this government meeting is brought to you by eastw works and our local cable subscribers Wednesday uh March 5th the meeting tonight is being recorded and broadcast by emedia on Charter channel 193 and live streaming on their web page eastampton media.org counselors and participants in this meeting are
gathering hybrid on the order extended until March 2025 allowing us to do so I remind both the members of the city council and the public participating remotely to remain muted until recognized by the city council president also for the members of the public please remove your camera for the duration of the meeting unless you are
participating in the public speak time uh or the public hearing thank you this meeting is now called to order Barbara hey conif here Connie denam here first I know I know Salem Derby pres Felicia jik here JP gazinski here
Tom PE Brad Riley Tam Smith here JT Terrell here okay and we're going to do a short moment of silence and we are going to please join us in the Pledge of Allegiance Pledge of alleg I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United
States of America to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all I will work toward okay we have two sets of minutes that we need to uh act on we have
February 19th and the 26th special meeting um I would like to take motions for those separately if we could I would entertain a motion for the February 19th meeting move second moot okay we have a motion in the second all those in favor I any
abstentions I abstain Salem and who else well Peg yeah anybody else du anybody else good vote I think that was everybody yes no no Nays uh and um also the uh special meeting of the 26th I would entertain a motion to approve
those minutes so move second okay we have Motion in the second all those in favor I I abstain and we have an exstension motion passes um this is the opportunity for uh members of the public to address the council uh we just ask that you state your uh name and address
for the record and address the council and you have 3 minutes so if you would like to speak please step to the podium um and if you're online just raise your virtual hand so I know that you would like to speak [Music]
yeah thanks hi I've never never been here before so this is kind of exciting uh my name is roxan uh Mariani PR uh but my friends call me Rocky so you may do so as well uh I live at 90
Maple good evening City Council Members I guess the mayor's not here uh thank you for the opportunity to speak today my name is Rocky I already told you that and I'm here to express my strong support for an ordinance that allows short-term rental in our community short-term rentals provide significant
benefits to our city they stimulate the local economy by attracting visitors who spend money at local businesses restaurants and and attractions but you know mostly the restaurants and businesses homeowner homeowners can earn extra income which helps with mortgage payments property M
maintenance and overall Financial stability additionally short-term rentals create opportunities for tourism growth which can lead to increased tax revenue for important city services such as INF structure schools and Public Safety while we recognize the need for affordable housing in our community
allowing women and seniors to list their properties as short-term rentals provides them with a viable means of financial support effectively creating affordable housing opportunities for this demographic in case you haven't noticed I fit within that demographic um by enabling these homeowners to generate
supplemental income they can afford to stay in their homes rather than being forced to sell or relocate due to Rising living costs some may be concerned about potential disruptions but we can craft regulations that ensure responsible hosting Common Sense guidelines such as
requiring permits implementing noise ordinances and setting occupancy limits will help preserve neighborhood Integrity while allowing homeowners to participate in this growing sector many cities of our size have successfully implemented short-term rental regulations that balance economic growth
with Community interests we have the opportunity to do the same I urge you to consider the ordinance I did see what the the brief that you guys have and it looks really amazing looks great um as a means of fostering Economic Development supporting homeowners and enhancing our City's appeal to visitors thank you for
your time and consideration thank you thank you James Kinski 47 hanen Brook Drive East stampton Mass I come to you today with a very heavy feeling right
here and that's because although I just pledged to the United States of America I'm not sure where we live I live in the United States of America as the current Administration
continues to align itself with the world's most dangerous dictator we're told that Russia did not invade the Ukraine two years ago we were told that 100,000 Russian troops gathered just to perform
exercises on the border of Ukraine we saw those troops indeed invade Ukraine but we're told by our leaders that that's not what happened we're told that the Russians didn't invade Ukraine
I believe in our forest service our parts our Aid to around the world I believe in our supporting our veterans I believe in
democracy our constitution if you still believe in democracy if you believe in our future if you believe then you'll want to participate in a rally that's coming up this weekend in Northampton I would invite each and every one of you to join
me and many others to be held this weekend Sunday 12: to 2 at the city hall in Northampton I'm so sorry last time I looked I lived in in the
United States of America not the United States of Putin hello Lindsay Mount time Avenue sampon lindsy Rothchild good vibe in here um it's hard to talk after JP because what he said was so important
and so pressing and I will be there my mom already invited me to the rally and you'll see me there um and that's a conversation we definitely need to keep having as a community um I'm just coming to talk on the Airbnb issue
um I just want to share my experience with Airbnb I my mom when we decided that she was going to purchase a home in East Hampton we could not find a single family that was affordable from for her and then we tried making some bids on a couple two families thinking that would be an option to help supplement her
ability to live in eastampton after my father passed away she decided to join me here um and we found a single family home on um Park Street that had just such the layout that I was went into creative solution mode and said mom if we like can Airbnb some of these rooms
out on the second floor and I'll help you do it this will supplement you being able to live in eastampton um and that's what we've done so when I got the letter the season of this letter I was really panicked because that's like our economic plan to like help my mom live in our house it
Airbnb does um add affordability give people options um I also wanted to not some is that three minutes no no okay some the fast sorry um some data points that from an Airbnb um research that the fastest growing group of Airbnb hosts in
the US is seniors and the growth is propelled largely by women 64% of those seniors are women for empty nesters who share their home Airbnb can economic Lifeline many senior women are taking a resource that would other otherwise be underutilized space in their home and using it to earn money that helps them
make ends meet 50% of senior hosts say they host for financial reasons and are on a fixed income and 45% of senior hosts rely on their Airbnb income to make ends meat and spend it on their cost of living and that is exact Truth for my family so I just want you know it's easy to kind of see as oh a
business this isn't the cape this isn't investors buying out the city and running it out these are people people using their assets to help make living here more affordable um thank you for taking the issue up so quickly and I appreciate your usually Common Sense approach to ordinances so thank you
thank you anybody else here please step [Music] up hi um my name is John Santiago I live at 13 Oliver Street um didn't plan on speaking but I'm also here uh in support of a
short-term rental ordinance that benefits everybody um and I wanted to highlight an issue that I know is on a lot of people's minds um which is about you know what happens with all these quote unquote random guests that come to
town um and come into our neighborhoods but I think it's really important to acknowledge that the Dynamics in our town are much different than the Dynamics in a vacation destination as great as our town is it is not a destination people don't come here to
hang out um and I know in the short time that I've been doing it the guests that I've had have been small business owners who are coming to East Hampton as part of a small business operation you know there's growing Tech activity there's just all sorts of
interesting small businesses that you would never think of they're coming here to work and they don't have anywhere to stay or they're coming here to visit their kids who are at Williston and they don't have anywhere to stay um or they're coming to visit aging family they don't have anywhere to stay or they're coming to visit grandkids they
don't have anywhere to stay so all of my guests they're coming to do something or see somebody they're not coming to hang out um and it's it's worthwhile to have regulations that you know limit noise and um avoid kind of a party atmosphere
but Airbnb itself as a platform has a lot of built-in protections uh that limit that sort of thing um and yeah I'd also like to Echo the sentiment that was expressed already which is that you know there are a lot
of us who took this on as a way to make ends meet in an increasingly unaffordable um world um and you know that's that's why my family is doing it um the last time I looked there were
less than 1% of the entire housing stock it's like less than 8% of the whole housing stock of eastampton is involved in short-term rentals um it doesn't have anything to do with the housing crisis but it is helping a lot of people
drive the the kind of economic engine of East Hampton so I think it's worthwhile to find a way to keep it going in a way that pleases everybody thank you thank you uh anybody else in the room room like to speak for public speak please I'm here for two
reasons met me because I was here in August introducing the um and if you wouldn't mind just saying your name and address I'm sorry I'm Marvin Ward and I live right over Street here on Cottage Street uh in the old factory I was here
because Nel and I all be both believe that we need to have a state a Citywide three and we ended just like Heavenly last week or not last week the
last meeting and but it got put down and I thought after I got home that we had a lot of people giving particular places where 25 is too slow and I was hoping that the people
who are doing this are waking making that and keeping it because you know some of them could be for 3 33 I mean 30 some can be 35 because it is too small SL uh and and
as my recall is that uh land's uh I mean names uh s person can Cassy L Lindsay said that for her area
it was the same way it's too too slow and I don't know if anybody has created any kind of group for things for lesser speeds and it would be a good way to
nail it down and of course I realize that we would like to have a good uh person permanent permanent uh Chief C we don't but we don't but it does doesn't have to be done after he's done that it
could be done before because he may not very well know any of anyway my second thing is that something I went through uh before during the one minute one minute okay in in the
uh uh uh res redoing of Union is that I talked with the uh engineer an about correcting the uh segment of the small segment of the sidewalk on the
other side of the re damn I fell getting on it on the ice last time and I could not get up until somebody else came and helped me I have an artificial hip I'm 83 and I I just said you got to help me
and push me and I'll just push me over until I can get my feet on something that is not ice but I talked beforehand with Diane and she said they were going to do it because it's just this just the UN
understand of the thing but there's a whole bunch of asphalts of different types and then there are things that are ra rotten things metal things standing up and TR trembling trembling
so I want to see why they can't do it now so that it is because the people who use that are people who are walking or on car you know w s or anything and I you know I
didn't get hurt I just couldn't get up so and that's your three minutes that's it I know thank you very much I'm ready to say goodbye I appreciate that but I really was I really unced about it because I other people told me about it too and because I live on that side of
the street I use it all the time thank you and anybody else from in the room like to speak a public speak uh okay I see none uh looks like Jesus you can unmute yourself do we need to
um public hearing oh oh it's oh good good point this is it's just one person so I'm fine with that yeah go ahead should I speak during the public hearing or now if if you here to speak for the public hearing then yes during the public hearing um and is that the
the one on the resolution for the school funding no uh no but we we I will ask you to speak at that time so if you just bear with us I'll yeah I'm GNA mute for now then okay sounds good thank you uh and I would entertain a motion to open the public hearing move
second we have a motion in the second second any further discussion all those in favor okay any nose any exensions okay public hearing is open and um the first thing we have on the public hearing tonight uh and I will take this as we
currently do not have an official chair um because we have not met um since our last meeting um was a request from Parks and W and the Parks Commission to uh examine the traffic flow going into nuk park and I see that we have the parks
director John Mason here and um let me just admit that and I think maybe we have some Commissioners potentially okay perfect um so I'll just give the rundown and John you can fill in anything I miss um
so this came to us and it seemed like it was a request of necessity um as the traffic pattern going into nanuk park has created some issues historically um and a couple of those issues are um with
the current traffic pattern um which is coming in um from uh Wilston AV to the park uh and then exiting out um through the driveway and um jeez I don't have
that it's what street is it uh hisgen I think is it hisgen okay um going out to hisgen and that creates a situation where cars coming in are taking a left-hand turn into the park and cars that are leaving are also taking a
left-hand turn out of the park which is a collision Hazard um it also makes the placement of the park Kiosk for collecting fees um in a little bit of a difficult spot it creates a blind spot
for cars turning in um and it also can create a backup in front of Residential Properties when there is a backup which can then limit people that live there from being able to leave their property at busy times um and so the request was
for us to take a look at changing the traffic pattern which would be coming in from hisgen um cars would be then taking a right into the park and cars leaving the park would be taking a right out um to Wilson AB which would then uh
minimize the uh potential for a collision since they would be going um without any uh interference uh another thing that was noted was that um if this traffic pattern change happens that uh cars
leaving the park out Williston would be on the cemetery side of the street leaving so the traffic would be against a part of the street where there's no residential or sidewalks um so the traffic that way and then um coming in from hisgen there's not too many houses
on the right hand side of the street that are facing the street it's a lot of sidey yards so then it would also minimize cars going through and being close to residential um properties uh and I think one of the main things for
this would allow for power to be placed in the kiosk um for the employees of Park and wreck that are collecting the fees so they could have air conditioning and potentially even heat um and it would also potentially allow for the addition of a credit card reader um you
know a card reader that would allow people to pay the fee bu credit card um and so John I would ask if you have anything to add to that not much okay well that's good I'll take that thank you thank you
very much John Mason parks and wreck um yeah just a couple of things um when we were looking at this this past year and sent it to Public Safety um we wanted to make sure it was sent out to our neighbors um so we mailed out postcards
regarding this public hearing um we want to be good neighbors to our neighborhood um that we're part of in the park um so you'll probably be hearing input from both sides um but which is great um that people have an opinion but um we want to
we want to make sure that everybody was informed in our area if this project does move forward there will be a lot of logistics uh signage notifying people looking at next spring that we would do this um you know
contacting GPS mapping Services of where the entrance is instead of sending them one way it's actually the other so there's a lot of the small details that will be looked at um throughout the year and a lot of um public Outreach um not only to um the neighborhoods but all our
guests that come into the park um so we haven't printed our one-day passes yet so this is approved and before we print our one-day passes it would be on the one-day passes on the back that you know next year look for a new traffic pattern our pavilion rental is same thing we
have all their emails phone numbers reaching out to them letting them know just so you know if you rent next year we'll be looking at this to you know try to get a try to limit the amount of um it's been 75 years uh that road going that way so
uh there's a lot of history so there be uh you know there'll be a lot of Education that goes in with that um to let folks know so I just wanted to um throw those in there as well thank you for your time thanks um do any of the oh um John we might have some questions for you so don't go too
far stay up here stay up here c i stretched out counc kazinski did you wantan to hi there there certainly seems to be lots of benefits in doing this uh I just had a question about some of the specifics and it had to do actually one question
right now and that had to do with Imagining the traffic flow coming in from hisgen down okay just to where the booth is and will there be a no pass through
to Williston at that point or will the traffic still be allowed to flow the traffic would still be allow to flow into L and then wil yes so into the park or through on to so folks would still have to kind of pay attention the right Turners coming out
of the park will still have to pay attention to what's coming in this direction it wouldn't be something like where they oh geez okay nobody's going to do that right and that's you know some Logistics put it get stop sign out so you you have a so there'll be a stop
there I you would you would Envision and then proceeding and the toll booth would be relocated down into the park about 150 to 175 ft uh and and one of the having it down into the park and having the line being
created into the park instead of on the public um access road is is really one of the the main uh concerns we want to solve sounds like it would help with a lot of the traffic situations at least at this point Thank you
