat everything. So it's not, it's a brand new house. And then I said, well, so it must be the backyard. But I didn't have a test. I didn't know. I'll definitely look for that and check. Because she was saying that, you know, you don't need to be specifically inside the house. The kids playing in the backyard can be, you know, playing with the soil and stuff. But I never knew that I could ask to do that, you know.

[Brenda Pike]: So in that case, there was no issue with lead pipes for the water either? Because I know the city has a program to, like, replace lead pipes if there are any.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, we did change everything, you know. So, I don't know.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, I wonder, Hala, do you think there might be an opportunity to do some education around this related to the community garden work?

[CAS00002438_SPEAKER_01]: Yes, I think I can talk to Amanda when I meet with her about this. But yes, and I'm interested in this.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: I'll ask Marianne too if she has any information. Maybe we can.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: like make people aware that you can test your soil because maybe they think that that's not something that they could do you know yeah like i personally wouldn't know where to go to do that but you have to look yeah i'd have to look it up yeah but is that does that cost anything and i'm sure it does cost money but you know What are you going to do? That's another thing to worry about. Yeah. Wow.

Or it's like, maybe it's just safer to do the raised beds, like you said. Don't even risk planting directly in the ground.

[MPS Member Jenny Graham]: Yeah, we do think about tomatoes and vegetables. It's not my habit.

[MCM00001801_SPEAKER_01]: Okay. Motion to end the meeting? I need a second. Second. All in favor? Aye. On the zoom too.

[Brenda Pike]: I, I. No offense, Samira, but you're not a voting member. Okay. All right. Then I. All right. Thanks, everyone.

Jenny Graham total time: 10.85 minutes total words: 1896