 Then I'm calling this thing to order at 535. Is there anyone here from the public who would like to speak? Councilor Paul? I don't look like we have any public forum signups. Great, thank you. The next thing on the agenda is the first thing which should have been the motion to adopt the agenda. Would anyone like to make that motion since I have already jumped into the agenda? I'm just getting mine up so I apologize. Thank you, Councilor Pine. Would anyone like to second? Second. Thank you, Councilor Paul. All in favor? I'm going to assume there's still no public comments, Jordan. So we're going to move to the consent agenda. Is there, I don't, the only thing on the consent agenda is the Board of Finance draft minutes from November 9th. Is there any comment there? Yes, Councilor Pine. No, I was just going to move to it. Adopt the consent agenda and take the actions indicated. Excellent. Thank you. Is there a second? Thank you, President Tracey. All in favor? I'd like to speak to it, please. Yes, of course, Councilor Paul. Okay, so in the minutes, there are some things that I think were quite important that were left out. And I'd like to be able to just simply send you language, those related to the use of the unassigned fund balance, the non-spendable items which were sort of glossed over in the minutes. And I'd like those stated on the record that, you know, there were comments about the unassigned fund balance, the use, partial use of that unassigned fund balance. And as well as the support that the Board of Finance gave in relation to the fact that there were, there are employees who are concerned that given the, you know, challenging times that we're living in, that we had affirmed our support for the fact that, you know, we will make the budget work and that there will, the people who are employed, valuable city employees do not have to be concerned that there are other dynamics of play. And I think that's really important for us to have in the minutes. I agree. Thank you for looking at that so carefully and providing that language. So we will table that motion. I mean, I'm happy to vote on that. I just wanted to state that and I will get the, it's my mistake for not having done that today, but I will try to get that to you tomorrow. And I'll copy everyone, if that's okay. If it isn't and it would be construed as being part of a meeting, then I guess we could table them and do it at the next meeting. Whatever, maybe Eileen wants to speak to that. She does. Well, I think they moved to adopt the consent agenda, which included those minutes as they're written. So somehow there would either you have to move to amend the motion to include your language or you table it the next time. Or we can what? I'm sorry, what was the end of that? Or you table it to next meeting. Either way. Okay. So once a motion has been made on the consent agenda, would the person who made the motion have to table it? Is that what you're saying? Nope. I think anybody can. Yeah. Okay. So I would make a motion that we table that until the next meeting. Sorry. Great. Thank you. Any further discussion on that? All right. Then we are going to move into item number four. You have to vote on the motion. Thank you. Okay. Oh, my God, all over the place. All in favor of tabling the motion, please say aye. Aye. Aye. All right. Now I'm going to move on to item number four, which is a report out regarding the COVID budget update. And I do have good news to share. I don't know how many of you saw the presentation ahead of time. But the headline is we got the money, the $2.5 million from the state. So that is great, great news. And I really want to thank Katie Kinstead, especially from CEDO, who's been the point person on this, and to even though I can't say she quite took it on exactly willingly ever since she took it on, she has done it with a smile and has done an excellent job. So, yeah, the headline is we got the money. And we are able to submit four reimbursements through the elder. It's got a great name for up to $2.5 million. It's a huge lift. And we're strategizing how to do that, because all the receipts and documentation have to be submitted by December 11. And of course, on the other end, we were only guaranteed $750,000, and we didn't find out until Friday. So, we've been trying to manage that. And as a result, this presentation has already outdated. But I did update it as much as possible over the weekend. I just am not going to have every answer to every question that you'll have. We'll keep talking. In the next board of finance meeting, we'll come to you to officially accept the grant. And I expect we'll know more even then. This is the overall summary. Please note that the Elger here was built on the $750,000, as are the slides you're going to see after this. But one thing to note is early on in March, city council gave the city $1 million. And because of the various grants, we have been able to leverage that at this point, more than $3 million. So that's exciting. Now that we do have this extra money, you know, Murrow, all of you, he or the mayor, he emailed me, texted me right after and said, great, now we have $1.7 million more dollars. What are we going to do? But you know, in reality, the pie has also grown. And there are additional requests that we are discussing how to best handle that weren't originally captured in this budget. So as I mentioned, we're working quickly to address that. This is the applications for funding that we have submitted overall. We are excluding the airport and BED from our COVID reporting, because those are managed autonomously. So you'll see that's why they're in a different color. Other things to note here, we have been really fortunate. The amount requested and the amount awarded matches up for pretty much all of the funding agencies, except for FEMA, which has been more stringent with what they will reimburse us for. This is the overall COVID budget. Again, this is the budget based on the conservative. We have $750,000 from the state. So this will be increased in the coming weeks. But these are sort of our overall line items. And in the coming slides, you're going to see more detail on each of these. But the EOC primarily addresses the primary impacts of the pandemic, things like masks and testing. The other items like the RRC business support and REIB address the secondary impacts, things like helping with access to food and also grants to businesses. And then contingency is self-explanatory. A little bit, digging a little bit more deeply into each of those lines. This is the EOC, and you'll see most of these lines are the budget through the end of this year. That is how the EOC and RRC were budgeted. That's partially because that's how the grants were budgeted. And I don't know why. That's how we originally thought we were going to do it. And now, as things have developed with Elger, now is a good time. We'll take another look because we have more money to keep going into January. But as you can see, what we call COVID response is the largest chunk. That is for things like masks, PPE disinfectant. It's a lot of that is reimbursable. Facility costs are largely ventilation improvements in our actual buildings. The low barrier shelter is the operating grant to a new place, supportive quarantine. I think we've talked about infectious disease response staff time sounds very interesting. That is kind of a technical FEMA term. And it is temporary, they're temporary positions. I believe they're all in the RRC. But they are focused on community engagement and getting public health messages out. And we track them differently because they're 100% reimbursable. And then we've got the wastewater testing and the pop-up testing. And there are certain amounts of the pop-up testing for sure that will also be reimbursable. The RRC, again, we've got staff costs that comes from CEDO as well as other department staff like planning that have been staff redirected to assist with COVID recovery. We've got some operational costs in here, including communications and translation, the food access fund, which are grants between $5,000 and $30,000 for food security, plan for the people. And then CDBG grants are also included in here as well. And the trusted liaisons. Yes, of course. What's the difference between these three elements, translation, communication, and trusted liaisons? What are the differences of those three terms? I think that we have Luke and Katie on the phone who can probably answer better than I can. But what I can say for sure is trusted liaisons. These are stipends that are paid out to five different individuals within the new American community. It is my understanding to help with communicating information about the virus. I think translation is paying translators for like printed materials or possibly also emails that would go out. And communications is, I believe, for Zoom accounts and things like that. But given the amount, I'm assuming it's more things and they can probably tell us. Yeah, I would just say the communications line was specific for print ads that we bought in local publications to advertise the availability of services through the RRC. That's a way to make it more accessible. And Katie, if you had anything else to add there. Okay, perfect. We also have business support. So as you will recall, while the Church Street Marketplace staff is working with CEDO kind of under this business support lens, these are costs that are specifically going to help all of our businesses downtown. So again, we have grants. These are $5,000 grants. We have the Love Burlington website and some associated costs. We have the abatement from last year of the Church Street Marketplace fees. We have some staff costs, as well as various projects that Kara is working on that I'm sure she would be happy to talk to us about and the ventilation micrograms. If I could make one quick correction, Catherine, our work is not just focused on the downtown, but on businesses citywide, so including all neighborhoods. Thank you. The last category is racial equity, inclusion and belonging. And this category looks a little sad, but keep in mind it is, in addition to the $1 million already allocated and up until recently, racial equity considerations for COVID were addressed through CEDO and now that's moving to the REIB team. So there's money in here for this eight-point plan and I'm sure Taisha could speak more to that, but that is sort of operational money as I understand it for things like website PPE that may be more culturally appropriate and translation services specifically for BIPOC communities. And the rapid response team is the group that she is working with and these are the stipends that we are paying that group. That is correct, Catherine. The eight-point plan, the money that's allocated there, it's for everything. It's like for printing, for translation services, for PPE, for the rapid response team members who go out into the community just to make sure that they're safe as they're talking to other community members. Great. Thank you, Taisha. So what's next? We've got the money, which is great. Our next priority is getting all of the paperwork together over the next three weeks because we've got to get it in by December 11th and it's a lot of paperwork and continuing to budget for RRC and EOC activities. As I mentioned, the other things are already budgeted through June. And not here to wind, so I'll go quickly, but some of the challenges are I don't think that either CEDO or the CET department really understood how much work or new responsibilities would be required for this effort. And just putting all of this together is really time intensive. So I really, again, want to thank CEDO and Katie and Luke. They have been leading the process. I also want to thank Lisa Roche in the CET office who has been helping. It is pointing out some staffing issues. I'm not coming winding for more staff yet, but maybe I'm setting the stage for that. So just a few concluding thoughts. We really have been so fortunate to be able to leverage the original $1 million allocation. And this will be much higher now that we have the 2.5. I do think this experience, once we get through it, is leading us. We are having a conversation about how to better align resources between CEDO and CET to do a better job accessing grants, how we can do that more efficiently so it's not such a scramble. But in the meantime, this is a huge win for us. And so in a tough year, this is one more one really great thing we can be thankful for. Questions and discussion? Yes, counselor Pine. Would the federal government allow for some of the additional staff burden to be paid for with any of the funds? There are some rules around that. But yes, the Elger grant is more flexible with that. And so, yes, in our application, we did include significant time for CEDO staff for the RRC where, for instance, FEMA, I told you we had segregated like that one category where it was just 80,000. Elger is much more willing to talk to us about that entire bucket of staff costs under the RRC. So, yes. It's not lost revenues, but it is staff time who were working on COVID related items. And I guess my next question really is, can we cover the added grant management, monitoring and compliance duties that are required with existing staff? Or do we need to augment our staff to be able to do that? And if we have to augment, could we use some of these dollars to actually literally bring in people to help? So, we don't have time to bring people in. But the time that people are spending now, they can charge and that's allowed. So, yes, it's just a little bit, we don't quite have enough bodies. And so, I think we're looking at a short-term real crunch and we're just going to get through it. But realizing that this is a longer-term issue and even beyond the pandemic, wanting to be efficient with how we use our resources around grants, I think, having closer coordination between these two departments and maybe just looking at that will be useful. Thank you. Yeah. Oh, thank you. Yes, Councillor Paul. Along those lines, so I just have a brief question and that is, are there consultants, even not necessarily locally, but are there companies who, as a result of what has happened over the last month, have sort of honed this skill in terms of being able to be responsive given the fact that this is not something that's just going to end in the next month or two in terms of the grant paperwork and getting these things in on time? Is there any advantage to maybe looking beyond ourselves and finding if there are firms that do this work since it's a specialized thing and maybe there's someone who knows how to do it quicker, better, more efficiently and doesn't take up our staff doing this kind of work? That would just be a suggestion. I don't know if that's even possible. It may not even exist. I think it is a great suggestion and I will look into it because, um, yes. I think there's consultants for most things and it has been challenging for our staff to try to learn all of these new things. So I think it's a great suggestion. Thanks. Thanks. And thank you for the presentation. It's on the whole, it's very good news. Thank you. Yes, President Tracy. Yeah, so going back to sort of what Councilor Jang was bringing up with regards to translation, I'm wondering if this budget is now needing to be modified in light of the language access plan that we adopted at last, at our last meeting to really reflect some of the enhanced services that we're looking to provide? I think that is a great point because this was an original budget that was done several months ago and we'll be looking to update it and probably Director McGowan would like to speak more about that. Are you here, Luke? I'm here. Director McGowan, you've never called me that. I know you're so fancy. I don't know. I'm just trying to do my best mayoral impression. Good lesson for the mayor to follow, I guess. But President Tracy, that is a great point and Captain described the situation well. I will say there is some interaction that we have, I mean throughout, have had with the state because sometimes they make funds available for translation services and so there's kind of a coordination challenge that we've had knowing when any funds need to fill a gap. But yeah, it's very much on our mind and it's something we'll be exploring as we review sort of all of this communications and translation work. Okay, great. And then the last thing is that is there any money, additional money budgeted for masks? I know that the city had put a strong effort out there initially and that that has kind of trailed off a little bit. So is that something that we're able to do moving forward? Or is that something that the city has moved away from in this budget? So I don't see Brian here. We do still have money for masks. We have some in storage. We have not ordered a bunch more. And I would encourage you to talk to him about the reason for that. But I do have in that EOC line item, a mask subline, if you will. So there's money there. We just haven't acted on it yet. Okay. Thank you. Catherine. Yes. So I just see as I'm on the call, the point you made about needing help with grants and between Court Treasurer's Office and CEDO, just so you know, this is not new. It is something that the city has needed for a long time. And I just wanted to speak up to say I would support that if I were you and others on this call because I think we're short staff when it comes to grants. And we don't have the resources to be looking at grants all the time. And then all the procedural matters with the new grant systems are very time consuming. So I just wanted to give us a shout out to support that initiative of getting some help for you for us. Thank you. I think this is one of the unique things that I bring. And now that I have my partner in crime, Katie Kinstead here, who also has a background in grants management. Maybe this is part of what we're here to help improve with the city. So let's see. Okay, if there's no other questions, we do have a full agenda. Yes, Councillor Paul. I just wanted to quickly add that when we went through the process of procurement and having a centralized purchasing, which was, I don't know, several years ago, we felt that it was a worthwhile investment because we felt that it could pay for itself. I would suggest we probably could do the same with grants. Yes. Thank you. I agree. Yes, Councillor Jang. Yeah, it is just interesting to hear the conversation about grants here, like right now, because I do remember when I joined the Board of Finance, that was one of my questions initially. And the response that I received was basically these grants come with a lot of strings attached so the city decided to not pursue much of them because what comes with it is too much work and sometimes it's not worth it. And now hearing it seems that there is an argument to revisit that area and was just wondering what the mayor's position on all of this is about. But anyway, he's not here. We can keep going. He might not want me to be leading Board of Finance if I let this get too out of hand. Darlene just shared in the chat, she's like, yes to grant support. So, yes, I think it is certainly worth a conversation. That is also a true point. I mean, as CEDAW can certainly attest, many grants have very strict requirements year by year that being said, that maybe still doesn't mean it's not worth doing some investment overall in grants. However, if I don't move us along, we'll never make it to be able to get to city council on time. No, I'm going to move us to item 5.01. How would the Board like to proceed with BED's property boiler and machinery insurance renewal? Yes, Councillor Paul. I'm happy to make a motion if you'd like to move it forward. I do have a number of questions I wanted to ask. Excellent. We've got some people here to answer them. Should we get a second first? That's confusing. Thank you, Councillor Pine and Councillor Paul, why don't you go ahead with your questions? Okay. So, thanks so much for the insurance memo. I greatly appreciate it. I'm trying to make sure that I understand from what I think I read in the memo, it says that the value of McNeil is around $180 million. I don't know if that number has gone up or down because I don't think I saw that in the memo. Then it sounds like the total insurable value is going to be capped at $175 million versus $258 million for last year and the price if we had gone to the $258,000 was going to be $683,000 by piecing together different insurance and we're not doing that. We're paying the $644,000 for a lower cap, for less coverage. Is that right? I think I can answer that. Good evening all. So, we have your right that our total insurable value means if we cover everything from paper clips to gas turbines, we have $258 million of property on our books. For the last several years, that gets capped at $175 million. It's not as concerning as it sounds because we have the pine street, we have the gas turbine McNeil. So, it's unlikely in any event that all three of those targets, if you will, would happen at the same time. So, there is a cap and our total insurable value covers $258,000 but the McNeil station alone is $181 million and everything else, and by everything else that's the gas turbine. Pine Street and Muskewin Hydro makes up that other $76.7 million. So, the good news is that in the chart we have everything covered at 100%. We almost didn't. AIG was going to cut back their share from 30% to 25%. So, we do have, and that's been, Commissioner Paul, that's the way it's been for several years now. That cap is not new. We've been at $175 million for the last four or five years. In fact, I think an 2009 was the first year that we were actually capped. Okay. And the, you know, I'm not 100% positive. I understand what the implications are on the budget. If in fact you budgeted for that amount, I probably miss that. And then the last question that I have for anyone is that it does appear as though, as you had just said, Paul, there are the chances of all of these things happening at the same time or even in the same year or even maybe in the same couple of years are pretty remote. Have you gone through the exercise of considering, I noticed in the memo, you talked about self-insuring. Have you gone through that process or is that something that you might consider doing over the next year? Because obviously the price of, the price is going up, not down. I'll take the first shot at that. So, as far as the budget, so your neighbor called from two years ago, you talked about, this is our monitor line insurance. There's nothing even close to this. Our second largest line is general liability from the $80,000 to $90,000 range. So just give you a magnitude. Two years ago, this line was $228,000. Last year it jumped to $579,000 this year at $644. That $644 represents 11.25% over last year's premium or against the budget 14.97%. So those are big numbers but what we're seeing in Paul Plunkett, our insurance agents online also, anywhere from 20 to 200% that across the nation people are seeing. So we know we got hit last year. We had 125% increase last year. Now we're in the 10 to 15% depending what you compare it to. So that's not bad but it's still huge numbers that we're talking about. The second part of your question is looking into the future, there are several things we've identified along with Hickok and Boardman that we might be able to do to either offset the premiums in other lines to take some of the hit or some things that we can do here at BED. And the number one thing we can do is certainly we have the four insurance carriers that write this policy, Zurich, AIG, StarTech, and Aegis. And their number one thing is have engineering recommendations. We had 21 of those on a list. Some of them have been out there for years. We either can't afford to do it. They don't make sense. We have trimmed that down to 11 to 12 this year. That makes a huge difference and as Mr. Plunkett can test to, when we can eliminate that list we might now get the premium down to something a little more reasonable. We'll probably never see in my lifetime anything in the 200 to 300,000 rate but I think we can get that down considerably as we kick these off. Okay, well I appreciate that answer and I mean it is concerning. I mean given the fact that it went up so much last year has not gone up as much this year. I don't know. I sort of feel like maybe next year is going to be another, you know, another large increase. I don't know if they tend to be cyclical in that way. You get sort of a reprieve one year and then they sock you the next one. I don't know if that, you know, I don't know the answer to that but it just seemed that that would make a little bit of sense to look into. So that's my question. I know we were limited on time. