Energy and Environment MM/DD/YY

AI-generated summary. Written by gemini-3.8-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 Energy and Environment Committee reviewed city environmental updates, tracked progress on the Climate Action Plan, and debated proposed changes to municipal waste collection and pay-as-you-throw policies. The committee approved the previous meeting's minutes and discussed legislative initiatives around rodenticide and plastics reduction.

3:16 Approval of Minutes — The committee unanimously voted to accept the minutes from the previous meeting.
4:59 City Environmental Updates — Staff provided updates on upcoming environmental events, the Electrify Medford program, third-party energy supplier costs, revisions to the municipal aggregation plan, air quality sensors at local schools, EV charger installations, and sustainability targets for the high school building project.
32:58 Climate Action Plan Review — The committee walked through the Climate Action Plan tracking matrix, discussing municipal progress on zoning recodification, affordable housing trusts, specialized energy code enforcement, and Building Department staffing capacity.
54:49 Member Updates and State Legislation — Members discussed state legislative items under the Mass Ready Act, including proposed bans and restrictions on anticoagulant rodenticides, plastics reduction measures, and dark sky lighting legislation.
1:14:38 Pay-As-You-Throw and Waste Management Discussion — The committee debated a proposal for bi-weekly trash pickup and pay-as-you-throw mechanisms, weighing concerns about rodents, odors, and service cuts against municipal costs and the impact of curbside composting.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: nonetheless, because the days are getting longer, but our hours are the same. So a question for you all that have been here a little longer than me. When we start prepping for summer sessions, I know we skip one month. Is that correct? When do we normally, is it June, no July, and then August? How do we like to do it?

[Barry Ingber]: Usually June and either July or August, depending on what works. Gotcha. Is that right, Bob?

[Robert Paine]: That's correct. Yeah, whatever. But then I guess we can't have it in my backyard because of some protest.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Well, we'll make it in. I think we should go to a park somewhere. We go to City Hall area and maybe Riverside. Get cozy.

[Brenda Pike]: The direction that I got was that it would need to be public space, not.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay, is my Wi-Fi better now? Yes. Okay. What I was saying was that the direction I got was that it just needed to be in a public place, not at someone's private home.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I'll do some research for our June meeting. I figure there's some areas around City Hall, maybe downtown somewhere.

[Josh Ekhart-Lee]: What if we met at the Hatch Trial for, like, 15 minutes and then walked over to Bob's?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Oh, yeah, we could do, like, a bunch of our meeting in that area and then retire for some food.

[Brenda Pike]: We could do the official meeting there and then head off for a socialization.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah, there we go. I like that. That's why he's my co-chair. He's got good ideas there. Yeah, we'll formalize it more for June when we talk about it and figure out whether that should be July or August. But all sounds doable. Okay. And with that, I got good news and bad news. Good news is we're at quorum. Bad news, it means we got to talk about the minutes. Did everyone get a chance to look at them?

I'm seeing some nods. Anyone care to vote to accept them? Any amendments we need?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Luke? Yes. Bob? Yes. And will is a yes. All right. It's easy when there's not that many people, but there's a unanimous motion to accept our minutes. Things look good. We can move on with the fun stuff. The biggest one being we have some small changes to the schedule. The pay-as-you-throw discussion is going to get moved to the end. I anticipate it going very long, and it's good to have a nice firm cutoff line at the $8.02 mark.

Um, that way everyone has a chance to give their other updates and things that need to get done. So. Small amendment to the agenda, but otherwise I want to go to Brenda. Let's talk about some city updates.

[Brenda Pike]: And I can share my screen here. So people have something to follow along with if they would like that. Can you see my screen? Yes, great. Okay. So, yeah, so I just wanted to just make people aware of some upcoming events. I won't personally be at most of these, but I wanted to make sure you knew about them. So this coming weekend, we have junk in the trunk. which is the swap at City Hall, and then also Disability Fair.

Next Wednesday, we have the rain barrel pickup. The cutoff for ordering rain barrels has already happened. But if anybody is interested in volunteering to help distribute them that day, I'll drop the sign up form into the chat here. And we've had I think 119 rain barrels purchased this time. which is, I think, a little bit less than in previous years, but, you know, still a good amount. Next weekend, we have Haitian Flag Day and the Youth Climate Summit. That's actually a statewide climate summit that's happening in Somerville, but it's open to high school students across the state.

Also that weekend, Arlington has an EV and e-bike event that they have invited anybody surrounding towns to come to if they're interested. So I thought people might be interested in that. Similar to what we've had in the past where we invite people with EVs or e-bikes to come and show off their vehicles and talk to people about them and answer questions. May 23rd is the free flea market at Tufts, organized by some of the people in this group. So it sounds like it's going to be a wonderful event. May 30th, we're having our own bicycling fair, not just e-bikes, but any sort of bikes. And that will be at the Pop-Up Park.

[MCM00001758_SPEAKER_12]: Can I just add for the Medford Bicycle Fair that Mothers Out Front is going to do a bike swap at that. Oh, that's great. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: So mostly kids' bikes, but it can be adult bikes. When kids grow out of them, it must be hard to keep them in bikes as they're growing. June 9th, we have a webinar will be shown about predatory electric suppliers at the senior center. And I don't know exactly what date yet, but I know a heat preparedness event is being planned at the West Medford community center. Any questions or comments or anything about these events or other events that you know about that you want to make sure people are aware of?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I think I included it in an email to all of you. I think I sent a lot more emails than I normally do this month. But free flea market also coincides with a Trees Medford planting event at Tufts Park. uh, there's a slight overlap. So, uh, I think the planting is all day, but there's a world where you could finagle it such that you get to do both. That's kind of my hope. Um, but if I don't see you at one, I'll maybe see you at the other.

[Lauretta James]: Yeah, well, I'll talk. Oh, I'm sorry. I'll talk about that later in the tree section to get more details. Great. Thank you.

[Josh Ekhart-Lee]: I also wanted to note this Friday from 3 to 6, there's a picnic happening in Lincoln Park in Somerville. It's bringing together a bunch of local climate orgs, and a lot of our allies will be there in the afternoon. It'll be a good chance to say hi.

[Brenda Pike]: Unfortunately, I won't be able to come. I'm going to be headed to New York for my birthday.

[Brenda Pike]: I don't think there are very many exciting ages after at this point. You know, there's no like milestone ages to hit.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay, moving on. Electrify Medford, just wanted to give a quick update there. We've had 245 residents sign up so far. We've coached 129 of them. And we've had people report back that 56 actions have been taken after those conversations. The majority of them have been around signing up for the aggregation or a different level of the aggregation. getting a home energy assessment, installing heat pumps, or installing solar. But then there are also lots of other actions that people have taken as a result. It's all very personalized, so it's good to see sort of the sheer number of things that people are doing here.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Um, when it says no response, that just means they signed up, but haven't attended coaching or they just, who knows into the ether vanish.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, they, they signed up. And then when we reached back out to try to schedule a coaching session with them, they, they haven't responded. Yeah. So either, you know, they signed up not quite knowing exactly what it was or they, um, you know, they had more things on their plate than they thought when they originally signed up, I'm assuming. A little bit of a deep dive into some third-party electricity supplier information. The Attorney General's office came out, updated their report about third-party suppliers, and there was, I'll drop the, Sorry, I will drop the link to that in our chat and then also include it. We can include it in any minutes too.

