--------- Good evening and welcome to the November 10th meeting of the economics development subcommittee. I'll rise and salute the flag, please. >> Ice to the flag. Madame clerk, can you please call the role? >> Roll call of the members. Councelor
Aenzio >> here. >> Here. Councelor H >> here. >> Here. Councelor Hario >> here. >> Here. Councelor Novaski >> here. >> Here. And chair chairwoman Garina >> here. >> Here. Cororum is present.
First matter on tonight's agenda is a motion presented by councilors McKenna and Orenzio that the mayor request the traffic commission to assess the activation of the 15-minute grace period button on parking meters in the Broadway central business district. The activation of this feature will provide
customers with free parking for 15 minutes to run quick errands without being penalized. >> Council me, would you like to speak? Thank you, madame chairwoman. Um Joan McKenna, W one counselor. Um so uh we put Paul and um councelor Jenzio and I
put this in uh because the patrons uh the um businesses were upset because um they couldn't the you know people couldn't pick up their uh takeout, they couldn't pick up their cleaning and and uh they were getting ticketed. So, um,
there's I just want to explain that on the park and meters there's a green button that you can press and you can get a 15 minutes minute grace period. You don't have to pay any money. Um, and so, uh, what we're trying to do is start
a pilot program, which we're which we're doing. Um, I know surely I've got, uh, a grant for this, so it's going to be like a 100%. Uh Broadway uh doesn't have a grant, so we're only doing eight meters. Um but if it works, we'll do the whole
um where all the businesses are, all the restaurants, maybe from Valaris all the way down to Murray's. Um the new parts were ordered. The um the green buttons don't work currently. So they were ordered. Um they're coming in uh they ca they're coming in in January and in
February they're going to install them and then we should see the pilot program and uh surely have uh be all set with this. Thank you. >> Any counselors? Paulio please.
>> Thank you madam chairwoman. Uh we've been working on this for quite a while. Um, I sit on the parking advisory commission with council Novaski and uh, Mr. Skarowski and we've talked about this at length. Um, the reason we're just doing a pilot program on Broadway,
they want to see what impact it has on the revenue because they can tell each meter how much um, money comes in. Um, if it's successful, uh, we'll take some more money out of the parking advisory uh, kitty that we have and expand the
program. Uh the businesses came to councelor McKenna and I uh quite a while ago. Uh people just running in for takeout, scratch ticket, um going into the liquor store, an ATM,
pick up their uh dry cleaning as council McKenna had said, and they run in for five minutes, come out and find a ticket on their uh car. So I I think this is good for the businesses. uh people will be able to, you know, do these short errands without having to feed the
meter. I know Shirley Avenue is getting 100% of them. I I do believe at the last uh traffic commission meeting the rate on the meters went up a little bit on Shirley Avenue to kind of uh circumvent the revenue loss there. So, Broadway is
is still uh being looked at and I look forward to the pilot program. Thank you very much, >> Council Hass. Thank you, Madam President. Like both my fellow counselors said, this could be a great boost for local businesses, takeout, um running in to pay a bill, running in to
grab something from a store quickly. I know Arlington had put something in um with the 50-minute meters, I think last year or two years ago, and there was some issues with the program. So, maybe we can do like a how-to. I know it sounds easy, but for maybe for a senior
or someone who um English is a second language, maybe we could the city could have a video how to even if it's, you know, you just push the button. I know that's being updated, but great motion that I fully support. Um great uh boost for local businesses and that's we speak so highly of our local businesses and I
think that's a that's a great issue. Thank you, >> Council Noelski. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh this is a great idea and uh as my colleague said uh surely have raring to go. We're just waiting for the parts and equipment to
come in and get the things rolling by uh the end of the winter. And it is a great idea. It saves a lot of people a lot of aggravation. And so um I'm for this 100% and I hope things work out also on Broadway. Thank you.
>> Thank you councel. Motion to speak from the chair. Um, I also really agree with this motion. Um, it would benefit both the businesses and the visitors in the community by allowing them flexibility and
convenience. And I think it would also help with parking enforcement. It gives them, you know, less time to run around, go crazy trying to ticket them the second that they park there. then they realize that they do have you know um and it'll create um make it more
community friendly I believe so I'm also in agreement and um if there's no further discussion anybody from the audience would like to speak no um then I would like to
vote on this favorably madame clerk shall the economic development subcommittee offer a favorable recommendation to the full city council to approve the motion. Councelor Aenzio, >> yes. >> Yes. Councelor Hass, >> yes.
>> Yes. Councelor Hermo, >> absent. >> Absent. Council Novaski, >> yes. >> Yes. And chairwoman Garino SA. >> Yes. >> Yes. The motion has received a favorable recommendation. It will be forwarded to the city council this evening. Next item is council order 24-256,
a presentation by the chief of planning and community development and Jason Shrivever of Stantech on the Broadway corridor parking study. >> Mr. Skolleski. >> Good evening, counselors. Tom Skowski, 281 Broadway. Um, you don't have Mr.
Shriber uh this evening, just me. Um, I think the the motion was a carryover from the original presentation, which I actually believe was in 2024, maybe early 2025. Um, and this is just a followup and um, because there already
was a presentation of of the full study to um, this committee. I'm just going to catch up on where we've been um, since that study was initially released and some of the work that we're doing and some of the work that is still to come. Um, councelor McKenna had just mentioned
one of the key items which are those um the 15minute loading zone spots which we are going to be incorporating um as one of the follow-up items from that study. So, I think make sure we're
live here. >> Not sure if it's that means it's not working or something I did. Trying to do it again. >> Andrew always to the rescue. >> Do you have You're all waiting so patiently. >> If anyone can fix it, it's Ashley.
>> All right. I have emailed it to you better than me. >> All right. It is sent. So you should have received I got a new computer. Until we can get our laptops up and running here, we're going to skip to the next
motion. Council order 25-032. Motion presented by Council Novaski that the mayor request the city solicitor to draft an ordinance regulating the placement, installation, and removal of satellite dishes. >> Council Novaski. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Uh, Madam Chair,
I put this in uh the beginning of the year and we did get a response from the city solicitor saying that they're under FCC ruling and we can't touch those satellite dishes. But I disagree that
something something can be done. It's just a matter of putting some time into it, researching and to try and make things happen to help our city. Those satellite dishes are terrible to look
at. Some of them have six and seven dishes on a small house. And when they people leave, the dishes stay and not being used. And we're not saying we want to ban them all together. We just want
to control them. And they have a minimum of one or two depending on some of the satellite dishes require two dishes to operate. And You know, I'm I'm very disappointed in the city solicitor that they just kind of brush this off and
just gave a uh a boilerplate recommendation or ruling, but uh you know, I'm willing to let this go and place it on file if you would. Thank you. >> All in favor? All oppose to place it on file.
Next matter is council order 25-271. Communication from the chief of planning and community development relative to ongoing economic development initiatives throughout the city. >> Evening again. Um I'm actually going to be faced with the same challenge here because I had a whole presentation
planned. Um, that said, I could probably start, if it pleases the chair, with the Broadway parking study because it's not as visual. I think I could probably talk all of it through. I I'll use the slideshow as my um Q cards, if you will,
just on my laptop, but I think I can talk with you all about um the the various things. Great. Um, wait, are they gonna >> Somebody got creative. You know what? There we go. I I I admire
the ingenuity here. Um Andrew is always here to solve a problem. So, um since we last met uh and talked, we've been working on a lot of the recommendations that came out of the Broadway parking study and I'll I'll talk about them in brief u both what they were um as a
whole and then um the ones that we've taken action on, what action have we taken. Um so there were some strategies focused on fixing the existing deficiencies in the system, improving the effectiveness and efficiency of how we enforce and monitor parking
regulations and finally supporting the development and uh the master plan on Broadway more broadly the goals of of that project. So, uh, first with wayfinding, um, we had a goal here to improve signage indicating off- streetet public parking, specifically the Central
Avenue lot, um, which is not well, um, signed today. And, and we saw through the the Broadway parking study that, um, there's a lot of meat left on the bone with the Central A lot. Um, the vast majority of folks do not park there as
opposed to on street where we have a bigger parking issue. Um, so one of the recommendations was taking a look at wayfinding. Um, and we actually have up up in our office right now the first example of some wayinding that's going to be implemented um throughout Broadway next
week. Um, you'll see a bunch of these signs uh throughout the city that uh will point people to various points of interest uh along Broadway as well as to the various parking locations. Um, we also took a look at parking lot
access and specifically on Central Avenue, what we could do to make Asella Court, which is the um the walkway from Broadway to the Central Avenue lot a little bit more welcoming and inviting. Um, we partnered with a group called Neighborways Design, uh, who worked with
city volunteers, uh, folks from my department, uh, the mayor was there as well, actually doing some participatory work on the ground, um, taking various designs that have been created and, um, actually implementing it to create kind of a welcoming and you've probably seen
on a court. Um, the designs are there are there today. It's beautiful. it it brings a little light to that area and that corridor. Um our next step uh in addition to having art bring light, we're actually going to literally try to bring light to Oscella Court. Um
lighting up some of the existing street lights that are not currently working. Um and also potentially experimenting with some something like you've seen um in other communities where you have kind of the hanging string lighting. just something to make that feel a little bit more playful and welcoming. Um, and
again to draw people's attention to Central A, which is a really underutilized parking corridor in the city. There were also recommendations about regulatory streamlining, streamlining operations in the central av lot, eliminating all the various uh areas
designated for permits and hourly parking, managing demand through the number of permits sold and pricing and restriping to actually increase the supply on the lot um and removing the time limits um for the central a lot.