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you all for being here. Yes, Councillor Pine. I would just follow up on Councillor Paul's question and ask if, not tonight, but we can have a discussion maybe just a narrative or a memo from BED about those Hickok and Boardman options to consider that are listed. There's about six of them. Which of those are, you know, advisable and desirable to pursue as ways to hopefully bring down this premium going forward because we certainly don't want to see it jump up continuously at this double digit rate that we're seeing here. So that list was, I was glad to see it and I think I'd like to hear from BED what's the plan for going through those future options going down in the future. Thank you. Absolutely. And I think, Commissioner Paul, what I didn't answer was next year also to, if there's such a limit we went out and Mr. Plunkett knows 25 carriers. So we've gone to all the big hitters that are out there. We're down to just these four that are really interested in writing us. If we lose those four, that's when that's sort of not an option, but that self-assured means no one will underwrite us and now we will dollar for dollar pay for the loss. Knock on wood, we've had great experience at that plant, but if we do have a loss it tends to be significant. It's a nine-story boiler, as you know, if you visit the plant. So that would be risky, but it's an option for sure. Thank you. Thanks for the answer, Pauline. You've been doing this for a really long time. I have no doubt that both of you, named Paul, have done your homework. I want to share the meeting. I think Mr. Dain's got a question. Yes, Councilor Dain. Thank you. Yes. And maybe for that memo, Councilor Pan is requesting to also include what self-insurance means and how does it look like? How does it play out? I think having that detail. And also if you could, because you never know about fire or lightning, you never know when it's going to happen. You never know. Like you said, let's knock on wood. But what are the likeliness, even for that when it happens and hits, what type of damage, for example, can it contribute to those boilers and etc. I think no time right now. But next time, if you could include those, that would be great. We'll do that, certainly. Great. Thank you. Any final questions on this? Yes. Yes. And the final question that I have is why we're seeing this today, knowing that the application already expired a couple of days ago. I believe you're muted. Sorry. Great question. Last year, we moved this insurance bill and Mr. Plunkett knows just negotiations with the carriers. They don't particularly care that we've got deadlines for electric commission, finance board, the city council, and so on. We moved from 10-1 to 11-1 to 11-20 trying to get this thing wrapped up. Paul worked diligently for months, quite frankly. This was just a timing thing. We met with the commissioners a month ago. We didn't have all the numbers. We had to have a special meeting just a week ago. And so that's why we came to you, because technically the policy expired on the 20th, and we bound the coverage. So there's no lapse in coverage. If we don't approve it tonight, then we'd have to go back to the carriers and negotiate a new renewal day. It's just cleaner and easier this way. So there's been no lapse in coverage, and we just extended, I don't want to say extend the policy, just bound it on the 20th and hope to confirm it tomorrow morning if it goes through here and consent agenda on city council. Perfect. And it seems the commission already approved this. Correct. Especially meeting just last week. Which good. Which good. Then you were on time. Thank you. Thank you. Great. Well, we do need to move along. Is everyone prepared for a vote? All right. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Great. Thank you so much. Item 5.02, request for use of impact fees for the fire department. How would the board like to proceed? Yes, Councillor Pine. I would move to approve and recommend the city council approve a budget neutral amendment through the use of impact fees to the FY 21 Burlington fire department budget to increase revenues and expenditures by $109,666 as outlined in Chief Locke's demo dated November 10, 2020. Excellent. Is there a second? Yes, President Tracy. Thank you. Any discussion? Yes. Yes, Councillor Jang. Maybe if Chief Locke can give a quick overview. This is very explicit, but maybe for those who are listening here today, what is this specific? Sure, Councillor. So as most of you know, the voters approved last March, the addition of a third staff ambulance for the city that will be stationed out of the new North End, and while we, which includes the hiring of nine new personnel, and while we do have an ambulance, the physical ambulance, there are certain things that we need for that to put that in service. The, you know, probably the biggest piece of equipment out of this $100,000 is a new defibrillator, defibrillator cardiac monitor that just over $30,000. This includes money for the personal protective of clothing and radio for every one of those nine new firefighters, lockers and storage space for station four for both, which for both the medical equipment that's going to be required to be stored out there, as well as the personal effects of each of the new firefighters. So at a high level, that's what that's for. And we are still on track to hire those nine new, our six new firefighters in March and a three additional in September and anticipate the go live of the third ambulance, which right around the first of August of 2021. Excellent. Thank you. Chief Locke. All right. Not to rush us, but a little bit to rush us. Are we ready to take a vote? Excellent. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. All right. Congratulations, Chief Locke. Go outfit that thing. All right. Item 5.03, the Champlain Elementary Pedestrian Improvements Project. This is authorizing a small additional contingency. How would we like to proceed? Councillor Paul. Thank you. So I'll make a motion to recommend and to approve and recommend that the City Council authorize the Director of Public Works to use up to an additional $4,000 in contingency funds for a total of $494,000 for the construction contract with DirtTech LLC to complete the Champlain Elementary Pedestrian Improvement Project. Thank you so much. Is there a second? Great. Councillor Pine, any discussion? Yes. Yes. President Tracy first, then Councillor Jiang. Yes. So I guess I'm just looking for a little bit of clarification because it's saying the motion is saying to complete the project, yet in the memo it talks about substantial completion having been achieved in in September. And so I'm just wondering if this is to cover the bill or if there's still work yet to be done on this project because that wasn't I maybe I missed something but that wasn't entirely clear to me. Yeah. Sorry for the that that wasn't clear. It has reached substantial completion. This money is needed to pay invoices for the project. Okay. All right. That sounds good. Thank you. Councillor Cheng, I believe you had a question. Yeah. It was similar to Councillor President Tracy in some extent but still not the same. What I was asking is basically, I do remember, maybe it was last year or year before that the Champlain Elementary School, they got a new, they received a new sidewalk, new improvement in there. And now this is in front of us. And I could not just picture where this project will be specifically. I see a couple of names here and was just wondering if they can extend to that a little bit. What exactly we're talking about in terms of, you know, this allocation and the contingency? So this project was completed kind of in two different locations. Birchcliff Parkway being the first one at the intersection of Cherry Lane and then on Locust Street at the intersection of Charlotte Street and Caroline Street. So those tabled intersections as well as some new sidewalk on Birchcliff Parkway were all included kind of under the umbrella of this project. So those funds, you know, the funds contribute to all of those items, new sidewalk, raised intersections, some new stormwater drainage, striping and signing, everything included in that project. Wonderful. I mean, what maybe confuses me a little bit is the name of the project, the Champlain. I picture it as Champlain Elementary School, you're talking about. Maybe Susan, you can go into the safe routes to school. Yes, that's a fair question. So this project came as a result of the safe routes to school feasibility study, which looked at the safe routes around different schools in Burlington, but these improvements were focused on Champlain Elementary. So it's facilitating safe routes for walking and biking to Champlain Elementary School, hence the name of the project. And the safe route recommendation was like throughout the city and all schools, and it seems this project is specifically for Champlain School, but the other school, do you have something in the timeline? Do you have timeline for the other schools? What's left, for example? We would have to get back to you on that. I'm not as familiar with all of the other routes that were analyzed. There are a few more remaining recommendations specific to Champlain Elementary School, which are in the queue. Some of those coordinate with access through Callahan Park. Sorry, I just understood your question, Councillor Dain. Yes. So it seems this is all from a safe route feasibility or study or recommendations. And I was just wondering if you have projects, similar projects for all the schools throughout the city. And if yes, what are the timelines for those? Or have they already been accomplished as well? I'm just looking into like the equity, please. So I think I'll go back to, or I guess, Chapin's going to answer that one. The original Safer School feasibility study that Susan was referencing dates back to 2013, more recently, and was just looking at that particular school at the time was my understanding. Recently, we have certainly received a number of requests around other elementary schools. And we are packaging a comprehensive school travel plan study looking at transportation issues around our various elementary schools across the city. That said, we have also over the last few years been looking at improvements we can make, whether it's parking management around schools or pedestrian facilities. We just won a grant with the school district on improving the path between the Miller Center and the school there, CP Smith. So we're always looking for ways we can make travel, excuse me, the Flynn School, but we can always make travel safer through the community. Thank you. Great. Are we ready to take a vote on this item? All right, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Great. Thank you, PPW staff. The next item is item 5.04. It is a special personnel management system for BPD. And I know we do have some BPD staff with us. How would the board like to proceed? Yes, Councillor Pine. I think it would be helpful to hear staff describe and discuss how this will be helpful to their efforts moving forward with efforts around, you know, police reform and accountability and monitoring of both data and outcomes. Excellent. Would you like to start, Chief Pierrot? Sure. Thank you so much. And thank you for the question, Council Member Pine. So this is designed to do exactly that. This is a program that is being used by a number of police departments and is designed to monitor, to ensure compliance, to have it's a certain amount of convenience that it brings to this process and it integrates. So we have a number of ways of keeping track of a variety of different personnel databases and personnel-related information. We have use of force reporting. We have training documentation. We have issues with internal discipline, with internal investigations, with personnel-related performance evaluations, with personnel records, and all of these things are maintained in different ways. Some of them are maintained on paper files and in file cabinets. Some of them are maintained through our existing VALCOR system. So our use of force reporting, for example, is through the VALCOR system. But that's not what VALCOR is designed to do. Our complaint intakes come in through a portal on the Internet into our emails. We enter them into a spreadsheet. We follow up on those complaints with complainants. Investigate is necessary. That's a separate system. What the benchmark system promises to do is to actually integrate all of that into one. And it is something that allows us to actually have, and data ports it as well. So it exports the data from, for example, our VALCOR system. Our VALCOR system is the system that we use to be dispatched to the calls for service and then to enter in all the information about a call for service and enter in the reports that the officer writes, whether there's any enforcement, and on rare instances when use of force occurs, that's also where the officer records the use of force and the rationale for it. And there are a number of things that have to go in there. That data would all be ported out into the benchmark system, which then would be able to track it in a very different way. It provides an early warning system for that kind of activity. If we are seeing patterns of behavior that are troubling for a specific officer or even a specific shift, it also allows us to track good things, commendations, to track training that officers have done, to track the idea of being able to complete required reports. It is something that really centralizes a lot of our management functions into a singular system. And one, frankly, that is not unique to this police department. It could be operated by anyone. So I know that as we look at police transformation, we're talking about having other entities being able to look at certain functions of the police, whether that's access to civilian complaints, whether that's access to use of force. This allows all of that to be in one place, which only facilitates the ability to share and ensure that other entities can see these kinds of pieces of data as well. One quick follow-up, if I could. How does this system do a better job, perhaps, of triggering some monitoring for poor quality data or incomplete data that we've heard in the past has been an issue around some of the data being provided, so ensuring quality, I guess. So in that, Council Member, it remains an issue of Gigo. It's garbage in and garbage out. Our data is as good as the data that comes in. What this does do, however, is it gives supervisors an added ability to know when an officer hasn't filled something out and to be able to press on that officer to say, hey, you didn't finish this and you need to be able to go back and do it. With use of force specifically, it creates a number of tabs that have to be completed. It also flags for supervisors or for the officers and stuff. You didn't do this yet. You need to. That alone will improve the data that's coming in, and thus the data that ultimately comes out as we are able to track these things. There have been a number of different methods of tracking data over the history of the department. This is going to consolidate a lot of it and impose a level of uniformity that's only going to be helpful moving forward. Thank you. I'm optimistic that this will be an improvement. Thank you very much. Thank you. Councilor Jain. Thank you. See you for a chat. And Chief Deputy Chief, was just wondering if the Council did not release a number of the police through attrition, would you need this? Would this come handy or no? Just wanted to know that. Absolutely. We need this irrespective of our headcount. This is something that all the officers present will benefit from. They'll benefit from it with regard to being able to track their training so that we're ensuring that we're keeping up with not only the rules that the state has, the state has very specific rules about certain kinds of training that we have to complete each year in order to maintain certification. It will not only help with that, it will help with all the new training that we anticipate coming out of changes in the legislature in Montpelier, that it will be additional training issues, and the training that we want to be able to do as a community and that frankly the resolution for racial justice requires of us certain kinds of training. We've been looking at this system and the need for such a system since 2019. So this really does is something that we need and knew we needed irrespective of our current headcount, our past headcount, our future headcount. Wonderful. Then lastly, I think we can follow up the email. It's just about when you receive a complaint, what are the appropriate steps you need to take to respond to that. Do you wish for me to answer it now, Council Member or in the email? If the answer is quick, yes. A complaint comes in through email generally. There are many, many methods for which it can come in and we do our best to make as many different avenues available to the community as possible, but the majority of them come through email through the portal. So they're made online, they come into our email boxes, we enter them currently into a spreadsheet, just an Excel file, and then we basically track that incident through the necessary steps, whether that turns into a citizen complaint that is one that we talk to the citizen, we talk to the officer if that's necessary and we come to a resolution, or if it turns into administrative review, an administrative review is a slightly higher level of complaint, it's more complex, it's going to require in all likelihood an interview with the officer, one that entails a certain amount of protection for that officer and that he gets or she gets to have a delegate with him or her if so desired. And then the final being a Bureau of Internal Affairs investigation of BIA, so any one of those can sort of be where that civilian complaint goes and it is something that will be automated with checks and balances by the benchmark system, so that it's not just us entering it into an Excel sheet. Thank you. Yes, President Tracy. Yes, I'm wondering how you're going to leverage the operational efficiencies embedded in this software to increase transparency and specifically make some of this information more available to members of the public. Thank you very much for that question, Council Member. There are a lot of ways that we can do that. Those come down to decisions that are currently being made by the Police Commission about what we are going to release or not. I think that one of the things we've talked about with Benchmark is the fact that they actually can create ready-made forms and data collection, so they actually, it automatically exports data into forms like bar graphs and pie charts, etc., so that we can actually visualize what we have. Our complaints, for example, a whole third of our complaints are on their face, not actually complaints. They're either things that are about crimes that are happening and have nothing to do with police conduct. They are meant for Burlington, Iowa or South Burlington BD. They are oftentimes sent to us by people with pronounced mental health issues, and that doesn't mean that such a complaint can't become, that we don't get complaints that are valid from people with mental health issues, but we get many that are simply, they're not complaints of reality. And so a full third of our complaints aren't that. We'll be able to actually distinguish between those and track those and put those up, and depending on the determinations that are made with the Police Commission, as we explore new levels of transparency regarding use of force, regarding citizen complaints, this is only going to facilitate the ability to put that up there in a clean and coherent way. Okay, thank you. Okay. Any other discussion or is anyone ready to make a motion on this item? We do have a lot to get through in the next 20 minutes. Yes, Councillor Pine. You'll make the first. Councillor Pollard, are you okay with the second? Great. All in favor. What? Absolutely. Thank you. And all in favor, please say I. Thank you, and thank you, Chief Murad and Lease for joining us. Thank you for all your work behind the scenes to make this happen. Item 5.05. Establishment of a BIPOC Small Business and Nonprofit Relief Fund and Grant Program. How would the Board like to proceed? My dog would like to make a motion and so would Brian and then Karen, please. Any discussion? I think we have to discuss it. Yes. Yes, Councillor Pine. I just want to say this is a truly amazing accomplishment for our city under Taisha Green's leadership, quickly leveraging resources to make this happen or reaching folks who really have been marginalized by banks and by government and have been left out of some of the prosperity that has flowed to others in the community. So we are, I think it's a long overdue, but I just want to highlight that this is an incredible accomplishment