and um thank you um I'll just be fully transparent ahead of time I'm not ready to vote Yes on this tonight and I'm I'm hoping that we'll extend this conversation uh in
part specifically I'm I'm genuinely concerned about Taft Avenue I think we're talking about hiskin but the reality is roads have to feed into hisin in order to get into the park right so that's first um we have a lot of
students from Williston who walk up um hisin uh to get to the park right cuz they their playing fields are there and things of that nature um the the hisin between um Garfield and Ward doesn't
have a sidewalk um and students I'm not sure if you know this they often just walk right up the middle of the street right um and sometimes we're kind of with a needle right walking through sometimes I walk on both sides of the
street right and so we're trying to get up um there but Taft in particular there's a lot of dog walkers there's a lot of Walkers um there's no sidewalk on Taft at all um I having spoken to Residents there I think that they would prefer not
to have a sidewalk there because I think they they appreciate that but when Willison is in school and they have a lot of sports there's traffic on both sides of that street um and so that's of great concern because people who are coming from the planes are going to drive right down Taft Avenue so that's a
real concern for me not just because I walk my dog on top but because of that particular um situation and so um there's grandkids on that street there's kids on that street um and
there's not a a lot of uh room for that I know as drivers we often even though we're looking at hopefully having 25 miles an hour I'm not sure but we have a tendency of driving a little bit faster uh when we're trying to get somewhere right and
I I don't think that um those particular streets they already deal a lot with schools of people trying to get to school uh and things of that nature so that's of concern to me right um so getting to my questions right um when
you say when you say 150 ft into the park where about how what is where is that exactly if you could give me is that like halfway up to the top of the hill just past so you have the the maintenance our maintenance road then you have the water department Shore departments DPW access road right at
just before in between those two um and there's there's grass area that actually can be created to make a a wider um entrance way to make it two lanes um easy enough for the toll booth and to put the toll booth in the middle um just to follow up on yours the same amount of
cars are going to come into the park is leave the park so there's it's not changing the number that come and go it's it's it's the same so if they're speeding to leave the same folks that speed into the park speed to leave you know we deal with it all the time um it's it's as Mar would say there's a
there's a there's an issue with speeds in in town for sure and and we deal with it a lot with the park no yeah I know I'm fully aware the difference is if they come into that park right if they come into the park the way that they're coming in now um there's a lot of people
who actually leave that way so the people who some of the people who come in from that direction actually skirt and go out even though I think they're supposed to turn left I think they still turn right and go to that side of and I'm not I'm not naive we're thinking that people aren't going to do that from Wilson either yeah y so here's my
question a couple of other questions that I have one did you explore what it would look like if you put the um if you put the toll booth we'll call it a toll booth at the top of the hill because you go down and then you kind of come up so
then at the the turn right there's the park that sits right there at the the top and then there Sheen field across there did you explore the booth being there because you can actually cut into that space right there that's to the right which would allow one it would
allow the same type of long kind of line that could that could come down um which would I think do what you're trying to do there's also space there that you could create uh a pass Lane that would go off to the right there but it would
it would reduce uh it would it would change the pattern right or would keep the pattern the same it keep the pattern the same current we'd still have the exiting and entering cross traffic pattern at the top of the hill right it wouldn't solve that right um but there would be stop signs right
we talked about there could be stop signs that people would have to there there's stop signs currently there at the booth okay and so here at the bottom next to the the uh basketball courts there's parking right there correct there parking on daily field
road at the basketball courts yeah at the basketball courts so if traffic is coming in this way those if there's a line there those people parking are going to have to try to back out into that line of traffic correct we're only anticipating lines in the morning so I
don't think there's going to be any cars getting there at 8:00 to play basketball and leave at 10: after 8 I would think you if you're coming to play basketball you're probably going to be there for a little bit of a duration this is really the idea of to relieve the traffic flow is the Saturday and Sunday mornings when
when folks have 10 soccer games at 8:00 or little league and softball pickle ball wants to get in Pavilion Rentals you know it's after that those hours there's really no backup um you know occasionally if a big event happens where they're all coming at once but
it's sporadic after that it's it's it's hammering those first early hours right and is there is there Baseball playing at daily field that early in the morning no they usually start start around 9:30 10:00 mhm okay that's most of my
questions for now did someone over here have a question coun Smith I just my my question is simple by comparison right now there's a draw bar that goes across the road with a different pack uh pattern would that still come down when
the park is closed so we would want to if we went forward with this we would want to keep the those gates open year round okay and and and still just have the the brown gate in the park would be the one that would be closed off but to keep those those year round um because
we also have we're looking at putting a gate at the access road behind the tennis courts where Park and wreck and DPW and water and sewer have to get in because they have to monitor the wells um down there that they would have access so maintaining that road you know
the other thing is when people come now to our Park office they drive into to see our Park office office and for them to go back to the park they have to go one way the wrong way or go all the way around the neighborhoods and come back in um so you know for people that want to stop pay for a pavilion picnic site
do whatever they can stop in and then continue on their way into the park I think and one of the things that we talked about in committee was that if this traffic pattern change happens then the traffic would be coming into the park past the park and wreck offices so
that would be another you know kind of set of eyes of what's coming into the the park um and and you know for safety again I think the whole reason this was brought up was around safety cuz I I think what you said was correct if a car comes in a car goes out so there's going
to be no discernable traffic change other than the direction that that car is going that car will still be coming in or out it's just the direction it's going so you're not really changing anything other than the direction of the car's travel and the timing you know so
from 4 4:00 4 to 6 say on the on the weekdays when um baseball soccer whether high school has a game that that line they're lined up they're one by one by my office you know
non-stop I mean I can't even pull out of my uh parking lot getting out of my office because the cars are going one by one it's just it's changing the time of the effect on the neighborhoods any other questions okay um do do you have any of the park Commissioners do you know if they'd like
to talk you I can't see that far carollyn okay yeah go ahead Carol I think um desire supposed to be here too thanks John go ahead
carollyn uh hi thank you for the time to talk about this and John thanks for all that detail the only thing I wanted to add I I think to Echo what John said I I appreciate the concerns about the traffic patterns on the two different roads and it is the same number of cars going in and out that exist now they
come in they have to leave um the one thing that I know and this was still something we were working on but one of the delays that happens with people who have passes and people who are paying so John mentioned or um one of the Commissioners or one of the um committee
members mentioned the possibility of using some kind of electronic payment system I think the additional possibility would be during busy times if we had the Staffing to allow people with passes to go through in a more timely manner and that would also decrease the weight times and the lines
that might form okay thank you uh and it looks like we have is that East Hampton basketball okay sorry it's actually I don't know why it's under EA
I was supposed to be there but we are currently at a playoff basketball game so I was able to send in person but I mean echoing everything that Ben said there's still going to be headaches that we need to address with this beating and the number of people in and out and maybe working with the programs to adjust timing and stuff like that but
it's really just trying to you know get that entrance inside the park and then let's still worry about the headaches I mean we're still going to have the will kids walking in the middle of the road which maybe we need to address as well with well that we look to put in some sort of walking LAN or you know some
sort of sidewalk to help with the movement of them but um definitely support everything that has been said again there's certainly things we still have to work on but I think the main focus is just trying to get that switch to allow for more room for cars to line up and a better flow of
traffic okay thank you uh so anybody else from the council or the parks I guess we would open it up to uh public anybody if just come up to the podium state your name and address for the record and and um okay Marie Ferraro 48
Brian AV and here at East tampon first of all I want to thank Council uh denam for bringing up the concern about the congestion on his gav um just to address it very quickly you have um virtually One Direction of traffic coming into the
park currently as we all know from Williston to louns and let's talk about the cross traffic and that's really where the issue is um if you change the traffic pattern you're talking about hiskin however you're not really
recognizing that to get to his hisin you have Taft Garfield in two directions you've got people cutting in through the high school and you have Brian AB this area is already very heavily congested with traffic from the high school itself
which changed dramatically when the high school was moved from its former location where the parking lot is to where it is now which used to be the Grove of trees so that made Brian AB a Central Avenue for the high school
school buses delivery trucks obviously parents and children okay so you've already got a very congested area now you have four to five streets converging at that hisan entrance near The Stone building and you're going to have worse
backup than you want already have on louns to say that there are seven houses on louns that are impacted that can't get out of their driveway while Brian a and hisgen a have had problems getting out of their driveway since the high
school was moved so that's just part for the course right now I think it's a great idea to come up to a different solution for that cross traffic is it perhaps that loun AB should be one way coming into the park and that hisan
remains an exit for that Park the the pedestrian traffic in that area on hisken is phenomenal I live there and I see children on bicycles from three and four years old they're on the sidewalk they're on the street innumerable dog
walkers the Williston sports teams as mentioned and you're going to tell teenagers at Willison sure just use the sidewalk well good luck and again I haven't been there for 75 years but I have noticed a change in the congestion
pedestrian and car traffic in the 15 years that I've been there and yes we're trying to remove move away from this car Centric center of town and by move changing this traffic pattern the way it's been suggested I don't think it
really helps that area it already is very heavily congested with traffic and I applaud the use of a bike path the encouragement of people walking and all of that it's a wonderful use of the park and the facilities and I
do like the schematic that Mr Mason was kind enough to send to me that showed two-way traffic within the park itself and I think moving the kiosk is another great solution and I think it would also be helpful as you mentioned to
eventually Electrify that little toll booth you know from 1900 and um maybe have have like you said have people Reserve things online instead of calling the office once they reserve a pavilion or what have you
online or buy a pass why aren't they giving a QR code like some of the very busy garages and in the uh cities Boston has it Springfield all over the place so I think modernizing the kiosk is a
helpful solution to expedite the traffic and lastly I want to mention the same amount of cars going in is going out yes technically that is accurate however when you go to a sporting event or an event that you've been invited to
at a pavilion you're converging at the same time however your exit is intermittent and I live there and on the weekends I know exactly what that difference is they leave the park intermittently but they do arrive
simultaneously and that's the congestion that you currently have so I don't want to see that same congestion transferred to hisin and basically that's plenty to say about it um and I thank you all for your
time anybody else you know the drill good evening everybody uh I'm Jeff bag I live at 49 taav with my wife Megan um I did want to thank uh director Mason for sending the abuts notification it's extremely helpful for this kind of
discussion so that's really appreciated um Megan and I just wanted to urge the city council to wait to approve this change until additional information is provided and considered things like options to install speed tables on Taft Avenue and possibly other
streets and a detailed sign plan for ensuring that visitors will be able to find the park since this was described at the past the past couple Parks Parks Commission meetings as kind of an easy or short money project perhaps the
effort could be considered temporary and explored as a trial run some things that um have come up at the past couple meetings um that we we were able to listen to um were that this will greatly improve safety and will reduce the Imp to residents on LS
unfortunately we see this as merely Shifting the impacts to residents of taav hiskin and Garfield AV um for minimal gain the safety concern of Crossing traffic at the entrance seems to be low given that the intersection is
a two-way stop and vehicles are traveling very slow as they exit the line of cars on louns on the weekend could be eliminated by moving the toll booth into the park um we've heard that the increase will U we heard that this change will not increase the number of
cars entering the park but as residents of Taft Avenue it'll represent a significant increase in the cars traveling down the road that we live on to enter the park um please consider that the propos The Proposal sounds minor but the
impacts are spread out beyond the park boundaries and I know that the council has a pretty narrow uh vote ahead of you to change the directional flow of one Street but the impacts are are spread out amongst this entire neighborhood the characteristics of Road
of a road needs to be factored in considered data shows that a wide roadway allows drivers to drive faster more easily um the car and looking at Willison AV which is a straight and Flat Road with a big curve onto louns
automatically slows traffic and the remainder of louns is very narrow and it's difficult to go fast on Ta daab on the other hand is extremely wide which makes it easier for drivers to go fast and unlike Willison have Taft has a long gradual downhill slope which will
further increase the likelihood of high vehicle speeds um tap daav has no Lane markings um no no painted lines and no speed limit signs so we haven't discussed this with our neighbors but we are asking that the city council not approve the change
until the city has one evaluated options to install two or three temporary speed tables on Taft like the one that's on Greenwood Court um two we would like to confirm the ability to install a 25 mph speed limit sign on Taft AV and confirm that
the police department would be willing to install a your speed radar sign uh my understanding is that without a speed limit sign they can't they can't post those your speed limit signs and then three that Pro uh provide a sign plan with details on the location
size and type of signs that would be used to get people off Park Street down Taft and also off Willison a on the Garfield and on the hisin I think I think the city council has an opportunity to understand what kind of signs would be used and where they would be located before you make this
decision and then the last one would be if approved and implemented just a method to track and monitor the effectiveness of the speed tables and a way to track complaints and issues with an opportunity to review after a year um the city council should be diligent in
considering the seemingly minor requests that will have a big impact on neighborhoods around the park it seems like the impacts are not being resolved by they're they're not being resolved they're being relocated the city council needs to be sure to consider that this is about this is not just about
eastampton residents it's also about buses uh from eastampton buses from other towns parents of visiting sports teams family members of sports teams pickle ball players the future dog park people all access in the park in a different way than it's been done in the
past 75 years so while it sounds like a minor vote it has a big impact and we're hoping you consider the broader impacts thanks anybody else like to speak please step to the podium hi um my name is Katherine Hancock I live at for Taft which excuse
me is at the top of the hill um and as you're going out of the park it'd be on the left side and I also have a neighbor um who's on Park Street both of our driveways are about maybe 30 to 40 ft
from the corner and half of the town is going to be coming from Park Street and turning right to race down Taft Avenue and there's a wall there I don't know if
any of you have probably not noticed it but um as you go around that corner that house has a fairly large wall so it's basically it's a blind Corner um there's also going to be a bike trail there that's coming soon so you're going
to have people racing around a blind corner across a bike path and then you've got two driveways that are really close as it is right now when I back out of my driveway there's a lot of you know cars that have to sort of Slam on the brakes because they don't they don't see
that I'm there so I think that's a factor that needs to be considered I and also people do speed I mean either way they speed but I feel like um it's it's something that needs to be addressed regardless because of the use