And there were similarly um suggestions on the city hall lot uh eliminating the various separations amongst the various um spots in in the lot right behind us at city hall. Um removing the two-hour limits and pricing the lot and adjacent
side streets as well because those tend to be some of the higher um utilized areas within the whole Broadway parking uh study area. So you could see here it's about 84% utilized. And we like to think of
with with parking policy 85% is kind of the perfect fit where things are working where there's always a little bit of parking to go around. Um but you're not sitting with a lot of underutilized parking that uh we're just kind of leaving those existing spots on the table. Um so this is sort of the ideal.
We want to keep it there, but once we're at that range, we want to use price as a mechanism to to control demand. So we don't get at 95% which is you know where you can never find a spot to park or certainly 100%. Um another recommendation was to utilize
parking benefits district money um to implement recommendations in the plan. Um and we actually have already started to do that. Um the parking benefits district as um councelor Orenzio had mentioned not only is paying for the um
15-minute sensors along Broadway which will be from Prospect A to um to Yemen Street. Um but it also is helping to support um the signage and wayfinding installation that's going to
be undergoing um on the length of Broadway next week. They also recommended performance pricing. This is not something we've done yet. Um but they would recommend higher prices along the core of Broadway. Um no pricing in some of the areas where there's not a lot of
utilization. Um and cheaper prices on the side streets and again ultimately eliminating time limits overall. And then they they took a look at shared parking and just said I think long-term thoughts were that we could utilize
shared parking as a way to significantly enhance our parking supply in the city. This would be looking at um privately held lots within the Broadway area and you know whether through arrangements with housing developers and and those property owners or with the city and those property owners utilizing some of
those underutilized private parking lots along Broadway to again increase the supply of publicly available parking um for businesses and and residents along this corridor. Um they also recommended parking ambassadors developing a program to
provide parking information to the public while supporting parking enforcement. So it's kind of like a friendly face where people can see and explain um you know what to do and what not to do. Councelor Hasset mentioned earlier with with the new 15minute loading zones um how can we make sure
that people understand how to utilize the the system and and that's certainly one way that parking ambassadors could could serve that role. Um and then various enforcement technologies. Um they recommended license plate recognition. Uh and actually this is
something we have since the the study is done. We we now have this throughout our parking enforcement system. So it's it's a way to help enhance enforcement and to streamline things for the enforcement staff. um long story short, where they can have uh through through a camera
system that monitors um use of the parking spots, they have real time up-to-date information about who's parked where and who shouldn't be where they're parking. Um and then loading and dynamic curves as uh councelor McKenna and councelor Arjenzio put forward. Um
this was a recommendation where we actually don't have designated loading zones along Broadway um to create some dynamic loading zones within our existing parking supply. So we will be installing this. We placed the order last week um as was mentioned both along
Shirley Avenue but also along Broadway. And it's actually not a green button system. They've they've upgraded the technology. So, it's actually super simple. I'm I'm hoping that uh the the rollout challenges that Councelor Hos mentioned won't even be an issue because
essentially it's a sensor that's placed on those spots that tells when somebody pulls up and if you pull up um the sensor immediately starts and you have 15 minutes of a grace period before, uh pricing ultimately kicks in. Um, and then that, you know, helps to make a
real-time enforcement of of when that um when that starts, but also we heard a lot with the green button system that people just walk by in the street and continuously press the green button for people that had way overstate their welcome. So, this is a way to actually ensure that this system is used for what it was intended, which is for dynamic
loading. You're you're picking up your food, you're picking up your dry cleaning, but you're not staying there all day. And here's the pilot area, as mentioned. um delivery is TBD. It's just basically based off of the vendor at this point. So I I would hesitate to make a um
estimate, but I I assume sometime in early 2026. And then parkletits were a recommendation that they made, which you've probably seen before, parks in parking spaces. Um we've we've toyed with that in other parts of the city and Shirley Avenue being one of them. I don't think this is something we're
going to do anytime soon on Broadway, but that was one of the recommendations of the plan. And then they looked at again leveraging the existing capacity to support development. So if additional development is taking place on Broadway, I think one of their main recommendations is we'd need to look deeper into shared parking as a
mechanism to broaden and expand the parking supply. Um so overall looking at the recommendations um you could see just a few of them that I've crossed off that we've already started to take on. wayfinding, utilizing our parking benefits district, um parking lot access through OELA
court, um enhanced enforcement technologies, loading and dynamic curbs are just a few. And then some that we haven't worked on yet, but intend to. And then some like the park lits that we'll probably um you know, think about for future use, but not something we'll be looking at anytime soon. Um so at
that, I'm happy to take any questions you might have. >> Councelor Jenzio. >> Thank you. Uh, Madam Chairwoman, uh, Mr. Saroski, uh, thank you for making a presentation. Uh, a couple of things. Uh, one of them, the Central A parking
lot, I know you say that's very, you know, underutilized. And this way finding is going to try to help people find that lot and use that. And then that's that's at a cheaper price than Broadway as it exists now. >> It's cheaper as it exists today. Yes.
their their recommendations were to potentially even lower it more. >> Okay. And I know the housing production plan uh that was before us that recommended using that area as affordable housing. Uh so those two
different plans recommending two different things for that space. Have Have we landed on what we really want to do with that central parking lot? I think for the time being we'll be using it as a parking lot and and updating the policies accordingly in in line with the study.
>> Okay. And I believe before the traffic commission or it may be going there are parking meters going to appear again on Pleasant and Hyde and Foster like they were in the past and they were removed.
Are they coming back? Um, I I think that's something that might be under consideration, but I haven't heard a definitive answer on that yet. Um, I think if we were to take this 15minute dynamic loading zone to
scale, it might be something we'd want to look at more detail, but I'd want to make sure our parking directors there for that answer. >> Okay. Thank you. I'm all set, man. Okay. So, um recommend that we place this on file and um look forward to the
planning and development during uh bring this back up during the next council um next year. All in favor? And nope, we're on the uh sorry, council order 25271. We're going back to the communication from the chief of planning
and community development relative to ongoing economic development initiatives throughout the city. I just need to email this presentation over to Reier TV and they were going to bring it up for us. Thank you. Well, we're working on the technology. I could
at least start framing uh the discussion for tonight. Um I appreciate your patience as we're working through this. Um but we're we're going to be talking about two separate um but but certainly related issues. Uh the first of them being just uh giving you all an update
as to some key economic development projects that are in the pipeline with the city. Um councelor Guian Oaya and I were talking recently and realized that uh the economic development council hasn't had a lot of updates on some of the exciting economic development work
in the city. So my biggest reason for first talking about some of these projects is to get you all thinking as a as a committee about what we might want to look at into into the new year. So, I'm going to run through quickly a few different projects that will just get you all thinking about um a few key
projects underway and things we might be able to talk about in 2026. And then the second portion of the meeting and where I'd like to devote the most time tonight is talking about the transformative development initiative or TDI. Um along Shirley Avenue, I have Laura Christopher
who is our TDI fellow uh who's been working with us for the last three and a half years. We're fortunate enough to have her um through a state grant uh TDI until the end of June and hopefully far beyond um because we'll be talking about some of the great things that Laura and
the TDI partnership have been able to do over the last three and a half years, but also looking ahead. I'd like to get um your endorsement on on a potential new district that we'll be looking at as um mass development has opened the door to um a new district application that
will be due um in just a couple weeks. So, I don't know if that we've got everything up, Ashley, and we can get rolling. Okay, great. All right. So, Andrew, it's kind of rapid fire
here, so I I'll I'll just say next as we're going through them, but you could um start with the economic development projects. Um and I want to just review briefly some various small business supports for the community just so people are aware of some of the things
that we have at offer. Um, I think we've got a a number of exciting different ways that we can help support the small business community. All of which I think would be good things to talk about in a separate meeting in more detail. Um, because I think we we are really trying
um and you know my team whether John Fester, Julie Dearo and in my office are are working really hard to support our small business community and I think part of it is making sure that folks are aware of the great resources we have. Um, so hopefully this is the start of of an opportunity to have that conversation with you all. Um, if you could go to the
next slide. Um, down a few more. Um, there we go. All right. So, the first one is our small business lending program. Um, which we have uh loans if we could provide low to no cost or low
to no interest loans to small businesses throughout the city. um eligibility. You either need to have five employees or less and um be an income eligible proprietor uh which is low to moderate income or you are hiring or retaining income eligible employees and it must be
a brickandmortar location. Um the terms are 5-year loans, 0% loans on Shirley Avenue or Broadway. Um in six months payments can be forgiven if all the other 55 payments are made in full. Um so we launched this program about three
years ago. Um, and we have over a dozen um, loans that we've offered throughout the small business community um, in the city and we're looking to expand that uh, program further. We still do have this uh, community development block grant from the federal government and one of our biggest priorities every year is to continue to support a small
business community. Um, so that's one of the ways we do it. Uh, the next way, if you could go to the next slide, Andrew, um, is through technical assistance. So, uh, oftentimes when we're hearing from small businesses that are looking to open up a business or maybe they're, um, struggling because they're not reaching
the right, um, target audience with their marketing strategies, maybe they need help putting a business plan together. We have a partnership with Roads Consulting, um, where we offer marketing and business planning and other forms of support um, to small
businesses. The eligibility is similar to the the small business loan fund. They're both funded through the community development block grant program. Um, and oftent times if you are getting a loan through the city, we utilize this tool as a way to make sure that the loan is coupled with support.