and really honored to be able to support this and be part of this right now. Thank you, Councillor Pine. Yes, Councillor Cheng and then Director Green. Yeah. I mean, I think just to echo what Councillor Pine just said, and I think what's really different and amazing about this is also the allocation would be made very simple and accessible and understandable for so many people, instead of just so many bureaucratic paperwork. I think that angle of efficiency is just something we need to salute and to say thank you Taisha and your team for the work well done. Thank you. Before I turn it over to Taisha, I just want to say what a pleasure it has been to work with her and that is before she just started bringing me checks and checks. I mean, we are so fortunate to have this director who can really raise money and then as Councillor Cheng says, create a very simple and effective grants program. And so I'm really fortunate and I'm going to give you a chance to brag about it, Director Green, but it looks like Councillor Paul wants one statement or maybe a question. Councillor Paul. I mean, I don't mean to don't mean to upstage Taisha on this, just simply, you know, I think we're all on the same page here. This is pretty amazing. I see that there is someone, I believe there's someone here from seventh generation possibly, and all I can see is the name of the word seven, but I'm assuming it's seventh generation. When you give $50,000 to the city, we give you your time to speak, but thank you. Thank you so much. And we did speak about this at the Racial Equity, Inclusion and Belonging Committee of which three of us are members. And I also want to echo what Councillor Zhang has said, which is that we need more grant application forms that are as easy to complete as this one. So thank you. Thanks very much. You should take it away. Thank you. I just want to say thank you all for your support and definitely thank all the businesses who have supported and especially seventh generation. And I do want Joey to be able to speak to why he thought it was really important to support this effort. And I definitely appreciate seventh generation support. So Joey, I'll let you take it from here. Thank you. Great. Well, let me start just by echoing what everybody was saying before about Taisha. It's amazing to have Taisha in the city leading the way. And so it's a complete honor for us to be able to support the work that she's leading and that the city is taking on. And I didn't really want to say much other than I wanted to come and support the work, say that we recognize that this is a predominantly white community that seventh generation feels, you know, we are a deep part of this community, but it is predominantly white. And we're working through a crisis that is disproportionately affecting people of color. And so we are super impressed by the eight point plan that has been built by Taisha and her team. We think it's really important to be able to get support directly to BIPOC business owners and are just really honored to be able to be able to support that effort. Seventh generation is a company we believe, you know, not just in the health of this generation, but the generations to come. And we've long taken big stances on climate justice and know that it's important that we stand for people who are hit hit first and hit worse by crises like this. So I'm very happy to collaborate together to have a real big impact. Thank you. Thank you so much. Sorry, Taisha. No, it's okay. I was just thinking, Joey, for saying that I don't have anything else to add. Counselors, I know that we're running behind, so thank you all for indulging us. Oh, the swags. So I assume that we are all ready to vote in favor of this. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. I have made them, has the motion, I don't believe a motion was made. Well, I have you as a second. Oh, that's right. That's right. Okay, I'm sorry. I apologize. It's okay. They're coming. They're coming fast and furious. That's why I write them down to make sure I don't miss any apologies. Sorry. No worries. Thank you. I really do need all of you to keep me honest, so that's helpful. Item 5.06, which is a reclassification, elimination, and creation of a position within BCA. And I know we've got Doreen in her awesome hat and Tony in his awesome plaid here to talk to us as needed. How would the board like to proceed? Yes, Counselor Zheng. Yes. A quick overview would be great because this jumped from a photographer to a social worker. Doreen, would you like to start? So we have the opportunity with the darkroom director leaving BCA this past year to reorganize in the education department, our team, as we both are meeting some of our strategic goals from our plan from last year. This reorganization was and continues to be a priority in terms of serving a broader, more diverse community and emphasizing the work not just during COVID, but understanding some of the implications from COVID for how we will program going forward. And so we are shifting now to bringing a emphasis on children and families because of both the emphasis in a number of our internal programs, but also reaching out deeper into pockets in the community and serving and working with our other partners and after school programs and various youth groups, along with the other cultural departments in the city. And then bringing some of the responsibilities that were in the darkroom and the photography program to a shared responsibility within the department as a whole. And Melissa is here as well, I believe. Melissa, are you on the call? Maybe not. Melissa is the director of education and this has been sort of a nine month wind up for her to bring some strength into the times of the year as well, like the very robust camp program that we run during the summer. And we've had interim and seasonals working in that program. And now to bring that in, here you are, Melissa, to bring that into the team as a part of our reclassification, I think is going to strengthen having this in one person. Melissa, would you like to add anything to what I've said? Hi, everybody. My name is Melissa. I'm the education director at Burlington City Arts. I've been around for a while. And just so excited to really think about taking us to the new level with these with this position changes. It's been something in the work since January. It had a lot of time to think about things. But I think with a youth and family programs coordinator, we'll be able to take those programs to the next level. And then we've kind of recategorized the current community programs person to really focus on the adults. So together, it would be a team effort. But it would be really efficient from a staff perspective. Every summer, we run an amazing amount of summer camps. And I always lose a seasonal camp coordinator at the end of eight weeks. So I really lose that moment of really partnering in the community and really getting a foot fold on youth and family. So this would be a huge, wonderful change for us to have this kind of a year round position to really go further. I could go on for a long time, but I'll stop. Yeah, I just want to quickly say I appreciate the attentiveness that the BCA staff has given to how to pivot programming in a cost effective manner. So thank you from the finance person. Councillor Jang. Yeah, now what would happen to the dark room photography program? Since this is going to be the part time position is now eliminated. The program would not change. The offerings through our photography program are still there. This is just being brought in under management inside without an individual person, which is a new model that we have for managing the different classes within BCA. So I want to make the motion then. Thank you. You're welcome. Great. Is there a second? Councillor Paul? Yes. Any other further discussion? Great. All in favor, please say I. Great. Thank you, Doreen. And thank you very much, everyone. You're welcome. We've got some more reclass and staffing news and a request from BPRW. And we've got Cindy and Danielle. How would the board like to proceed with item 5.07? Yes, Councillor Pine. Given the hour and the fact that this is laid out so clearly, I would move approval of the reclassification as presented in the resolution from Burlington Park's Recreation of Waterford. Thank you. Is there a second? Councillor Jang, any further discussion? Great. All in favor, please say I. I. Thank you, Danielle and Cindy and all for your clear memo. Congratulations. Thank you very much. There is no item 5.08 because I included it accidentally, so that's great for us right now as we're running late. Under Board of Finance approval only, we do have one more staffing issue and that is item 6.01. With CEDO, the Community Works Project and Policy Specialist 2. How would the board like to proceed? Councillor Pine. I would move to approve the recategorization of the Projects and Policy Specialists 2. Development position as outlined in the attached materials by CEDO. Excellent. Is there a second? Yes, Councillor Paul. Any questions or discussion? Great. Yes, Councillor Paul. Just to simply say this is something I feel long overdue. We should have done this sooner and I'm not a fan of limited service and I think that as soon as we know that a position is what we need, that we should not waste any time at all in giving that person the rights that they deserve as an employee. They work way too hard not to have the full benefits that they deserve as soon as that position is deemed needed. I think that this position has been deemed needed before today and should have been done sooner. I hope that this will not be happening in the future. Thanks. Thank you. Everyone ready for a quick vote here? All right. All those in favour, please say aye. Aye. All right. Item 6.02, the Perkins-Pierre Citing Study Design Contract with BPRW. How would the board like to proceed? Yes, Councillor Jang. I was wondering if a quick overview about this would be. Of course, we've got Sophie and Cindy here who would like to start. Sophie's got that one. All right. Thank you, Sophie. I'm her lovely backup. Thanks for the question. So the Perkins-Pierre Citing Study is going to provide us the chance to do a thorough public outreach with a consultant, with a consultant at the lead to determine the future of what Perkins-Pierre should be or continue to be in some instances while integrating the needs of the wastewater treatment plant, if that's the case, the bike path, which is being realigned along its eastern edge right now, and have a vision for it for the future in terms of supporting the marina that's there. As you may know, the Lyman building has flooded in the past because it's not at a proper elevation. So there's a lot of challenges on the site right now, and we're hoping that through this process we can determine what the best course is for the future in terms of projects at Perkins. Great. Thanks for that overview, Sophie. Any other questions or is someone ready to make a motion? I move to approve and authorize the execution of the contract with agency landscape. Excellent. Councillor Pine made the second. All in favor? Please say aye. Aye. Great. Thank you both. Thank you. And last one, Letty Park Staircase Replacement, Item 6.03. Yes, Councillor Paul. I actually am happy to make this motion, but I realize perhaps Councillor Jang, maybe you would prefer to do this since it's Letty Park. No, it's good. It's all city of Wellington. All right. Well, I know it's your backyard and would be happy to do that. With that being said, I'll make a motion to approve and authorize the execution of a contract with engineer constructions incorporated for a price not to exceed $78,000 for the Letty Staircase Replacement project, plus a project contingency of $7,800 and to authorize Cindy White, director of parks and recreation to execute the contract and any related documents needed to carry out the project subject to the review of the city attorney's office. Great. Councillor Jang for a second. Any conversation before we vote? All right. All in favor? Please say aye. Aye. All right. I believe a motion to adjourn is in order. So moved. Excellent. Councillor Pine seconded by Councillor Jang. All in favor? Aye. Great. We are adjourning at 6.56. Please enjoy your four minutes before City Council. Yes, Councillor Paul. President Tracy, do you plan on starting exactly at 7? I can, if you need a minute, Councillor, we can give like a couple of minutes around that. And I'm sure we'll have to give councillors a chance to sign on. So maybe a minute or two after. I know some councillors might be a little late. So I'll give a couple of minutes. Grace, period. Great. Thanks so much. Councillors on at this point, I know that a couple we're going to be here a little bit late. So with that, I'm going to call to order the City Council meeting at 7.05. The first item is the pledge. So do that. First item on our agenda is our agenda. Councillor Stromberg, may it please have a motion on the agenda. I move to amend adopt the agenda as follows. Add councillors Carpenter, Paulino, Shannon and Freeman as co-sponsors to agenda item 5.02 resolution divestment of City funds, including retirement from fossil fuel investments. Councillor Stromberg, Paul, Hanson, Hightower, Pine, Tracy. No additional communication for this agenda item per Councillor Stromberg. No proposed amendment for agenda item 5.03 resolution, March 2, 2021, annual City meeting, just cause evictions charter change, charter change committee per Councillor Carpenter. No proposed amendments for this agenda item per Councillor Hightower. No additional document per Assistant City Attorney Sturdiment per Bill Ward for agenda item 5.04 ordinance, Burlington Code of Ordinances, Housing Minimum Standards, Parking Plan Ordinance Committee, second reading, no proposed amendment to this agenda item per Councillor Mason. Thank you for that motion. Is there a second to the motion? Seconded by Councillor Pine. Any further discussion of our agenda? Hearing none, we'll go to a vote. All those in favor of the agenda, please say aye. Any opposed? Okay, that passes unanimously. Brings us to our next item on the agenda, which is the, sorry, let me get it. Well, I'm not going to go to public form quite yet because we're a little bit early on that, so I'm going to skip over that. We'll come right back to that. I'm closer to 7.30. We'll try and get some of the reports done. We do like it sometimes when we're able to get to these reports earlier in the night so that more folks are able to hear these updates. So we'll go to item number three, which is the climate emergency reports. Does anyone have a climate emergency report that they'd like to offer tonight? Okay, seeing none, we will close that item and move on to some of the other reports that are down further below on our agenda. So I'll go to item number six, which is our committee report. Are there any committee chairs who would like to report out on work that they're doing in their committees? Councillor Pine, go ahead. I think we'll have plenty of time to discuss the Just Cause Eviction item coming up tonight. I just wanted to at least mention the idea of landlord licensing was something that our committee discussed. I know that Ordinance Committee has spent some time on this issue and wanted to at least provide the circle back to the full council and maybe Ordinance Committee members would add some to this, but the idea behind licensing rental property owners is one that has been discussed for many years. It still has, I think, some valid pros and cons for what it would do and what it could do. And we're not ready to, I don't think anyone's ready to propose any kind of action. There's still some work that needs to be done in terms of the Code Enforcement Office providing a, essentially a memo about how licensing would change the way, or I should say, whether the registration system that we have now could get us the benefits of landlord licensing. And so that is a sort of report back that we'll be hopefully getting from the Code we had no action, but I just wanted to go back as that came to our committee and that's for now. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Pine. Any further comments? Councilor Mason, go ahead. Thank you, President Tracey, to sort of pick up where Councilor Pine left off. I would concur that was sort of the conclusion that the Ordinance Committee had reached. So I'm encouraged that CDNR is sort of carrying that forward. Two other things to report. One is that there will be yet another joint committee hearing with the Planning Commission tomorrow, 6.30 on Zoom, not live, to continue the discussion relating to short-term rentals. I think we are probably in the last two or three meetings on STRs, but we will see the other sort of update just for the benefit of the full Council. We had a hearing on the decarbonization electrification proposal that had been put forth where we're thrown a little bit of a wrinkle from the city attorney's office relating to some concern that all or some portion of the proposal went beyond the enabling legislation. So they were tasked, the city attorney's office and BED are sort of tasked this week with figuring out what the potential path forward, if any, might be. We are potentially bumping up on some charter change deadlines. I think, unfortunately, that's the reality. So to be continued, but I wanted to not have it be a complete shock depending on what happens next. Thank you. Thank you, Councilor Mason. Any other committee chairs? Councilor Zhang, go ahead. Thank you, President Tracey. These are items around the racial equity and belonging inclusion and belonging committee. We decided to now host our meetings every third Tuesday of every month. So now that calendar now is set, our next meeting will be on the 15th. So in our last meeting, we received updates around MLK Day from both Patrick Brown who've been doing it since the 90s, since 1993, as well as the city of Burlington MLK, how it's going to look like during COVID. And the report is basically, both entities will be having some type of MLK celebration day. And the last item is specific to the swags that the racial equity and belonging department, led by Taisha Green, she's selling a lot of swags. And please consider buying them, masks, hats, jackets, shirts, and all of that. And Christmas is coming, good time to support the program by pushing us in kids for families, coworkers, and loved ones. Thank you. Thank you for that. Any other updates from chairs? Councilor Hightower. Yeah, just a quick update on the joint committee between the Police Commission and Public Safety. One of the, one of our items is on the consent agenda. So assuming, hoping that goes through, we should meet with the first set of our consultants, December 3rd on community visioning and kick off a plan for that. That same day, we'll also hopefully get some things from Charter Change later this week. So we'll be discussing that on December 3rd as well. And then hoping to make a decision on the second, the second set of consultants that we hope to be working with on December 22nd, so that we can get that done before the new year into the council early January. Any further updates from committee chairs? Okay, seeing none, we'll move on to our next item, which is City Councilor General City Affairs. Does any city councilor have something referring to General City Affairs they'd like to speak to? Councillor Pine, go ahead. I don't know this really fits under this topic of General City Affairs, but I thought I'd at least mention that Councillor Tracy and I together have been working with the building trades unions to look at the city's policy around responsible contractors. We have an existing ordinance that was developed about 20 years ago back then, then City Council field for Monty spearheaded that effort as a way to ensure that the city procurement of construction contracts does so in a way that levels the playing field for building trade unions so that they can compete head to head with with other contractors for publicly funded projects. We just want to give a heads up that we'll be bringing something in December in this regard to strengthen the Burlington existing ordinance to be more in line with what the City of Montpelier has done in this area about a year ago, Montpelier passed a responsible contractor's ordinance. This would be taking our existing ordinance and proposing that the ordinance committee look at the revisions and changes to that ordinance to bring it in line with what Montpelier has done. So I just want to give a heads up. Councillor Pine, any further comments on General City Affairs? Okay. Seeing none, we'll move on to the next item, which is the City Council President updates. I do not have any Council updates for us this evening, Councillors. I'm not sure if we have Chief of Staffordell, is the Mayor with us this evening? Yes, he is joining momentarily. Just give us one minute here. Okay. If it's going to be a little bit longer, I can hold off or if it's like two seconds, I can just wait on that. I'm just here we go. Thank you President Trusey. Can you hear me alright? Yeah, go right ahead. Okay. You have a big focus to the City right now continues to be on on the recent surge in COVID cases. We are continuing to work with the State to increase the number, the total amount of pop-up testing that is available within the City. I'll be giving a full briefing on testing and all range of COVID issues tomorrow at two o'clock. And I do just want to say happy Thanksgiving to all my colleagues and to all Brawontonians and urge everyone to really take seriously, listen carefully to the guidance coming from Commissioner Levine regarding the need for Thanksgiving to be different this year and to avoid gathering with other households at Thanksgiving, even within your family and loved ones. It could be risky to do so this year. Thank you President Trusey. Thank you for that update, Mayor. Alright, we will I think we are a little bit ahead of 7.30. We do have quite a few folks who are signed up to speak for public forum this evening. So I do want to just get that started. Again, just so that folks know, if you are interested in speaking at public forum tonight, you may sign up using by going to the urlburlingtonbt.gov slash city council as one word slash public forum and that will take you to a forum that you can use to sign up that feeds into a Google sheet that then I use to do the order for the public forum. In terms of the order itself, as has been our practice this year, I am elevating BIPOC voices to the front of the queue in the conversation this evening as I have done for prior council meetings. Folks will have two minutes this evening for their comments. So look forward to hearing from everyone and let me just give me just a second. Let's get the if we could please have the timer put up. Wonderful. Thank you so