on Taft Avenue um the Willison kids um hisun is just always going to have kids walking down the middle of that street Willison tries really hard they I mean every Tuesday they have a
meeting and they talk to the kids about safety on Park Street on hisan don't do this the kids are just they're going to do what they're going to do so I don't think you can count on a lot of changes coming from that piece of it um and the
other thing is that intersection hisan and Brian is horrible um there's like bushes that block you can't see there's a stop sign on Brian but not on hisgen and I think there's a
huge problem with traffic going there and potential for a lot of accidents there already been accidents there um there's also been accidents on Taft and Park Street as well um I think that's it okay thank you for
listening you I appreciate it feel free to step to the podium state your name and address for the record thank you I'm Bob Graham from 20 Taft Avenue adjacent to Williston Academy parking lot and the summer summer soccer programs and sports programs that we
have to deal with on a daily basis in a nightly basis um I think we need some feasibility studies before we make a vote here back when I was a kid a long time
ago not 75 years ago but 66 years ago they put a toll booth at the top of the hill going into ntic park they did that primarily for one reason proposition two and a half it
killed the recreation department really did it did away with everything we had to charge for picnic sites when I was a boy we never charged a thing we used to ride our bikes up the daily field and that's where we learned how to play soccer behind the old high
school yachty Bugatti the recreation director would throw a bunch of balls out there and he'd say have fun boys go up with his cup of coffee smoke his uh cigarettes and do his Racing for him God's honest truth but I think we really got to be
concerned about Taft daav and Kathy hit the nail right on the head I'm not opposed to charging fees we have to for the park Department to survive that's an issue that it's not going to go away but safety is my main concern everybody when that High School
leaves at the end of the day we've got kids racing each other from Brian to Taff to see who can get the Park Street first I have jumped out in the road numerous times and actually followed somebody with my
hearse racing to school after I've told them to stop and slow down on a daily basis and I've even gone to the police department and suggested we do something about this I drove my hearse van and pulled in front of this young man he had his girlfriend with him and I asked him
to roll down the window I did not acost him I just asked him to roll down his window and I said to him can you read what it says on my vehicle FAL home I says the last thing I want to do young man is be meeting your parents or this
young lady's parents in my funeral home because you wrapped yourself around a tree trying to get some place in a hurry there is nothing that important but we are talking about safety and you cannot you cannot use
hisin or or Brian a or Taft daav to do this we got parents coming in now that come flying down the street take a left go over onto the right into on Brian and shoot through the parking l lot to get
their kids to practice on time it's not going to slow it down and I think a feasibility study is definitely in order here and I think that we really have to have some speed humps on Brian and hiskin and Taft daav to slow the traffic
down someone is going to get killed and if we don't do something as leaders and speak up and I usually don't come to these public hearings but this is a real safety concern that we have to address thank you thank you anybody else in here
like to speak before I go to people online okay uh it looks like we have uh a couple people so I'm just going to go with the one I see first which is uh Daniel sadic
sidic hi Dan zonic uh I live on paav I've been there for 30 plus years it seems like I might be in the minority here but I support this change okay the cars that come out of
the park at night fly out of there sometimes when there's sporting events there there could be up to a 100 cars leaving there I've seen them exit the park and on hisin take a a right onto the dead end of tap da just to turn
around and not know where they're going it would be much easier I think if cars were going in that way just to to clarify a few points that people made williston's school year ends at the beginning of May the park I don't
believe opens until the middle of of April so you're talking about two weeks that there would be an impact and then in the fall um I think that it would be it's living on Taft it's a lot easier to pull onto Taft from Park Street than it is to
pull off of Taft onto Park and most of the people that come out of the park take a bri take a left onto Taft AV and just fly down the Park Street I I support this I don't have a problem with pushing the vote off until the summer or even in the fall if you're going to do a
feasibility study one thing I would recommend that you do before the park opens is making hisin and Taft a four-way stop not a two-way stop so the cars exiting the park have to stop and cars coming up his would have to stop as well I think that would make it a lot
safer thank you thank you okay and it looks like the next one is uh Karina thank you Karina shred I live at 15 LS Avenue the um Park entrance Booth is or
kiosk is placed in the street directly across from my house so I have witnessed the impact of the location of the entrance to the park and the direction the traffic is rooted for over 20 years the current configuration um causes a lot of
Confusion And it absolutely is dangerous the cross traffic um on a daily basis when when it's busy I witness cars confused about which direction um lots of people turn right they can't see
around the kosk um and it's dangerous not only to individuals who are driving but it's Danger dangerous to pedestrians it's dangerous to um children to students to people who are walking their dogs the
backup of cars um idling is extremely disruptive to residents on louns and on Williston if you change the direction the backup of cars is going to be inside of the park um the the backup of cars as well
as the location of the kiosk um impacts access to my drive way um so I support changing the flow of traffic and moving the kiosk if you're not agreeable to changing the flow of traffic at this time because you want further time to
consider it I would ask that you at at a minimum consider um approving moving the kiosk into the park as it sounds as though um no one has objected to um that change thank you so much thank you and
uh next would be Nicole J okay hi I'm a resident on Williston and um recently had a baby and it sounds like safety is concern for people who live on both sides of the park um I really don't have a strong preference
either way except when it comes to speeding which people have brought up um numerous times which people are speeding up and down Williston as well um the speed limits actually 35 which feels very high for a school zone and I think
the issue is more implementing speed tables and a lower speed limit on whether the direction of the park is reversed or whether it stays the same um to create a safer environment for
pedestrians and drivers as well um especially children since it's mostly children that are using this park um and parents walking over with young children um and strollers I think we
really need to implement feed bumps on won as well as a reduced speed limit there thank you uh it looks like we have someone whose name not available hi sorry I don't know why my name's not available my name is Emily
Billo um I live on seven LS um I've lived here for 11 years and I support the idea of switching the traffic pattern um I just wanted to add a concern that I've had since I've lived here
um is that if changing I think changing the visibility would actually help um the small playground is not visible if you're driving up from louns um and cars will drive really fast down louns and there's little kids
playing there and um if the traffic pattern was coming from the other direction you would be able to see a small playground very easily and you'd also be able to park easier um I know I just really like the idea so I just
wanted to add that okay thank you anybody else from the public like to speak on this topic uh uh actually hold on one second um I'm going to take people that haven't spoken yet
first okay uh J Paul hi gilo yes um my name is Paul gilo I live at 103 East Street in East Hampton and um I'm a member of the eastn soccer board and you know we definitely
I feel like the suggestion of moving the kiosk further into the park is uh is very necessary especially as was mentioned earlier on the weekends when uh a lot of that traffic backs up people are kind of confused I think
sometimes as to whether they have to pay or not and so certainly adding some modernization we really fully support that so that there's a there's a pass through Lane for people that already have passes uh perhaps some sort of electronic payment would probably also
speed things up so definitely very much in support of that and in general um I think all the concerns that were raised about speeding and traffic patterns are are valid um it does seem to make sense to be able to have right turns as
opposed to competing left turns for people entering and exiting at those busy times thank you thank you okay so uh if there's anybody else that would like to speak before we close public speak if you want to yep you can
so once again Marie Ferraro um speaking from Brian a um Mr zidon mentioned that the Williston curriculum ends in May um he may not be aware that they have a very intensive summer sports program
that I believe starts early June and Carries right through the summer tennis soccer and you name it so the the traffic and the pedestrian traffic is just the same as in this during the
school year thank you thank you okay so at this yeah councelor Quin before we close I wondered if I might ask someone a question in the audience because of his planning former planner
status you know I think I I won't object to that this time I think it's not common practice but I was wondering if Mr bad could come to the podium if you wouldn't mind as a former city planner uh I would ask you to maybe put that hat
on just for a moment only a second um you don't have to you don't have to you you don't have to do any of this but it had to do with with your suggestions and other suggestions of speed tables uh is there such I I such a thing
as a portable speed table or a rentable speed table that you have any had any experience with and are they expensive I am probably not equipped to answer those questions but there's one that's been implemented on Greenwood Court so and I think it's done by DPW so it's probably
a DPW question something okay yeah I I appreciate that uh no I think I think we're good appreciate it sorry to put you on the spot but uh and and appreciate your Indulgence do you have any other no no okay Council Riley um yeah so I mean
look obviously I'm a strong supporter of good governance and the request for things like feasibility studies or um taking a look at other uh traffic mitigation patterns I think is fair as a
request um I was prepared to vote Yes on this tonight and the only reason why is because at the committee level I have been working on this policy topic for 5 months and and it is a little
frustrating that all of the things that we've heard from people tonight nobody came to any of our meetings to talk about this and and it's fine the public hearing is is absolutely a time to have these kinds of conversations as well the challenge being is that we spent five
months working with the parks and rec Commissioners and the parks and rec department and the city council to talk about these things and now we have 5 months that we've lost on a policy solution because nobody came to talk to us about the things that you've talked
about tonight well it's okay excuse me so we'll just hold our comments unless you have something further to say and then I'll invite you to the podium so with with that said I would just ask that if the city council moves this back to the
Public Safety Committee that you come to the meetings and talk to us about these things and stay engaged because now what we're talking about is a policy Solution that's going to have to wait until next year um because we can't do all of these types of changes in the middle of the
winter um so that's that's the only frustration that I have is that I wish that you all had shared these things with us over the last five months um but I am happy to send it back to committee if that's what the council wishes
this um Council Conor so admittedly I have not been in the meetings that have been going on since this is my first meeting um but H I am a person who goes toward the easy before we go toward the
difficult and I think John mentioned it some other folks have mentioned it here that step one might be to just move the toll booth and that may mitigate the lines that may mitigate traffic in the
neighborhood and we may have solved a problem we don't know but I think absent and listening to what all of you folks have said tonight it makes sense I haven't heard the rest of it so I admit that I'm only getting half the
story but to me it feels like you know everyone universally believes that moving the toll booth will help so my belief is let's not let's not get a Cadillac when we can do just fine with I
won't disparage any other car but um we can do just fine with something else and that feels more more easy feels easier and you can still get the electricity in it you can still talk about the the electronic
payment you can still do all of those things which will mitigate the lines and at the end of the day in a year or a season we go through this and it's still a nightmare then we need to come back to the table and have a conversation about
we need to do more because right now it just feels to me like we could do something really simple quickly probably not terribly expensive including the the speed tables and see where that gets us those are my two senses thank you
councelor Peak I actually have a very similar comment but I wanted to phrase it as a question to Mr Mason if that's okay oh sure please yeah but only if you want to so it seems like just hearing
everything here um there's kind of I want to make sure I understand this correctly that there there's what your The Proposal that that you're laying out really kind of has two components and one of the components is about changing the traffic direction outside of the park and one of the components is about
changing the location of the toll booth and and adding features and amenities to the toll booth that would be desirable within the park is there a reason why the second thing cannot happen without the first thing sure I'd be glad to
answer that um so back uh well over a year ago um when we had a uh City we had two City Engineers on staff I met with them on site to work with me on a design
to move the toll booth into the park um the one city engineer left the city leaving us with only one with so many projects we we've had in the city it was a small side project for our city engineer compared to everything else
they've been working on um we've since the city has hired a second one I've had uh conversations with the city engineer um when the weather breaks they're going to come back back down and look at designing the toll booth into the park
so we looked at a while ago we're going to be revisiting that shortage and Staffing so that is something we still wanted to move forward with not withstanding this this part secondly um like many of the folks have said I'm ins
support it or or against it uh the speeding is a problem within the neighborhood within the park um it it is a concern it's a concern for uh Park as people that drop off a child in the Park race in to drop off a child um you know
it it's counterproductive to to think about it and and we put speed bumps in and and a lot of times it will turn into jumps you know to be quite honest with you um I met with DPW in the fall um to discuss the
feasibility study if we wanted to go down that route we've used them in the city uh in the city in the past we we've used a um a traffic study group um through uh DPW and I've been in touch with them that just in case we go down
this road we might be going down this road so we might be looking for a quote so we did some of that leg work as well if you know CU like I said earlier we want to make sure we're meeting the neighborhood and everybody is going to be happy with whatever resolution that can come out of this so whatever steps
need to be taken on the park staff um to meet um a resolution we're we're more than happy to to work with with all the folks um at the table that's super helpful do you mind if I just please follow up so just to confirm though like and and I'm not saying I'm like I I
think that the this the traffic situation is a really interesting situation there's a lot of perspective it's clearly a complex traffic situation there's a lot of different perspect different people coming at this from different angles and I think that's all that's all fine and valid I just want the not withstanding the direction of
the traffic the the toll booth thing is something we can move forward with and us if we don't have it on our agenda it's not something you move forward we being the city not we being the city council yes eastampton
can move forward with um and if we were I don't know I want to continue talking about this but if if the council were of the decision that that that we wanted to disc deliberate on this further or request a study or anything like this
doing so would it not hold you up on the toll booth thing in any way no the only thing that's going to be holding um potentially something up is after I get designs um from city engineer and designing a toll booth entrance where the toll bu can be placed in in the
middle looking at the cost whether how much we can get done inhouse or how much we have to Outsource so where you guys would be come back into play for that part of it would be potential F uh funding it okay thank you you're welcome are done yeah thank you director Mason I
I very much appreciate the the effort I know that this was a longer conversation maybe than was anticipa no I was anticipating a long one but I I appreciate the dedication of you and the Commissioners to address this issue right and and I fully respect um the
residents who have been dealing with the entrance of this right um and I respect the residents and neighbors who have been dealing with the exit issue of this particular situation but when you think about potential of moving the booth the
toll booth you know can you think about moving it to a couple of like moving it to a couple of different locations so that we can actually see what what does that look like if it's here and what would it look like if it was actually even farther into the then we're going to be looking at a much higher cost
currently where it's being placed there's power directly above it that power line actually goes to the DPW there's no longer power on that line going into the park it would have to be fed from somewhere much further away and a
much longer line and that is a could be a costly proposition um so I mean we can look at it but the easy simple solution is moving it down about 150 ft where there's power right above you drop a line you're ready to go and and um and you can supply power my concern with