So we're um, giving folks not just, you know, res financial resources, but assistance on putting together a solid business plan to take their business to the marketplace. Um, and then a couple ones just quite briefly uh, in the interest of time. Uh the Massave main streets initiative is
one we're actually going to be launching this this month um in partnership with our North Suffach Office of Resiliency and Sustainability. We actually have a Massave rep who's going to the small business community throughout the city um talking about how you can make your buildings more energy efficient and save
on energy costs which are exponentially rising as you all know. Um and that's something we're you know want to make sure the business community is aware of and if you have any questions on you can contact uh John Fester small business leaison for the city. And then finally
um in 2026 in partnership with the mayor's office we're going to be launching a um small business starting a business in rever series. Um, and it'll be kind of like business 101 essentially where we'll be working on lease negotiation, business planning, and marketing workshops and then might even
work up to business 2020 2011 and and kind of more advanced business planning activities. Um, and you know, this is an effort again to have have a better front door at the city through our office and the mayor's office to make sure we're helping to support our small businesses.
Um, and then a few exciting projects that are underway. Uh, one is what I'm calling the Wonderland Area Plan. Um, so we re recently received a grant from Mass Development, um, where we're going to be conceptually developing a master plan for underutilized properties all
around the River High School. Um, this includes Wonderland Marketplace, um, Wat's Edge, which is currently in in bankruptcy, and as you know, two of the properties are actually um, condemned, and you know, it's a it's a huge under underutilized asset in the city. Um, and
then the Wonderland MBTA surface parking lot, which the MB uh MBTA has expressed interest in partnering with us on a potential project there. So, we're using this um real estate technical assistance for mass development to basically put a
plan together on what all this will look like. It's kind of nestled in the middle of the exciting work happening at the high school and everything of course that's been happening over the last decade along Revier Beach. Um, if you go to the next slide, um, you'd actually see just a quick photo of of the areas
we're talking about here. Um, and the plan will be to have this completed in June of 2026. I actually think this would be a great thing to talk about with the committee in the new year when the study's completed. Um,, you know, it's one of the things I'm most excited about tackling from an
economic development perspective. This is a lot of land right next to the tea and right next to a lot of exciting things underway. Um, and then next up, uh, we have the Square Road Master Plan. Uh, and this is going to be funded through the Mass Gaming Commission's Community Mitigation
Fund. It's going to look at transportation. It's going to look at economic development and overall just opportunities along the Squire Road corridor. Um, this is going to build on the road to Revier, which I think some of you participated in last year, which was a Harvard student study, um, that,
you know, looked at what what the possibilities are along this corridor. Um you can see in one of the subsequent photos um and I'll also email email this out so everybody has access to it um a rendering from one of the students or at least a drawing of you know the ideas
that came out of that study were really about reconnecting Squire Road to the marsh. We have one of the largest salt marshes in the greater Boston area right behind Squire Road and you wouldn't even know it if you were standing there. Um, and you have this beautiful natural resource. And how could we in a master
planning effort, again, not five years from now, probably 10, 15 years from now, create a plan and set the framework for reconnecting with with the marsh and um, you know, reconnecting that whole area potentially to to a new pattern of development that helps act more as a
steward of the natural environment, but also, you know, creates open space and creates new economic development and housing opportunities. Um, so we aim to start that work probably uh a bit later in 2026. Maybe that's something we could talk about with the committee about a year ago or a year from now rather. Um,
as that study's really underway, I I'll certainly be looking to gather all of your input to make sure we've got a holistic and and ambitious but also a reasonable and feasible um strategy moving forward. And um then some Broadway master plan
follow-ups. They're going to be brief here. We talked about the wayfinding already. Um we are at the tail end of some sign of facade improvements that have been going on um over the last year and a half. Um hopefully you've seen some of the the great work. The the photo on the next slide is Hector's
Barber Shop and the Good Diner. Um one of many um great facelifts that we've seen on Broadway through our sign and facade program um and work that was recently expanded to Shirley Avenue. And then in 2026, we also got funding
through the Mass Gaming Commission to uh look at zoning and design standards along the corridor. Um I know we've had a few different housing projects that have come up in in front of the city council as of late and some of them I think had some very impressive designs
that fit well within the character of the Broadway corridor. And just to be frank, some did not. Um, a and I think one of the ways we can use zoning is is really helping to create a roadmap for what we want to see and the types of design that would really be appropriate
and fitting in um more appropriately with with the Broadway corridor. Um, so before we get into TDI again with the idea that these are all things that you know I'd love to hear from you all more about in 2026, but I will pause for any questions you might have because I know
I just covered a lot of ground. Councelor Jenzio, >> thank you. Have you heard from the MBTA about the uh blue line extension there, the stop over by the high school? Any talk of that? >> Finally.
>> Yes. Um, so we've we've had a $5 million earmark for three and a half years for a commuter rail station at Wonderland, and we have not yet been able to access it, but we've been very relentless, both myself and the mayor's office, and in making sure that that money comes to
River. Um, and just within the last month, we got word that they're initiating the study and they're going to have a follow-up meeting with us. Um, so I'm firmly in the camp of, you know, trust but verify. I I'll believe it when I see it, but it it is better news than than I've heard in in recent months.
And, you know, to their credit, I think the META has done a great job of fixing their existing resources, but because of that, I think they've been narrowly focused on what's in front of them, not what we need to be thinking about into the future. So, >> thank you very much. Good news.
>> So, let I recommend that the city council place this on file. All in favor? Yeah. >> I'm seeing no further business. This concludes the November 10th economic development subcommittee meeting. >> One more. Do we have another one?
>> Yeah. Sorry, that was kind of a two for one. Oh. Oh. Well, then proceed. >> Um, yeah, you you're hearing a lot from me today, which is why I brought Laura Christopher here, our TDI fellow who's been working in the Shirley Avenue neighborhood. Um, that that presentation
had two parts to it. Um, and I wanted to take some time to talk and celebrate the work that we've done. Uh, TDI actually just received a statewide award from Mass, Inc. through the gateways uh innovation summit just last uh week or two and and Laura uh Laura's got the the
trophy um but we got it in Lel for the wonderful work that she's been doing and leading this partnership and I think it's a partnership worth celebrating and talking about because you know we got to think about what's ahead so uh we recognize time is of the essence so we'll we'll try to get moving here um
but the first of all just talking about what TDI is on the next slide you'll see um TDI is really about um Laura, I'm going to hand it to you. It's about our fellows, so I'm going to let her do the talking. >> Sure. So, TDI is a um place-based neighborhood scale investment program.