But some interesting things I thought from that was that it breaks things out geographically. And so they identified that 12% of Medford households were enrolled with competitive suppliers in April 2025, which is sort of when they do a snapshot. And in that month alone, they lost almost $50,000 compared to if they were on basic service. And that averaged out to almost about $18 per household. And the low-income households that were part of that group lost more per household, about an average of $20 each.

And that's in April when people aren't using a lot of energy. Imagine if that were in the middle of the summer when people are using air conditioning or in the middle of winter if they're heating with electricity. So that could be very, very expensive. And so that's, I mean, that's obviously one of the reasons why we're doing this aggregation that we have. Um, and one of the reasons that we're doing that, uh, webinar that I mentioned on, um, so June 9th, it's going to be playing at the senior center. Um, but it's also available, um, on Medford TV.

Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at 8 p.m. And it's also available online. So we're going to be getting the link to that out. So we're trying to get it out there in multiple locations. And that webinar is done by the consumer liaison from the Attorney General's office. So it's a lot of very, you know, general information. But she also gets, you know, specific to Medford in terms of like the sort of this geographic information that we talked about, and then also the Medford's aggregation and what people can do to sign up for that.

[Lauretta James]: I'm glad, Brenda. I had mentioned that in an email to you and Wilma, I think. And so I'm really happy. When will that webinar be on the Medford Community Media?

[Brenda Pike]: So it's available online right now. Oh, it is? Yep. Yep. And it's available on the, um, on their, um, sorry, their local channels. Um, Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at 8 PM.

[Barry Ingber]: I wonder, it's great that the city's doing a webinar. I'm really glad about that. I mean, it's pushing the webinar and is holding the event at the senior center. I wonder if it would be possible to do a robocall. warning people away from third-party suppliers, maybe telling them about the webinar, but primarily warning them away from third-party suppliers, like two quick sentences about the Attorney General's findings. This is costing us money. Your best bet is Medford's aggregation and what to do in order if they want to switch to aggregation.

[Brenda Pike]: That's a good suggestion, yeah. And I can see us doing that in conjunction with sort of the next thing up on the agenda here. We'll be doing an update to our aggregation plan because the DPU has new streamlined guidelines. So we'll have to refile our plan at some point. So we're doing that now. And we're going to be taking advantage of this opportunity to make a change to it so that residents who are on National Grid's low income discount rate will be automatically added to the Medford basic rate instead of the default option, which is that middle one.

So that means they won't be getting the additional 10% additional renewable electricity as part of their offering, but they will be getting the lowest rate that we have to offer. And I think that's really important.

[Brenda Pike]: Oh, yes. There's always an option to change your level anytime. Yep. So we'll be doing a press release around this. I don't know exactly when that's coming out, but when it does, it will kick off sort of our 30-day review period that we have to, according to the Department of Public Utilities. And so we're going to be doing a press release. We're going to be doing outreach around that, including, I think, a robocall barrier would be a great opportunity. And we'll be including in that, pointing people towards the webinar, pointing people towards the attorney general's report, all of that.

[Lauretta James]: Brenda, would it be possible to make a flyer with this webinar information. Like, I know some elderly people in my area that I, that, you know, don't, they may not actually get the robocalls and they're not on Facebook. But I could put them in their mailboxes or hand them to them. I shouldn't put them in their mailboxes, but in their door or talk to them.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah. Do you have suggestions for other places that we could be using those flyers as a way to reach people who aren't connected to the senior center or to city halls, communications methods in general?

[Lauretta James]: Yeah, there's a couple of places. I mean, I'm sure we could all come up with some, but I know, like, there's a bulletin board at Panera. That you can put public announcements. Oh, boy.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: That's the 1st, when I thought of this, probably there's a couple, a couple, like, restaurant, like, Colleen's, I think also has 1 right.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Library library always building up that network is tricky and important.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, if people have any other suggestions for places that we could be doing that outreach to, um, let me know either, you know, now or later on at any point. Okay.

[MCM00001758_SPEAKER_12]: Oh, Jill. I just wondered if you, is the city able to post things in Guide to No Medford? I found it to be really helpful. I mean, they have a really rich source of information.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, they're doing a great job getting information out there. Yeah.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Well, I don't think we get, like, preferential treatment, I think we'd have to submit like anyone else, like an op-ed or something. I'm sure they would take it if we start talking about something like this. So it might be worth drafting up an op-ed or at least tipping them off and giving them information so they can write an article about it.

[Lauretta James]: Actually, you probably handle this already, but on our Facebook page, it's called planning and development. Is there a post about this?

[Brenda Pike]: No, not yet. We're going to be doing that when the press release is available.

[Barry Ingber]: I just want to say thumbs up to the Gotta Know Medford idea. I mean, it can be a short piece, but they print pretty much anything that you throw at them. So I think that that will reach a bunch of people.

[Brenda Pike]: And not just that, but they're doing a great job, I think, summarizing city meetings, too. They'll even go through our events calendar and summarize an agenda for a meeting so that people know whether it's a topic involved that they're interested in. So I've been really impressed. Sorry, Benji, did you have a comment? No, thanks. All right, I'll move on. A few other quick updates. The outdoor air quality sensors are now live at the five schools, Andrews, McGlynn, Missituk, Roberts, and Brooks. And so you can view those on purpleair.com.

It's a pretty simple web address, but I'll drop that into the chat too. The thing that I noticed once I looked at the map with them on there is so many of our schools are very close to the highway, which I don't think I realized that before. And when the wind is coming from the west blowing east, you can really see the difference in air quality for a few of those schools. Um, our on street charging stations are, um, the installations are happening now. Um, actually, at this point, we're just waiting for national grid to connect the electricity to them. Um, and we're planning on a ribbon cutting June 16th, uh, with mass clean energy center.

Um, and that's going to be at at Morrison park. The Tufts Park is undergoing a redesign to improve the stormwater runoff in the area and to sort of improve the heat island effect over there and to give people sort of a respite from the heat over there. And so there's a survey out right now where they're looking for people's feedback on what they would be looking for. in a park there. And I think that's only going to be open for a couple of weeks. So if you know anybody who lives in that area who uses Tufts Park, then please share this survey with them. There's also going to be People from my office are going to be in person, they're going to be at other events, sort of soliciting feedback from people in person, but we're also trying to get the survey out as much as possible.

We have signed a strategic energy management plan with National Grid, and that is a three-year plan where we take a look at the energy efficiency projects that we're more likely to do over the next three years and the energy savings expected from that. And National Grid gives us some small additional incentives if we do more, have more energy savings than a threshold that they set for us. I say it's relatively small. It's about 200,000 over three years.