much. And our first speaker will be Jess Laporte to be followed by and I'll read off a couple folks just so that you know if you're going to be coming up shortly. Russell Statman, Steven Marshall, William Dunkley, Ezra Liebowitz, Phillip D. Foy, Grace Field, Lydia Kern and William Keaton. So I'm going to come to you, Jess. I'm enabling your microphone right now so you should be able to speak. Hi, council. This is Jess Laporte. Again, I use she, her pronouns and I'm a block president of ward two. I'm calling in this evening to talk about a few things actually which I think really highlights the intersectionality of being a person of color in this city. I am a renter in this city and I'm in full support of just cause of the work that is coming out of the charter change committee for just cause. And I think it's really important to make sure that we have checks and balances for the many renters in this city, me being one of them. And I just feel like it's like so many power dynamics across our society where landlords have been given priority and I think it's reasonable to as somebody who might not have access to capital to invest in a home and own one myself to have some level of stability. I also want to address something on the deliberative agenda as well. Chief Murad's finance request for this new reporting mechanism. While I'm in support of mechanisms to make reporting, to streamline reporting and to ensure that this information is circulating in a timely manner. And I know Chief Murad has noted that it could help to support some of the accountability measures that myself and other activists have been calling for. I just want to point out that in his memo, he suggested that this funding would, this additional funding would come out of savings from reducing staffing in BPD, which I think is totally inappropriate given the purpose of the racial justice resolution in June, which is to defund the police and to reinvest that funding in other places in our city. And it seems pretty reasonable to me that he would have to come up with ways to fund this in other ways through his budget instead of dipping into that money, which is intended to be allocated to Director Green and efforts for racial equity in our city. Already, the mayor has dipped into that pot by the actions that he took to appoint the Director of Policing Transformation, Kyle Dodson, taking some of that work, which I think is really restructuring public safety, which is highly related to investing in BIPOC community out of Director Green's workload and into some new short-term contractor workload. And I just, I think that we need to be true to the letter and also the spirit of the racial justice resolution and not allow Chief Murad to dip into this pot. So, yeah, that's it for this evening. Thank you. Thank you for that. Our next speaker will be Russell Statman. Russell, I've enabled your microphone. Russell, it looks like you're muted on your end. Russell Statman, it looks like you're muted on your end. Russell, I can try again in a little bit. I'm going to go, I think I found Stephen Marshall. One second. Stephen, I've enabled your microphone, so you should be able to speak at this point. Yes, hi. Hi, Stephen. Go ahead. Thank you. So, in the first place, let me suggest with respect to the Just Cause ballot measure that there's really only one sentence that is needed. Everything else is burdened judgment and is unnecessary. That sentence is that the city shall have the power to provide by ordinance the conditions under which evictions and non-renewal of leases may occur and prohibit such without, in quotes, Just Cause. But the proposal is on the table, so I want to be really clear why it's important. This charter change empowers the city to do work that needs to be done to bring out from a hidden marketplace into the visible light of public scrutiny, the rights and responsibilities of landlords and tenants alike. This charter change must be sent to the voters in past so that the city council can perform its duty of deliberating on matters of concern to the public. Exemptions may be proposed today that provide loopholes which would be applied by the powerful against the powerless, against the interests of justice and without recourse to the political process. Exemptions built into the charter change would forfeit for the city the ability to adjust or correct for them. Exemptions are obstacles to the sound deliberation of the city council. By having this charter change, the city is able to describe what behavior is deemed acceptable and what is deemed not acceptable. As the place of community self-governance, the city, the city council, it is logical and appropriate that the city would have the power to deliberate upon and set the conditions which govern a relationship of such great and lasting consequence to such a large fraction of the city population. I implore you, pass this ballot measure, put as few conditions and criteria into it as absolutely necessary so that you, the city council, will have the maximum amount of flexibility to deliver justice to the Burlington community. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I'm going to go, our next speaker will be William Dunkley to be followed by Ezra Liebowitz. William, I've found you and I'm enabling your microphone. You should be able to speak, William. Hey, thank you. My name is William Dunkley. I live in Ward 3 as a renter. I use he-him pronouns and I'm a white man. I've been calling to the charter change committee meeting so for the last month and I want to voice my three thoughts on a few things tonight, three things. First, I don't know much about agenda item 5.01 but I don't support Burlington Police Department and I do support the movement of resources away from the department and back to the community where it belongs. This has been a core demand of community members and many of my colleagues and I spent more than a month at Battery Park demanding this in part. The police don't help me. They don't help many among my community. It seems like the Burlington Police Department is requesting more money. Say no but Burlington Police Department find funds elsewhere. Let's not give our communities funds to a deeply unjust, violent and harmful system. Second, on agenda item 5.02, I fully support the divestment of city funds from fossil fuel investments. And lastly, I'll talk a bit about just cause evictions, agenda item 5.03. I'd like to say I support the just cause eviction resolution. I really care about the well being of my fellow community members. We live in a very unjust world as many of you are aware. Working people in Burlington are forced to work in unjust market systems. This is your opportunity to create more justice in this unjust system whereby the working people pay the wealthy for a month's guarantee of an overpriced roof over their head. I support a strong resolution which gives power to renters and takes unjust power away from landlords. And renters' rights are intimately tied to racial justice. It's often BIPOC folks who are victims of landlord harm. It's often BIPOC folks who are victims of unjust evictions. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Give me a second here. Okay. Our next speaker will be Ezra Libowitz to be followed by Philip D. Foy. Ezra, I'm going to enable your microphone right now so you should be able to speak. Can you hear me? Yep. Go ahead. Great. My name is Ezra Libowitz. I'd like to speak out against agenda item 5.03 and the language to eliminate just cause evictions. I'm first and foremost a social worker and secondly a property owner and a manager. I pride myself in being a responsible, responsive, thoughtful and reasonable property owner and feel that tenants of my units would say the same about me. My tenants are wonderful. They're productive, long-term members of this community and I am thankful to have them. My focus has always been on providing housing to long-term tenants who live and work here. If this language is adopted, I worry that this will no longer be the case. By taking away my ability to terminate a tenancy at the term of a lease, you tie not only my hands, but you take away a tool that enables me to maintain a safe and welcoming environment for the other tenants. My least favorite part of managing buildings is finding new tenants. I enjoy maintaining long-lasting relationships by offering fair housing. By requiring just cause findings to evict or not to renew a lease, I will no longer be able to focus on long-term rentals. My operational model will be compelled to allow for more short term tenants such as college students who stay for a year and leave as that will be the only way to safeguard my buildings and the other tenants from the occasional bad Apple who has undermined the tranquility and or safety of the buildings for his or her neighbors. For example, a recent tenant adopted a new dog which is allowed but failed to train the dog and brought it to the basement to urinate and defecate. I was able to talk with the tenant and hopefully she'll change her habits, but if she doesn't I would not want to be compelled to renew her lease. Additionally, I worry that this language will take away any openness I have to working with social service agencies to house tenants with less than perfect rental histories. Like I say, I'm first and foremost a social worker in this community. I pride myself on working with local agencies to offer housing to those who may be turned down by other property owners. If this proposal becomes law, I will no longer consider any applicant without solid references a high level of income and savings in their bank accounts. Please don't take away my only safeguard we have which enables me to confidently house those who otherwise may not be able to find a unit. Thank you. Thank you. So I wasn't able to find Philip Foy. So I'm gonna I can try again in a little bit, but I'm gonna go to Grace Field and that's and Grace you're to be followed by Lydia Kern. So Grace I've enabled your microphone. Hi, thank you so much. I just jumped in this call. I wanted to speak on three different issues that are on the deliberative agenda tonight. I wanted to speak of course in favor of just cause evictions. I know there's been probably a very compelling case laid out in favor of no cause evictions by landlords, but I believe that we must have this just cause eviction change in Burlington. It's extremely important that folks not be evicted from their homes without a cause. And I think that seems pretty clear to me. I also wanted to speak on the divestment of fossil fuels. I think that is extremely important. And I also wanted to speak to the request by the chief that I believe he's going to speak on later this evening to take the $13,000 that was saved from the staffing reduction and to have that go back into the budget. I think that that should not happen. I think that that money should be per the rise initiative that that money should be invested into the community. And that perhaps they can find a way to pay for this new information system software by readjusting other funds from the budget. I think they spend around $30,000 a year to launder uniforms. So perhaps some money can be found elsewhere in their budget to be able to pay for this new software. Thank you so much. For that, I was unable to locate Lydia Kern. So I'm going to go to William Dunkley and William is to be followed by Dana Keyes Gibbons. William, I'm enabling your microphone now. William, you should be able to go. William Keaton. Hey, I already spoke. I don't know what Keaton is. Oops, sorry. Thank you for letting me know that. I apologize. Let me just see if I got, okay, there we go. I got the wrong William. I apologize for that. All right. I'm going to come to William Keaton. There we go. William, you now your microphone should be enabled. Apologize. All right. Awesome. Yep. Go ahead. My name is Will. I use the pronouns. Just wanted to speak out briefly support for the divestment of crossfields and city pension. You know, UBM recently divested, but only after, you know, years and years and years of a pressure from the student body. So, you know, I think the time for, you know, it's kind of like diddle around just kind of wait is over. We need to divest in crossfields, you know, to ensure safety in the future. We also need to understand as we're monitors that, you know, the people who feel the effects of climate change the most, you know, it's not felt equally. It's a racial justice issue as well as just an environmental issue. So we need to be conscious of that going forward. Also definitely in favor of just cause evictions. I think it's just nonsense that, you know, landlords can just kick out people, you know, whatever they want to. And yeah, I don't have time to say it, but just full support for divestment. Thank you. Thank you for that. Next speaker will be Dana Keyes Gibbons. I believe I've located you Dana. I'm going to enable your microphone right now. Dana is to be followed by Sarah Tino. Hey, it's Dana. I'm she, her pronouns. I'm a white resident of ward eight. I moved to Burlington about a year and a half ago and I've been a healthcare worker at a local clinic ever since and I'm also a renter and it makes me feel really unsafe knowing that I could just be kicked out of my home without just cause and without any real reason and to think about how a landlord could use this power to manipulate or take advantage of a tenant. Landlords cannot impartially advocate for tenants. So any landlords that you hear on this call who are saying that they're doing this for the tenants good are really only looking out for themselves and their own interests. I also support divesting from fossil fuels for the long-term health and safety of our planet. And lastly, I oppose the request from Murad in item 5.01 that money that was saved from the reduction of uniformed officers is supposed to go directly into community empowerment initiatives according to the racial justice resolution. So that would be completely going back on all the work that's been done this year to give back to BIPOC in our community. So the police department is just going to have to find somewhere else for that money because that would be taking it away from the community empowerment initiatives that we really, really need. Thanks so much, Shale, the rest of my time. Thank you. Our next speaker will be Sarah Cirtino to be followed by Peter Tucker, Tom Proctor, Emily Reynolds, Gail Rose, Lula Fortunoff, Thayazaluski, Lou Mulvaney-Sanic, David Siddell, Erhard Monca, Kristi Delphia, and Kai McHale-Forley. Sarah, I'm going to come to you and I've enabled your microphone. Hey, can you hear me? Yep, go ahead. Hi, I'm Sarah, I use she-her pronouns and I'm here to speak in support of fossil fuel divestment. As a student organizer for divestment, I feel proud to now go to a university that is going to be divested from the companies that threaten my future and I wish that I could say the same about Burlington and from my experience speaking with current students and prospective students in the past, I know that when thinking about a place to go to school or live, we definitely take this type of thing into consideration and it would definitely be, Burlington would definitely be a lot more attractive as a place to live for environmentally conscious students and potential residents as well as tourists if it were able to capitalize off of being divested from fossil fuels and that's not to mention that these investments are financially irresponsible and they definitely don't have a place in our city given that they are a dying investment, dying field and yeah, Burlington should definitely follow in UVM's footsteps and divest. I definitely worry about the future of our planet and my personal future and the future of my loved ones every day and yeah, I think that it would put a lot of people at ease if this were to happen and it would really just be so huge for the city. I also want to speak in favor of just cause eviction because like someone said earlier, I also definitely worry about if something were to happen where I could just be evicted for no good reason and I really don't see any reason why that should not be, why it just cause eviction should not be in place in Burlington because no one should have to worry about being evicted for no good reason. Thank you and I yield the rest of my time. Thank you, next speaker will be Peter Tucker to be followed by Tom Proctor. Peter, I've enabled your microphone. There we go, can you hear me now? Yep, go ahead. Right, hi. Hi, Peter Tucker, I am the director of advocacy and public affairs for the Vermont Association of Realtors. I'm asked to speak with you tonight by the Northwestern Vermont Board of Realtors who serve as Burlington and the topic is the Charter Change proposal on just cause eviction that the council is considering. We suggest now is not the right time for a Charter Change without first understanding the language that such an ordinance would have and the negative impacts on rental housing in the city. Just cause must be considered to be certain that the impacts and tenants and property owners like are clearly defined and that the unintended consequences of such an ordinance are understood. Tenants will face a reduction of available rental housing in a market where rental vacancies hover around 1%. Just cause policies create a misallocation of rental housing units as tenants maintain the status quo and blocking new tenants from entering the rental market. Property owners will have to understand that once rented their property may not be able to revert to personal use under this proposal. Small property owners will have to make a decision to continue to rent or to plan for future use. Even the loss of a small percentage of these homeowner landlords will further restrict an already tight rental market. A just cause ordinance may cause property owners to offer their rentals in a short term marketplace rather than long term housing for Burlington residents further reducing available rental properties. Landlords who do remain in the long term rental market will need to strengthen their leases and utilize greater scrutiny of their proposed tenants. This will further complicate and raise the cost of rental applications. As a result of the reduction of smaller landlord properties the rental market will see increased consolidation as large landlords become a greater percentage of the market and competition is reduced. Tenants will have less of a selection of quality housing because just cause and rent control affected deterioration of current rental housing stock as landlords are less able to recoup maintenance and capital improvement expenses. In addition investment in rental housing becomes less attractive as funds to support rental housing market become less available. Good tenants will be impacted when one bad tenant spoils the entire property causing good tenants to move out. Landlords need to have the ability to address this public nuisance to protect their tenants. Just cause policy is a policy that needs to integrate with already established landlord tenants policies. This is not a standalone issue but rather part of an entire eviction process that needs to be reviewed to effectively integrate just cause language. Voters of the city of Burlington need to understand what they are voting for in this charter change. The proposed language does not do this. The ballot initiative should provide detail on the language that such an ordinance would require as well as an explanation of potential negative impacts on the rental housing market. Just cause language as proposed in this charter change lacks sufficient clarity or certainty and therefore I'm sorry okay I'm fine. Okay thank you. All right our next speaker was Tom Proctor. Tom I don't um I'm not able to locate you so I'm going to go to um Erika Victoria Erika I'm enabling your microphone Erika Victoria it looks like I am here yes okay perfect great I can hear you okay so my name is Erika I'm a resident of ward two I just want to start by saying I oppose the request from your ad in item 5.01 regarding housing I applaud the hard work of some local tenants advocates and support the request for a charter change on just cause. On the issue of eviction however I believe we could go even further than the language currently being used as I believe all persons in Burlington should be guaranteed stable safe healthy housing throughout the duration of the pandemic and after and that we must immediately stop every eviction because at the end of the day all evictions are adjust there is no such thing as a just eviction no person deserves to be evicted or houseless ever for any cause. Tenants who are made the most vulnerable to houselessness and eviction should be the ones deciding what happens to themselves not landlords or city counselors some of whom are landlords not homeowners or non-profits or mayors or governors I am actually one of these tenants currently facing eviction myself myself and others stood up to our landlord Bill Bisonette to tell him and our city officials and code enforcement that we were fed up with unsafe living conditions we were fed up with discrimination against POC disabled and immuno compromised tenants we were fed up with fire hazards and safety concerns with tenants heat being shut off intermittently when it's below 55 degrees with landlords charging illegal fees being on our leases and illegal clause in our leases and as one of these tenants personally facing eviction I can tell you with certainty that the crisis ahead of ourselves is not going to be fixed by any program that does not center the lived experiences and realities of poor and working class BIPOC disabled trans queer and or immuno compromised tenants this week alone the tenants who are fighting against Bisonette's abuses of power and his disregard for our health and safety were served letters from high bailiff Daniel Gamelin and were informed that eviction papers would be filed with the courts in 30 days just a few days before Christmas it is our belief that Bisonette is coordinating with Chittenden County Sheriff's Department in an attempt to scare tenants as a retaliation for our activism amidst a global pandemic and a ban on evictions at a federal state and local level our community has a real immediate material need for stable safe housing now tenants in Burlington are fighting against human rights abuses that landlords and city officials alike are participating in we're fighting for our dignity and the right to save stable homes for all people we're fighting to not be threatened with evictions by landlords and sheriffs while tens of thousands of people are houseless or facing houselessness while tens of thousands are unemployed and forced to make the choice between rent and food for themselves and their family so this is why we must demand as a community that no one is evicted or houseless for any reason not now not ever