that is that's going to be a turn and you're not going to get many traffic much traffic around that corner within that 150 feet that's going to be able to get around so that's just my observation kind of opinion because you're on a you're on a turn but I would appreciate being able to see what it might look
like if it was farther in at that particular Road change right um I'm just I'm just asking um but but I I do I do want to acknowledge the the level of concern from everybody that I heard today um the level of frustration
that I heard today from particularly from the neighbors who were dealing with these things and I think it's clear to city council we really have a speed issue within the city that we really need to be thinking about because I mean it really is bad particularly on I think I think Williston I think Taff Brian Garfield
hisan I mean it's really bad like like like Mr um Graham was saying uh you know I've walked out into the middle of the street too and told people like slow down right I mean it's really bad I do it all the time yeah I'm sure I'm sure
so just want to acknowledge that but it' be really great to have a couple of different options to see what that would look like okay um and I see that we have Greg nutman who has his hand up so I would i' would love to give Greg and then I can if you have a question after Greg why don't you go
ahead and and uh join us good evening everyone I'm Greg nman director of public works for the city I just listening to the conversation here I think we have an opportunity kind of approaching us here with the Park season um getting underway in the next couple months and um and in that
opportunity in that time frame you know we'll have the opportunity to capture traffic counts and speed data for a complete season of the park operation you know maybe moving the toll booth will fix part of the um solve some of the challenge but if we could get if we had a Year's worth of traffic data counting which cars were on which street
at what time and um we could you can get their average speed I mean it's not something DPW could fund but we do have consultant that could could help us with that and really offer a very broad picture into into what's happening where and then offer you know expert insight into you know the reaction that happens
if we make a change in one spot or the other so um I I think if it's something that this traffic pattern change is something that the city as a whole really wants to um evaluate to do it properly looking at looking at the
impact on one street from the change on the other um is something something that really needs to happen and the chance to do that uh starts soon to get a full season's worth of data and then you know have this conversation with some real reliable information okay thanks Greg um any
other thoughts uh JT Council I just want to say I came in here tonight fully expecting to vote in favor of this uh but after listening to all the concerns from a lot of the neighbors uh that I didn't think of Prior prior to hearing them this evening um I want to take
pause and I think it would be a great idea to revisit this um at a later time to give this more thought and maybe look towards a feasibility study um or traffic patterns like uh Greg nutman said um and I think whether we decide
ultimately to change a traffic pattern or not I think this brings to light again the problem that has been since the high schools moved and maybe whether the traffic pattern changes or not we can do something about the speed on on those on those feeder roads to the high school because that obviously has been a problem and it's been a problem since
the high school move so if nothing else maybe it brought that to light maybe something could be done with that okay thanks any other thoughts councilor Kinski thank you uh I just want to say I came in here leaning towards saying yes
it certainly makes a lot of sense but wow there's a lot of good discussion and folks who came to speak and I'd like to thank Mr Mason and the parks uh Department for getting the word out before the public hearing uh because we
need to hear all that type of information in order to make good decisions so thank you Mr Mason for that effort uh what I'm hearing is that you have the authority or the parks department has the authority to move the
kiosk and that may very well be coming for 150 foot maybe temporary move you don't have to go through electrical expenses and con you know all sorts of get a study to find out about that move to no we we no we'd have to develop the
to be able to put the toll booth in the center there still has to be construction there's going to be documents that need to be put together by uh the city engineer and then going out to bid to create an ENT an entrance point where the toll booth can be in the middle traffic can leave the park and
enter the park um in between that so they're not waiting on that so they're it it can happen at some point hopefully this season to get the toll booth moved down but we can't just take the toll booth moving in the middle of the the park right now and say we're it's in the
middle there's there's not enough room yeah there's not enough room down into the park to do that or else we would have done it long ago okay all right thank you uh I also wanted to say that you know discussing the one way and the impact on on the neighborhoods louns and
the exit hisgen Taff Brian that's all very important because it raises the issue of four-way stop at the intersection of hisgen and Taft and that's something that is clearly within the authority of this Council to do and
within this community to do if that's going to be helpful uh I hope you'll stay tuned to that discussion if we had that way uh and I'm not sure that we need to wait for a decision on the entire process to Institute uh a stop at
that inter section uh the kiosk is being worked on speed tables ought to be something that we we consider I think uh if it's a danger to for for the for the speeds now just a reminder for folks
entering in might be helpful enough to provide enough safety to help prevent an accident uh and exit the same the same the same issue whether the entrance is this way or that way U so I would look
into those issues okay and I would be amable to proceeding on this at another time uh Council Conor just real quick John sorry to make you stand up again um
but for coming to the council for potentially funding to do the wiring and the moving and the construction and all of that there is no role for the council for you to make the decision to move the key Kos no no that's on Park property we
can do that on our own okay thank you um so I think we'll just so yeah so a couple things here I just want to say a final statement before we take an action here is you know I I consider myself a pragmatist and you
know if you look at this and remove yourself from being a property owner in the area affected which I can realize is difficult to do the pragmatic thing to do is to fix the traffic pattern I mean if it it's very simple I mean the the most simple piece of this is if you look
at daily field road which goes from Taft to the park entrance um it's the same distance um as the entrance from louns to the entrance of the high school but in that space there's uh 11 houses so if
there is a backup on daily field road not one house is affected by that backup not it would I mean I don't think that the the backup has ever gotten into the entrance of the high school from the entrance of the park and maybe it has and but I would say it would be very
probably rare for that to to spill out onto his Guin and to Taft um and what I think is really the issue here and what I'm from what I'm hearing is that we have a a speeding and um you know a traffic issue in this neighborhood which
I think is represented across the city um right now in public safety we have I think three items around speeding and traffic calming Med measures um including one from West Street uh we have a review of traffic rules and orders for speeding we this is an issue
that is 100% affecting the entire city and and and it hits us I think every every time we talk about this so um you know obviously you know what I would be prepared to do is I would be prepared to um you know enter an item into public safety where where we alongside the West
Street um about looking at putting fog lines on tdav um about narrowing the street because is a wide Street um in you know in conjunction um with hisgen and Brian and looking at the high school and other potential so I think that this
is something that Public Safety should be discussing with the neighbors this is something that we should be trying to solve um now it seems like the sentiment is to not move forward with this tonight even though I think the pragmatic thing to do would be to move forward with this tonight because if we are going to move
that kiosk it makes zero sense to move it where you're going to have cars crossing in front of each other it just doesn't make any sense um but that being said and I will also say you know like I think it has to be acknowledged that me this is my precinct I'm Precinct 4 so I'm your city counselor and you might
not like me right now but but I think you know the dangerous part of taav is not turning into Taft daav it's turning out of Taft daav onto Park Street that's a blind corner and you kind of have to hold your breath when you pull out of there so right now we're asking people to hold their breath when they're leaving the park if they're going from
the you know the part of town that is going towards Southampton um and turning in there is not that difficult uh you know so and again I for me you know living here for 28 years and and frequenting this area a lot it's six of
one half dozen of another I mean it's a car going one way or the other you still have the same amount of cars going the same speeds and to me that's simple but I get it I understand like if you were trying to root cars a different way down my street I would say something too so I don't have a problem with taking another
look at this but I think it is there's two separate issues here you know and I think that needs to be acknowledged like there is a speeding and traffic issue one and then the the a separate issue is the flow of traffic through here so I just want to I just want to acknowledge
that um and I like I don't have a horse in this race so I I have no problem bringing this back to Public Safety and allowing you all to come in and let's talk about the traffic issues right and if you if we really get down to nuts and bolts if we address some of these
traffic issues the flow of traffic is probably going to be a mood point so I'm hoping that we can get to that point because I would love you know our Parks and Rec director has has come to the table with the parks and rec commission to try to solve a problem that they are
living with and and I do I I have to say I do really feel for the people on louns if you have a line of traffic in front of your house that's stalled idling and you can't get out um I think that that is the one thing that I wish that we could fix tonight um
so you know I I guess probably the The Next Step here would be to entertain a motion to send this back to property or to Public Safety um and so we can just take another look at it but I I do feel that this is the right thing to do so um I would entertain that motion
so Mo okay second second we have a motion in a second to send this back to Public Safety any a further discussion okay all those in favor I I any NOS or extensions okay motion passes and that
brings us um no because we still have another one so this brings us to supplemental Appropriations from Capital stabilization oh wait oh I'm sorry I'm sorry we also have Bruce DAV too yeah so iy this one's easy
um and so this one is uh amending the rules uh the city ordinances appendix a traffic rules in order oneway streets to remove Brewster AV the entire distance and traffic to proceed in the southernly and southeasterly Direction um and so I I
would be happy to entertain any thoughts on this um does anybody have any thoughts on this one I think we said it all I think we said would anybody in the audience like to address this particular change
[Music] I guess not they're G yeah anybody online should say why um I'm what is sorry I speak up that's a good question and um I'm since I was not
the chair and I'm I missed that meeting I'm having a hard time remembering oh oh will okay now I know exactly I'm sorry yes so this was the the um street that we exchanged Willison for uh the rotary in front of uh
Mountain uh School Mountain View School um and so we gave them that street for that parcel of land um and now it would you know it makes sense for it to be removed because it is no longer a through street is just serving Wilson as a driveway so this one makes sense sorry
sorry my brain fart do you think we could really do that tonight I think we can I think we got this one okay any any further discussion I'm sorry anybody have any questions anybody from the public have any questions okay seeing none let's do this
um I I I move to uh first one oh jesz to amend uh oh sorry to amend appendix a traffic rules and orders Article 4 oneway streets by removing Brewster Avenue entire distance traffic to proceed into southernly and
southeasterly Direction okay we have a motion and we have a second uh do we have any further discussion on this piece I'm just please if I could um just for for the purpose of the record um This was um supported by the Public Safety Committee with a vote of two to
zero um with with your absence so perfect all right um all those in favor any against any oh thank you KH any abstentions seeing none motion passes now we will get to the
supplemental Appropriations from Capital stabilization Council Peak thank you Mr President uh okay we' got two uh two of these one is a lot more complicated uh than the other so let's do the complicated one first um it is a
appropriation of [Music] um so this is part of a uh this includes uh police vehicles this includes fire vehicles includes some Park Vehicles include some admin vehicles um the uh I
think that the the various uh department heads of the mayor can probably speak to the details um if you're curious but uh broadly the idea here uh philosophically is that cars are not
really assets they're they're liability ities the second you purchase them they lose a lot of their value and then they break and you have to fix them and so there's an idea that while leasing cars is not cheap that what you can do is
eventually set up a a Fleet Management System where every year you lease a number of cars and then uh you've leased those cars for a certain number of years if something happens to them there's you you you deal with that but but if not
that you're leasing those cars for a certain number of years and you know when you're going to be returning those cars and leasing new cars and so for the purpose of budgeting uh we can get to a place where instead of right now just for the benefit of anyone who's never
looked at a municipal budget um think Capital purchases like vehicles are not really part of the budget there's something that if we run a surplus which we usually do because we budget very conservatively uh the Departments can then uh VY for that money to to take
some of that Surplus what we call free cash and uh to use that to purchase vehicles um and many of them uh with many of them badly need and if you you don't get that free cash then you've got to stretch out uh the life span of your
vehicles longer um which leads the city to have some hilariously old Vehicles there are vehicles in our Fleet right now now there's one that we're going to talk about in a minute that is from
1995 so that's sort of like that's kind of the situation where like that this there's there's there's a lot of these things um we the the idea here is to have uh to move towards a a leasing
model uh that will give us a lot of more um predictability uh with our Fleet Management um and uh will also be helpful in uh dealing with uh or uh
implementing a lot of the goals that we've set out in terms of uh sustainability and moving towards a hybrid or electric uh Fleet so uh we reviewed this last week uh the finance committee voted to approve it 3 to Zer
um I think it's a really really interesting idea I think that doing it with a a number of a small number of vehicles uh you know to start and then sort of seeing how it plays out uh is a is a really smart idea I don't know for
sure that it is um necessarily uh going to work but I think it's a really interesting idea and I think that if it works the way that we're hoping it works it could potentially be really really really help
for helpful for the city's sort of financial management perspective to be able able to kind of understand and plan ahead for when leases are expiring um and hopefully move us uh towards getting
some of our oldest and least safe and reliable and most fuel guzzling Vehicles off of the road um so that's all I have to say about it I don't I'm sure they're representatives of the city I'll ask the mayor to come up and and um on this Tom
just quickly before the mayor uh this is a mix of hybrid I think there's a couple electric right is the couple Blazers that are in on this as well this one this round um yes so there's one so we we were hoping to do let let me back up um this process started um about three
years ago we uh in as we were developing the climate action plan uh we were working with a startup uh that we were connected to at MIT that focuses on Green Solutions for uh municipalities
and they went through through our our carbon and what what we could do more quickly than others and cars came up um so they worked with us to to put together an education plan but also some
deep research we put out an RFP to Fleet Services um that would be interested in working with us and Enterprise um got that bit um from there uh Greg nutman uh kind of took over and managing the
data that Enterprise needed and pulled in um different department heads who had existing requests in for cars as well as cars we knew just needed to go um we the
idea or the the goal was actually to do at least 50% um all electric uh two things have prevented us one ever Source um has had our applications for level three charger connections and haven't made a move on
those we're seeing some uh two uh there were vehicles that we desperately needed like police cars and we didn't have enough choices that were crash rated so we reverted to hybrid um also ordering
any vehicle right now takes a very long time to get it and and the last time we ordered hybrid um vehicles for the police was at least 6 months over what they told us um as far as working or not
um uh chair Peak uh uh captured a lot of the the reasons yeah there are questions we we have talked to other cities that have done this um both big and small I mean what you're coming down to is we um very purposely asked for the
appropriation to kind of um put some da light on what we're trying to do with the climate action plan and specifically um with our vehicles and and then this this amount of money would go into the budget um as
a line item under DPW a highway with the cost then um dispersed to various departments on the back end of it um for basically $600,000 which is a massive number we're bringing in um 10 new cars
but we're also getting rid of 1995 vehicles vehicles that that have traffic signs um welded on the bottom of them because they're rusted um and also repairs um you know we the the amount of
repairs on what's what is considered class one two and three vehicles is just going through the roof um and the idea was and then the last big motivator here was Market timing so with free cash being certified in the fall it's not a