Every little bit helps and it's really helpful to just align with them and make sure that we're getting all of the incentives that we're eligible for. So we have regular monthly meetings with them to talk through sort of where we are with different projects and what's coming up. Um, and the new high school project, um, so I'm sure everybody, this has been a big topic of conversation. So I'm sure everybody's aware that we have six designs right now that will be narrowed down to one, uh, by June 10th. Um, and the last meeting sustainability focus meeting that I was at, um, there was discussion about. sort of the differences between LEED version 4 and LEED version 5, which is what we'll be certifying under. And the designers are saying that LEED 5 gold is roughly equivalent to LEED 4 platinum, since there are some things that would have gotten us points in LEED 4 that are now requirements with no points in LEED 5.

MSBA is requiring that we, at minimum, are LEED Silver certified. And the school committee has voted that we would pursue LEED Platinum. And the discussion was sort of, when the school committee voted on this, it was LEED 4 Platinum. is it now lead five golds? And I think sort of my perspective on it right now is that platinum should, especially this early on, platinum should be the gold with the understanding that we may not be able to reach that with a new version. And so we may end up dropping down to gold, but platinum should still be our goal.

Um, that would require full electrification. Um, and there's some discussion right now about whether heating the pool, um, is going to be done, uh, with electric or, or, or gas. Um, and there's some discussion about some vocational school uses, um, where they might need natural gas for the building. Um, It would also require it to be net zero. So we would need enough solar panels to completely make up for any energy that was used. And it would require a 20% reduction in embodied carbon in the construction of the building itself.

[Brenda Pike]: For the building, we're considering geothermal heat pumps. Um, the next meeting that we have, we're going to be looking at the life cycle costs. And sort of making some comparisons there, so. Still a lot of planning to be done there, so. Keep it keep an eye out for all of that. Um, and then just an update on the climate equity council, they're going to be doing some outreach around summer preparedness, developing some materials around heat and outdoor air quality. and then doing some outreach around that at their events. And they're also interested in doing some outreach around lead contamination. And so that's in the lead contamination conversation is in a very early stage. So I was just wondering if anybody here is aware of materials that they could be pulling from or could use poll hog around like lead contamination. I think what kicked this off was somebody tested their backyard soil because they wanted to do a garden and found out that there was lead contamination in the soil. So they would need to do raised beds. And they were just thinking about everybody who might not know to do that and get that testing done.

[Barry Ingber]: That was true for me too. Benji, don't you have some expertise in that arena? Yes, I think so.

[MCM00001610_SPEAKER_06]: So what I would say is sort of the same thing I always say. Knowing about lead in soil is important. Knowing about lead in the water is important. The overwhelming source of childhood lead poisoning is deteriorated house paint. And everything else is dramatically, dramatically less. So, and when there was the Flint and that whole crisis. or sort of crisis. I think a lot of people in cities and towns lost track of that. I think if you speak to anybody who works in a lead poisoning clinic, they'll tell you the overwhelming source of lead poisoning is lead dust created by deteriorated house paint. Are you talking about indoor house paint or outdoor house? Well, it's primarily, you know, outdoor house paint does end up in the soil and is can be a contributing cause. But primarily, it's dust. Dust created by friction surfaces, which is windows and doors, which creates small amounts of lead. And the dust, the reason dust is the primary source is because of surface area, and it's so ingestible. Child goes around, gets dust on their fingers. Kids at that age put their hands in their mouths. That's, that's the way most kids who get good poison. That's the way it happens.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay. Yeah. So that's a, that's a really good point. I think they were focused on sort of the outdoor exposure and maybe lead in water, but really important to focus on the other, the main source of lead that most people would come across.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I'm putting in the chat, Environment America, it's like one of their big pushes is get the lead out. I'm going to put a link to, they have like toolkits for community guidance and things. Yeah, just another opportunity. But it's mostly for lead in water and school drinking water.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: All righty, and we are moving things around a little bit. I'd love to make space. Brenda, do you need a breather, or do you want to go right into the climate action plan updates as well?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah, between that and any member updates to follow, I think it'd be good to move those forward. And yeah, we can do those in either order.

[Brenda Pike]: Sounds good. OK, I guess I will share my screen again then. Let's see. OK, can you see this?

[Brenda Pike]: OK, good. So I took a first pass at just going through the spreadsheet here that Josh put out to everybody. And I figure we can just take some time at each meeting to talk through each of these topics quickly and pause if people have any feedback. I think maybe the breadth of it was a little overwhelming, and so taking it bit by bit might be helpful. So just for the overarching section here, that one of the strategies created Climate Council. We have done this, that's completed. Our first meeting was at the end of 2023.

Another strategy here was use the climate equity framework to guide implementation. And I would say that we're not formally using this, but this is a foundation of our work. And then the third strategy here. is model greenhouse gas emissions to forecast and evaluate progress. And I would say that we have not done this yet. We are reporting on our greenhouse gas emissions annually, but we're not forecasting them yet. But we are working on green communities decarbonization roadmap, which is one of the steps to become green communities climate leaders. And we're working with an outside consultant that they've provided for us. And so that should be completed by the end of this year. So we are making progress on that one.

I will jump to the building section. Let me stretch out my screen a little bit. So. reduced zoning barriers to multifamily and mixed-use housing development. And so that would be part of the zoning recodification that's happening. right now. The statewide MBTA communities law is already leading to increased density in the areas that that applies to, but something to still keep an eye out on and to keep a hand in and to advocate for more density. when as those conversations are happening, you know, that can be controversial. So if that's something that you are passionate about, it's important to keep your voice in there. Another Objective in this section, enable smaller and more diverse housing options through zoning updates.

Again, part of the zoning recodification process, we do have the state accessory dwelling unit law. that allows ADUs in any zone where single-family housing is allowed. So that's a major part of it. And we are seeing more ADUs as a result of that, which is nice. I don't have any specific numbers. So if that sort of quantification is something that you would be interested as a part of this that might be worth digging into a little bit more.

Feel free to interrupt me at any point with either correction, addition, questions, anything like that. Establish a Municipal Affordable Housing Trust. This has happened, so it was created through law in April 2023, funded through Community Preservation Act. The board was created in 2025, and they are plugging away at their work. So let's see, the next one here, foster affordable infill development. I'd go back to the climate action plan to really dig into what the meaning was behind some of these.

So for this one, permitting infill development for affordable deed-restricted single-family housing on small vacant lots that currently fall below minimum lot size thresholds in single-family housing districts. And there were, at the time, 550 vacant lots that meet that description. And I haven't seen an update on where we are with that right now. So something to dive into in more detail. The next objection here, protect and continue to advance fair housing choice. And for that one, the intention was conduct an updated analysis of impediments for fair housing choice to identify barriers to fair housing.