Um you'll see some of the the core tenants is to have a geographic focus. This is so you you all saw this in what was presented about Broadway too. When investments happen together, you really can start to build momentum and feed off one another. There is a timelmited um
partnership, but this is mass development saying we'll be at the table with these cities and communities for three years. Um it's not an upfront transaction. It's an ongoing um partnership and it's guided by local partners. So the city of River as a core
partner as well as um private parties like women encouraging empowerment and the neighborhood developers in the case of Shirley AB that changes per city. Um during those three years now four with an extension participating neighborhoods get a fellow. So that's the role I'm
lucky enough to be in and I' I've really enjoyed partnering with Rivier. Um also they get access the cities get access to technical assistance and consultants as well as implementation funds. There's also competitive access to arts and culture programming uh funds and real
estate grants. And I might do my best to just work through this rapidly so you could take any questions that you might have because that's actually I want to take advantage of the limited time we have to do so. Um but yeah, we received an award. We look great, don't we? Um next
slide. Um just some of the great things that TDI did that allowed us to receive that award. Um TDI provides small business grants. Um like I mentioned on Broadway, there's signing facade improvements on Broadway. We utilized TDI to carry that over to the Shirley
Avenue neighborhood as well. You can see Kelly's Beauty Salon here and right next to it, Lasias were two of the recipients. Um in the next slide you'll see through our shared spaces program we help support and this is really something Laura identified where you had businesses that were having trouble
making the rent um under soaring development costs um ways in which you could couple multiple businesses in one. The example we see here is Cho Laf and they were able to put together a podcast studio in their cafe. If you haven't been there or filmed a podcast there, you should. It's it's a beautiful space
that this helped uh we helped support through this grant. Um and also there's a fund called TDI Equity that helped among other things. FNJ Juice actually moved from being a tenant to a a property owner uh in their their beautiful uh property on Shirley Avenue. And um you know it wasn't just a grant.
it leveraged a significant amount of private investment on their part and our CDBG loan funds. So there was a lot of various methods of support in addition to bank support um going into this project. So uh using those small dollar grants to leverage much bigger um funds
and then placemaking um in the next slide. So TDI is also about experimenting and creating new activities and events. Um, in 2022 when when you recall the World Cup was moved to the winter, um, we we decided to have a World Cup viewing at the the Shirley
Avenue off streetet parking lot and it was winter so we didn't get a lot of people. But what we did get was the idea to take this to the the next big event which was COP America. And this was an event actually put on by the city but spurred by uh what first happened at um the TDI partnership in 2022. and is
hopefully some of you were there to see Colombia in 2024. It was it was a really electric atmosphere and actually something we're hoping to replicate in in the new uh in the new year with with the World Cup coming to Boston and Foxboro soon enough. >> They they lost the final by 13 points,
right? >> No comment. Um so um then a few other great things that TDI has done. And we had a participatory budgeting exercise where um in 2023 we had folks vote on um over $500,000 of
investment in the neighborhood on what they wanted to see. Some of the great things to come out of that. Um the the what we're calling the urban forest on 69 Shirley. Um Fitz Henry Park, the dog park that recently Ed Shovels in the Ground started construction on. Uh that
will be done shortly as well as Flity Square. all were different things that were identified through that process and paid for through participatory budgeting and wouldn't have happened without TDI. Um, and what TDI also allowed us to do um was leverage grant funding to take
our impact further. So, we were able to give out over $500,000 because TDI um got us a $280,000 grant from the housing choice program at the state. um one of many different ways in which TDI took a little bit of money and turned it into a
lot of outside money through uh grants and and leveraged impact. Um and actually just recently we were able to announce uh we got 2.75 million for water main improvements along Ocean Avenue. Those were improvements that the city was going to have to pay for one
way or another. Um, and now we have 2.7 million uh $75 million to spend on other things in in part because of the story that we've been telling about the the growth along Shirley Avenue and the Shirley Avenue partnership um and and through the work the partnership has
done um has helped us unlock millions of dollars. this this being the most recent and most exciting and SA the Shirley Avenue Neighborhood Association. Um we we're not just focused on the partners at the table here but actually working with the small
business community and and understanding that this is a timelmited project. Eventually we're not going to be here at least the partnership won't be here like it is today and handing it over to the small business community to actually help maintain some of this progress that we've been seeing. So, it's not just a
three or four-year program, but it continues well beyond that. Um, one of the things that uh Sana helped support in the last year was the um in the last month, I should say, was Shirley Eats uh which hopefully some of you participated in um over the month of October. It was
basically a restaurant month um in in the district where you go with a passport and get your passport signed. And um each restaurant had their own like unique take on a new menu item. Uh, one of them was like Dubai chocolate waffles, which I didn't even know what
Dubai chocolate was until I went to uh, Napoles to get it and it was delicious. Uh, and you know, hopefully one of many ways that the small business community is kind of working to support um, the culture there. And then uh we offered technical support
through TDI and this is district improvement financing um was one such tool where where they helped us look at a tool that's kind of a creative budgeting tool we can use um to harness future growth to support a neighborhood. Um way too complicated to talk about in
two minutes but they have a pilot study that I'll share with the council after this meeting that uh use Shirley Avenue as a test case for what this would look like. But this is a tool we might want to use on Broadway. This is a tool we might want to use on Squire Road. This might even be a tool we want to use in
the Wonderland area that I just referenced before. Um, and you know, we couldn't have gotten that initial support without, um, TDI. And the the final thing, uh, and Andrew, if you maybe go to slide 32, um, is
we're going to be applying for a new district, um, very soon. And um we're looking at the River Beach, what we're calling the River Beach TDI district because we have to compete with all the other gateway cities in the Commonwealth for a TDI designation. And at least to
my knowledge, we are the only TDI district that or TDI community that has a beach and maybe a couple others have a beach, but we have the best one. So, yeah, the best one, the first one, all the above. So, we're trying to look at all of the things that Shirley Avenue
has been doing, building upon that, and you know, how can we leverage Rever Beach Tourism to support local businesses? That was my first meeting with Mayor Keefe, the first question he asked me. Um, and something we're going to try to take on with this project if we're awarded. Um, placemaking, how can
we better activate the waterfront? So all that green space that DCR owns and manages that just kind of sits there dormant. Um how can we utilize that to create uh more activities all year round? Um how can we improve non-vehicular travel to and from the
beach that includes the commuter rail station that includes um bike to the sea creating a safe path for families to get from the northern strand to the beach and um points in between. And then how do we build upon the development of Shirley Avenue and Waterfront Square in these kind of underutilized properties
that that I had referenced and how do we tie in also what's happening at the high school in Suffach Downs and and kind of create some uh connected district. Um so we're applying for that hopefully at the end of the the month. I hope I'd have your blessing although I know we're brief in this discussion today. Um so
I've talked a lot. Happy to take any questions you might have. >> Any committee members have some Uh, council H. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Um, guys, congratulations on the award. Tom, I had a quick question with the um the TDI. Was that a three-year
>> process or? >> Yes, it it was a three-year designation and we there were originally 12 communities. Only five of them were extended. Six were extended. So, we are one of six that were actually extended for another year. And is this something Reier might have a chance every three
years on getting a new new district or a new location to that they can that we can work on >> that? >> As far as we know. >> Yeah, that's the goal. So hopefully if we get awarded in November, we'll have another three years. >> And I know you talked about the beach being probably the um the most likely district
for the next one. And um any other locations other than Wonderland and Broadway that that you considered? Um, so I think Broadway and then Square Road would be probably another one into the future. I think this one's going to be really competitive. So, we wanted to,
you know, again, First Beach and all that. Go go go go go with the most competitive location, but I think in the future those are ones we're eyeing up because this will be hopefully a a program that will continue. >> Great. Thanks. Congrats on the award by the way. Thank you, >> Council Novaski.
>> Thank you, Madam Chair. Madam Chair, you know, again, I've already told Laura this is congratulations. It's a great award. This has been the best three years I've seen down in Shirley A. She's been so proactive to get all the businesses together and work together
and working with the Shirley A uh business association that they're putting together, a neighborhood association. And everybody is so excited working together. And it's just been great, you know, with the city providing the funds for the uh uh frontage of all
the stores and the parking plans. Just everything has been so great and it's put everybody together as a community and working as a team and I love it. I've been involved in all the projects that they've uh they've had down there
and uh I wish we can have Laura longer than uh next June. So, but uh it's just been awesome to be able to work with her and uh her work with all the uh people involved on Shirley F. So, thank you
again. I recommend that the city council place this on file um and looking forward to discussing it next next council term. Um seeing that there is no further business, this concludes the November 10th economic development subcommittee
meeting and the regular city council meeting will begin at 6 p.m. Thank you. Part: 2
Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Monday, November 10th, 2025 city council meeting. Please join me to salute the flag. I aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under
God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Roll call of the members. Councelor Aenzio >> here. >> Here. Councelor Cogleandro >> here. >> Here. Councelor Gino >> here. >> Here. Councelor Gino Slaya >> here. >> Here. Councelor H >> here.