great time to buy say an all-wheel drive or an SUV um or a plow truck which we'll talk about it in a little bit so um Greg is on line to talk about that process but also fire and PD are here to talk
about the the process frustrations and give a lot of details about where we're going um we are getting um we're getting one um EV I think it's a Blazer that's crash
rated DPW is going to to use it but the idea is the police will have time to try it out it won't be all geared up um and we will also get more data from other police departments who have used them and it's that's kind of like our our toe
in the water um we do have the charging capacity for the EVS that we've ordered right now and um and then the the hybrids um need less charging or their regenerative breaking okay uh I have a quick question
for you um a few years ago we did the honey well yep um and I I believe a part of that program was to look at outfitting buildings with solar is that where are we in that process because it seems like that would be a natural link if we're getting EVs and and plug-in
hybrid so with with honey well we terminated that part of the contract with them because they were really expensive and the management fees just weren't with it we then went out um separately forbid like we did with the enterprise we would
do with any other um uh contract because eversource did grant us the connections for this building and 32 uh the price of materials to do it uh were very high and it's small um two small arrays so we did
not get any bids we got letters of interest if we were going to do more solar at once or the cost of um the solar would come down uh we'll probably go back out to bid um once our new sustainability coordinator takes a good
look at what we have and um also other locations we now might be able to put solar on the incentives from the state are a little different and um so far direct pay which is the direct cash back to municipality to do
that is is still happening has written turn not good thank you yep any other questions councelor denam yeah just uh one quick comment um first um I I'm not taking it personally but I'm struggling when councelor Peak here says that 1995
is really really old so vividly but anyway um I I've thought about something since the last time that we met and and part of this has to do with kind of our
current Global financial situation that's a little bit a little bit shaky right so one um can you can you or can um assessor uh Patel um you know is now
the right time to be spending this amount of money when we're on kind of shaky ground and that's the first question and the second question I have if I if I understood the Pres and this stems also from the financial situation that we're in and
this is maybe uh director nutman can also answer but for what I heard from the presentation right was that um not eversource um enterprise Enterprise thank you um they uh are really going to
take care of the maintenance of the vehicles and and things of that nature right if there's an issue with them they're going to manage some of those pieces um so I believe that we have two mechanics in the city so are their positions in any way in Jeopardy as a
result of us now Outsourcing our Fleet so I just want to make sure that our jobs in the city are being protected yeah no one's losing their jobs and the need for the mechanics actually this would would help them do other things that like were not able to do also tires
and and whatnot um Greg who oversees Highway can probably speak to that a little more the um money question um so um yes things are are shaky um but we've been putting
money aside in capital for this first appropriation and putting this lease into the budget is something we can plan for it also we're not um we're not wedded to it's it's a 5 year expenditure
um and we're not we don't have to renew the lease there's an option to buy them out there's an option to just give them back um there's an option to add cars um if we can afford it but um I had a great example and I totally forgot um there
was something else that we did um and brought it into the budget for predictability and knowing what the cost would rather than coming back for Capital um I when I'm at finance a couple of times we've talked about um
looking at these kind of expense different expenses and how we can bring money back into the budget and reduce the amount of free cash it's kind of like a tax return you know it feels great when you get the check but you're basically getting your money back after the government makes money on your money
um so just trying to to kind of move there when when we can but I I yeah this a plann cost we're ready for it um and again the amount of repair and unknowingness like we can lose a car and
it can be out for months and then we drive another car and then that breaks down but yeah the mechanic's job in no way in in danger at all they have plenty to do Council RI then con um thank you Mr
President so um so I well first first I want to make a statement then I have two questions so the statement is um that largely I support um doing something like this you know I know for many years now we've had um an aspiration uh
towards having all of our vehicles move towards electric and hybrid and I think this gets us the closest realistically than we're probably going to get for a very long time um just as a knowing how much some of these vehicles cost um to
purchase them out right so on the surface I'm absolutely in support of this so first question that I have um in all of the votes that I have taken in city council the only one that I regret voting for and I wish that I had
listened to counselor denim at the time because she was the only person that voted against it is that we paid a lot of money to buy a Tesla and over the course of the time when that vote happened that organization and its leader have
absolutely destroyed the government and I would argue put us in more financial Jeopardy than even covid put us in um is dangerous dangerous rise of fascism so I remember when we had that initial
conversation the Teslas were the only vehicles that the police department could use because they were the only vehicles that have the opportunity to out fit the the vehicles in the ways that the police department need so the question is what are the brands of all
of the vehicles that are being purchased and is there a way for us to put a restriction on ensuring that no taxpayer dollars go go towards Tesla and Elon Musk um so Greg had no Teslas um
All American I I don't know if any car is American anymore um and a Nissan so we have Fords we have Chevy um and we have this one Nissan um all-wheel drive kind of
interesting um uh EV that we want to try on uh try out to see um if it could be helpful for staff like the building inspector and and whatnot um the the the ban or prohibition on on
Teslas um I believe is up to city council okay you know and and putting you know language around that okay um and so then the second question that I have um interestingly I think nobody in this room knows this um but before I became a
city counselor I was a licensed Property and Casualty uh adjuster so I know that leases have different insurance policies than purchasing Vehicles outright so with that
context are there any sort of mileage restrictions on the vehicles when we lease them anything like that because I know if if you go over that you end up paying a lot more money um to the organization that you're leasing the vehicles from so I'm smiling because I
just flipped my lease cuz I had too many miles on like literally last week um yeah so it doesn't have the it doesn't uh have those restrictions um and with the fiveyear flip of the cars it's one of the reasons
why we we did that to make sure also um just the wear and tear on the vehicles uh we've worked with our insurance company Maya to be very clear this is these are leases um there are different requirements for um just uh
the amount of coverage we have it's been a switch over process we've not seen increases in our uh car insurance we anticipate seeing increases in all of our insurance I mean health insurance we've already um had but we would
anticipate the insurance going up just like um all insurance is going up but not because we are leasing okay okay all right thank you thank you Council Conor um mayor so a couple of things you said
may have already answered my question and the first one was was this when you did the budget last year plann for this lease Arrangement or is this subsequent to that budget and you did say that going forward these
would be expenses that would be in the budget so yay and uh you use the same word I was going to ask you like does this promote predictability and it does um so a were you planning on this and
where does it land in the greater plan and also it says 10 vehicles for $17,000 is that what is 10,000 per vehicle what is that length of time I mean I'm doing the math is there more to this number that you've already saved um
um no the Greg really should take that question um he's shaking his head right he's like mayor don't open your mouth but what I will say is that this has been in the planning stage for three
years and the reason why this didn't come forward last year um was we were thinking we were going to do um something out of capital and do that every year and then when we talk to um
our Auditors and also other cities that have done it um that because cars lose value so fast it really should be worked into the budget um and that was the big change so we we didn't know how or should we um look at it and we're also
waiting to hope that more EVS would be realistically available able um and you know I was the hold up too CU I I didn't want to buy more hybrid um police cars and there was nothing trash rated so we
we went with what we knew can I yeah please um so now I forgot it well we can also brilliant too we could potentially have Greg in on your first question okay Greg what up you save me Greg go ahead
hello again everyone yeah I'm here I want to add something right um so of that cost councelor con at the 10679 you have in front of you tonight that is upfit for the uh police cruisers and the fire department admin Vehicles as well
as some small outfit for the other vehicles uh radios and things like that and the lease payments on the uh first um eight vehicles that we're ordering straight away for the remainder of this fiscal year should they come in in time we can't really say with much
certainty which ones we'll have on the ground uh in the city before um June 30th a couple of them may come in I don't expect seeing the police and fire vehicles by then but it's possible so we have to make sure that that money is accounted for in the budget and then when I bring my uh the DPW budget
through city council for FY 26 there will be a a larger line item in there for the lease payments for the entirety of FY 26 okay I I remembered my question okay and this might be you Greg it might
be you mayor when you um when you come to the conclusion that this is a better idea than doing maintenance on old things do you have numbers for like tracking the maintenance that we've been paying for X number of years and is there a point where it becomes a break
even point where it just makes more sense to lease and do you have that data that that I could maybe everyone would like to see you will be very pleased with the amount of data that and spreadsheets um the repair
to lease um ratio we're so far behind the ball on this um I'm sure there's a point I I don't expect to see that point like this year or next year um but our
anticipation is the regular maintenance is much lower um on these cars as well as every time we get a car um on the
lease a car leaves the fleet so it's eliminated that way um over time it should there's a point but I I don't anticipate really knowing that um uh uh director nutman has the spreadsheets and
from Andrew ENT prise and the original assessment from moov EV V that kind of got us here um and I I don't know if Enterprises here tonight um but whatever you would need we we could get it
they're they've been really responsive and um oh Enterprise is here so and yeah if you want to chime in Josh not to tell the counil sure yeah hey I'm Josh Rondo I'm with Enterprise Fleet Management
um thanks for having me and and so we put a a ton of work into this for over about eight months uh the mayor uh Greg and I have worked closely for the majority of that time too um to answer your your question that date is hard to kind of put a Time on on because part of
the reason is that this is a flexible program you guys are kind of always in the in the Reigns or holding the Reigns so we depending on how much you kind of um engage or or look to flip the fleet to your Qui that point will kind of tip back um
vehicles are going to need maintenance no matter what um newer Vehicles need far far less um so you know the replacement plan works by replacing the oldest Vehicles first and then so forth and so on um predicting a fleet's kind
of it's a little bit of a moving Target um but if we stay on kind of where we prescribe best case scenario to get this um you know East Hampton's Fleet caught up and electri ified as say quickly but as in a steady pattern as quickly as we can it's about
5 years to turn the entire fleet over at which point safely you could say the maintenance would be as low as we can possibly get it with continually new vehicles being being refreshed so it's hard to couldn't give you an exact date on a calendar but uh the short answer is
as quickly as you guys want to you want to do it thank you thank you yes please good evening uh Sergeant Boer from the police department um I am currently uh in charge of our Fleet Maintenance um I took it over upon
Sergeant Ross's retirement in uh January so um I just started this and um boy have I been in for some fun but um it's already kind of been said but aside from electrifying the fleet um our Fleet is just it's getting old it's falling apart
um just in the what five six weeks that I've been doing this um I think uh poor Dennis and uh down at motor repair has seen all of our cruisers at some point um every every time I call him it's another 600 on this Cruiser 1,200 on
this Cruiser and it's they're all repairs that we need to get these cars back on the road um back on patrol so um just to kind of give you a an idea of uh where we're at our uh two newest Mark Cruisers are 2023 is
um and the next newest Cruiser um from that is a 2020 with 100,000 M on it and everything else is older um I have Cruisers all the way up to 150,000 miles so we're we're getting to a point of being in dire need of of uh replacing
this Fleet so that's where we're at on the police side okay thank you any questions C denim um thank you for that um question not not for you but I appreciate you taking that over
um this is actually for um um auditor Patel I think I referred to you as assessor and I apologize but I often think of you as assessing our budget um um can you tell us what the and this is really for the public right so can you tell us what the the budget
will be for the capital stabilization after this yes I can um after these two Appropriations we'll have 3 million $3,767 left in this
account great thank you very much thanks Adel do you have more no that was it councilor Kinski um let's see looks like we need to get some vehicles and get them soon that's
become clear usually when we get to 100,000 the police are here and they're saying hey you know folks this is not working for us we need new vehicles uh we either buy them or we bought them sometimes we bought vehicles that
we maybe wouldn't like to have previously purchased oh boy and I appreciate folks saying that before councelor Riley I appreciate your your your comments on this I would definitely put an exclusion
of certain vehicles and that we exclude Teslas from any possible lease and that we codify that in our uh in our language uh as one of the requirements
um that being said I did have a question about mayor if you had one quick second a question you had talked about uh being able to well listen if they don't if it doesn't work out if we don't want the vehicle we can you know the lease period I think it's for three five five five
years it's a fiveyear lease and we could always give the car back or we could buy out M if we give back is there front front-end loaded costs where you you're going to lose money by by doing that yeah possibly yeah so it's really not
something that you look forward to doing you really have to have a lemon but I presume that' be there whose problem would it be if you did get a lemon on a lease um maybe our lease someone I we would work with Enterprise I mean ultimately Enterprises the leasi I mean
the leasor where the le e um the city could file the 93a Lemon Law claim or or Enterprise maybe or we certainly would by that that's good I appreciate the work that's gone in here uh I appreciate
the auditor for speaking out about what we'll have left in capital stabilization that the money's been funded already in anticipation of a car purchase that's good to know also helps to make our decisions I think easier uh those are my
questions um I'm I'm happy to offer um oh uh I'm happy to listen it's a dangerous thing to say I got a lot to say um not but on this um with uh Josh from Enterprise Greg from DPW on on here um you know the action of
council going forward as far as uh codifying um brands of car what not happy to say that you know we will not accept a recommendation of a Tesla going for until there's you know action or or whatnot soate
that um thank you uh just a quick question um so we're going to be replacing cars uh and I know generally the process for that is they there's like a you know Municipal kind of uh uh junk program um are we going to be able
to trade in any of the cars maybe to potentially or are we just going to go with the um why is it escaping me it's like Surplus surus yeah um I Greg did a lot of research on this with procurement law um yeah I mean uh Greg and Andrew
really got handed a whole big project unexpectedly so I appreciate their their work on it um but Greg can can speak to that go ahead Greg so so once we have the other vehicles here and things moved around uh accordingly cuz some vehicles are being reassigned as part of this to get some of the oldest stuff out of the
fleet across the city uh be back to the city council with that list of vehicles for permission to Surplus them and they will be surplused with Enterprises assistance okay beautiful that that answers my question appreciate that thanks Greg any other questions from the council any questions from the
audience okay uh seeing none oh wait oh oh come on up sorry missed [Music] you uh Carl PRL Tory Street I really don't have a lot to say on this I don't know the Min minutia but one thing that really stuck
out to me in this age of subscriptions and owning nothing is it a good idea to be leasing our first responder Vehicles will we have them if we can't afford to reup that lease if things get dire and again I have no idea
about the you know maintenance fees what it's costing but there won't be another 30-year-old vehicle in the fleet if we said L skip to all leases and is that setting us up to be a sustainable environment is that actually moving in
the right stage to be sustainable it's not just about batteries thank you that's a valid point um Kel denim do you want to well I was just wondering does the mayor or director nman want to respond to that
yeah I think that was a really great question I thought it was a great I it really did I mean not at all be being um pissy about it um I would throw the question to Josh Andor Greg about that exact situation um and maybe Josh