And I'm not aware of any update to the 2019 analysis of impediments. So that would be something to follow up on. The next objective here, support community efforts to create a community land trust. And so this isn't necessarily something spearheaded by the city, but this is saying that if this is something the community wants to do, then the city would try to support that. But to my knowledge, there hasn't been community I don't want to say there hasn't been community interest, but there hasn't been a push to move forward with something like that from any community groups.

And conduct a displacement risk assessment. So that would be the intention there was work with neighboring universities and community groups to evaluate changes in demographics and property values in Medford's neighborhoods, susceptibility to gentrification and risk of displacement. And so I don't believe that that's something that has happened. So if that is something that you wanted to dig into, That would be an important thing to do there. How much do we want to get into in this meeting, Will? How much more time do we want to devote to this?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Truthfully, I had allotted 10 to 15 minutes for our member updates. But since Prabita is not here, it would likely just be Loretta. So don't take more than maybe five or so more minutes.

[Lauretta James]: Yes. When I'm looking at the spreadsheet, some of our members have put names in under column S, you know, to follow up on these topics. So, can it be more than one person? That was what I was wondering.

[Josh Ekhart-Lee]: Absolutely. Just to cut in I think I'm looking at the environment ecosystems and natural environment tab And something like introduce a tree protection ordinance has both you and Lois listed Or you and Barry for some of the ecological resilience Projects, so that's totally fine tech team. I think is encouraged Yeah

[Lauretta James]: quite a lot of categories. And some I found, I looked at it as soon as you sent it out. And then I saw that Brenda went in when I wasn't there. I had already put some notes and then I corrected because some things didn't make sense. But I saw a lot of, to me, a lot of overlap. So it's interesting, like, could be talking about something about buildings that might have something to do with environment. And I'm like, oh, Yep, like, it could be consolidating, but I'm not going to go there. You know what I mean? It's something to keep in mind.

[Brenda Pike]: I think next year, we'll probably want to do an update to our climate action plan since it's been. you know, four years now. So something to keep in mind as we're going through this for progress and we're thinking ahead to what that's going to be next time is consolidating some of these, because 172 objectives are quite a lot.

[Lauretta James]: Oh, OK. That's what I was thinking. I had to stop. I was like, wow. OK. Thank you for all your work on this, both of you. It's much more understandable.

[Lois Grossman]: Can I give a mini update, please? On our mini forest, there are several of us around the city who have adopted 40 to 50 seedlings in a special air pruner, which is an enclosed, raised structure. They're in burlap. I just got the last of the trees this afternoon from Jared Ingersoll. And, uh, I'm fostering trees for the Milwaukee forest that we're building it. Oh, great. Great.

[Brenda Pike]: That's really exciting. Yeah. Well, I'll just do a few more of these here, and then we can jump into maybe member updates.

[Brenda Pike]: Okay. Adopt environmental performance standards for large buildings. So the intention with this one was for new buildings that were being built and going through our permitting, zoning, site plan review process and having performance standards such as passive house, zero carbon or lead platinum. And I would say that the specialized energy code that we adopted goes a long way towards that, just because it does require multifamily buildings, large multifamily buildings, to meet passive house requirements. And there are thermal energy demand intensity limits for other large buildings.

[Josh Ekhart-Lee]: So that is distinctly different from our goals in BE 2.2 for like a Berto type ordinance? When I was reading it, that's how I was seeing it. But is there room or interest in doing some like zoning based performance standards tied to like shade or like SRI? We haven't heard that code in Somerville.

[Brenda Pike]: We do have a green score as part of the new zoning, so that has a lot of there. You have to meet a certain. So things like trees have a certain number of points that you can add to it. So there's a lot of flexibility of how you get there. It's really, it's a lot of focus around storm water. And so. most of the elements as part of the green score have things to do with stormwater, but they also, a lot of them have heat island impacts as well, right? So if you have different kinds of vegetation, trees, things like that.

So I think that answers part of your question, but not all of it. I think there's still room for opportunity. There's still opportunity to include more performance standards. in the new zoning. So if that's something that you are passionate about, I would encourage you to get involved in those zoning conversations. Yeah.

[Brenda Pike]: Let's see what's next. Offer incentives for exceptional energy performance. So the intention behind that was things like density bonuses, reduced building permit fees, or streamlined review processes for new construction that meets exceptional energy performance, such as all electric, net zero, passive house. And in the same way that we, as we were saying before, that some of these seem to be leading towards the same intentions. I think 1, 1, 2, a, and 1, 2, B are very similar here. I don't see a lot of distinction behind them.

[Brenda Pike]: Sorry, 1-2-E-E-1-2-B. Oh, 1-2-I-1-2-B. Yeah, maybe I jumped ahead.

[Lauretta James]: Okay, so I have this question about the DPW and It relates to this, but also it's under energy environment about impervious surfaces. So, years ago, when we were starting to write the draft ordinance for trees. We took as a really good example that was collaboration for the tree report. And we named it Soil Remediation and Sediment Control by way of work lines. And Will, I think I saw your name under Environmental Soil Remediation. So that's why I'm bringing this up. But then Brenda, I'm also going to ask you the question. Have you heard about any plans from DPW about an ordinance for soil remediation and sediment control. Because at that time, Tim was, I'm going to do, he was with engineering. And he was going to work on an ordinance for that.

[Brenda Pike]: So there was a stormwater ordinance that was passed a couple of years ago now, actually. And I'm not sure exactly how it matches up with what you were talking about.

[Lauretta James]: Okay. Yeah. There is another town in Western Mass that has soil remediation to reduce impervious surfaces within the city. It's in the tree, but that's the city that was, I could look it up. So I was wondering if you would, this is to reduce impervious surfaces throughout Medford and affecting also residents. And it's appropriate. Yeah. So I was wondering if you knew I can't keep track of all the ordinances in Medford, so.

[Brenda Pike]: Yeah, let me send you the stormwater ordinance and the green score, and you can see if between the two of them, it gets to what you're talking about. Because again, part of the green score is reducing impervious surfaces.

[Lauretta James]: Yeah, I thought you would put that in under completed or in the spreadsheet about green score. But the green score is only for certain buildings, though, right? Yeah.

[Lauretta James]: It's for larger buildings. Right. But this was for everybody. So that to reduce, you know, say black tar driveways on their property so that we would have more filtration. So if you could send, maybe I'll find something not in the green score, but maybe in the other ordinances.

[Lauretta James]: Yeah. Cause I thought it might, relate to some of the sections under energy and environment and building.

[Brenda Pike]: Um, and then the last 1 here, I'll go through expand staff capacity to oversee building performance standards. So this is in the building department. Um, and capacity they were referring to it was both in terms of, like, the number of staff to be able to focus on this and then the training that they had to to be able to, um. To be informed about this, um, and so. The building department attended two trainings on the specialized energy code that MassSave held here in person in Medford.

But I definitely don't think there has been any additional staff added to that department. And in fact, the commissioner of the building department is moving on to another job. And so we are going to have to hire a new building commissioner. So if anything, the staff capacity has gotten worse there since then.