>> Here. Councelor Jeromeo >> here. >> Here. Councelor Kelly >> here. Here. Councelor McKenna >> here. >> Here. Councelor Nobasilski >> here. >> Here. Councelor Zambudo >> here. >> Here. And council president Sylvester >> here. >> Here. Quorum is present. >> Approval of the journal of the regular meeting of October 27th.
>> All in favor? All opposed. >> So ordered. >> Madame clerk. I'm requesting a suspension of rules on a suspension rules. All in favor? All >> opposed. >> Yeah. Yes. >> Rules are suspended to take up calendar
item number 13. Motion presented by councelor Hermo that the city council award a certificate of commendation to Sebastian Aguadelloo Gomez for his exemplary contribution to educating and informing the residents of Rivier in representing the Colombian American community with integrity and distinction
here in the largest Colombian-American community in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. >> Coner. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you for all the leeway uh for this particular item. I will I just wanted to I'm not feeling well and I'm going to head out but wanted to take this up so that for
the next council meeting I'll I'll say all my words about Sebastian but he's a exemplary um person that helps um educate our community. So thank you Mr. President. >> Thank you council. Any other counselors?
Okay. And while we're under suspension of rules, can we take up the communication with uh parking director? >> Late communication calendar item number 14, communication with the parking director requesting approval of the annual toys for tickets amnesty program
and the stay in shop local Sundays Saturday program. >> Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the council. probably the most exciting mighty my year. Um each year, um this is will be our sixth annual toys for tickets amnesty program. Looking for the blessing of the council. Uh this program
allows the parking department to remove up to $30 per violation brought to us for a toy of equal value up to five tickets at maximum. In conjunction with this program, we also like to um do a little holiday shopping incentive where we exempt metered rates or need to pay a
parking meter on the Saturdays leading up to Christmas including Black Friday, the Saturday after Black Friday. Um hoping for the blessing and if anyone has any questions, be happy to answer it. Thank you. >> Thank you, Zach. Any councils? Council Kogandro.
>> Oh, okay. Any city councils? Council Samuto. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you, Mr. Director. This is a wonderful program and uh I hope we get lots of toys for kids that need them. And uh I'm going to
do my part, but uh I'm happy to see you up here promoting this and uh let's hope we do real well this year. Thank you. >> Thank you for the kind words, counselor. >> Thank you, council. Any other counselors? All in favor? All opposed?
>> So ordered. Thank you everyone. >> Okay. >> Are we still suspension? name and address. >> Okay, got it. >> Hon chairman and city council members, thank you. Thank you for having me here. My name is Wamshi Pali and I graduated
from Northeastern University two years back studying applied machine intelligence and I currently work as a data processing engineer for state of Maryland department of health. Um so I'm so passionate about the data and a dataentric solution. So I I have created
with a website called as rivier.c city. So this is to help the governance uh for the counselors and for the people of Rivier. uh the reason why uh I built this because uh one day I was trying to search the data regards to reviewer but
I found that the entire data is scattered on very different resource because it's understandable uh there are very various types of datas that has been you know split across federal data state level data and uh city level data but I couldn't find a single resource
where we can gather all of the details in a single platform so that's why I have developed this AI civic data platform form where you where you would be able to grab all of the details and have a single point of solution for that. Um,
okay. So be so and so while I was going through the city budget document it was like 257 pages and it's very hard to read through and uh so what I did was I have created a solution which can answer any question regards to the city budget
and all you have to do is just ask the question in a natural language uh and it would be getting the answers for you and not only that so we have the data from you know state department and the health department and the federal data and various levels of data right I have combined all of these datas into a
single platform and single website where you can just go to the website and click on the respected departments to get the information and not only that recently we also have the reviewer post data information so what it does is like every day you can get the real-time
insights so you can ask uh in the website hey what happened in the last week in the reviewer then you would be able to get the answers like hey there was certain type of incident happened and there are police responded to that event you would be able to get the what are the different percentages of events
that happened in the last week for the police department. So whether it might be five departments and any other issue you'll be able to uh get insights for that and next slide please. So yeah so there are various different
ways to you know interact with the website. uh you can just use your voice and ask the question uh like hey um what's the what's happening with the wonderland project right so it will get the data from the uh city doc city
budget document and and likewise you can ask about what's the weather for re and what's the transportation how many schools are there in uh river and various etc details so basically a is going to pro process all of the 12 departments data which is available so I
gathered from uh US Census Bureau and MBTA data and various departments. So you're going to you're going to get the answers for that. Not only just uh information, you're going to get the state-of-the-art visualization charts. Those are the best in the industry where you would be able
to understand the data with a single view. And uh likewise the updates were real time for example as I mentioned each each and every day our uh re police department publishes new data every day. So it's going to fetch your recent
uh new data and it's going to provide you the chart which I can show it here in the chat uh website. But we can go with the next slide please. So these are the example questions that you can ask with a chartboard like uh what are the most common types of
instance in my neighborhood and what's the median household income in the reviewer and when's the next blue line train and the interesting part about this website is like uh I have made the MBTA uh subpage where you can get the
each and every train data like made into a chart let's say like if you find like from wonderland to uh river beach You could see the chart if there is any you know delay in 2 minutes you you would be able to see the spike in the chart and you would be able to get the all uh
relevant data. So the entire MBT MBTL uh line data is with the website and you'll be get you'll be able to get the very nons information where you won't be uh you won't be getting that data unless you go to the MBTA directly. Um next
slide please. And coming to the data verification, I know the most important question uh the council might have like how accurate is the data. So for this I'm using uh resources from the reviewer. So one of the main resources like a city budget
document and the second one is a MBTA data and third one is US census bureau and fourth one and is a state level information that we have and various information that we have and next slide please.
So for this FIA it took couple of months for me to have this done. So it has like 50,000 plus of lines of code and there are like eight data resources and for this to be done uh it might it would be costing around 200k for the C2 to implement and 75k to have the
infrastructure cost for that for a year but it was done for free uh and and also have done the case study for the various different cities in the country. So including the San Francisco area, Silicon Valley, Boston, New York
City, no other city has all of the data points in a single uh in a single platform. So if you're able to have this picked up, this will be the first in the entire United States to have the state-of-the-art solutions as per the 2025 and 2026 standards for the civic
transparency. Uh next slide please. as as you can see here. So this is a differentiation uh factor when compared to other cities. It has a unified semantic search and the rest of the cities mostly doesn't have the a
integrated maybe they might have a chatbot or something but we want to have enter semantic uh search for it and most of the tools doesn't have no voice interfaces. This includes San Jose and San Francisco Bay cities as well. And
yeah, can we go to the next slide please? Um I'm what I'm requesting the counselor for is like uh the the reason why I'm doing this because counselors as you are the lawmakers you deserve to have the best of the data available for you
because AI AI is just a tool but we need a transparency so that counelors can make a better decisions because it's up to the humans to make the decisions not to the AI so but what it can do what it excels at best is to have the better uh
better information insights. So that's what I'm trying to provide have the insights provided to you so that you will be much more informed about what's happening with our city and it's up to the city council to make a decisions. Uh so I I'm just requesting for you know to
have you know acknowledgement of the this website and to have the backing to the rivier.org our website and what what I'm interested uh is counselors like uh there are many uh many things that we can actually improve to provide the data transparency not just to the residents
as I said like to the counselors let's say like there are many factor let's say like we have 311 data right so for the governors what I believe is like rather than being a reactive system it's better if you have a proactive system because if you find the issues much way uh
forward than you something becomes worse, it would be best for us to be in a best reactive based system. So that's what I'm trying for. So I'm recom I'm requesting if we can have like six months of trial period where we can actually have this website
uh have the data and have uh just go by your validation trying to try to see like if there are any certain type of information that we can provide so that council can make a better decisions for any aspects in the
various departments. So that's what I'm requesting for so because we can integrate 311 services as well so that a city might have much more better insights as well. Uh next slide please. Yeah. So so yeah as we all know like uh
in the late 19th century u through a former DCR uh river became the United States first public beach. So it that was then. So we also have the chance now to become one of the most transparent even though we are small it's that
doesn't prevent uh prevented us from becoming one of the first uh good initiatives the city has taken previously. So likewise we can also become the one of the most transparent city in the states. So yeah that's all I have. Thank you so much.