because he's the least guy who's dealing with this and then uh Greg or I could jump in yeah so they there are leases um with payments if for some reason there's you know default or an inability to pay everything there's a conversation about how that looks we're not you know we a
partnership business so we're looking to kind of keep everything going but if it's a case of severe default then typically vehicles are are turned in um municipalities have traditionally next to zero risk in
our eyes and we rarely rarely see you know if we've ever seen a default with municipality especially for Frontline Vehicles like Cruisers um where they serve such an you know integral part of what you guys are are doing so
um gut feeling is if those were kind of on the The Chopping Block I think the town would be in very very serious trouble um across the board but yeah I mean it's it is a lease vehicle so if there's any um you know if there's a default on it it would be like any other asset that's being defaulted
on okay thank you if I could just waigh on that for a second what we what we have here and what we're proposing to do with this first the initial round is kind of a small sample of the fleet um we will still own the majority of our vehicles I think it breaks down to about
we have about a 100 Vehicles Al together between heavy duty trucks and lighter Duty vehicles and I think it's about 60 to 65 our light duty Vehicles so in this you know it's it's it's a small portion of them and if at least for the for the
time being it's a this something we'll evaluate moving forward if this is the is the right path to keep the city um moving towards getting you know more fuel efficient vehicles and right sizing vehicles for their task um right now one of these vehicles will take a 2007 Chevy
Silverado that's at the parks department that's the V8 fullsize pickup truck that's getting used to uh drive around and unlock and clean bathrooms and replace that with a uh a Ford Maverick hybrid which is significantly more fuele efficient vehicle that's right sized for
its for its job so um we will still own the vast majority of of our vehicles that we have although many of them are up for replacement thank you uh Council Connor just real quick is part of this Arrangement lease to buy is there any opportunity at any
point if we wanted to purchase the vehicle I would the conditions I would talk to Josh would defer to Josh yeah correct um the the structure of these is something called an equity lease which is actually really as close to ownership as you can get in terms of lease
arrangements so the the town owns the equity in the vehicles you purchase essentially or take Title by just satisfying the remainder of the lease at any at any time thank you great uh any
other can I just point out one yeah go ahead to council oh uh since director neline brought it up um just in terms of evaluation I would hope that you all will kind of begin to put that evaluation together so that at the end
we can kind all together kind of look was something that was in the best interest of the city is is something we want to continue to move forward with and and hope that that's a process that's kind of ongoing and not kind of at the end but just that was just a comment yeah I mean just to the the
public comment uh question and and just overall commitment so right now the the amount of cars that are in this first group um we're not obligated to do more like when we're talking about switching the fleet over it's not automatically
there too more cars or or whatnot and it's you know um tracking it via spreadsheet and repairs going down or what it's itemized and we will be looking at that um I don't think it's unreasonable to think there will be
future years within like this 5ye that we won't add cars I mean that that's kind of one of the you know we're not going to add to the budget we feel confident for the term of this lease for the number of vehicles um it's affordable and it it is a great
way for us to catch up on vehicles but they're very well might be years where we will we will just keep that line item the way it is and not you know go up another two or or whatever the the
spreadsheet recommends and before I take your question counselor krinsky uh go ahead Josh if you wanted to respond to so I will I'll say this too so we are very flexible in terms of financing um we approach a variety of businesses in towns and fleets in very similar shapes
um and age and you know TST level of wear um on them we can we can kind of change right so we're looking at a lease program now um often times um partners of ours will engage the lease program for that cash flow benefit to replace a large number
of vehicles at once um get caught up if you will um and then from there we can we can structure these to either take full payment on a lease and it sits on a lease agreement but is not you know anything owed essentially we can take half we can we can kind of maneuver
those so essentially at that point the town can buy vehicles from us that are sitting on a lease agreement and take title when they need to um but we're you know super we're super flexible about that so if there's a catchup period we want to lease 25 Vehicles which is about half the leg Fleet get you guys in nice
shape or better shape and then reassess cash we're open to whatever the city's needs wants priority are of of any particular year so it's it's super flexible you guys are always kind of driving um there isn't a subscription so to speak with this there's recommendations every year that you can
accept decline we kind of look at how that models out into the Future How It doesn't um but it's you know again it's really all about kind of meeting the priorities um that you guys are looking to do year in and year out and uh to the recording um kind of tracking parts that were that were mentioned um benchmarking
year toe part of just by partnering with us some Vehicles you're gaining essentially two employees one that's strategy manager that will kind of in depth take a deep dive into those types of benchmarks like where maintenance sits where it sat from where um we
started this journey what it would look like if we added X number more Vehicles so there's a lot of kind of in-depth reporting and whatnot that you get back um that is probably on a level that very few municipalities or commercial entities do on their own typically so um
you know we do really well in this space and i' love to bring into the town thank you councelor kazinski I think you may have answered my question Josh uh but if I you haven't please let me know uh and mayor you had talked about tracking
repairs and doing an analysis and so we have our own repair records for our own vehicles that we've had so far we have the current vehicles in Fleet and we keep those those costs how much did it cost to maintain how much did it cost to repair
are all those figures included it sounded like they were Josh and that and that was available to us in report form so those numbers be kept by the city is that true yes so so when we we put together
an initial model for this is actually a 10-year budget plan um Greg correct me if I'm wrong whether you supplied numbers or we used industry data um I believe we use industry yes yeah industry data so use industry averages we we pull um maintenance data it's
pretty common for municipalities and and uh you know government entities to not have incredibly detailed records on on maintenance dollars unfortunately um but when modeling we pull from a pool of about 700,000 other similar um government vehicles in a cent
per mile fashion and we are able to get incredibly accurate um in terms of what maintenance cost would look like for any given Fleet of a municipal makeup and we also have repair costs for the specific vehicles that we are leasing in addition
to the industry numbers so is that correct like we're going to buy 10 we're going to buy got at least 10 Vehicles vehicle ABC through whatever and and we'll know oh this this vehicle cost X in repairs X in
maintenance I misunderstood the question I thought you were talking about the cars we have now so every time a car goes to Highway that we own now that gets repaired we have tracking of that and um and so if there is a repair needed on a lease vehicle there might be
some we do inous and there' be tracking but also if it's something that Enterprise had to do for some reason there would be tracking of that cost so we could monitor right and we'll keep track of we'll have that information good I think it'll be good to evaluate the program and using that information
also thank you okay any other questions from counselors or the public we had the we were off that work we hadn't gone to the I don't think we have any question there's no hands up you can ask we have another hand up please since there's nobody else you
can go again to prove that I really don't have a lot of interest in this um I guess my question then is for Josh what is the difference between the cost you would charge the city to purchase the vehicles versus the MSRP what it would cost the
city just to buy it you spoke about you know the city gaining two extra employees by utilizing your Fleet Services but I'm guessing Enterprise isn't offering that service out of the kindness of their heart and I guess a second part of that question is when we're talking the cost of repairs for
City Vehicles is that taking is that separating the cost of parts with labor because I guess as us local business owner the idea of keeping money in our local economy is good and if we're paying that to our city mechanics to do
repairs on our vehicles that feels like a more tenable expense as opposed to a line item every year going to Enterprise and their stockholders thank you um so your second question first the
way we currently have it um set up to move forward is me it's Management program which means do mechanics stay on they service Vehicles as they normally would with an option to utilize local shops um as pass through kind of all a
cart um scenario so essentially yeah we keep keep money local it's not a line item that just goes to Enterprise um and I apologize the first part of your question one more time it was the difference between the MSRP and the um cost to buy out the lease at the
end I believe difference between the MS MSRP and the residual or MSRP versus um purchasing kind of as you currently are we we buy from a few different sources Factory ordering being the primary
primary one as we get into the program and start to proactively order things so um Factory ordering typically yields anywhere between $1,500 and $3,000 less than MSRP just on itself you can select options all a cart there so you can weed out whatever options you may not need or
would have been encumbered to take off of a dealer's lot um also government incentives are research and you know researched and applied as possible which are very Steep and still available at this point um government incentives depending on the vehicle and type range anywhere to between $500 and $3,000 that
ARA that we mentioned Nissan Arya was brought in because we do see some um I guess bepoke Inc of as a as a Fleet Management Company there's a a $9,000 incentive on that vehicle that we were able to to capitalize on so so
that's part of our our work is to research and and present the best uh vehicles to fit a certain job category based off of that acquisition price um you mean the least structure there's a residual put on there that's pretty conservative um in terms of you know
when we're working with municipalities we're pretty conservative with our residual it's a case by case basis for types cars okay any any other um comments from the council or the public mayor did you want to finish up with um yeah and and Greg can probably speak to the specifics
but um from 30,000 so we are having a big problem using local shops because they can't fix new cars and the cars that are old it's just not worth repairing them um and we use marot and other bigger
companies um or bigger dealerships to get those parts and to fix them um so while they're local businesses that are generous with keeping the fleet we have now and the cars we have now like together as much as they can um they
aren't equipped like if it's a Ford interceptor that we have now um it's we go to marot and I um again no one loses their job the mechanics have more than enough work and in reality we do not have the equipment in our Highway garage
to repair um never mind our mechanics doing it and they would continue doing you know um tires and and basic so Greg to wrap it up you might just want to speak to that to the details of it yeah
we we run into it quite fre quite frequently especially with the hybrid vehicles and just the newer any of the newer Vehicles we have they have to go back to the dealer more often than than you'd like and I mean one thing to point out with these leases is that um for the majority of their time with the city they will be covered by the factory
warranty and going back to U whether it be marot or I'm not sure the local Chevy dealer would be that we would use but Burke and be Burke in Northampton um but I also wanted to mention that if we were looking to buy these vehicles out right right now um I the quote that
I have for a fully marked uh line Cruiser for the police departments in the area of $85,000 so we'd be looking if if it weren't in front of council with this appropriation tonight yet trying to fund the same amount of vehicles just the two police cruisers would be um 180 to 200,000 to admin for
the fire department I think those were about 55,000 a piece so this turns into too this what this does is really lets us put close to half a million dollars worth of vehicles in service in the City without having to lay out a half a million dollars in
capital so I think that there is some some unspoken benefit to that as well okay one final question um with the tariffs that have just been announced I know that there's been uh a lot of
discussion today about how that's going to increase the cost immediately for purchasing new vehicles do you anticipate that that's going to bleed over into lease payments at all or would that be another significant difference between purchasing Vehicles outright
versus Leasing and would that be a benefit for us in that case I would I yeah I can't really speak to the effective and yes the tariffs are going to affect um
yes they're going to affect the lease payments and that might be one of the reasons why we keep our hope would be and when we talk to Enterprise and and Josh is that the vehicles that we are are before you now are on someone's lot
right now and we can get them that way it still takes a lot of time but um tariffs are not um it's dest izing for for those markets I I don't know how the the prices stay where they are now
and they're already high I yeah absolutely thank you okay uh any further thoughts before we have councelor Peete give us the motion I would say let's get the motion on the table councilor du uh I'll make the following uh request
in the form of a motion um request is hereby made for the approval of the following appropriation amount requested $16,779.23 [Music] hybrid vehicle $ 56,2 something5 FY 25 fire electric
hybrid vehicle $14,500 fy2 admin electric hybrid vehicle $3,000 the amount requested will be used for the following purpose the Department of Public Works has been working with movie V and Enterprise Fleet Service to
further the city's transition away from gas powered light duty vehicles in favor of electric and hybrid alternatives in coordination with the police fire and parks department uh they have developed a list of 10 vehicles to be acquired in this initial round of leasing agreements
leasing these 10 Vehicles will allow for older gas powerered vehicles to be removed from service and represents a major step forward towards achieving the goals outlined in East Hampton's climate action plan second we have a motion in a second any further
discussion I just have one comment Council d um you know I I genuinely uh want to be supportive right and I'll I'll vote to to support this um but I am
particularly given councelor jadik question just now uh it makes me uh want to engage with um the various departments just evaluating this kind of quarterly of of cost of this Etc and and
impact I I do think that that is a a very important um factor of cost that I think we need to be monitoring um particularly in light of the instability of our I'll just say economy I I could say
many words but um I'll just go with u economy okay thank you Council denim uh any other comments before we take the vote okay seeing none all those in favor I any against or abstaining motion passes and would entertain a motion to
close the public hearing one more I really wish I could from a where you going this one should be awfully easy thanks counil Peak appreciate it go ahead uh the second uh supplemental appropriation is for
$286,100 uh from Capital stabilization towards an fy2 Western Star dump truck so we had a dump truck from 1995 that is not old at all for a human being it is very old for a dump truck um so that
dump truck the international 4900 heavy duty uh was removed from service two years ago because of extensive rot and safety issues um so we no longer have that dump truck we would like this the Department of Public Works would like to
have a dump truck to replace that one which again is no longer in service and like this is so it's not a question of can we push this out a couple more years like it's done we need to get a new one I think we all agree that the the city
should should have a dump truck and so yeah uh that's it's expensive because these things are expensive but uh the um the the finance committee did vote three to zero to approve this appropriation uh I don't know that it
necessarily warrants the same sort of debate we just had I think we can all agree on this one is something that's probably got to happen okay any uh comments from counselors uh oh looks like I got one here cinski take is it possible to lease the
vehicle actually I got this but but it's a good question the the there isn't really like the really really heavy duty stuff um is that's like something that the city's looking into but we're not quite there yet so we
I would imagine that with you know the weather changing with generally we get less snow it might be something to consider but I understand that this particular vehicle type is not available uh it's necessary we've had it
it will have it for a long time I hope I hope uh maybe not 30 years they don't make them like they used to but oh don't say that but who knows maybe we get lucky anyway any other comments from the council any comments from the public
okay I see none okay let's read that motion request is hereby made for approval of the following appropriation amount uh requested $286,100 to be transferred from Capital
stabilization to be transferred to fy2 Western Star dump truck the amount requested will be used for the following purpose this appropriation will fund the replacement of truck 33 this vehicle was a 1995 internal 4900 heavyduty truck uh
that had to be removed from service in 2023 due to extensive rotten safety issues uh we are requesting uh $286,100 to be transferred from Capital stabilization to fund this expense second okay we have a motion in the
second any further discussion I'll just say that I think it's worth noting that we replaced two vehicles tonight that were predated eastampton being a city because eastampton became a city in 19 I think that's just worth acknowledging uh and all those in favor