[Brenda Pike]: I think his last day may have been Friday and then he'll be doing some part-time work for the city until we find somebody else but it's really just he's going to be starting his new job as well so it's going to be not a lot of time that he's going to have to spend on this.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: And Brenda, if there are any, uh, I know we all have this progress template, like matrix, but if there are specific sections you'd like us to cover, um, I have my. Um, like end of meeting updates thing open. So if there's any specific call to action, anything in particular you'd like us to be working on for the next month.

[Brenda Pike]: So I mean, next time we meet, we can just pick up here with 1.3a and get through as much of the building section as we can. We probably won't get to the end of it, but maybe we'll get through 2.1 here.

[Josh Ekhart-Lee]: I'll note that BE2 is sort of largely lacking a meek volunteer to research beyond Bob's volunteering for 2.1 on fuel switching and efficiency.

[Brenda Pike]: So that involves benchmarking ordinance like BIRDO. Sorry, yeah, benchmarking and performance standards ordinance like BIRDO.

[Brenda Pike]: Yep. So, if anybody's interested in finding out more about that, or digging into that, not necessarily even for next meeting, but for for later, feel free to add your name there.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I'll put a little call to action in our follow-up email, just so everyone has the links and they're ready to jump in as they need. Well, thank you, Brenda. Goodness, we had you going. We had you going for a minute there. No breaks. So with this, I want to open briefly to MEC member updates. I think everyone should have received an email from Prabita about Xero and SmartWaste events that she's running. mostly around junk in the trunk and free flea market. But if there are other, we'll make sure, if there are other things, I'll make sure that she is able to relay them to everybody and we'll be a-okay.

But I want to turn it over, open the floor to anyone else who would like to share. I know Loretta has prepared a few things.

[Lauretta James]: Oh, I'm ready. Should I start? Please, yeah. Oh okay, I thought you, I was waiting for someone else to jump in. Excuse me, allergies today. I wanted to talk about, now that I'm a little bit out of order, some things that, Brenda had sent out a letter about the Mass Ready Act, so I wanted all the members, I'm glad most of you are here, to learn, you know, about what is going on with the Mass Ready Act. It's an environmental bond bill.

It's S, it was in the Senate, S-3050. And it's a major environmental bond bill with $3.64 billion in funding. And it was passed by the Senate, moved to the House around, let's say, April 16th. It was passed the 15th. It included a lot to protect the environment and many issues. But there were a couple of things I noticed, and I was looking up the bills, and sometimes it's so hard. I spent hours on this, often on the past week, tracking the bills, because the bill numbers change.

But well, this is one of the things I saw. I thought that was interesting. So I remembered that you had talked about maybe doing some paperwork and creating an ordinance for dark sky lighting. So you might want to write this down. H3494 is to increase dark sky visibility and lighting by Sean Garbali. I don't know if you knew about that. And so I tried calling his office, but today's the worst day to call any legislator because they were in session and nobody answered or their mailbox was full. So you might want to follow up on that. I'd love to see the document.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Definitely will. Can you give me the number one more time? It was H3494? H3494.

[Lauretta James]: And then it might have changed, but the office would know. Yeah. So that's interesting. And the second one, I'm going to move along and some of you may have known this, but we haven't talked about in the meeting. So this is Phyllois and Benji and anyone interested in plastics, it's an act to reduce plastics and trying to find the information. Um, I can read it to you real quick. Bill. S654, that's the Senate, and it's to reduce plastic, it's the Massachusetts Plastics Reduction Act that includes black plastic.

Okay, it is very long, but it includes bags, carry out containers, and plastic utensils, plastic straws, Oh, water bottles. And, okay, so I wrote down some notes. Sorry, I'm jumping around here. Section 3C, let me go to that. I have to go very, well, it'll seem longer, but I have to find the section to get to, here it is, 3C. No food service where provided consistent with the section shall be made from black plastic provided. However, that the provisions of this subsection shall not apply to prepared food packaged outside of the Commonwealth.

So I just wanted to bring this up so that the group that's working on this is aware of it. and to keep following it, because I think this was moved to the house, but I'll give you the name and number of who to follow up with on this. And then the other, there's a lot to this. There are exclusions for certain places that are a smaller business of up to 4,000 square feet. They can use so much plastic. I think I read that. But the other important part about this is, where did it go? Section three, section seven. Section seven, the department shall establish a statewide program to provide for the recycling of bulk plastic materials, including but not limited to child passenger restraints and all kinds of plastics. Implementing local or regional bulk plastic recycling programs. So that's exciting if it goes through. So my understanding is that Senate passes and it's in the house and it's part of the Mass Ready Act. Now the bill number, sorry, I didn't get to do a spreadsheet for you. I just found this out and I was calling these offices to get the exact update on it. That this one was Senate Bill S654.

I think I mentioned it already. So that was by Senator Rebecca Roche. And if you would like her telephone number, you may have that too. It's 617-722-1555. And I have two numbers, I'm not sure what these mean. I did say S654 and I also have SD2134.

[Lauretta James]: Yeah, but there's all kinds of numbers and there's amendments. It would be good to get the update to see where this is at. So as Mystic River Watershed Association had sent the email and Brenda sent it out to us, You know, the Mass Ready Act was unanimously approved by the Senate. It's at the House, I guess now, you know, to be voted on and discussed and debated. And once approved, then it would go to the governor for signing and review, well, for review too.

So moving on, we'll get to the, um, The act establishing the municipal reforestation program was part of that bill. And let's say we're with that. Well, it went to, it was changed slightly. Well, actually it was changed a lot. It was the redraft, but Brenda had sent the links out in that email. I think she sent it out around the 17th or the 20th. with a letter from Mr. River watershed Association. And you can click on those links that are in that email to see the change bill but it's still exciting that they will provide get, try to get funding to support tree planting in, you know, heat island areas, support nonprofits and anybody, other cities can join together to plant more trees. So that's a whole, we'll be following that to see what happens. And the other one is the rodenticide bill. I have, I'm not looking at you, I'm sorry.

All these tabs I have open. Mass Ready Act. The Senate delivers Mass Ready Act to build a more resilient, sustainable Massachusetts. And it just covers tons and tons of stuff. It'd be fantastic if it is passed. The rodenticide bill. That's a lot to keep track of. I don't know how Brenda does it. Let's see. Okay. The act restricting anticoagulant were identified in the environment. The portion of the bill that was in the Mass Ready Act was to allow municipalities to decide if they want to enact a ban. for the use of anticoagulant rodenticides in their city, which could be for not just public, but private land. And already we have many, many cities and towns in Massachusetts that have adopted it either for their public properties or to include private. And there's several that are waiting that have to go to legislative committees to be voted on and passed. So with this, since the Senate approved this overwhelmingly, it went to the House also as part of this huge bill, environmental bill, for them to deliberate and vote on. So hopefully that goes through. Still, it was watered down in the I think it's over 65 organizations want to support this bill because of the deaths of so many animals. And it's not just hawks and eagles, it's foxes and pets.