>> Yes. Okay perfect. Okay. So this is a city dashboard that we can uh see. So over here we have various departments over on the left and can you please uh click on scroll down? Yeah. So those these are the various
charts. So if you click on the each chart you will be able to get the what are the numbers for it and these are the over the years data for the budgeting split via various departments. Yeah. and right can we go to the MBTA section
please? MBTA section on the left. Uh yeah, so you could see the spike right. So there was a 2 minutes of delay from uh a media station from that's wonderland to rear beach at I couldn't see the time but yeah uh so you can change the different we have various
different stations in the blueand right so we can change uh the stations and likewise we'll get the accurate information from the MBTA pipeline so you can click on any of that so those are the graphs of the west train details
can you Please uh come down scroll down. So these are the various uh uh line details and you could also see the various maintenance details. Let's say like some of the elevators are not working. You would be able to see uh over here. Can please scroll down
scroll down please. So those are the maintenance details that you have over here. So so one spot for all MBTA related to blue line. You don't have to go anywhere else. you will be getting getting so not only for the current day you would be able to go back in the time and see let's say like 13
days back if you want to see any delays between uh river beach to wonderland you would be able to do so um can we go to a different tab please um a insights a insights on top just
above a insights yeah so over here so this is a a So air read entire city budget document you could see various departments over there various categories uh those are the insets you would be able to see how much
cost per uh person in the reviewer for any funding effort that we have through the city budget document can you please click on any of the category please any random right so you could see over here like per person cost and how much percent of
the budget that might constitute. So yeah and if you see on the bottom you could see the reference to which part of the budget document it was getting the information from. Let's say like it it mentions some source certain page number and the line number you would be able to
you know trace back to the city budget document and get the insight. Uh can we also go to the housing details please? So these are the intu in intuitive charts for you know housing details. You could see uh what are the trends for
city of can you scroll down please? This was data from main but you could see like where are the people leaving from. So for this part I got the information from aggregators like red finin and zillow. If you have city based information like a city based
information that would be much better. Um can we please go to uh police locks please? Right. So this was the police locks I was talking about. So this has a enter data
about for from the police department. Um so you could see the what are the call distribution types. We have other type and fire and various categories. Over here you could see the chart what are the trends that's happening throughout their days
from the police department and if you also see like what's the peak hour so our police department gets most of the calls at 2 p.m. you could see over there like how 14 so this is chart on a 24-hour graph you could see we usually get most number of calls from the police
department at 2 p.m. and less during the late night. Uh can you scroll down please? And you can also see like weekly trends, monthly trends. And can can we click on the rever beach bowl first bar chart
bottom? Yeah. First one. Yes. Any one of them. Yeah. So you can see over here what type of uh on which street we have more type of more police locks from and you can subcategorize. Okay. Is it uh so if you click on the
rear beach boulevard you would see most of them uh that needs attention compared to other streets because other streets might have more complaints about loud noise but the re beach ball has little bit of crime data or something. So that's how we can get the information
about the v different streets on a street wise basis. So this is the real time data that we are fetching from uh river police locks. Can we scroll on please? Okay. So this is interesting chat. So you could see like how different type of
uh logs that that's been evolving over the days. So can we click on uh October 28th on the chat? October 28th on the chat like graph >> on on the chat, please. Yeah, October
20th. That's perfect. >> Uh the the one with more orang-ish little bit of left. >> Yeah, even more left. >> 26. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. 26. So you can see over here like the more number of
disturbances happened on 26 because there was Friday. So that makes sense. So that's why we have more pulse complaints with a nose uh noise complaint. So likewise you can see the trend of various type of uh police logs that we are having in the city. And if
you could see like we also have actual logs like the with the police details over here. This these are the each and every individual entry that we have. Okay. So, and
so uh next thing I want to show is can we also open the chat bot on the bottom right uh with the Yeah. So, can we ask a question like uh can you give me uh
let me check real quick. Can you can you provide me uh last week police data? Okay. So, can we expand that please if you if you want? Okay. It's okay. So you can see over here you are able to uh see
the split between the various type of reports that happened in the last week the percentage wise and what happened and you could see in the bottom where are you getting this data like citation citation is more important for the accuracy so just to make sure we're not hallucinating the data so so that's so
like you can also use the voice mode to ask your questions and I'm saying it for sure we can obviously can refine the data like a for much more better data sources. But this is a chat board for that. We can close this
and can we scroll up please? Can we click on uh health indicators health? Yeah. So for this uh we got the data from um census bureau. So we could see on the
bottom we do have a charts where we can you know you have the split of data between various categories. So likewise we have many of the charts like it's going to take a lot of time to demonstrate all of the features but uh that's a summary of it. So we would be
able to get information and insights for uh many data points and and likewise we can also include if the city council is interested have much more visible insights we can obviously can include 311 and anything the council that seems
that's valuable for the committee to make a better decisions. So yeah that's all I have. Thank you so much council. >> Thank you. That was great. Any counselors? Councelor Kelly. >> Thank you so much, Mr. Py, for coming
here, for approaching me and, you know, allowing me to see this and and coming in and giving a presentation tonight. Um, I think this would be a valuable, very valuable tool. Um, it's a wealth of information and it makes it so accessible to everyone, not just us as
counselors, but um, residents in the city as well. So I just wanted to um just confirm something in your presentation that I saw. So in other words, what I think what you were saying is that if this technology were being used, it would be roughly at a cost of
about $275,000 a year for the technology and you're offering it to us for free. Is that correct? >> Right. So just for the product that was made so far. So that's going to cost about 200k. I mean like in a like typical software engineering cost that
we have and 75k for rough estimates of the infrastructure billing. So that's what it is. Yeah. 275. That's right. >> And is this something that then I think we could what I would like to suggest is that possibly I know we'd probably have to have a a bigger discussion. Maybe we
could go into a subcommittee with it or something. I I don't know. I'm open to suggestions. But maybe um if it were decided that it's something that we wanted to pursue um maybe have it available or accessible for a six-month trial basis and see you know if we
really think um the benefit is there um and then you know do it on a more permanent um basis if if that seemed to be the case. Um but I think it provides a ton of information. Specifically I think it could provide help with um the budget because it can be daunting. Um,
so, um, I think it would be great. So, thank you so much for your presentation and for getting in touch with me, um, and for coming in this evening. And I know probably other members of the council have questions for you as well. So, I'll let them ask their questions. Thank you. >> Thank you so much, uh, Mr. Kelly. So,
thank you for, you know, uh, for responding for my email and thank you very much for this opportunity. Thank you. >> Thank you, councelor Councelor Janino. >> Thank you for coming tonight. Um, there's a lot of information there, a lot of knowledge there. I went through
it this afternoon a little bit. I did some looking into it, a lot of reading. I I had a problem with the trying to figure out where the information came from. When I was looking, I was trying to find the pages, references, cross references on it.
>> Yes. >> And and if it was put in, you know, all just all past data put in, current data put in, how it was put in there. I also noticed your police log on there, the Vivish Pacway calls. You had a um
higher number of calls which someone from outside see look at that look at that would say, "Wow, Vivish Parkway. Who want to live in that street there?" But knowing the Parkway itself is the police station and when cars go in there that they're logged in as Vivish Parkway.
So that would throw that number off on you. So, I mean, it's it's a lot of information, a lot of data, a lot of good data on there, >> but I'd like to be able to cross reference some of the stuff over. >> Sure.
>> And I said, when you go to the page yourself, I'm not very computer >> savvy. So, I go into it, I look at it, I poke around a little bit. >> Yeah. >> I'm poking around in there saying, you know, this is a lot of good information, a lot of good stuff in here. All good stuff. Where's it coming from? How can I
cross check it over? >> Right. So, >> you know, even just small points into it. >> Okay. >> But >> yeah. Yes. So, thank thank you for your question. So, for as for the first one like for police loss, right? So, every day at 7:00 a.m. Re police department
publishes a PDF report to the website to the uh re police website. So what we are doing is like we are processing the data processing the data into the tablo format and we're trying to extracting extracting the information from the data
provided by the police department and we are sending that to the data pipeline so that we would be able to get the respect to relevant information. So that's for the one of it and for the rest of the data majority of the facts came from u
river city you know budget document. So I know the references might be off because it was in a very different format from >> so so it's basically the past data and put it in there. >> Yeah. >> To be reviewed and then the current data from the department would be on the morning updated by people that work in
the office. >> Yeah. Yes. So if you if you go to the river police website you could find the go to the police log section you would be able to find each and every day police logs. But I'm not sure about the retention policy. It seems like they are deleting if it's 90 days or older. So once we have the systems like this you
would be able to have a you know public own data repository where regard regardless of what happens to that data you'll be able to get the respective insights for that. So yeah for for the police data I'm exciting from there. >> Now how about how about contact for the website itself if if a citizen want to
contact you for information is there a contact page on there for information or is it just basically >> I mean we can include that. So it's still in fancy but I would like to consider that session. Yeah, sure. I would like to include that. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, sir.