thank you thank you i was able to locate tom proctor so i'm going to go to tom and then i'll follow up with emily reynolds tom i've enabled your mic thank you um so my name is tom proctor i use he can pronounce an original because he many of you know me already on this uh i along with other phenomenal housing in cdnr and through child of change it's noticeable that landlords on this tall that many landlords in the committees that would talk to you about um where just causes be discussed and be using abuse threats against tenants as for reasoning for why they cannot have just cause eviction if this sounds like an abusive relationship it's because it is and 60 percent of burlington find themselves on the wrong end of this power imbalance good landlords for just cause northgate supports good cause cht sports good cause just cause protects institutions for stable housing sports neighborhood growth it protects tenants from being harassed from bad landlords like the one group that tonight it protects tenants from being discriminated against based on their age race ability for sex it gives tennis leader protection to challenge bad evictions of bad landlords and it creates an equitable standard and levels of playing field and protects good landlords along with all the tenants of burlington uh i would strongly urge you to pass your choice cause tonight using variety of high towers amended bill um this is an issue that's not going away it's only getting worse and uh burlington is watching right now and listening and um we really do urge you to do the right thing thank you thank you our next speaker will be emily reynolds to be followed by um gail rose emily i'm enabling your microphone hi thank you can you hear me yep go ahead hi yes my name is emily reynolds and i am a tenant in ward 2 i have been organizing with burlington tenant union for over a year we were founded on the notion that housing is a human right we all need housing that is safe affordable and in neighborhoods we care about the very minimum is we deserve to stay in our homes especially deserve during a pandemic we need people to be housed and stay put evicting people during a pandemic is unbelievably cruel we need to stop all evictions immediately there should be no evictions in burlington ever we need to ensure a just cause bill without exceptions unfortunately that bill is not on the table tonight the two bills are compromises and we really need to push for a stronger bill but in light of that it is key that we pass zaria's bill tonight so we can push towards a stronger just cause thank you thank you our next speaker will be gail rose to be followed by a little fortune off gail i've enabled your microphone all right thank you i'm gail rose i'm a resident of forage i only have okay there we go um ward six i use she hear pronouns um i'm calling an opposition to the just cause charter change just cause eviction charter change um and i just want to make a point about the language um people are talking about being evicted or kicked out of their apartments but really it's it's non-renewal of a lease and so when a lease expires you know a contract ends and um it's not the same as being kicked out um and then i also agree that fair housing is a really important issue but i don't think that the proposed charter change is a good way to achieve that um i just think that it will have all the unintended consequences that the previous speaker the social worker who called in the realtor um because i am a landlord for us a house in the south end um and we have very good relationships with tenants who we prefer in our best interest to be long-term tenants we there are people who can't afford to buy a home who can't afford to rent this house it's a house with the yard you know in a residential neighborhood there aren't a lot of homes like that available as rentals and so if this would go into effect just to keep control of my own property i would be very inclined to sell that house therefore leaving one less rental property available in burlington i if i wanted a real estate investment i might choose a different city that didn't have this kind of charter change or charter um and i also would be more likely to increase the rent every year when we have a long-term tenant we don't tend to increase the rent because they're good tenants we want to keep them but if that all the rules were enacted about um caps on rent increases i would increase rent every every time every year because i would not um be in control of setting my own rent when uh when it was appropriate thank you thank you um lilla fortune-off is going to be next um to be followed by thea zalouski lilla i'm coming to you she'll be able to speak now hi can you hear me yep go ahead awesome thanks yeah so my name is lilla i'm a cis white woman my pronouns are she and her i'm a renter and i live in ward three i was a student at ubm and i've chosen to stay and live in burlington after graduation um i firstly want to support to voice my support for the establishment of bi-pox small business and non-profit relief fund and grant program um i highly encourage the council to pass that resolution um i i see that the resolution of divestment of city funds including retirement from fossil fuel investments is not on the agenda but i do want to state that this is an incredibly important action to take um to in the face of the climate crisis and it's actually quite a small step to take um but i do hope that it gets back to city council so that the council can approve um this agenda item um i also don't know if this is still in the agenda for the evening but i support the resolution regarding um requesting that the mayor add the issue of just cause evictions to the ballot um in regards to the way that the landlords and the realtors who have spoken on this public forum um have talked about this issue i want to point out that the landlords are worried about losing their money and they're lost worried about losing capital whereas the tenants um are worried about losing their homes about facing houselessness and i don't think that those worries are comparable um i personally don't believe that being a landlord is should be considered a job um and just the idea that you're worried about losing some income versus folks who are worried about facing houselessness um is ridiculous to me um and i absolutely want to echo what erica v spoke about earlier um everyone deserves housing not just the good apples or the good tenants um and regarding to the agenda item about the police but um budget and the benchmark analytics personal management systems i want to um urge the council to engage in a discussion on this issue and and reject the resolution as it currently stands similarly to what just support and others have stated i support systems that would allow further accountability and monitoring of what the police do but i do not support the way that the deputy that deputy chief mirad has suggested that the city pay for this management system the funding for this should come from reallocation of the current police budget um perhaps from the twenty six thousand dollars dedicated to uniform laundering thank you thank you for that um so just one one point of clarification that may have been confusing for folks the the divestment resolution was um inadvertently placed on the board of finance agenda um we didn't need to deal with it at board of finance it's on our consent i mean it's on our deliberative agenda for this evening's council meeting is item five point oh two so we will be um discussing that item this evening so sorry for any confusion that that might have created for folks um i'll get to um her next speaker will be thea zalewski and thea will be followed by lu mulvaney stanek they have enabled your microphone hello can you hear me yes i can go ahead wonderful um so i would like to speak on item five point oh one regarding um i think chief of police john mirad's request for over thirteen thousand dollars um to be reallocated back to the police um after it was cut which is you know just going really backwards on um any of the progress made thus far towards um racial justice um following the the racial justice resolution in june um you know that that was a huge you know it was a step towards towards a better future where we're investing in communities and not the police um and this is just directly undoing going back on all of that and would really render the whole thing just a bureaucratic show with with no actual um weight to it no actual benefit for our community um and you know hearing tonight that the there is twenty six thousand dollars in the budget there for you know laundering uniforms i mean i suggest that the police uh do their own laundry like the rest of us um this just shows how easily this money could be better invested in the community um i also do uh would like to speak on city council voting to divest from fossil fuels um i think that's a very important move um considering the impending uh climate change that we're experiencing and i am in full support of legislation that mandates just cause eviction as nobody should be houseless let alone evicted from their home without a um a just justifiable reason which i do agree um it doesn't even go far enough there is no justifiable reason to uh kick out someone and put them on the street um that's just not how community works so i suggest anyways yeah at a time thank you very much um that's it okay our next speaker will be lu mulvaney stanek to be followed by david sedal uh lu i've enabled your mic great good evening everybody um my name is lu mulvaney stanek i'm a gender queer white resident of burlington for over 20 years and a homeowner for the last five out in the north end i use they and them pronouns and i support 5.03 uh i was a tenant for in burlington for almost 15 years many of those with max as my city councilor in the old north end i absolutely love to live in the old north end and i love the house that i lived in uh 10 of those years who are with my landlord larry miller who owns multiple rental houses in the city and it was been a vocal advocate for keeping eviction with no cause we had a great relationship with larry uh until he used no cause eviction as a retaliation against us in 2014 we believe this was over 50 dollars that we requested off of our rent when we requested uh the 50 to cover cleaning costs after the insulation company he hired covered the entire apartment with an inch of insulation dust it was all over our stuff you're breathing it we needed a 50 professional cleaner to come in and really take care of it and soon after that two weeks later we got a certified letter in the mail with uh unjust eviction essentially um it wasn't at the end of a um of our our lease it was completely out of the blue like that so we had never missed a rent payment we took care of that house as if it was our own we improved and maintained that property we transformed the yard with a variety of gardens max walked by it all the time he can attest he saw it likely um so we suspect that ultimately the aim there was him being pissed at us that we pushed him for the 50 bucks for the cleaning costs um and also that he probably also wanted to raise the rent he didn't even give us a chance to have a conversation though on either of those issues he never he literally never communicated with us again it was only through these letters it was an awful experience it was embarrassing it was demoralizing it was scary and we were well resourced people we were community organizers who were able to seek help about what the heck to do he gave us 45 days to find new housing and as you know that's impossible in burlington i fully suggest that the city council uh pass this no cause eviction law is frankly criminal and it should be legal in vermont thank you thank you lu our next speaker will be david sedel um to be followed by airhard manka um david i've enabled your microphone great um yeah thanks so much everyone for the chance to speak um my name is david i'm a uvm student i also live in burlington um i identify as non-binary um i primarily wanted to voice my really really strong support for getting burlington's pension fund um divested from fossil fuels like as soon as possible um i think it's hugely important uh as a city that prides itself on its commitment to sustainability and really draws people to it um for that reason that we really lead the way um on this issue and and cut all ties with the industry that um bears so much um responsibility for our global ecological crisis and also you know send a message around the state and more broadly that you know the time is now for a real substantive transition um divestment absolutely makes a difference um we've seen reports from shell for example saying that you know divestment movements have the potential to pose a real threat to their material interests which is necessary um and with uvm committing to divestment and you know the massive amount of enthusiasm behind that it's clear that you know there's demand for this and that it's more than possible um and additionally you know we know that fossil fuel stock is dying it's it's no longer a fiduciarily responsible investment and so all around we should absolutely divest um i'm incredibly grateful that it's on our agenda um and briefly i'd also just like to say that i fully support the um just cause evictions charter change resolution um to protect the rights of renters like myself um housing security is absolutely a right and this is a step in that direction um and i also support you know the push to reallocate resources away from the police um and directly investing them into uh communities as well thank you thank you our next speaker will be erhard manka to be followed by christie delphia and kai mckel forley erhard i'm gonna come have enabled your microphone i think you heard me okay i can hear you erhard go ahead this is some reason y'all have disappeared from my screen um so erhard manka live on 60 grove street ward one long time burlington resident um landlord of a small owner occupied duke flex and long time for a housing advocate i'm here to testify in support strong support for just cause this was something that we tried to pass 30 years ago and uh and did not succeed and uh i think it's great that um there's a major movement to try and pass it again now um i will say that i support reasonable exemptions like those that have been incorporated in some in countless other state county and municipal just cause ordinances um just cause is as you've heard from so many important to protect tenants who buy buy their lease pay the rent and protect them from unwarranted evictions and non-renewals uh i mean lou's story just now is just a picture perfect reason for why this needs to be passed i do think that um exemptions are warranted uh a to get this passed just for purely political reasons uh and also send a clear message to uh some of the concerns that have been raised um that these you know some of those concerns will be addressed through some of those uh exemptions um while leaving um as much flexibility for uh you as city counselors to craft good ordinance uh once it hopefully gets passed by the voters and uh passed by the legislature uh it does look like uh given sarah and zaria's um uh amendments like you're still a ways apart uh i urge you not to try and actually work out something work out language tonight uh because this is complicated stuff uh and maybe uh just postpone for a couple of weeks to see if you can reach a compromise that is uh has a greater consensus among uh city council members you you do have a few weeks left before your deadline for posting charter uh charter changes um i do think that there's problems with uh both uh the original version as well as with uh both sarah's and zaria's i think they're a little overly complicated simplicity is really what's needed for charter change um and i'm very concerned about one uh line in um in one of the proposals that simply seems to authorize the city to completely rewrite landlord tenant law which would never pass um the legislature just uh i see my times up but i do want to add one quick reminder as someone who's worked for over 20 years with um the state legislature that uh we don't have the most tenant-friendly state legislature and this would have to pass lawmakers and in fact lawmakers have the complete right and authority to uh tinker with and rewrite charter changes so just bear that in mind um when you're crafting something it has to pass the voters in barlington and then it has to pass this on the state legislature thanks okay i'm going to go to christie delphia and then that christie will be followed by kai mckelthorley christie i'm enabling your microphone all right so as you all know i am here to support just cause evictions obviously i do not like the exemptions and i'm going to go with everybody else and say no one should ever be evicted for any reason but as for this proposal at this very minute in time the language is not set in stone i would lean more towards the rias proposals and amendments than i would for sarah's obviously i don't think there should be any exemptions at all but this is not again this is not set in stone there is plenty of time to work on this and this does need to pass as it is very important to every tenant in burlington we don't need to be evicted out of our homes it's scary it's demoralizing it's demeaning and it has lasting effects on you for the rest of your life even if it only happens to you once this proposal i will see it again it's not here in control and we don't appreciate landlords making threats to sell their buildings or raise their rits so and lastly i want to not i do not support measure 501 any money taken from those reductions should be put into the agreement that was made in june for the police should not be taking money spent for one program and putting them into something else so i do not support measure 5.01 thank you thank you i'm going to go to kai michelle forley kai have enabled your microphone hey everybody good evening just briefly i am a long time owner of an owner occupied duplex in burlington a tenant prior to that and i also worked in the affordable housing field many eons ago and i am calling tonight just to lend my support to the notion of just cause eviction but like airheart want to add my my request that that folks include the necessary exemptions and i speak particularly as a owner occupied duplex owner with lots of experience i think it's unfair to lump owner occupied duplexes in with you know properties that are that are much larger property owners that have much more property there's exemptions that owner occupied duplexes have been granted to date and i think that's in a in an acknowledgement of the unique circumstances that owner occupied duplex creates it's much closer to like a housemate situation um then um then a larger landlord who has multiple multiple units and i think just to to an acknowledgement of of the uniqueness of a owner occupied duplex and in deference to giving folks like myself all the tools that we need in order to be successful you know an owner occupied duplex we have a we take on all the risk and we aren't able to spread that risk out like a large property owner is and therefore you know the exemptions that we currently have that we've that these types of properties have had for decades i think need to be maintained just because this is going to affect owners and we are often right on the line and so we need all the help we can get so i have a few seconds left i'm also going to say i support divestment but i want to make sure that it's divestment uh real divestment as opposed to what we've found out from several investigative reporters like 350.org divestment which yes divested from fossil fuel companies directly but then put all the all the money was dumped into fossil fuel service providers and so it didn't really solve the problem so i want to make sure that folks are cognitive and that if we're going to do this we need to do it right thank you okay i'm going to go back to some folks and see if we can reach them now because i had some issues before Russell Statman i'm going to enable your microphone and see if hello i'm here can you hear me okay great yep go ahead thank you for hearing me so i wanted to raise an issue that is an unintended consequence that i don't think anyone has considered for background i i have been buying and actually improving properties in landlord in burlington for the past two years i like to think i've improved the housing stock of the city there have been a lot of arguments back and forth about whether this is a good idea a bad idea i'm not going to change anyone's mind so i wanted to raise a different issue that if it passes all of us will have to deal with and the city council have to deal with which is that it's very clear that this will reduce the value of rental property in burlington investment property i think i've heard a couple of other landlords already say they won't invest anymore certainly i would be less interested in investing as an economic proposition it just makes it a less valuable investment so that will reduce the value of property in burlington which affects our tax base and that means that unless you as a city council raise taxes that we're gonna have a deficit and i don't think we as a city we can do that i'm looking at the mayor now i don't know how he plans to come up with extra money for this but where as a city are we going to are you going to willing to raise the tax rate to get the money that's necessary to close that gap or is there some other way that we're going to come up with this lost revenue from the city as a result of our tax base being reduced so that's the question that i have i think it's clear that it'll reduce the value of the tax base i have a lot of other issues with it but i other landlords have spoken to it and i'm not going to change anyone's mind so i'm just hoping you as a city council begin dealing with that particular problem as well as the mayor thank you thank you i was not able to find uh philip foie so i'm gonna but i was able to find um lydia kern so lydia i've enabled your microphone hi can you hear me yes go ahead lydia hi everyone uh my name is lydia kern and i'm a resident of ward one i'm an artist and a care worker i've lived in berlington about eight years i'm just calling in support of the just evictions charter change i want to thank zaria and everyone um who's worked on this to push it through i think housing is a human right and um no one deserves to be evicted and also i just want to bring up the psychological toll on people wondering whether their home is stable that's not that's not something that i want anyone in my community to have to live with um i also would like to speak about um officer murad taking funding from the defunding of the police to this new software system i agree that anything that holds police accountable