It's just terrific way to die in this many other, um, which we don't call integrated pest management plans, which does, but, um, it can be used to control. Like, you know, sealing up your property rubbish. removal, not leaving it out, all kinds of things like that. So that's within the House. So what happened with that is many of these groups said, hey, this isn't enough, you know, that all these cities have to decide to enact that for their city. Why don't we just have a statewide ban? So Senator Hawkins, no, I'm sorry, I think he's Representative Hawkins. Ah, let me see. Well, sorry. I think it's Representative Hawkins, wrote an amendment to go into the budget bill. It was number 322. And that was to ban, that the state would ban all escars and escars or denticides.

Apparently, something happened with that. It was put in the bill. And I just found out last week that the number of the bill was put in the draft budget, but they left out the text. So it was thrown out. And they believe that this was on purpose. This particular amendment, I actually called Donato and lots of people called to have them support this amendment 322 for the state ban. on anticoagulant redempticides. And I think it was 77 representatives in our state co-sponsored that, 322. So everyone's upset about it. And, you know, it could be the pest control board, not the board, pest control, what would you call it? Industry has been pushing to keep using these, but something happened and The text was deleted. So that'll be ongoing to see what actions, if any, can be taken to have a statewide meeting, because that's what they'd really prefer.

[John Rogers]: Yeah. I think I remember hearing, I don't know whether it was from the person who did You know, at City Hall, they're talking about the rodents and stuff. I think there are certain, like, uses where it's all that can be used, and it has to do with children. Something about children and, like, anticoagulant rodenticides can be reversed very easily. And I think that might have been why There needs to be, like, professional language, like, you know, under certain conditions, professionals could use it, I think is what they were looking for.

[Lauretta James]: I can speak to that. Okay. Oh, great. To use anti-coagulant rodenticides, this bill that was passed, well, passed by the Senate, it has to go through the House. And actually, this whole environmental bond bill that includes this, they have to decide on this by the 26th, I think, of this month. There's all these dates. Getting back to that, it can only be, if you have the cities who have adopted this, this can only be administered by licensed professionals. Yeah, okay. Not, okay. Yeah, that's good. And the restricts will be left up to the board of pesticide use, which has been sort of not exactly fond of this because it limits funding for companies that use the products, which is not environmentally friendly, it's other things that they can do. But it limits the use to maybe one time, they have to document the boxes with what's on these rodent bait boxes, and only used in emergency conditions, you know, like so many times a year, because they are toxic.

[John Rogers]: Yeah, that's not, I mean, yeah, I remember, like I said, something about children and needing to use this in case the children ingested it, and then they could, like I say, it can be easily reversed. And of course, you're not gonna reverse it in an animal, but I mean, that's the same thing, though. If your cat or your dog is showing signs of this, get them to the veterinary emergency room, and it can be easily reversed.

[Lauretta James]: I've seen that, you know, I'm very involved with Newhouse Wild Hype, KPN Wild Hype. Yes, they can use K2, vitamin K2. and blood transfer, but it's a horrific thing.

[Lauretta James]: Did I say K? I'm getting confused with vitamins, but K. Yeah, yeah, vitamin K. But most of the animals that have DNA- No, that's right.

[John Rogers]: And the thing is, is you're affecting wild animals, and that's bad, you know?

[Lauretta James]: Right, because they keep accumulating it, and they keep eating the rodents.

[Lauretta James]: Right, right. But with children, I mean, really, we just want a band. You know, there's no reason to use these.

[John Rogers]: Well, I guess that's true. I mean, you know, so yeah, I mean, the only reason I hesitate, the only reason I hesitate is that I'm not a pest control expert. So I would hate to tie the hands of an expert when they have really legitimate reasons. And again, you would craft the law so that it would be under these, you know, four conditions it's acceptable to use. And then out of the hundreds of conditions, absolutely not. You know what I mean? And so maybe and all I'm saying is maybe that's why the law is stalling, because there's something like that in there.

[Lauretta James]: They did cover that. That's what I was telling you. For emergency conditions, it can be used.

[Lauretta James]: All right. That's what I was saying. Anticoagulant or genticides could be many different types that interfere with blood clotting, not limited to pesticide products. And they have all the active ingredients. Bromeladone, I can't even say the name. Sorry. Defendicum. I won't even try. There's many. I'm sorry, but it does say the department with the approval of the board, which would be the pesticide board, shall by regulation establish a process and standards for cities and towns for the limited use of anticoagulant What? Sorry, I'm getting tired. Progeniticides by licensed applicators in public health emergencies, including but not limited to provisions for the emergency use of anticoagulant progeniticides to protect drinking water supply, control vectors for mosquito-borne illnesses, and for emergent infections and disease control, and it goes on. The regulation shall allow for one time indoor use in a single location or address of a public health emergency as determined by the commissioner of public health and the commissioner of social discretion. And it goes with all these things that they have to do. That sounds perfect.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Loretta, would you be able to send us a link once again, just to make sure we have all that?

[Lauretta James]: I will send that to you, because I'm having trouble with other emails.

[Lauretta James]: It's a little teeny box, because it was sent through Mystic River. I got it from them. So it's just a little teeny thing that you have to read through. But the important thing is they have to tell, post-publicly, from my understanding, where these rodenticides were used. So people are aware of that. Any other questions? I mean, I will follow these, you know, when people are back on a regular basis, and I hope they're passed. No question?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: All righty. We don't have, we have a decent amount of time. I want to make space as always for pay-as-you-throw discussions. I know we've talked about it a lot. So I really appreciate you all sticking with me through these conversations. I think we get a good amount of friction and I think that's really important to making policy better. So I appreciate it again as you talk through these things with me. The goal tonight is not to get votes, and I think we're past the point of agreement on all of this. I think the really important thing is that I've put together a list of pay-as-you-throw fact sheets and what I'm calling solutions, but that might even be too weighty a term. More than anything, it's a list of research responses to the kinds of things that you've been bringing up.

Hopefully providing some better understanding of how these things can be implemented or why. Because I think there's going to be a lot of talk about pay-as-you-throw in the coming months. if you're going to be for or against it, I'd rather you be as well informed as possible as to why you are. So, I created this little document here. I shared it a while back, but I will make sure that everyone has it again just in case.

And I'm just gonna talk through for like two minutes and then I'll open up the floor. I know we also have a guest that's been very patiently waiting to talk as well. But the general idea is we have the sort of compounding problems of funding and this existential problem of we create too much trash. And I recently found a few communities that have been doing bi-weekly trash. I actually have a call with Portland, Oregon's DPW on Thursday to talk about their process and reactions to bi-weekly trash pickup they've been doing since 2011.

So I'll be talking with them about their experience, what they've been doing. I also learned just recently that Maynard is introducing optional bi-weekly trash pickup as well. All in this hopes of reducing cost to residents and general cost to the town. Massachusetts is currently ranked number one in spending the most for waste disposal fees. We produce a fair amount of trash, but more importantly, we don't have many places to put it. And the amount of money we spend getting rid of our trash is only increasing. I believe the rate is between 15 and 25% a year.