>> Thank you, councelor. Councelor Green. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Thank you for your presentation. Um, how much in real time is this data? >> Uh, so majority of the data is static. So, let's consider for budget, right?
That that comes like yearly budget. So, have to do it once. So, majority of the information is like that. The one I would say much more dynamic is the police logs and the weather data. And the other one that I have is MBTA data. These three MBTA, police and weather
data are much more real time. So for police uh police locks, it's going to be 24 hours frequency. MBTA is going to be around 15 minutes and the other one is is going to be daily. So rest of the data the let's say like
for Census Bureau, right? So the data I found on the public data is as latest of 2023 for the uh national census bureau. So that's the latest as of yeah I would say 70% is static data and
30% is more dynamic. So that's why I'm requesting if the city has any permission for us to have the because I could see like most of the 311 data can be public as well. So if the if there is any way that we can have that included we will be able to have much more better insights to other aspects of realtime
data as well. So that gets to my other question how accurate is the data? >> So so yeah so we are presenting the data as is. So that's why the reason for that we are doing citations because uh so that we would be able to cross reference to
the original document where you're getting that from the police data it's just you know we are just parsing the data as is. So we not there is no guesswork in the facts right let's say like if some person asks in in natural human language let's say like very
narrow specific question like um how how many how many pounds of uh sand that we have in a river beach it's very hard for it to guess because there was no data for it so it might be hallucinating that that data at that point so during that scenario what we
can do is we can just give an estimate uh if if not we can just totally prohibit from answering rather you know rather than providing the estimate we can just say like uh we don't have that answer for that so rather than doing the guesswork we can do that >> right because if you're guessing then
it's not accurate data and people really don't want to know that >> um my other thing is you said it was free the 274,000 a year but for how long is it free the first year the first six months the first two months I want upfront
Uh yeah so that's a good question. Uh I would like to see the progress like for me as the current state of uh the website it goes I don't have any issue with the I mean I I do have to incur the cost for the server server maintenance and using the like a inference cost like
that's basically infrastructure cost for maintenance >> and how much is that? uh I don't have current estimate as of now because I'm doing from my own credit card so I didn't actually check on that part but uh I don't have a problem having it free as it you know currently is so I don't
have problem in that but my more thing is to have much more better transparency so that that might require you know much more data better sources as you have said before how much of the data is dynamic so we're trying to have much more dynamic data so for that it's it's going to be you know it going to incur
cost for that but but the website has no there's no cost for me so it's zero for that >> I'm I'm sure um what you're saying I completely understand because I think this whole idea of this AI thing is for transparency but it has to stem from you
coming to us first and being completely transparent of the actual cost in the future what it's going to cost the council what I mean what it's going to cost the city >> if the council decides to go with this Um, and again, I want to make sure that the
information that's going out there, if people are going to access this, >> is as accurate as it can possibly be because otherwise we're defeating the entire purpose of having this AI. And then, um, some of the information that you pulled up earlier, I saw, was from
back back in February. You also mentioned something about using Zillow, Zillow, and and the other Reddit, >> Redfin, >> Redfin, right? I mean those aren't accurate either. >> Yeah. So that's my council like uh I
would like to get uh insights and suggestions from you so that we would strive for having much more 100% accurate and transparency. So I would like to see like if the city has a better information resources so that we can know couple with that and try to get that information. So so far what I did
was uh with me I don't have any permissions for any private data. So I go I coupled with all of the public resource data that we have so far and just want to have the coun uh council like as you have mentioned that was a very good point. So like take session from on that point and to see if we can
do better on that part. >> Thank you. Thank you so much for answering my questions. >> Thank you councel council McKenna. >> Thank you Mr. President. I just want to say thank you for coming up here and giving us a presentation and the work that went into it was awesome. Um I just
think that as we we move on uh you know day by day year by year the um technology is just going to be it's going to advance and I think maybe someday you know everything will be accurate. So uh I just want to thank you
and um you know this is the future and so this is where we have to go. So thank you. >> Thank you so much ma'am. I agree with you. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, councelor. Councelor H. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Thanks so much for the presentation tonight. A lot of a
lot of information on here. Um, you know, so many people ask me how many people are in reair, how many how much funding do the do the schools get from the state. It's pretty amazing to have it at the the touch of your finger on this. Um, like the fellow my fellow C
counselors brought up before, um, accuracy is huge with something like this. We don't want residents looking up something and having it be completely false. But um a lot of great data here and a lot of great information. Um just want to thank you for the presentation. Thank you.
>> Thank you sir councelor. I agree with the point like uh I mean that's a very valid question. Even I resented it with that. We have to strive for accuracy. So, so that's why I was uh I'm here with you counelor so that if if you have path forward we can make we can try to have
much more accurate data we can get the accurate data um storage and and also the proper regress testing so only that so that's why I requested for six months trial period where we can you know just see like how it goes and yeah you see
the pilot >> can I ask one more thing >> thank you and so you said you got the information, the data from the census, um the MBTA. >> Yes. >> And the city budget >> and city budget and river police department. >> Great. Thank you. >> Thank you, sir.
>> Thank you, counselor. Any other counselors permission to speak from the chair? >> When you mentioned earlier uh about re.org, or would you have to somehow implement with our system with within
our our system here at city hall? How could that possibly impact the security of our system and is there going to be an updated cost to us to integrate the two? Uh so uh for the for the D it was
just asking for you know just to have the backlink just like the mention like you know independent data source program just like I mentioned in the website where all you have to do is just click on the website. So there's no connectivity between the both website. It's just like we have the link over the website so that you know if users are
interested in the you know beta phase we're not saying like this is completed project yet but it's in a beta. We can also have a disclaimer like see it's in a prototype phase it can make mistakes so you can make it as a definitive but it's in a prototype phase. So we can just have a link reference that might
not cost anything for whoever is maintaining the website. All all they have to do is like a change of 10 lines of code. So that shouldn't be a issue if the city council approves. Yeah. >> Okay. Um
councelor >> I think we'd probably want to have further discussion >> regarding this. So I think if we maybe discussed it in a subcommittee. I'm not sure which subcommittee would be appropriate. So I'm open to suggestions
for that. um and maybe even have invite um our IT department and um you know have a broader discussion with them and get some insight from them. So I'm not sure about which subcommittee if someone wants to suggest >> I think there's a techn isn't there a
tech uh subcommittee now wasn't one's created something in technology >> I'm trying to think what's left available for the rest of the year >> Mr. President >> Councelor, >> thank you. Is this our decision if this gets implemented? >> Definitely not. >> So then why are we bothering putting it
into subcommittee? This is a great presentation. It's a great website. We should forward this to the administration. We should This is not something that we can vote on. If it when it comes down to the money that we will potentially owe, yes, that will be something that will be in the budget, but I don't think we should put be
putting this anywhere but with the administration, just procedurally. Mr. President, >> counselor, >> uh, you know, I think this is this I'm impressed with the presentation. It's
very nice. This is the future. As one of my colleagues said, you know, this is something that if we want, we put a motion in to have the may the administration look into the possibility of putting an RFP out for this. It's, you know, this is this was great
information, but there's a a long way to go with this. I don't know. We could have a subcommittee to discuss how we want to present it to the administration, but it really has to come from the administration. It has to be an RFP, has to we have to be protected and protect the vendors and
and so forth and so on. So, uh I don't know where we go from here, but it uh it's a good start. Thank you for coming up. >> Thank you, sir. >> I would go along with councelor Kaggleandro's suggestion if that's >> if uh Mr. present through you. It It
just, you know, we're kind of the middleman here, you know, so send it right to the guy or the people that are going to make the decision. It's not to say that this isn't a good idea. Just, you know, get it out of our hands so it can get to the right people is essentially what I'm saying. So that's all. Thank you, counselors.
>> All in favor? What's the motion? motion to request that the mayor uh I don't know >> request
>> consider an RFP or do some research >> consider an RF an RFP to implement rea city >> prototype >> what's that >> prototype pilot program >> for a trial basis
to have it available for a trial basis, something like along that >> that the mayor that the mayor be requested to investigate an RFP for Riier do city prototype. >> All in favor opposed. >> So what?