is good but that funding really needs to come from somewhere else you've heard from hundreds of community members over the last couple months that we want the defund the money that from defunding the police to go towards things in our that benefit our community that research has shown actually keeps our community safer like housing and healthcare and education and you know a community center that supports um our bi-pod community members um there are so many other creative ways that we can find this funding um and so to do anything different would be to be going backwards and i think all of you have listened to so many people for way too many hours on these calls to not address this so thank you so much for your time and your work um that's all thank you for that and thanks to everyone who spoke this evening um that'll be our final speaker for tonight um appreciate everyone coming and sharing their thoughts with us as always we'll get into our agenda now um since we already have done our climate emergency reports that brings us to item number four which is the consent agenda councillor stromberg may i please have a motion on the consent agenda yes i move to adopt the consent agenda and take the actions indicated okay i see a motion and the second from councillor freeman is there a any discussion okay hearing none um we will go to a vote all those in favor please say i hi any opposed okay hearing none um we that passes unanimously which brings us um into our deliberative agenda um and item 5.01 um which is an item about benchmarks uh analytics personnel management system i think before we go for a motion i'm gonna be beneficial to hear from chief murad as an explanation as to what exactly the system is chief murad are you on the call hello how are you doing councilmember thank you um so what is benchmark uh benchmark is a analytics personnel management system that for us consolidates a number of systems that we currently have scattered across a variety of different platforms both uh electronic digital platforms and frankly paper based hand created systems so taking all of the material from those platforms and putting into a single place where we can better monitor better track uh have accurate flagging that includes uh the ability to have early warning systems for a variety of different kinds of categories of personnel management um and overall accountability uh and among those methods and categories of personnel management are use of force reporting um training documentation internal discipline and internal investigations personnel performance evaluations and personnel records and these currently are across a number of different kinds of platforms our use of force reporting is tied to our val core system which is the primary system we use uh to categorize and and bring in our dispatch calls for service and then it is the reporting platform also for officers to report what happened once they go to a call for service and they can include evidence in that and photographs and sworn statements and video and it's a use of force platform but it's not designed for that it is a uh it's not that aspect of it is not its strength it's not what it was created to do what benchmark does is it is able to export data from all of these different platforms val core in the case of use of force um it would be able to export data from our current spreadsheet where we uh categorize and keep citizen complaints it would take all of this and put it into a system where it's all put together where it can create um auto run uh graphics of of data so that we can see for example what kinds of calls for service or uses of force we're we're engaging in we can see what kinds of citizen complaints are coming in we can be able to track whether or not specific officers are appearing more often or less often in some of these categories um and we are able to really really enhance both our our data integrity our flagging systems our transparency and our early warning systems um tracking training tracking use of force tracking performance evaluations all of this comes through the the benchmark system and this is one that we've been looking at since 2019 and and looking at others as well but uh one of our lieutenants Justin Kutcher has done a huge amount of work getting this system uh through our processes and really evaluating it uh we looked at it with director Dodson as well and others more recently but this was something that we had proposed to the city um before uh even before covid actually and and had brought forward to the mayor I think ultimately in May for the first time um it is it functions irrespective of our headcount it functions irrespective of who's using it so even if we see uh increased civilian authority with regard to monitoring uh civilian complaints with regard to monitoring use of force this platform is going to facilitate the work that they are doing as well and it facilitates whomever is in charge of putting that information out in a transparent coherent way by creating ready-made forms and and images that can really be digestible and understood easily by the public so that we can be better at sharing what it is that we do and uh these categories that are so important for police legitimacy and transparency and public accountability okay thank you for that explanation um are there um comments or questions from counselors councilor paul thanks very thanks very much um so this um passed at the board of finance unanimously uh the mayor was not there but uh ceo shad was was there and uh cast uh the vote on on his behalf um and you know I went back after we had done this probably something I should have done first um but I I didn't and went back to some of the um what appears to be some of the things that the uh office of racial equity inclusion and belonging is doing in terms of training um uh and I'm wondering whether or not it's necessary to have uh two different programs that to some degree effectively are doing a lot of the same work and um that's one of the components I think there were six or seven components and I'm just wondering if that's something that is entirely necessary since we've already approved another one um thank you very much for that question councilmember we did pass this by uh both members of the racial equity and inclusion belonging board and city it and yes there are aspects to this system that are either parallel to or that uh seem to have some of the same functions but those entities determine that that they did not that this system was separate and different um and whether what we're talking about with regard to training tracking is very different from the kinds of training that are being tracked by the reib we have uh it's called um rule 13 and rule 13 is a state law that has a significant amount of compliance that officers are required to meet in order to maintain their certification that is one aspect of what we are tracking in addition to that we're tracking a significant amount of material that we ourselves as an agency expect officers to uh to meet and to continually uh train on those aspects also get tracked by this system and then frankly rule 13 while voluminous already is going to get even more so because the state is exploring a range of new requirements for officers and then we have from the the racial justice uh resolution we have additional requirements for our agency above and beyond requirements for the rest of the city to have certain kinds of uh anti-racism training bias training uh and training that that really does evaluate and assess and then foster a sense of uh of anti-racism and equity in our officers all of that can be tracked by this system and and it has to be for many of those things have to be tracked for us in order for us to remain compliant with state law okay i'll set counselor paul yes thanks okay i have counselor high tower next counselor high tower go ahead great um i actually don't have a question for chief mirad i think the memo was well prepared um i can definitely see the point of this and how in ways it would be helpful and it's not a huge amount of money so my question would actually be more for director kyle dotson or in his absent mayor weinberger it doesn't i definitely empathize with the thing that i don't think it speaks to transformation of police to the degree that it could um i think there's a lot of potential there i think some of the things that we've been talking about and worrying about since um since the racial justice resolution in terms of how do we have you know like alternative workers who have can tap into the call system and things like that um who aren't housed in the police department how do we streamline some of those dolls sounds like software solutions to me and i wonder why that transformation isn't at all readable in this memo and um yeah why doing some of that transformative that i considered kyle dotson to be in charge of isn't isn't part of this you're looking for an answer from the mayor on that councillor tower i am and if he doesn't have one i also don't mean to put him on the spot because um so um i'm happy to make a motion instead oh there we go what mayor recognize you if you'd like to do it yeah i don't have a whole lot to add to the contribution here to the conversation i think uh chief mirad has explained the um where this is coming from and the history behind it and um uh it's it's not been the focus of work from the mayor's office okay council hi tower you have the floor um great along those lines i i do think that i think that this is an opportunity it's a three-year contract i think there's an opportunity here to do more around software so i'm not opposed to um allocating the change of the berlington police department i think we need to be careful about the contract that we're using so i would actually move um to have director dotson take a look at this look at what police transformation needs to be done and how this needs to be counted for in this and table this item until our next city council meeting to have him the chance to propose some of those amendments and changes and work with the contractor to is anything that needs to be used so um i believe you're making a motion to postpone because motion to postpone is time-certain to our next meeting so um we have a motion on the table is there a second to councillor high tower's motion seconded by councillor hanson is there further discussion of the motion to postpone for further input from the police transfer director of police transformation councillor hanson great yeah i would agree with councillor high tower that um we could go a little bit deeper in terms of how this this move is going to align and and mesh with the police transformation work that we're doing i think we could have a clearer vision and articulation of that i also do take really seriously the concern that was raised in public forum which is that we passed um one of the most important resolutions that that certainly since i've been on the council and i think one of the most important that the city's ever taken this summer the racial justice through economic and criminal justice resolution that we passed in june um and one of the early i think the third resolve clause in that is that the dollars freed up from reducing the number of uniformed officers shall be used to um reduce the demand for police services um and basically reallocate these resources towards you know cultural empowerment racial justice initiatives and the vision that we laid out in that resolution and that we're all working on so i think i'm not really interested in going against that resolution even if it is a small amount of money i think that was a key resolution and we need to stick to that resolution and find ways to actually stay true to it um even on the small things and and yeah so i i don't want to set a precedent of violating that resolution thank you councilor hansson i have uh councilor polino to be followed by mayor weinberger and councilor shannon are there others interested in councilor jeng i see you others interested in speaking to the motion okay that um councilor polino go ahead so my question was for uh the chief um i was just wondering uh is there any time constraints result of this are you in negotiations is a delay you know is there time certain by which you have to accept is there an rfp that went out you know like that sort of thing well uh this is a an engagement that we've been in with this vendor uh for as i said more than a year now um and uh we're we're really feeling that we'd gotten it to a finish line especially with tonight's unanimous vote from the board of finance um it was something that director dodson was present for for the uh the demonstration the most recent demonstration that we got from the vendor um and it was a a very important moment in so far as as having him understand uh why we have issues with our use of force reporting and concerns about our use of force reporting we want to fix those concerns as immediately as possible um i don't think anybody here wants us not to have the kinds of accountability measures that we need to have and that frankly the public wants from us and delaying those is is is not something that that we're eager to do um we want to have that additional accountability in so far as use of force we want to have uh the kind of tracking and early warning systems that are necessary for uh citizen complaints and putting all that together these are these are issues that have been brought up by uh the committee to review policing practices that met from august of of 2019 through uh february of 2020 these are issues that have been brought up by the police commission these are issues that that are things that really echo things asked for by the racial justice alliance in various meetings by various callers the idea that somehow we're now not going to do it is is frankly a little bit confusing to me i i this is a a needed step we're making uh proactive efforts to find the best kind of system that's used in these to consolidate these kinds of records and and have it done in a way that isn't about having the police department alone have that system but having the ability to turn it over to any kind of entity that may be developed from for example these charter change discussions i'm i'm i'm a little confused when we're bringing a system that really is going to enhance accountability and transparency that we're having these questions um about about tabling it and i think uh maybe there's a point of information i'm not sure who to ask counselor uh president tracy but is normally the fact that it's a multi-year contract set the reason why it's become a debated issue here because this is otherwise a very small expense within a department i can i can't understand why we're here debating this i'm not sure who who can answer that for me president tracy but it's more of a i guess point i believe it to be the multi-year only aspect of it that is what's brought it in front of the whole council so this is what if you only let's say you negotiate with the vendor to a one-year contract um which i'm sure the reasons for the price so forth and so on how you negotiate these things uh as to why three years probably the best if it's like dpw you know three years i imagine was the best price best x y z there's a there's like a back and forth um so i guess what my question is if it was a one-year contract we wouldn't be here tonight that is my understanding that's yes okay thank you i'm all set thank you thank you for that i appreciate that um i have mayor weinberger to be followed by counselors shannon and jay mayor um president tracy i just gotten the update that um uh chief mirad just gave that that uh director dotson did participate in uh demos and review the um the bids and the and the proposals as um as chief mirad just described so i don't have anything for to be on that okay thank you for that counselor shannon thank you president tracy i was just going to ask uh chief mirad the same question and understanding that director dotson has already had an opportunity to participate in this i can't really um justify uh postponing action on this and i think it's uh this is a great initiative um for increased police accountability which is what people have been calling for thank you okay i have counsel jane uh thank you president tracy um i think it's important to also uh highlight who is on board of finance and there were statements here that border finance unanimously approved this measure to recommend for the council right and the members president tracy consular pine myself and consular fall we all did right now maybe the question to be asked here is based on what consular share uh hanson just stated it is where the funds are coming from to pay for this new system i think all those that spoke here in front of us that's their concern but it's not the system itself i think it's important to highlight that now the question that i have is for dr green tayisha green what does she think what is her takes on on all of this did she approve it did she allow it i think that's a good question if we can have her answer this question for us okay dr green thank you um i i did not approve it i wasn't consulted on it i didn't give an opinion on it so um to answer your question no thank you now the second question is for the mayor and uh cfo chad do we have any poll of funds where we can get those 13 000 dollars to pay for this system other than the racial justice uh the racial equity and belonging funds do we have any other ways where we can find that money ceo shatter are you able to speak to that mr mayor would you like to speak first yeah i just do want to clarify and there is some like ongoing confusion i think it's worth um reminding everyone about there was two things happening at the same time during the budget process right there was the um uh the um high tower um resolution which had the concept of attrition savings um going to fund racial justice and and consider one certainty about what kind of revenues that would create in the fy 21 budget year so um given that uncertainty the budget that we passed uh we made late changes to um to make sure to ensure that we would have funds for um progress on racial justice in fy 21 and when it wouldn't be in this conditional situation where we had to be waiting on attrition to know what kind of money we would have we and we put a million dollars into that fund and then we put another quarter million dollars into police transformation and as i understand the way chief mirad um has brought this resolution forward this um 13 000 is not coming out of either of those funds those funds remain intact and untouched what he is suggesting is that some of the attrition funds or some of the salary funds that are are have not been spent um uh be uh allocated to this so that um as a way of paying for it so it i follow the logic that this keeps there from being even further funds available to invest in the racial justice of police transformation funds i think that's a fair analysis but um i think it's awesome just important point it's not being taken from those funds those funds remain um you know we only allocated it together about 400 000 of that 1.25 million so far although there are big big ideas out there that it could you know take consume the rest of them shortly um if the question is you know is there anywhere else in our uh 60 million dollar general fund budget or elsewhere that we could that this could be um paid for by of course there are other ways to do it the chief mirad has proposed a solution that has been approved by the board of finance as a way of doing that um but there are certainly other ways that it can be done as well thank you um do i still have the floor president yes go ahead yes so uh now maybe it's not unrelated it is all about asking the right questions and also getting the right answers to move us forward because i cannot vote in support of there and come here to vote against it it doesn't make sense right but i was wondering chief mirad if you have an estimate of how much money you have saved based on police officers that were budgeted and that left after the June the racial justice alliance resolution do you have any idea not off the top of my head council member i don't um i do know that that we are not using those savings uh that they are you know that as the resolution requires the budget requires their um those are planned for savings so we don't consider them to be savings uh and i believe that we've now crossed the threshold now that we are at 83 effective officers we've crossed the threshold at which there was a certain amount of buffer built into the budget already um and are now in a position to have to have savings but i do want to point out that um we did contact and and we discussed this uh platform with venezia eugenio santos uh excuse me venezia santos eugenios um uh and made certain that it while it had parallels to neil gov uh in her words uh there are uh there are specific needs that the police department has that neil gov cannot accommodate for in the same capacity so we did discuss it and and try to make certain that we didn't have that kind of overlap and both both miss uh santos eugenios and uh brian lowe were clear that that our system had addressed needs that could not be met by other city itines system god wonderful um and last lastly yeah thank you for the reminder about neil gov and i think uh president tracy we made a request to have neil gov presentation to the full council i don't know if you access it yet from marisela gump i think the council and the public would really benefit from that new tool that the city is using uh in in in managing you know staffing and all of that um so i want to be voting for the um the motion on the floor to table this i think we should move forward and especially when the mayor really made it very clear that the the saving for the racial justice and belonging uh funds stays intact no one no fund is coming from there to pay for this then i think we should just move forward and keep this in mind as we move forward thank you okay i have councillor paulino um to be followed by councillor freeman and councillor pine councillor paulino i i just want to focus i hope to focus the rest of the debate before we vote on this on what councillor jane said which is that the objection here is the source of the fund so not the merits of the motion to invest in this new software it's really as some councillors have concerns that we're taking essentially uh savings vacancy savings money and moving it over in the memo the vendors giving the police department 30 reduction their normal rate so i think we should take advantage of that and not lose this price one but in addition to that i just think that we i i think it's overly simplistic to say this goes against the racial justice resolution because we're essentially taking money and reinvesting it i think that's exactly what we wanted we wanted to create a