We're seeing huge explosions in cost. So pay-as-you-throw, in general, is a really important system to ensure that we actually can afford to keep disposing of trash. But I went through some of the different things that people have brought up and talked through a couple different solutions that I've researched, ways in which people have managed it in the past. Brenda, I don't know if I can share my screen.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah. Just give me a shout if you can see. It's nothing much to look at, but it is hopefully something.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Perfect. And I'll be really brief about these. You can read these on your time and I can provide extra sources as you like. But in general, people were concerned about pet waste, diapers, rodents and other pests, odor, illegal dumping, damaged trash bins, inequities in the program. And potential concerns over if this is ethical as a response. And I don't have great responses for all of these, but we're beginning the process. And I want you to know that, at the very least, this is the kind of response I want to give you.

So in general, pet waste is something that requires that extra binning. I haven't found many other solutions that work, and diapers have a similar one where in addition to cloth diapering and ways that we can support people that do that, having these covered lidded bins, I know I use a Home Depot bucket, anything with a snapping lid usually does wonders for containing scents and things long term. I think there are very easy equity realms where, you know, households with new infants could receive a free bin for the first year of that child's life to accommodate diaper creation over that infant's lifetime.

Animal proofing bins. I really struggled finding too much on that because Garbage to Garden already flags those bins where they happen and create systems that allow us to know in real time when and where pests are getting into bins, replacing them, keeping them clean, and giving us live data points as to where rat infestations might be. So locking our food away might be one of the best ways. Yeah, John.

[John Rogers]: Does Garbage Gardens, do they replace the damaged bins for free if the rodents have attacked them?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I believe so, yeah. That's very good. Yeah, they have a stack on hand and they just flip them out. I see Lois as well.

[Lois Grossman]: I couldn't unmute, I'm sorry. Two things just clicked in my mind. You talked about a place that has optional every other week pickup. Pay as you throw. When I was on the Trash and Recycling Commission a couple of years ago, when we were renewing waste management's contract, We worked with Jeremy Drake, who's been working with the city ever since, and they explain pay as you throw by you pay for the amount you throw. And what they're proposing for Medford is not pay as you throw. They're calling it that, but it isn't because everybody's getting the exact same thing. The only thing you can do is buy an extra barrel. which is some extent pay as you throw, but not really.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Well, in communities that have pay as you throw, the only way to measure how much more that you're throwing away is by purchasing additional bins or bags.

[Lois Grossman]: Except that we get it every week, and some people have an extra barrel every week. That's the system we now have, okay? We all pay for trash removal, and some people buy an extra bin. So you're paying the extra that you throw, but we are all, if they go to this weekly setup, every other week setup, we're all being charged the same thing for that amount, and they're not gonna come every week. What if we did have an optional? You could have every week service with one barrel, the way we have it now. I don't think this has been mentioned anywhere that I noticed.

It was when you talked about this optional service. One of the main things is to cut down on the amount of trucking, the wear and tear on the streets and the pollution from the trucks. But if there weren't that many pickups, it would be a lot quicker and easier. If only 25% of the city went for weekly pickup, there would be certain advantages. I don't know if this has been looked at.

[Brenda Pike]: Lois, is your suggestion, the optional every week service as an extra service that you pay for?

[Lois Grossman]: Yes, that is pay as you throw. The people that want more service have to pay more and it will be a substantial amount more because it's not just having a second barrel there, it's causing a second pickup and people that want that are going to have to pay a considerable amount to get it.

[John Rogers]: Yeah, I'm thinking about, like, near my house, there's a couple of, there's a restaurant and a grocery store, and, well, a super-ret really, but they have a trash pickup every week, and they have, like, 10 bins, and I'm thinking that they would have to still have trash every week, because their trash Most likely contains food and they'd probably have to like privately. It would probably still be the same the same hauler that we use, but they would privately contract them to come and and yes, that's the way it's done.

[John Rogers]: Right. And I think that that would probably be available for citizens, too. But then if you think about it, if 50% of the citizens went for that option for some reason, I'm just going to be an extreme just to prove a point. If 50% of the city decided to go for the weekly option afterwards, then you're not going to really save on pollution, because you're going to be still traveling all the roads, right? One thing, I used to work for an electric vehicle company that I designed the electrical systems. But the thing that we always wanted to get and we could never really get it get by in trash haulers would be perfect hybrid vehicles because they do a lot of starting and stopping. And so if you if you had to go down the street and pick up every fourth house, it would still save. It still would save energy because the stopping and starting uses a lot of fuel, whereas the driving down the road does. You know, because they're really heavy, so stopping them, you know, burns off the kinetic energy as heat, but then starting them again takes a lot of energy to get them moving. So yeah, it would save. But yeah, I do like the idea.

[Lois Grossman]: What if they would sign up for three-month weekly pickup? Yeah, yeah, because that would be- And maybe they could save. Maybe it's a way that we could ease people into it instead of forcing it down their throats.

[John Rogers]: Right. I do agree, and I think it would be expensive. I think it would probably be $300 or $400 a year, probably. Maybe even $500 a year to have them make a special trip to your house, right?

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah. Increasing trips is another reason why weekly trash gets so much more expensive. Because whenever we pay our waste contractors, it's by weight and it's by wages. So every time we hire a driver to come out to pick up trash, we're paying them. And every time we make a lot of trash, we pay for the weight. So in general, in order to keep at the constant level we're at, it would be every other week just to keep the amount of money we're paying the same. That being said, I don't know how popular it would be with the mayor. There are worlds where we pay a lot more money to not just break even, but increase services exponentially and change systems in a major way. But this bi-weekly system is designed to keep us kind of net neutral despite huge changes and increases in disposal fees.

[Lois Grossman]: I just don't know what's going to happen when they try to put it through. And that's it. You have no choice. This is how it is. I don't see options for people. That's the one thing I don't like about it. I don't see options for people who feel they need more.

[John Rogers]: So every other week, I take my recycling. My trash, I don't even, sometimes I only have one trash bag, like one household trash bag in my trash, but my recycling, I go down the recycling bin in the city yard every week, and I bump into people there, and everybody is buzzing about this. They're like, did you hear about it? I'm like, yeah, I have heard about it. So yes, it's on everybody's minds.

[Lois Grossman]: It really isn't, because there's no wiggle room at all, John. They just slammed it down and didn't give anybody an option to solve their resulting problems. We've got to.

[John Rogers]: I mean, the option is to have two bins. There is an option. The option is to have two bins.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Yeah, the option is to purchase more bins. And you could have four, eight, 12.

[John Rogers]: I mean, yeah, but I think, like, from my point of view, again, we're really, we're really sorry and sad us at this point, but, but my only concern from a, like, a real, like, look, you have to pay for trash removal, either through your taxes or somehow, because it's expensive, right? So that's what it is. But my only concern is the rodents. That's my only concern. And I have a feeling we'll figure out a way to deal with the rodents.