>> Yes. >> Thank you. Thank you very much council. It's my privilege. Thank you sir. Thank you sir chairman. Thank you. >> Bye. Thank you. >> Unfinished business. Calendar item number four in ordinance repealing section 9.12030
posting political signs of the rea revised ordinances. This is the third reading. >> Council. Um, I mean, at this point, you know, disagreeing with this is disagreeing with the Constitution and the United States Supreme Court. I I've beat a dead
horse on this one. So, >> roll call on the third reading. >> Councelor Jenzio. >> Yes. >> Yes. Councelor Kogandro. >> Yes. >> Yes. Councelor Janino. >> Yes. >> Yes. Councelor Gino SA. >> Yes. >> Yes. Councelor H. >> Yes. >> Yes. Yes. Council Harammo is absent.
Councelor Kelly. >> Yes. >> Yes. Council McKenna. >> Yes. >> Yes. Council Novaski. >> No. >> No. Council Zamutoo? >> Yes. >> Yes. And council president Sylvestri? >> Yes. >> Yes. There's objection on the third reading. Table two, the next meeting.
Next up is the economic development subcommittee report. Council Gosa. Okay. Um, the first motion was 24-130. The 15minute grace period was reported out favorably. So, I would bring it to the council for
a favorable vote. All in favor? All opposed? >> I. >> So ordered. >> Um motion 24-256 was taken out of order. Um presentation
by Tom was good even though the equipment wasn't working at the time. Um this was about Broadway and it is p placed on file till the next council term. Um motion 25-032
[Music] the satellite dishes was also placed on file and motion 25271 the economic development initiatives um was an excellent presentation and it was also placed on file. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Calendar item 678 will be placed on file. Calendar item number nine, communication from the city assessor requesting a public hearing for the purpose of establishing the minimum residential factor for FY26. >> City assessor here.
>> Okay, this will be going to a public hearing. >> I spoke with Chairman Branorty this uh this afternoon and he recommended December 1st. to have enough time to prepare. Calendar item number 10, motions. Motion presented by council McKenna, that the
city council request AFC Urgent Care located at 339 Squire Road to appear before the city council to conduct a presentation on the health care needs and services provided. >> Council McKenna. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Um, a couple of weeks ago, I wasn't feeling good, so I was looking for a place to go. I
didn't want to go to the emergency, so I wanted to go to urgent care. And I was uh thinking about going up to Damas. And then I Googled it and I was surprised that there was an urgent care at Northgate Shopping Center. Had no idea. When I walked in, it was empty.
>> And so I asked the receptionist, "Why is it empty?" And she said, "No one knows it's here." So, um, and so I talked to the, um, the person in charge and she said she's current currently servicing
Revier firefighters with free screening, uh, hot screening. She's servicing uh, Rever school kids. Um, so I'm trying to get her to come up here so she can talk a little bit about her urgent care. Um, and, uh, get the residents of RE to know
that it's here. It's there. It's been there for a year and I had no idea. So, if I don't know, a lot of people don't know either. So, um I'd like to have her come up and talk about her care and what she's doing um servicing the people of
Revier. Thank you. >> Thank you, councelor. Council H. >> Thank you, Mr. President. Great motion by councelor McKenna. Um my children have been there twice in probably the last two weeks. But uh it's it's incredible to have a facility like that right here in our city. We don't have to
travel, you know, 20 minutes, you know, a half hour. But they're doing great work there and I'm excited to hear what what else they they offer. Thank you. >> Thank you, council. Any other counselors? Council Janino. >> Excellent motion. Councelor K. I've been there twice myself. Thank you.
>> Any other city council? All in favor, all opposed. >> So order. Calendar item number 11, motion presented by councelor Kaggleandro, that the city administration and school administration provide the city council with a comprehensive written report
detailing the jurisdictional responsibilities over school property, including the areas and matters under control of the city, the areas and matters under the control of the school department, and any other departments or entities that hold jurisdiction or authority over school property. >> Kico Gillandro.
>> Thank you, Mr. President. Uh, as we all know, we voted unanimously last meeting to place a memorial plaque at the new early childhood education playground at the Lincoln School. Uh, it was voted unanimously
and then it was turned down by the superintendent pretty much saying we didn't have the purview to vote this in. Uh what was worse is an email went out saying don't make any memorials and don't talk about it. And um I am uh I'm
actually kind of beside myself that there was no collaboration with the city council or the city or anything on a memorial for this young man. Um, when a young man battles leukemia and still has a a great attitude and lights up a room
and gives everything he has, uh, he deserves to be recognized. And I'm not sure why the superintendent, uh, turned it down other than it wasn't within our purview. So, I I don't get
it. Um, I want to know for f for the future how we can proceed with dedicating things that are on school property. Uh, who has jurisdiction and where, as it's stated in the the motion. Um,
uh, I my heart goes out to the Chris's family because this would have been awesome and, uh, I apologize to them, but we're I'm not letting this one go. that young man is going to get something and uh I
hope you'll all support this motion. Thank you. >> Thank you, Council Councel McKenna. >> Thank you, uh, Mr. President. Uh, so um I don't know uh uh councelor Kleandro if you were on the um the council or not, but a couple of years ago um we had a
student uh from Rivier High School. Um he got shot or stabbed on Riviera Beach uh in front of Twist and Shake and um his friends came up to the council and asked to put a mural on the Lincoln
school in the basketball court because Ununice always played basketball there and it was denied and the reason why it was denied and I think I if I'm not sure I don't remember but I don't know if um
superendent Kelly came up and she said that she just doesn't want to make the schools memorials. So, um, and I think that would and it just died in the water. So, I'm not sure where this is, but I'm supporting you. I'm definitely
supporting the emotion. Uh, but, um, that was the reasoning why. So, I just wanted to tell you a little history. Thank you. >> Thank you, councelor Council McKenna. I'm sorry, Council Z Council Zambo.
>> Thank you, Mr. President. We don't look alike. >> Uh, I'm laughing, but I'm not I'm not pleased with this response from the superintendent. You know, it appears that the city council is only good to be
bullied into funding a high school. And uh you know, I've had it with the tactics of the superintendent, and I'm saying that publicly because this is a disgrace to turn down this memorial for this young man and to and to pull this
juris jurisdiction stuff. God bless her coming up here again for funding because I'm not going to be too uh quick to do it. So, I'm very angry about this and I'm not going to say anymore because I might say something
that's not polite. So, uh I this this is a disgrace to turn this down and to pull this jurisdiction stuff when when when we just funded a half a billion dollar high school and it's going to go up.
>> Thank you, councelor. Councelor Kiano. >> Thank you, Mr. President, for the leeway. I I um my colleague to my left uh councelor Hash just informed me that the bench for Richie Santaaso that we just approved is getting done. It was approved by the mayor's office. So I don't know what the problem is here. And
if they're worried about memorials, the name of the school is Abraham Lincoln, you know. I'm not really. So um I I just thank you for the support everybody. >> Thank you counselor. Any other
counselors? All in favor, all opposed. >> So ordered. >> Calendar item number 12. Motion presented by councelor H that the city council award the revered Junior Patriots flag football team for its undefeated season which concluded with
the championship at the NC YFC 2025 flag football tournament on November 1. Council >> H. >> Thank you, Mr. President. I'd like to save my comments for the night the certificates are awarded. Thank you. Thank you. Any other counselors? All in
favor? All opposed? So ordered. >> Council President, I neglected to add public comment to the agenda. The council would like to take that up. >> Okay. So we will take up public comment. If anyone here would like to speak on anything on the agenda, please come up.
Name, address, you have two minutes to speak on anything on the agenda. Re business owners and residents. Anyone here for public comment? Hearing and seeing none, back to regular order business.
Late motion, calendar item number 15, motion presented by council president Sylvester, that the mayor request the chief of police to provide the city council with an update on the use of body cameras for officers to include cost and expected start time. >> Um, motion speaks for itself. We are one
of the few cities in the area that uh don't have them. I know there was a cost with um storage of of the the cameras um and just looking for an update. Motion speaks for itself. All in favor, all opposed.
>> So ordered. That concludes tonight's uh business. >> Mr. President, >> councelor, >> just a point of personal privilege and information. Um tomorrow is Veterans Day. >> Oh, you just stole it. Thanks. And uh
I wish everybody would uh recognize it. I'm disappointed that a lot of businesses still work on federal holiday. And but I want to wish everybody, all our veterans, uh happy Veterans Day. And I do want to thank
everybody that participated in the Rever Veterans Day dinner dance last night. We had over 170 people attend with 30 people from the uh Veterans Home in Chelsea and it was an outstanding evening. And for those who uh who made
donations to the event, we thank you very much. Al Terminello and I have been running this for 20 years and we're proud of it. I'm glad we started it and hopefully we'll continue it and with the help of everybody here, it'll help pay
for uh some of the veterans meals that were attended last night. So, thank you and God bless you. >> Thank you, counselor, and happy birthday to the Marine Corps. 250th birthday to MC. Have a good night.