better department you know we use the words transform public safety and i think that it seems like this is a one of a kind software used in the state of vermont by police department first of its kind so i it would give them more tools to figure out what they need more tools for the consultant that we're about to hire to be able to use in the six or seven eight eight months upcoming where they're going to be looking at the department i just think that it actually goes against what we're doing to not consider this for what it is which is we're actually taking money that would you know we heard from the public they didn't want a lot of officers they want to take that money and put it into the police department this is a reinvestment in data thank you thank you councillor Paulino i have councillor freeman and pine and high tower so councillor freeman go ahead and i'll just note that director of police transformation dodson has joined the conversation councillor freeman thank you president trucey i didn't see this mentioned in the memo but i do know that the bpoa contract has um a restriction on retention of records i can believe it's page 42 i can pull it up it's in section 15 and i'm curious given and those are specifically around instances of discipline and misconduct so i'm wondering i see that this is a software analytic analytic system to um look at essentially the performance of personnel and so i'm wondering how that interacts with our union contract i personally don't agree with that part of the contract that um allows for those records to be um not retained past that limited period but if we are trying to have an integrative performance tool something of this analytic nature i'm wondering um how how is that interacting with that with that clause in the in the bpoa contract that's a great question um frankly it's going to be a matter of of diligence on the part of the operators of the system to do the same thing that we currently do with their personnel files those when we talk about the personnel records we mean only the record of those uh incidents as it is contained in the personnel file so if a letter is given to an officer that is a letter of reprimand it lives in the personnel file for a predetermined amount of time the contract limits how long that can be uh and it is the job of the usually the chief the deputy chief of administration um to go into the actual physical folder it's a hanging folder in a file cabinet and take that letter of reprimand out at the allotted at the excuse me the uh a pointed hour um in a in a computer system it would be the same it would simply be a file that would be removed from the overall database at that time period if there are no changes in the interim uh to the contract and these kinds of of issues and if there are changes at some point when the new contract is negotiated then it would live within that system longer or shorter depending on the terms of that renegotiation thank you for that clarification um so i do um i know people have already spoken about the concern about the the source of the funds um for the software system i think my concerns are actually a little bit more focused around um though i do think that is a concern um i'm not just agreeing with it but the concerns that i had um written out are more in regards to um sort of the direction we're going with um going in um i in terms of reviewing performance um being able to have a set like a system of accountability and um improving performance so um as i just mentioned um you know the union contract is an issue um i think also some concerns around the fact that um for example um dr suguino's like research has been um out and sort of presented to the city um and to the police department um hen is not really um and this is my perspective has not been raised by vpd leadership or by um the leadership of the city um not the council but specifically the mayor's office and um that is there is no cost to us and is an incredible tool that we can use um for evaluating um performance and um looking at how we can improve the police department um it's free we're not using it um in fact we've the department has actively disregarded it um uh we've also i also served on the special committee for policing practices um in that um committee i brought up concerns around um or i brought up the point of looking at um in instances of hiring um and just sort of general personnel matters um looking at signs of domestic um violence or domestic abuse and using that as a tool when we're hiring um and when we're evaluating personnel along with other sort of early warning signs but specifically around domestic abuse because there are unfortunately a conflation of those two issues in law enforcement and around domestic abuse and um unfortunately that was um was not supported and was opposed by um the mayor to uh chief demirate is um in your capacity on that committee and also point of motion uh president tracy i want to know the relevancy of what we talking about and uh police transformation and and and what councilor freeman is talking about it's your main like you know you can go ahead councilor freeman keep continue please it's your main because i'm saying what how i'm going to be voting on the motion so um and chief of staff um redell who was the i believe the mayor's office appointee also adamantly opposed this um and so i just i have concerns around um investing in this analytic system i don't understand how um if we don't actively change and really think about transforming the system that we're the entire policing system and really um have a change in how leadership in the city is looking at performance i mean the fact that we're not even talking about the union contract and there's been no um indication from um the department or from the mayor's office that we are willing to look at that um and re-examine that contract um that we have not engaged with dr suguino's research from what i'm sorry who was who was that mayor mayor go ahead i just think it needs to be clarified i i i issued a public uh directive that the city attorney's office is reviewing the police contract with the mandate to report back to this council on issues in the police contract by uh i believe we put a 90-day timeline on that so it's just not accurate to suggest these issues aren't being discussed or taken paid attention to comes a freeman please continue and um anyway um so i just i mean yeah we can we can spend 13 000 on this software analytic system but it just it one i agree that the source of funding is a concern and i also just feel like we're throwing we're putting money and trying to offer solutions when we're not i don't think the direction is to actually change things and i still have concerns about that and whether we spend this money and create this and invest in this analytic system or not um there i just have a lot of lingering concerns about the hesitancy to actually make changes um and really think about how we can hold people to a high sort of standard of accountability and professionalism so those are my concerns i do agree with um tabling it i think it needs further review um i at this point i don't feel that i i am ready to support this um i do think we need to review the funding source um and that's where i stand on it now um i i apologize i i hear that there was the directive from your office to look at the union contract but it just it hasn't um it hasn't felt like there's really a significant push and that we are really we're actually just tiptoeing around it instead of really fully engaging with it so that's my concern thank you i have councillor pine to be followed by councillor hightower thank you the um the motion to table by councillor hightower really did focus on something that i don't think has been mentioned much because is this the right approach not so much all these other details which are important details to discuss but the motion the table is based on is this the way right way to move us toward transforming the way we police our community and is this a tool that fits within that those goals so i think having director dotson on on the meeting i'd like to hear your thoughts on that and how it does or doesn't align with that where we are right now and point of information just because before director dotson goes president tracy since he wasn't here for my question do you mind if i just reiterate it certainly go ahead councillor sorry um councillor pine um yeah so my question and admittedly i did not know that you had seen this so my comment had been that to me this very much reads like something that has been in the works and that is doing something marginal to move the police um in the right direction and that i understand why it's necessary i think it's a good idea but i don't think that it has anything in it to the point of police transformation and that none of the things go far enough in terms of getting to that police transformation and so i had thought maybe you hadn't looked at it or maybe you just didn't have comments on it but to me this reads like george floyd and brown a tailor didn't happen and it was in the works before this and we did nothing to change it in light of that so wondering if there's any changes you would like to make as the director of police transformation um to make this a more transformative process even that if that does increase the cost good evening everyone thanks for um inviting me and thanks for the questions um you know i appreciate the questions and the due diligence i think there could be a fundamental difference um in opinion on what uh transformation means i have taken it that uh transformation um is not equivalent to obliteration there will be officers in berlington 74 65 85 and we'll want them to be the most professional trained accountable organization they could be as someone who runs a different organization in my organization technology and data are critical tools and they are bedrock to professionalism you can't do so much of what we need to do without ideally if you have the wherewithal and the capacity and the dollars to do so to get the best tools that you can i appreciate councillor freeman pointing out the use of the data or the lack of use of professor segrino's data but my understanding is the only way the data gets there is to the degree that an officer puts it in so it's useless it's only as good as the person who was in the moment doing the action which is the officer and there's accountability and there's a chain of command that reviews and make sure as they put that data in and it's not data last week but imagine i hope that the council and our community is creating data for two years from now five years from now because that happens you'll want to go back and part of the problem now dr segrino happens to be a friend of mine is the data can be spotty sometimes when we go back the data is not super reliable it's not as comprehensive and consistent as we would like it to be and therefore we could be saddling future generations with a similar problem by not having a tool that is not directly related to transformation but it is i would argue directly related to professionalism and professionalism if we're going to transform we're going to have the most professionally refined police force in the nation part of transformation will be high degree of professionalism so when i looked at it and i had an all day presentation with the tools and based on people soft and other things that i've used that aren't police specific but i understand the different components that you would want i was convinced particularly in what is a transformative element and that's use of force that this is the catalac objectively if you look at analytics for police work across the nation with people not bpd saying that multiple large police agencies will acknowledge that this is the catalac for maintaining data that is germane to the job of policing so i was convinced that if we could get a tool that is user friendly that an officer after a long shift who is tired and not particularly interested in doing data entry but has a user friendly tool that is intuitive and that creates a really high degree of useful information that that would help burlington it would help bypass communities it would help transformation because what happened not only in that moment but sometime down the road some users who were not there when the thing went down would be able to access easily in a consistent format what had actually happened so they could determine perhaps the pattern of a rogue police officer and someone who if we look would be like wow in 2020 2022 2023 and 2025 there were these incidents that create a pattern and thank goodness we have this data that shows us this pattern so now we can make a decision about appropriate public safety for the community so that's what compelled me when i looked at it we do not have that tool currently the the consistency of officer input is not what we would want it to be for any number of reasons and part of it is because the tool is not commensurate with the need and i was convinced that this tool would do that so mine was a vote for professionalism and i personally see professionalism as connected to transformation okay councillor pine you saw the floor thank you mr president uh what i heard both just now and during the board of finance certainly gave me um optimism that this was a useful tool and it is just a tool that has to be um you know viewed in the context that it is in and of itself it is not like a panacea it's no silver bullet here this is just a tool to be used for this but what i i appreciate what councillor hightower brought up is are we sure that you know we haven't exactly defined and and and director dodson mentioned we haven't defined and come to consensus on what exactly we mean when we say police transformation so we're putting together a tool to help us get there but have we are we kind of putting that cart before that horse is the question are you looking for an answer i was hoping uh director dodson would at least um you know tell me with that a little bit okay i mean you raise a great question uh councillor pine i like it presented that way and that's a judgment i i once again i agree with you i think every tool is as good as our use of it and is a better tool helpful during the time when you're uh also working on culture and how the individuals the humans who use the tool use it i would say yes i would say hey let's have a totally insufficient tool and we'll use that insufficient tool until we have the humans behaving where we want them to behave there probably would be a few organizations that ever buy new technology if they're waiting for the humans to catch up um humans are going to be humans but i think giving humans this you know this is all personal opinion i believe that uh you know uh equipping uh the human folks who are in organization with better tools that create greater potential for the kind of data collection of kind of professorism we're hoping for while you're hopefully impacting what supervisors are doing and what other mechanisms that manage the humans who have to utilize the tools um so it's a it's a both and not either or i don't see it as either or i would say that uh for me uh in the kind of things we're looking at uh the dollars are kind of short it is uh it is a uh tool that's going to have some tail uh 13 000 a year and we're at a moment where our community has to spend money but we're spending uh significant dollars on all sorts of things and all those things are aspirational we hope they'll do that and as i may have been you or someone else there is no panacea we're going to work through this and we're going to work through humans and some of you are managers of organizations and your organization moves at the pace that you can move the work through human beings without the magic wand and this will be that process as well i continue i will affirm that i think this tool can be helpful in asking and requiring a greater degree of professionalism we have to put the tools in place which there's any number of things before this council to put the tools in place to increase accountability and transfer uh transparency and i think this tool will be helpful to those professionals who are being uh you know sort of transformed quite frankly okay mr president i just want to ask um interim chief mirad if the um if the police commission is has looked at this and and what did they what's the feedback we got from the police commission on this we have discussed it with the police commission i believe but it's not something that we we brought to them it's it's an operational system and it's again it's a system that we we did bring by we we passed by city it by miss eugenio in her capacity is is rolling out neogov um but we didn't bring it to the police commission for approval that's that's not something that we generally do with with these kinds of purchases but i do know that it will add directly apply to the information that we supply them and the information that we are uh that we've passed new rules to have delivered to them on a more regular basis so that they can have more complete interaction with that data and discuss the parameters for which they are considering making that data public such as issues with civilian complaints issues with excuse me citizen complaints issues with use of force um so that's uh yes that's what i can say about i mean i think it's going to definitely benefit the information that gets presented to the city council excuse me the police commission thank you and this president i have to just ask since the resolution or the motion was the table to allow for feedback from the director of police penetration that feedback is in front of us tonight i just want to ask if if you as council president could just ask councilor hightower if um that is still the desired action because we i i just want to make sure that's still up is it yeah so i have that in um i have councilor hightower in the queue and i just want to clarify that because it was a time certain that's actually a motion to postpone and that's what i believe the the original motion was because it was to the next uh the next council meeting so councilor hightower i'll recognize you now um i'm happy to withdraw the motion it sounds like police transformation director saw it and saw no need to add anything transformative to it so i guess that's that is where we are so i'm happy to withdraw okay um are there attorney blackwood is our counselors allowed to withdraw motions without i don't know that we necessarily do that no once a once a motion has been made and seconded it's on the floor belongs to the body and the maker can't withdraw it okay that's what i thought okay so um the motion is still active does anyone want to still speak to the motion on the tape uh that was that was originally made if i made sure person tracy just might be helpful because uh councilor hightower uh brought up rightfully um houses connected to transformation um it might be worth noticing that in the wake of uh the george floyd um horror there are multiple agencies that have implemented benchmark miniapolis being one and if it would be helpful to have a list i could probably bring forward any other any number of other municipalities urban municipalities that have taken to the fact that this tool is out there it's being seen as something that can improve the professionalism so other uh agencies that are pretty deep in in this work are using benchmark to help up their professionalism and that's part of what i think argues for it's being used in transformation to the degree that places with some pretty acute challenges are seeing it as a way to help them do their work okay thank you for that i have councilor jing to be followed by hanson and freeman um president tracy that's you you made that motion exactly i wanted a point of information can we uh withdraw a motion on and you you you captured it that's it no question thank you councilor hanson great um so yeah i still think it's beneficial to take more time to address some of the concerns that have been raised the funding source being one as well as can we lean deeper into how this interacts with transformation or maybe that's just a better articulation or a bit or vision that's laid out around how this is going to be used for transformation um we could also potentially get input from director green and or the police commission so i i still think there's a benefit to to taking more time to address these concerns thanks okay thank you councillor hanson i have councillor freeman to be followed by councillor paul yeah so again so like these um there were officers that came under like incredible public scrutiny and yet um it seemed pretty clear that leadership at the police department believed that they were essentially in the right um so how does a uh software analytics system um impact how does it help essentially when there are things that are out in the open in public um are clearly warning signs or concerns around performance and yet those incidents that are publicly well known are considered to be in the right so i'm just i i still just can't i can't fully understand how the software analytics system i i do recognize it as a tool but there's something that's just really not i can't figure out here in terms of how we're actually going to move forward in terms of transforming the the department thank you councillor freeman that that was i actually that was a question for okay all right i'm sorry who was it a question for it was my comment was directed at chief mirad okay all right sorry about that go ahead chief so i think that the the notion of this platform is that it allows us to flag behavior that is troubling that's recurring if we see patterns of that kind of behavior i think that when we have these situations for which people want quick redress and want action taken quickly i think the idea of of tabling this and and not moving on it of waiting more time doesn't seem to make a lot of sense i understand that you're saying you want certain outcomes the software doesn't create outcomes but it provides the mechanism for which uh excuse me by which we can see patterns of behavior and then make determinations about outcomes uh absent that if you don't see the patterns then the outcomes are not as likely so i i'm i really don't understand why we're talking about about preventing forward motion when forward motion and improvement is is what has been clearly expressed and wished for by this body by the public for me it begs the question on what you're going that you're going to see something but we're not your how is it going to be seen differently because as i mentioned there are these public incidences that have caused incredible outcry over and concern and yet leadership at the department has basically stood behind it and not and not and not um really flagged it i would say is concern and so what what are what are you you it just