[MCM00001610_SPEAKER_06]: If people's concern is the garbage sitting for two weeks, I don't understand how getting a second bin

[John Rogers]: that's what I'm saying that's why I'm worried about the roads because the convenient like yeah okay you have to pay more okay you need two bins have two bins but your two bins are still gonna sit there for two weeks and that's that is where I think we might have a rodent problem with that. And I guess the idea is that we would make it illegal to put food in the recycling bins, I mean, in the trash bins, and that would help.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Which is becoming the way. I mean, that is the anticipated bill in Massachusetts. They've been thrown around for a while.

[Barry Ingber]: Well, with John bringing up roads, I'm going to bring up an analogy that I talked with Will about when we had a conversation on the phone. So I think all of us here would agree that cars are really, really bad for the environment. And we'd be better off if people drove less or didn't even drive at all and used other ways of getting around. Medford, and it would save a ton of money, could just stop fixing the roads. And they'd eventually break down to the point where people wouldn't be able to drive anymore. That is what we're doing by reducing trash pickup. We're trying to address a systemic issue by blaming the consumer, by laying it on the consumer. And that's screwed up. You want to get people to drive less? You create public transportation. You create walkable cities. You don't make it impossible for them to get around in the world that they actually live in. We live in a world that produces trash. We can't go shopping without buying unrecyclable crap. And if that's the world we're going to live in, the city needs to provide basic services for us. And I think that this is a really screwed up way of trying to fix a serious environmental issue. Thank you for giving me time on the soapbox again.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I would, I would push only so far as to say that it's a reallocation of resources as well. I mean, public transportation, I think, is put in the chat here. Compost would be the reinvestment of those funds. Like, the city is putting money towards public transit right now.

[Barry Ingber]: Well, so would weekly recycling instead of biweekly recycling, but hey, that would cost money in the city doesn't want to do that, but it still doesn't address the fact. In some ways, the recycling and compost is like public transportation, but there's still the systemic issues of non-walkable cities and still the systemic issues of creating trash that we can't actually get away from consuming.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: So I think my only point to all this would be, my only retort I would say is, a question of, do we agree that this is a problem worth solving? And if it is, if it's really important, we should attempt more levers. Because right now, to solve a systemic issue requires either state or federal intervention. And federal intervention is unlikely for a lot of reasons. State intervention seems to be quite slow. I'm not saying this is a perfect system, but I do believe that there are municipal levers that need to be pulled.

And there should be ways about that. And I think that's an important thing to recognize that there are ways about this that the municipal government can go about.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: And that's really what I would like to see next. Rather than saying, I think we've made clear for some of us, we're not going to do every other week trash. We do need better suggestions going forward that would fix those systemic issues. And so I'd like to see those too. But I also see Christina has raised her hand.

[MCM00000565_SPEAKER_05]: Hi, everyone. Thank you for well, I think this is a public meeting, but thank you for having me here. My name is Christina Elaine, and I'm the co-coordinator of Medford Mothers Out Front, which is a local climate action group, as well as a statewide and also national climate action group. And we've attended this meeting before to introduce ourselves. And we were attending tonight, myself and my colleague, Jill Feldman, who's also on the line. just to, I think, contribute our perspective on the waste management discussion that's being had. I wanted to let you know, which I think you may be aware from a past update a couple years ago, that one of our local campaigns is in support of composting. And in support of the city's municipal composting program. So when we started our group, a couple of years ago we started with a pumpkin smash and that's been an annual event that we've had each of the last, I think three or four years now to raise awareness about composting to compost pumpkins. and then increasingly to actually let people know about the availability of the free municipal curbside composting program that they can sign up for now. Many of us in the group are very satisfied composting customers ourselves, and as it relates to the bi-weekly trash in the Pays eThrow program, several of our group members have noticed just on their own that since we've been composting in Medford, That our trash output has reduced significantly as a result of using composting. And I'll just speak personally, but I have had this exchange with a number of my colleagues in the group that what goes into my trash bin these days.

It contains no food waste and seems as though it would certainly be fine to sit for two weeks in my bin and I would not even fill the bin after two weeks. And that seems to really correlate with the use of composting in my household. I also have two young kids, they're not in diapers anymore, but we're a household of four and I know that, you know, the volume of trash per family will vary due to a number of factors. But we wanted to, I think, just attend this meeting and I think express like what joins us together as a group. This is the Medford energy environment committee mothers up front is very committed to local solutions to climate action and to energy and environment measures. And I think that's something that we all share together and something that our group is doing is. encouraging sign up for municipal composting and also we will be encouraging members of the group who may have heard about the pay-as-you-throw program and the bi-weekly trash program to consider reaching out to the city council and to the mayor to express their support for that if they support it and also if they support measures for for waste management measures that address climate and that also address the fiscal stewardship of the town of Medford, which is something that I think many of us share as well. So we wanted to just add that perspective and kind of share with you some of those activities that we're undertaking. I have no comments about the the art and science of the implementation of any of these programs. I'm just speaking as a resident of Medford and as a member of the Mothers Out Front Medford group about our interest and commitment in I think this very unglamorous but extremely important topic of waste management and how it dovetails with composting and revitalizing our soils. but at the same time, reducing our costs as a municipality for waste management. So I just wanted to share those points in the context of this conversation from the perspective of just our resident, but a group of like-minded residents who form our chapter.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: Thank you. I appreciate you taking the time to join us and share your experience. It's really, thank you.

[Brenda Pike]: Christina have you has anyone in the mothers out front group started doing biweekly trash just on their own to test it out considering that you know they're already composting.

[MCM00000565_SPEAKER_05]: I don't know if anybody's doing that formally. As I mentioned, I think in practice, my household probably is. If there was a way of piloting that more formally, that would be something that we could be interested in doing because when we have discussed this as a group, the wide view has been that we could all see, and it has been as a result of the composting, I would say that's really made That's been a catalyst to trash reduction in our households. So, yeah, we could be interested in discussing that further if there were a formal way of kind of piloting that.

[rov34HMcKiU_SPEAKER_27]: I don't know about a formal pilot, but perhaps a worthwhile challenge for folks. I know I've been pushing my housemates to just try it on. I give out high fives every time we keep our trash bin to a bin. But everyone has different journeys and different steps. We've gone well over time. That being said, please reach out to me with questions, concerns, comments, haikus, literally anything on your mind about Trash. I'm wrapping up my finals. Now it's my time to just eat, dream, sleep. All of this will be trash. It's me. This is what I do. So please talk to me about composting, about trash, about all of it.

I don't know if there's a perfect system, but by God, we're going to find it some way. So, thank you all, and please, I think we might have one more motion to attend to. I don't know if I'm allowed to be the one. Motion to adjourn. Motion to eat dinner. Thank you all. Please email me, call me. I don't, you know, go for it. I want to hear about this. So just because we didn't do enough time this time.