any against or abstentions see none motion passes now can I please ENT to close the public hearing accept we we will that have any effect on my question is does that have any effect on the
moving back to uh Public Safety the issue of the oneway street by closing this hearing that closes the hearing will not going to bring it up for the near future we sent it back to we sent it back to the committee but if we CL we haven't closed the hearing on it no
you're closed we're closed with this this you dealt with it we dealt with it we sent it back to committee so it's no longer in just wanted to be sure we weren't prejudicing it coming back no I don't think so I think we're good thank you so uh all those in favor I any against or abstentions seeing none let's
move on thank you uh we have a request for immediate uh attention which is oh did I miss I think we're good for public speak I'm done I'm comfortable with being done with public speak um we have a resolution in support of the fair
Charter School reimbursement act and councilor denim would you like to te this up I I would I would um thank you so much Mr President um and also I'm going to I will say a couple of brief words but I will uh defer to a couple of
guests that we have in the room who have done uh a lot of um work on this already regionally um as well as for our own School District so um this is a resolution in support of uh HD 4439
which is the fair Charter School reimbursement act um which is really related to school funding inequities in the Commonwealth as and its impact um on eastampton public schools as it relates to um Charter School reimburse
um it's it's been a very long evening thus far and so I think that there are some folks um online um Jesus um Lea um who has done a lot of work around Charter School um uh reimbursement and
this particular uh resolution uh with um representative Gomez um so Jesus if you would be Mr President if you if you would welcome absolutely the opportunity for um Jesus uh to speak on this particular
matter and give us more context that would be appreciated y thank you for waiting Jesus please go ahead um thank you um I I'm actually gonna just U read from a brief prepared statement and um if there are any questions afterwards I'd be happy to
stay and answer them um thank you for for your consideration in passing a resolution in support of H 4439 and to amend Charter School tuition reimbursement Provisions representative Gomez who you know submitted this bill to the legislature on behalf of his
district and the six School committees undersigned to advocate for this proposal that's amest Amis pelum Regional East Hampton Greenfield Northampton South Hadley as well as the Northampton city council the proposals currently on the table in the
legislature to support new K through2 education funding unfortunately largely ignore East Hampton and districts like eastampton as did the student Opportunity Act while such Provisions such as increasing reimbursement to the special
education circuit breaker improveed transportation funding and fixing the inflation calculation error error in the Chapter 70 funding formula would all bring new funding to eastampton as a function of the costs per capita benefits and factoring for East
Hampton's wealth or lack thereof eastampton would would once again draw the Short Straw in the school funding for this reason we must vigorously advocate for policy changes that will bring new funding to eastampton specifically nothing will bring more new
funding to eastampton than addressing the municipal cost impact of Charter School Public Funding because eastampton is asymmetrically impacted by this policy we ask you tonight to join your school committee and the city council of Northampton in supporting House Bill
4439 we also invite you to attend the state local Aid hearing taking place at 11:00 a.m. March 24th at UMass amers it's rare that a state budget hearing is held in western Mass and this represents a real opportunity to show up
in person in full force in support of our education funding advocacy agenda I do realize that 11:00 a.m. on a Monday is hard for people who work full-time but for those of you who might be retired have um
flexible work hours or are otherwise available that day this is the time to bring parents teachers um City officials anybody in the community you know to to basically show up and you know say to to
state officials that we we need the funding and uh that's that's basically my statement um and I'm here to answer any questions and I can talk more about okay thank you and um does anybody have any questions first off for
Jesus point of clarification can you just repeat the date and the time of the meeting uh sure uh hold on going back so um the the meeting this is a state um Ways and Means Committee uh hearing
that's going to be happening uh March 24th Monday at 11:00 a.m. at ums ammer okay thank you great um I can send more details by by email to counselor uh denim about the specific building that
the meeting will be held in great thank you um and we have other people that are going to speak to this as well thank you Mr President we also have um School Committee Member Sam Hunter who is also here to to speak on this and it is
important to note that uh while the school committee uh didn't refence reference HD 4439 they did uh pass a resolution more broadly talking about um uh a funding reimbursement yes and the
reason we didn't um reference that um HD 4439 is because it hadn't been um proposed yet so this is really exciting it's been very um it's been it's been actually really I've been working with Jesus on this um he uh approached me uh about this a few months ago and it's
actually been really exciting because a lot of times I find when I get involved Inu like this it kind of we we do a lot of work and then it kind of sits there and so this it's actually been really cool to see um this moving moving along so essentially um just to like give a little bit of background about East
Hampton and just for like the benefit of the public um at the moment for this past fiscal year we spent $1.86 million on um tuition for school choice and charter schools now this is a little bit confusing because um we actually also
get a lot of we we we almost break even on school choice we come very close to breaking even because every school choice student we get brings tuition with them um the way that it works is that every time a student um goes to a charter school or goes to a does a um goes to another District via school
choice they take uh uh tuition with them um to that new school um so for the school choice aspect East Hampton comes close to breaking even but where we really have a lot of trouble is with Charter Schools um and so as you all know we have Hilltown Charter right here in East Hampton um for students who
attend Hilltown Charter we're also required to provide them with Transportation if they live more than 2 miles away from the school um so transportation is another um challenge um well it's a challenge for everybody but it's especially a challenge in East Hampton um and I also want to just say because I feel like um some of the
Nuance gets lost in public sometimes like you know if you have a child who is thriving at a at a charter school or you really want your child to go to a school in a different District maybe you work there um I I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing like I think you know we all have to make the right decisions
for our kids and um I just want the the and all of us at the school committee we just want the funding to be more fair um and right now our um our enrollment is declining uh which brings down you know that brings down the amount of money
that we um receive to run the um the schools the enrollment is not declining because everybody's sending their kids out of District it's declining because the number of children being born is declining um so the whole way that this formula was set up in the '90s um just doesn't really account for the way that we live now and so East Hampton is one
of the the districts in our area that's the most affected especially by Charter Schools um and that would actually stand to benefit the most from this bill being passed um and one example that I always like to give um is when it for East Hampton specifically is that you know I was on school committee about 10 years
ago um and I'm on school committee now and we have never in the time that I've been involved in the schools been able to have a consistent World languages program at our Middle School um and the reason for this is um just because it's it's one of those um kind of optional things there's no mcast test for French
in seventh grade um and so it's been one of the areas that we can cut so we have cut it um meanwhile we have the Pioneer Valley Chinese immersion charter school which started um right down the road from us which a number of students from East Hampton attend and um those students are able to access a high quality bilingual education starting in
kindergarten and um we would love to offer something even close to that here in East Hampton and we can't because we're spending so much money on sending children to attend a charter school to learn another language um the other thing that just personally for myself
and I know for others on the committee um one of the things that we've um really struggled with is special education funding and the the whole we could like have a whole other hearing about how special education funding works but uh the fact is uh Charter Schools um in do not uh take on the same
burden as public school districts do in educating students with special education needs um they were required to provide a free and appropriate public education to students with disabilities but the fact is um a lot of students with disabilities don't attend Charter Schools if they do attend Charter
Schools they're kind of um it's suggested that maybe they would get more services in their reg in their um and their sending district and students who uh require you know more intensive uh services and supports Charter Schools don't pay for that our our Public Schools do so that's kind of another um
aspect of this that's that's unfair we kind of end up um with more students who uh require more resources and charter schools are able to work with students who require fewer uh resources in that way um so we're just looking to like I said we're not trying to like take down
um Charter and choice and and also the school choice um question when it comes to East Hampton is a little more complicated now which is so exciting for me to say because when I was first on school committee that was not the story in East Hampton at all and now to say that we're um we're we we're make we're
making money off not making money off a school choice but we're coming close to breaking even in a way that I never thought we would um so that's super exciting um I do think that it means a lot to me that you all are considering um passing this resolution I'm really excited uh to have uh representative
Gomez and sabadosa um having sponsored this bill and I'm like would love to see uh where it goes and it's been um a nice I think reminder during a time that's been really tough for all of us in Civic life that like sometimes the Civic process just like works and people um
say hey here's a problem and here's a um here's a way to solve that problem and then we actually like do it it's cool um so I invite you all to be a part of that and if you have any questions you can ask me or Jesus I just I just have a question um I feel like I remember the last time I dug into this there was
there was a bit of a difference between choice and Charter as far as reimbursement like I feel like Choice was somewhere like around $5,000 a student but Charter was significantly more is that still the case it it is is and it varies from school to school so the charter schools get to set their own
tuition rates um so you know that is could be almost double well it's it's one of those costs that we really just don't have a whole lot of control over like and it's um and you know one of the issues this didn't happen with choice of charter schools this year but one of the issues that we were hit really hard with in East Hampton was um out of District
special education uh rates the maximum rate went up and it's not like our uh our per pupil spending didn't go up to match that same amount so um we're really like in public education kind of at the whims of these larger uh forces a lot of times and there's very
few places for us to cut and unfortunately the places where we do end up cutting are are places like performing arts and uh language and now we have those two Charter Schools um in in this area so it's um it's hard and I feel like we've been really like all of
us in education and this includes like my colleagues who work in charter schools I've I've um have a lot of friends who work in charter schools as well um we've all been like forced to do things that I think um aren't are less collaborative than we would like to be and you know as far as Hilltown goes I
know that they um have always expressed wanting to be a good neighbor to us and um I've never had any any issues with with anybody who has uh been associated with we're just all stuck in this um really bad system where we're kind of ped against each other in a way that I don't think we want to be so I'm so
sorry to ask another one or maybe it's maybe it's not a question I know we've been here a long time um but you know I think East tamped in and Northampton are not necessarily unique but are a little bit different than other communities because we have large um U you know non nonprofit educational facilities in in
the city where where faculty live that have children that can send them to Charter Schools um is that addressed uh in in this at all or is is there anything it is addressed in it is addressed in this in that it's the same formula it's the same you know um if if
we have a a number of families in town who are choosing to send their kids to Hilltown one of we we are that does kind of Hilltown in particular really has an impact of us on us because of the transportation um and this does address that it it doesn't like it's not kind of
written specifically for that it just it evens out the um the state's contribution to the Charter School um uh to the the tuition for the charter schools um but in terms of like you know I think one of the um and actually this
is a what your question is a really good example like one of the things that I've um really tried to do is to like think about places where we end up I I don't want to end up like pitting members of our community against each other and I have had Parents you know come up to me as a school committee member or as a
member of my of our um special education pack saying like I really want to keep my kid in District and it is just not working for our family or it is just not working for my kid and they need something different and I feel so bad about that because I really I really believe in public education and I really believe that like they should go to
school here and my answer to that is always like you have to you've got to make the choice that's right for your kid and so in this way like parents are going to be more free to make choices that are right for their families and for their kids without um without like affecting the schools our the our District's finances so um extremely
which is what I think everybody wants you know thank you yeah can I add a clarifying um statement absolutely please so I I just wanted to go back and answer that that question about the difference between school choice and and Charter sending tuition so school choice
sending tuition um when we send a a a student to another public school district is capped at $5,000 by the state because they understand the uh the funding effect that it would have on the city uh Charter School sending tuition
is not capped and is generally the full per pupil amount for that student for that District yeah plus the amount that we would spend over Foundation budget for that student from that District so it's it's it's a
considerable amount of money and I also want to be clear that when we're talking about this piece of legislation as well as other um charter school funding reform legislation that is being proposed at the state level we're not proposing to take any money away from the charter schools or from charter
school students we're asking the state to take responsibility for the funding impact it it's important to understand that at we're we being told by the state often in small districts that the the response that we should have to
declining enrollment is to regionalize our district with other districts right but in fact by opening charter schools throughout the state they are in fact actively un regionalizing our student body the reason why you would regionalize is to save money on fixed
costs these fixed costs are essentially doubled for a school district when you have to split them between a charter school and a public school yeah yeah and I think um actually I'm really glad you brought up the regionalization Jesus because that's something that I often hear from from families in town is that
they don't want us to regionalize uh or they don't want like or you know they're they're concerned about you know having seen other districts regionalizing in the past um and I um we're unique in Massachusetts if you look at the way that other states do public education um
the way that Massachusetts does public education is really uh um or New England and General is is unique in that we have a lot of these like very very small districts that have a lot of local control um that's kind of a model That You Don't See in in much of the country
um and so one of the um one of the downsides to that is that you know like it's it's expensive to run a school district um and you know so there's obviously like bigger conversations to be had about regionalization but the um the charter schools really do put pressure on school districts to have to
cut things that they can cut and um and also the charter schools have to get their um they have to pay for their buildings and their upkeep and everything out of their tuition cost as well so um that's another reason why those tuition costs are so much higher so it's uh yeah any other questions
thank you uh see none I don't think Council denim uh uh thank you Mr President um so this was a resolution put together by myself councelor jzz and uh councelor Smith and um with prion um councelor is
going to read the resolution yeah absolutely the city of East Hampton is deeply committed to the success of our school district and the success and well-being of all of our students additionally we recognize the school funding in equity in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and its effect on East
Hampton public schools and we support the eastampton school committee resolution and similar petitions and other affected communities in the Commonwealth that advocate for Equitable Charter School tuition reimbursement where as the Massachusetts state legislature is considering passage of
Bill HD 4439 the fair Charter School reimbursement act which is sponsored by Representatives homar Gomez and Lindsay sabadosa and whereas 1.86 million is the amount for school choice and charter schools that was deducted from the East Hampton Public School District State a
in the fiscal year 2025 and whereas this resolution is to ask the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to take greater responsibility for charter school funding and improve funding equity for lowincome districts and districts with large population of high
need students and whereas under Massachusetts current funding system for each student residing in the city of East Hampton who chooses to attend a charter school almost all the funding from the city for that student follows them to the charter school and whereas
under Massachusetts current funding system for each student residing in East Campton who chooses to attend another Public School District a smaller but significant portion of the Public Funding from the city where that student follows them to the chosen school district and whereas the current funding
system costs public school districts much more then it saves them by educating fewer students and whereas when a student leaves a school the cost to operate that school remains relatively unchanged making it difficult to proportionally decrease expenses in
response to reductions in enrollment and whereas many of the costs associated with running a school district are fixed costs including maintenance utilities transport ation student services and benefits negotiated in good faith for public employees and whereas this
results in a downward spiral of budget cuts that perpetuates the loss of students to charter schools and wealthier school districts and a continued decline in school funding loss of programming and support staff and whereas the Commonwealth of Massachusetts is obligated by its
Constitution to provide a public education to all its children rich and poor in every city and town and whereas charter schools do not take on the full fiscal responsibility of free and appropriate public education of students with disabilities emotional physical and
learning disabilities and students with those needs are routinely excluded from charter schools and whereas the current funding system siphons valuable and necessary Public Funding disproportionately from lowincome and moderate income school districts now therefore be it resolve that the
eastampton city council in cooperation with our Municipal partners and the eastampton school committee calls upon the Commonwealth of Massachusetts to correct this inequity by taking long overdue financial responsibility for charter school and school choice assessments for lowincome and moderate
income school districts be it further resolved we are calling for the passage of HD 4439 to increase state aid to the East Hampton Public School District by changing the funding formula for school choice tuition and Charter School tuition and not deducting any funds from
state aid for public schools for school choice and charter schools and be it further resolved a copy of this resolution to state representative Omar Gomez Senator John Bellis and the Massachusetts Association of school committees second motion we have a
motion in a second we have any further discussion I just want to thank the people that brought this forward I appreciate that this is this is important and I appreciate the people that spoke to us about this um so uh all those in favor I any against or
abstentions see none motion passes thank you and um moving on we have some Communications from elected boards and officials I believe councelor Riley yes thank you Mr President so first I just want to acknowledge I know we've been here uh
for a long time um but this is an important uh statement that I'd like to make um the members of the appointment committee would like to take a moment tonight to acknowledge the passing of Danny Hartman a member of our planning
board as members of appointments we view the 200 or so volunteer public administrators in the city of East Hampton as an integral part of the fabric of Pac Avenue and Danny was such a bright spot on the planning board he was sworn in on June 15
2021 and in the time of his service to the city he oversaw some of the most consequential aspects of our City's business and its future he was a civil engineer with some of the highest qualifications we typically see in public service his perspectives structural and
environmental engineering were essential to the work of the planning board and qualifications aside he was a great friend and a partner to everyone who served on the planning board in the planning department and even those of us who've served on the ordinance
committee much of the revitalization everyone enjoys in this city is in large part because of the planning board every person who served on the appointment committee with me knows that I thank each person who comes before the committee for their dedication to making
our government work more effectively and efficiently and I mean that we cannot be good stewards of the city without the willingness of so many bright and kind people who serve alongside us across 30 boards committees and
commissions tonight we would like to go a little bit further and thank Danny's Family for sharing his Brilliance with us for these last four years it's so easy for us to forget at the heart of some 200 volunteers are 200
families that may miss someone special at family dinners or concert recital or even quiet nights on the couch that are consumed with reading plans agendas and thinking about the weight of their decisions on how to best care for the
city and its 16,000 residents we can't do this work without any of you so thank you for your Collective sacrifices and know that our community Grieves a alongside you thank you thank you um any other councelor Peak and then
councelor jtic I'll do this one real quick okay um so uh there were some people here earlier who were talking about the short-term rental thing yes uh I just want to make a quick statement about this because I've received a handful of constituents reaching out about it um so uh and everyone who is
here for this and also the mayor are gone so I'm going to say this very quickly because I don't know if anyone's actually going to hear it um okay so uh I have some uh issues with Airbnb as a company and they're well documented um
however uh the uh the thing that I think is important we did pass a tax on short-term rentals in my first term so was 2018 2019 something like that we did it um so as far as the city council has been concerned I think that this has
been a use that has been acknowledged in votes uh as something that exists in the city um so it is our understanding that has been allowed now um The Building Commissioner is just doing his job uh in his reading of the zoning it's not a use
type that is allowed so he's doing his job in pointing that out and telling people to cease and assist um but I just think that is important as a council to Just note that this is something that we acknowledged and chose to tax and in choosing to tax I do think implicitly
did say that it's something you're allow to do we don't pass taxes on illegal things um so I do think there something there so it's something that we we um we we are going to be I there I also understand there are some Public Safety concern like is in public safety
departments police fire do have some concerns about these uh operations and I think it's very smart for us to do uh legislation on it and that's something we're going to be submitting uh the the reason I'm making the statement rather than just submitting it is to to just
say that um I hope that given that understanding that the city council who makes these rules believed that this was something that is allowed and that we do intend tonight to begin the process of figuring out what our reasonable restrictions and rules to put on it that
the city could perhaps pause any sort of enforcement of this matter until such time hopefully in the near future as we can come up with that because I don't I I think that when when this when we of the understanding that this is okay and
I think that there was the people who made investments in these things whatever my feelings about the company or its impacts might be like I believe that they did make those things with the understanding that we were allowing them and so I think that the fair thing to do
uh would be for the city to not take any enforcement action until we've been able to pass rules that I think we all believed already existed um and that I think is the the fair thing to do and I I would ask the zba to do the same and
to just just take a beat on this whole thing to let the council uh do work and not feel rushed in in doing good work I appreciate that and I just want to say that I did um make that sentiment known to the mayor um and pointed out some
language that could potentially uh make things a little less uh or potentially uh allow for a kind of a stop of the cease and assist so I'm hoping that that as we sort this out that that can happen because it's not fair um and so I would fully agree with that and I know councel
jic is is next so I'll I also try to keep this brief I know we've been here a long a long time um I'd just like to uh share that the eastampton cultural Council which is our local cultural Council of the Massachusetts cultural Council uh just announced that they
awarded 31 local projects out of a record 70 applications this year so I think that's just a testament to the amount of talent that we have we have a very deep well of talent um and a thriving Arts Community here in East
Hampton the projects include everything from guided tours of our cemeteries and our historic cemeteries to um nine different unique musical events there will be five literary happenings four theatrical programs all ages uh experiences and even our very first cat
parade for any cat LS out there um most of the these grants are small they're about $500 or less and but they they have a very deep meaning to the artists and the community members who receive these grants and the other thing I'd like to mention is that there will be um a celebration for the grantees at a
public reception in April the date will be determined but I'll be sharing that out when that happens and I'd like to encourage everyone here to attend if possible great thank you very much Council Conor I was just going to reiterate what you said and you know have it put in writing to the May mayor
but this is our thoughts and feelings so we do that I can do that uh okay uh thank you and that brings us uh we don't have any correspondents uh I don't have anything uh councelor Kinski do you have anything no I don't okay let's uh and
the mayor is left um so let's move on to reports from uh standing committees and finance councelor Peak thank you Mr President uh we met last week we discussed some things that we voted on tonight um so uh we're going to be
meeting next week uh to uh discuss uh well we have one new uh in departmental transfer so um oh shoot I don't do you have the language for that I'm sorry for the first reading the
P I mean I can I can probably just guess it's not Peg access Peg access look at Peg is giving us the peg access that's great thank you okay so um I would like to uh move
so uh yeah so I think we're going to be meeting next week uh Wednesday at 5:30 uh in conference room one uh to discuss this item and uh then I'd like to make a motion to move this item to finance and also to set a public hearing for it you
need to do a first reading first reading first reading yes that's what I'm going to do I'm just doing the whole thing so um uh so request is hereby made for approval of the following appropriation amount requested uh 46120 34 to be transferred from Peg
access account to be transferred to Peg access account uh the amount request will be used for the following purpose to give uh approval to spend from the peg access account uh receipts reserved account for cable related purposes consistent with the franchise agreement
uh so I'm making motion to move this to finance and also set a public hearing uh for uh 2 weeks from now at 6:15 in these Chambers second we have a motion the second any further discussion uh all those in favor I any against or
abstentions motion passes thus concludes thank you councelor Peak and we'll move from that to um Public Safety and councelor Terrell yes well Public Safety Committee has not met since our last meeting uh we will however be meeting
next Thursday March 20th at 6:00 p.m. in conference room 1 I believe if that's open we'll see see um I do have one request uh for a 90-day extension for the traffic and pedestrian safety on West Street okay we
have a motion in a form of a motion second we have a motion in a second any further discussion all those in favor I I any abstentions or no okay motion passes th concludes thank you councilor trell and appointment Council Riley I will be very quick thank you Mr President the committee met last night
to review two mayoral appointments and one city council presidential appointment the first order of business concerns the appointment of Samantha Mater to the Board of Health with a term expiration date of December 31st 20127 I received an email early from her Tuesday afternoon to notify the
committee that she was applying for a municipal position within the health department and requested a temporary stay on her appointment while the HR process works out if by the time her appointment process times out she hasn't heard from the city on an employment opportunity then we can withdraw her
appointment without prejudice we agreed as a committee that that would be sufficient so for tonight we will not be moving her appointment out of our committee um next was the appointment of Emily Russo to the Retirement Board with a term expiration date of December 31st
2027 this is a pretty straightforward appointment um the East Hampton Retirement Board has an ex officio seat for the mayor's Administration and this appointment was previously held by Jessica Hebert historically the HR Director has been uh serving in this capacity so it's merely a process of uh
appointing her to this seat um and then finally we have Connie Denham as the city council presidential appointe to the bees committee with a term expiration date of December 31st 2025 like the Retirement Board the bees committee has an exofficio seat reserved
for a city councelor the appointment committee met with Connie to disc uh discuss her vision on how to best support the bees committee and how to be a liaison between the city council and the greater volunteer community so as is customary I'd like to turn it over to council president Derby for any remarks
on his support for uh Connie denham's appointment uh thank you Council Ry I I just wanted to say that uh councelor Denham reached out to me with interest uh to be on the bees committee and it sounded like that was a really good fit and so I appreciate and thank coming forward uh for that and I'm fully
supportive of that appointment okay thank you Mr President so um so I'm going to make the a motion for uh the two appointees so I move that the full Council appoint Emily Russo to the East Hampton Retirement Board with a term expiration date of December 31st 2027 and Connie Denham to the bees
committee with a term expiration date of December 31st 2025 second okay we have a motion in the second any further discussion see none all those in favor I any NOS or abstentions motion passes and would you mind moving your new mayoral
appointment uh yes well I actually I have one last thing that I need to say um so in closing I wanted to notify the full Council that we held a reorganization meeting and unanimously appointed councelor Smith to be the new chair of appointments and that I will fulfill the duties of the clerk um I
have so much respect and admiration for councelor Smith and her pH and I'm excited to continue the great work of the appointments um committee under her leadership um so our next meeting is scheduled for Monday March 17th at 6 p.m. but is subject to change
I'll be sure to have uh the new chair communicate any new dates with the council clerk if that should occur thank you so um I now would like to make a motion to sorry I'm scrolling here we go
um to move the mayoral appointment uh to the appointment committee second we have a motion we have oh we have a motion and a second any further discussion all those in favor I I any knows or extensions motion passes thank you Council
R um and that concludes yes it does yes ordinance councelor denim uh thank you Mr President um we haven't met since our last meeting we attempted to but just we had a couple of um conflicts um so we are
I we have a couple of meetings and I'm going to explain this um on March 11 Tuesday uh we're going to have uh a meeting from 5: to 6:00 p.m. uh and at that particular meeting we are going to
disc discuss uh several of the items uh on the agenda including the new item uh dealing with the short-term rentals so from 5: to 6 uh much of our conversation is going to
be uh regarding the short-term rentals so um we're asking those who want to speak or want to participate in that to come to that particular meeting either online or in person uh we will be in conference room B uh which is small um
so you know that's why we're asking folks if if that's not what you're there for to please wait uh because then at 6 from 6:00 to 7:00 uh we're going to have another meeting uh and at that meeting
we are going to uh discuss the um the housing Partnerships um recommendations for around zoning ordinance uh changes um so at that meeting from 6:00 to 7:00 we'll be discussing that item um again the rooms
are very the room is very small so we've split these out so that we can try to accommodate uh individual needs uh Etc so please um please be respectful of of that particular need um we do have a couple of items uh that need 90day a few
items that need 90-day um extensions um that's the uh request to review residency requirements for membership on committees um review of the affordable and Fair Housing Partnership zoning ordinance recommendations as well as the
um amendment to chapter 8 to add new section 8-26 East Hampton Shrubbery ordinance second okay we have a motion in the second to extend those three items for 90 days any further discussion all those in favor favor I any knows or abstentions motion passes great and um
I'd like to move the uh request to review zoning ordinance amendments regarding short-term rentals to the ordinance committee second okay we have a motion and a second all those in favor I I any notes or extensions motion passes and that's everything that our committee has to offer um the council
this evening did I did I miss the uh city ordinance amendments extension uh we did that all did that together so we did request the review and the Amendments thank you I miss that uh thank you Council denam uh
property property has now a full compliment of of uh people since we had our new uh person appointed to the committee councelor conif so thank you we'd like to request 90-day extension for the matter of uh regarding flags on
public property second we have a motion in the second to request for days the flags on public property all those in favor I uh any knows or extensions motion passes thank you this concludes property okay uh how about rules and government relations rules and
government relations uh has uh is a waiting word from the city attorney with regard to the mayor's compensation Amendment home home rule Amendment request and I'd like a 90-day extension for that time I would request okay we
have a motion in a second uh all those in favor no exensions motion passes thank you this conclud oh and I thank you councelor kazinski uh I don't believe we have any old business I believe we moved all of our new business I apologize for my flub UPS tonight and
I would entertain a motion to uh adjourn no did I miss something wanted to make one one note is this really the next to the last meeting the last oh jeez oh wanted I wanted to remind everybody of that sop for a moment we're so happy
we can make long for not looking like next we how many times has she sat there tonight thought okay we have a motion in a second all those in favor thank you thank you everybody appreciate it e