to me it begs the question on i i still i still think it's it's an odd step at this um at this moment or rather it's a it's sort of these small ways to think that we're fixing things and solving things and healing things and we're really not making substantive changes um and that is my concern so i think that there is a clear progress implied by this system towards professionalism as director dodson said and it is uh it's something that is a tool for promoting that um and i i think that he can probably weigh in equally on this matter about how this tool is able to promote that is able to move us forward with regard to tracking training making certain that officers are getting the trainings that we believe are necessary in order to make them better servants of this community that we are ensuring that they have the the kinds of performance monitoring and and performance evaluations that allow supervisors to keep track of of nudging officers in the right direction across their career so that we have officers that perform in the ways that we want them to it is not a platform that that necessitates outcomes it's a platform that allows tools for uh directing people and improving behavior through uh through regular accountability yeah i mean i think in terms of you know outcomes and it doesn't necessitate outcomes i think you know something that people are asking for is a different is an independent oversight body that looks at conduct and perhaps a tool like this was being used by a body like that was advocating for you know people who are like for example um Kyle someone in your role and and police transformation by the mayor's office by the department perhaps it's just um um it feels like i don't know we're doing we're doing the small part instead of just the smallest amount and not actually looking at the whole um in the entirety so yeah perhaps if we move forward with the oversight body would i wonder if it might be helpful something that all right no counsel freeman has a floor um counsel freeman i think that needs to be strongly considered if we're talking about personal pain there sorry that's okay i'm almost that thank you okay so i have counselor paul to be followed by counselor mason and shannon i just i have a point of information president tracy yep my understanding is there's been a motion to withdraw or a motion to withdraw made by the maker as i'm googling robert's rules that motion is at the permission of the body if anyone objects then there's a vote and it's not debatable we're back off on a tangent on a motion that the maker no longer is making okay would you like to call would you like to call the question i would or or my understanding is we're supposed to vote on the motion to withdraw instead of having continued debate about a motion that the maker is no longer the amendment that is no longer being made by counselor high tower so i'm indifferent i yes i'll call the question please okay thank you for that so we have a motion to call the question it is non-debatable seconded by counsel shannon point of information that i'm sorry i need i need to clarify what i'm voting on please the motion to you're voting on calling the question arounding the postpones surrounding the motion to postpone yes okay all right thanks yep so the motion to call the question is non-debatable and requires two-thirds uh all those in favor of calling the actually let's um i'm going to go ahead and um call the have the city clerk call the roll please councillor carpenter uh you're a mute councillor carpenter uh yes to calling the question councillor jen hi councillor freeman yes councillor hanson yes yes councillor hi tower yes councillor mason yes councillor paul yes councillor polino yes councillor pine yes councillor shannon yes councillor stromburg yes yes council president tracy yes that's unanimous thank you for that we'll now go to a vote on the motion to postpone this item to our next meeting um will the city clerk please call the roll on that councillor carpenter no to postponing councillor jane no no councillor freeman yes councillor hanson yes councillor hi tower no councillor mason no councillor paul no councillor polino councillor polino i couldn't hear you councillor pine councillor shannon no councillor stromburg no no council president tracy yes that's three eyes and nine days okay so the motion to postpone carries we're back to the item but we do not have a motion on the item itself is there a councillor who'd like to make a motion on the item councillor shannon um i move to approve fiscal year fiscal year 2021 expenditure totaling 13,880 with a budget amendment to move 13,880 from police fy 21 salary account number 101-17-5000 underscore 100 to the software account number 101-17-1 i'm sorry 050-6015 and to authorize the acting chief of police to execute a three-year contract and any necessary supporting documents there of subject to final review and approval by the city attorney we have a motion is there a second seconded by councillor jane is there further discussion okay seeing none um we'll go to a vote um will the city clerk please call the roll councillor carpenter uh yes to passing this yes councillor jane all right councillor freeman no councillor hanson no councillor high tower yes councillor mason sorry i couldn't hear you yes thank you councillor paul yes yes councillor polino yes councillor pine yes councillor shannon yes councillor stromberg yes councillor president tracy yes ten eyes two nays that motion carries um we are back to discussion uh we're that moves us on to our next item um which is item 5.02 a resolution on divestment of city funds from fossil fuels councillor stromberg may please have a motion on that i'd move to i would yeah move to waive the reading adopt the resolution that would be the revised version as sent to folks's inboxes at 713 and asked for the floor back after a second okay i see a second from councillor paul go ahead councillor stromberg awesome thank you um so one of the absolute main reasons i ran for local office and why you're seeing me here tonight um was because i was incredibly fearful that we as human beings were not taking the climate crisis seriously i started my involvement in the divestment movement when i was a freshman at uvm and now i have the privilege and absolute honor to be in a position where i can bring forward a resolution that focuses on the divestment of our city from fossil fuels for the betterment of our future the climate does not know politics it does not know borders and it certainly does not know how to mitigate the damage it itself is doing but we do and um we do have the statistics and science in our faces every single day divestment from fossil fuels is not only one of the most impactful ways to combat the climate crisis but it also serves as a concrete example for other institutions companies and municipalities to follow suit and it gives us an opportunity to reinvest in our city such as local sustainable initiatives and marginalized communities hence the burlington green new deal investment fund clause that is in this resolution um it also financially is a good time in terms of our portfolio as a city to divest but even beyond the fact that the whole world is in trouble and facing this incredibly threatening issue sometimes it's helpful to zoom in on a local level which i often do um we're seeing horrific impacts of climate on our lake and subsequently our local ecosystems and like i know the lake is one example but it's a darn good one like closed beaches and toxic water is not appealing not socially certainly not not like economically environmentally whatever you um our agriculture is suffering i could go on with the specifics and i and i also really do realize that this is a very high anxiety time in our city so i do want to focus on what we can do um nowhere on this planet can we afford to wait any longer and we are not exempt burlington has come a long way but we are not exempt from moving forward and moving to you know fulfill our full potential capacity with what we can do to help mitigate the climate crisis we need to step up and we need to be brave and you know for some this is long awaited and overdue and for others this may be a new priority but the point is we have an incredible opportunity to lead the way we can be the city that other states and municipalities go well burlington did it you know many of you even specifically folks on council have children and they get to say you know well my mom or dad or parent did that that's huge and it isn't only just meaningful it's a widespread positive permanent impact tonight i don't speak from a place of fear though and i honestly i do speak from a place of hope and ambition and that ambition is shared amongst so many of us we are not making this a partisan issue here and it's simply because it is not um to see that this project is so widely supported by colleagues and the administration is honestly just incredibly heartening um but it also reinforces that broadly understood urgency of the climate crisis um so i honestly i could not be more proud to bring this forth tonight but i i really am not doing it alone i do want to thank everyone for their support and just a lot of local leaders and collaborators um but i really specifically want to thank councillor paul for her incredibly thoughtful collaboration and leadership on this issue i am so appreciative of her expertise and input and the productive space that we shared to really work on something that will truly be beneficial for as many people as possible we have a long way to go and i realize that and this will be a process um the resolution itself lays that process out to some extent um but i i do hope to see everyone's support here tonight so thank you thank you councillor strongberg i have councillor paul in the queue thanks so much thanks president tracy um you know i think this resolution brings the council the retirement board you know who's really entrusted with our city's pension assets um with our community the our valued employees you know to really a critical juncture one where we just have to mirror the climate science reality um you know it's one that's widely accepted uh across our planet um we all do our part to embrace our personal responsibility to lower our carbon footprint and i think now we need now more than ever we need to take our commitment to environmental justice to our investment portfolio and this is a long time in coming there have been other initiatives in the past um and i want to speak to the reason why i think this one is successful but i'll get to that um you know i think we have you know one of the things to keep in mind about the pension assets is that we have a significant fiduciary responsibility to honor our commitment to the employees and assist with their retirement with the defined benefit plan um but we also have a commitment to um our taxpayers to our community members to ensure that the rate of return in the plan is commensurate with the actuarial rate of return if it isn't then that responsibility is born on the taxpayer um and i think really good news is that as councillor stromberg said and as the resolution points out we can do both um you know more so now than ever and i've been following this for a really long time um there are more investment options available today that can allow us to pursue our goal of environmental justice um uh but our world is changing a lot and you know someone one of the speakers in public forum said that a lot of these are outdated industries and you know they're right um there are a lot of utilities that are now looking for alternative you alternative energy investments um and you know between new technologies healthcare uh exciting alternative transportation models such as the electric planes that we're seeing um under development at our own airport um we're leading the they these industries are leading the way financially to allow more longer term stability in our pension plan um i uh um i you know i i i'm really thrilled about the fact that uh councillor stromberg got a letter from rights and democracy with their support for this and i also really want to thank mary powell the former ceo of green mountain power um green mountain power was the first utility um i believe in the nation to announce their decision to divest their pension fund portfolio from fossil fuels um and they are now a national leader in this effort um the uh the last thing i just wanted to get to is that um there is a reason i feel why this resolution is going to be successful when when there have been other attempts and i've been part of some of those attempts um and i think the reason um is you know a huge thank you to councillor stromberg who did a lot of the heavy lifting most of the heavy lifting to bring this resolution forward but it was the way that it was done and it was done in a very collaborative way um not only did she reach out to me over a month ago um she has actively engaged the administration um who is very supportive she reached out to members of the retirement board and some of them were it was not as easy a conversation but she pursued that and um and there were others um i think the result of that good work is a resolution um which is a great example of how it's possible to listen to be collaborative without compromising on the focus the intent in the unwavering spirit of an issue and in this case it's an issue that's incredibly important to everyone on this planet for today and for generations to come so i just want to say um uh as someone who has served on the council for a long time thank you to councillor stromberg on a job very well done and um i trust that this resolution will have our unanimous support thank you you councillor paul i have councillor mason to be followed by councillor jane i will pass president tracy my my thoughts have been shared more articulately by my colleagues thank you thank you councillor jane go ahead yeah i mean i cannot pass on this one to tell you the truth um because you know i want also speak about the substance the thief of this resolution but about the process you have used councillor stromberg to get us here i do believe that you did your due diligence uh very smart uh you reached across the aisle you reached outside of the city government and i think this is exactly how things should be done we should not come here to fight against each other we should come knowing that this has unanimous that could move us forward i just want to say i don't know how old you are but i'm inspired today it's rare to get inspiration from others but you demonstrated that today and i just want to say thank you and hopefully after christmas it will be another new beginning and we will all move forward united united thank you again and definitely i'll support this thanks thank you for those comments any other councillors councillor hanson go ahead and then councillor freeman and councillor hightower go ahead sorry it wasn't on meeting um yeah echo everything that's been said so far and thanks to everyone who's contributed and worked on this especially councillor stromberg and also shout out to former city councillor salina colburn who think initiated some work on this in 2015 um and something i was going to say during the climate emergency reports but i thought i would save it for here in case folks haven't been following it because there's a lot going on right now this is we're in the middle of the worst atlantic hurricane season on record right now there's been 30 storms um and it's it's been uh five years in a row with a category five um atlantic storm which has also never happened on records so i know it sometimes gets lost in the shuffle of the news cycle but um the climate crisis is raging right now um and this is just you know a small preview into what things are going to look like um going forward so it's critical that we take every opportunity we can uh get off the fossil fuels and also start to adapt to um the new the new i won't say normal but the new world that we're going to be living in as the crisis unfolds um so glad that we're taking this step forward tonight thank you councillor hanson i have councillor freemen to be followed by councillor hightower i just wanted to tell what some of the folks were saying um i just really really appreciate the work of councillor stromberg and councillor paul um for collaborating on this um for working really hard on it um i know councillor stromberg um took a significant lead role um it's just really amazing to see this work um i feel yeah i feel really excited to um to pass this hopefully um it sounds like it's got quite a bit of support it's quite a lot of sponsors um yeah i just um yeah i'm just really proud of proud of this work and i really do appreciate it um thank you councillor hightower yeah the pain of sending the food possibility of sending a huge kudos to councillor stromberg and councillor paul i think it's always just a great moment when we have these bipartisan um efforts that make real change and it's so great to have during these times especially so thank you all so much for pleading this and digging into the details and doing the work councillor pining go ahead i can't pass up the opportunity strong councillor stromberg reached out to to all of us so we can you can all share in that praise i would just say hopefully as goes burlington so goes remand and so goes the nation that's it excellent anyone else okay we'll go to a vote all those in favor of the resolution please say i hi hi hi hi hi me opposed hi that passes unanimously great right all right which brings us to our next item which is a resolution regarding just cause evictions it's actually a charter change on just cause evictions um councillor pine thank you as president like to uh move the resolution waive the reading and request the floor back after a second okay we have a motion and a second from councillor high tower go ahead councillor pine i think i've i've shared with many of you before that um the concept of just cause eviction is something that is something i have worked on not consistently over the last 30 years but we we started this effort as a community the meeting whether this was a good idea honestly on town meeting of 1988 and the majority of burlington voters said it was a good idea we just asked for sort of an advisory question so pose an advisory question then we went back to the drawing boards and tried to develop a charter change language or charter change language for the ballot in november of that year and it was it was um crafted in such a way that the opposition to the idea uh was able to essentially assert and they successfully asserted to the voters then we were um asking the um city we were giving the city council essentially a blank check with no details in it at all and it was a very vigorous fought campaign um tenants and tenant advocates and many many homeowners frankly we're we're organizing hard to pass it and um real estate interests we're working very hard to stop it uh then mayor sanders was a supporter um and uh we tried to build broad coalitions and uh we're not successful but i think it's important just keep in mind the whole concept the concept of housing security is a universal concept in most countries this is the policy the law of the land throughout europe north of us in kebek this is a guaranteed right this is not a radical radical concept the notion that if you play by the rules if you pay your rent if you follow your lease if you don't disrupt the peaceful enjoyment of the property you deserve the right to not live in fear that you're going to get an eviction notice or you're going to get a termination notice people like to correct us and tell us oh no terminations aren't evictions well to the person being pushed out it's the same thing whether it's called an eviction or a termination so the effect is families live in fear they live in fear of what might be coming they live in fear of making a complaint to code enforcement even though the tallyatory evictions are totally illegal what we hear from property owners is how big a problem is this really we just we don't think this is a really big problem well the reality is you don't know the problem because you can't actually measure it because most of these terminations happen as an oral transaction between the owner of the property and the tenant this is mostly done through face-to-face discussion this doesn't end up in court so the data we have is incredibly incomplete what we do know is that people living in fear of of having their housing um losing their housing there's health implications there's there's issues around family stability there's there's stress and there's tension there's a whole range of things that come from that and to offer the level of security that all the people on the council who own their homes that's what you get you pay your mortgage you pay your taxes you pay your insurance and you get to stay in your home I realize that ownership is you know 90 but the right of private property ownership is it was what they would often refer to as a bundle of sticks and if you take a few sticks out of that bundle you still own the property so some of the assertions we heard tonight and we've heard throughout this debate have been oh you're going to you're going to harm the value of people's properties they're not going to want to invest in their property that is not what the data shows in places where just causes in place they have not seen this plummeting of property values they have not that has not been the case so that data just does not back this up so I would just say in closing that providing security of tenure to the people the 60 percent of the households in Burlington who rent oh by the way about a quarter of those renters already have just caused eviction because in social housing you have to provide it it's required so all the cht all the north gate units all the other social housing units have just cause so that's that's important distinction but the private the notion the private property rights should be elevated above the rights of tenants to to live in their homes peacefully and to meet their meet their obligations and to know as long as they do that they have the expectation that they will have housing stability I think that's a basic concept so that's that's why we're asking here now we can argue over the language and what's the right language but the concept is very simple shall we go to the state legislature shall we ask the voters and if the voters say yes shall we go to the state legislature and ask for approval to regulate this part of the relationship between a rental property owner and the renters who live in their building that's all we're asking getting into the details of what's going to be in the ordinance as a charter change is deeply problematic but I trust others on this council will say that tonight I just wanted to give that piece of sort of why we're doing this what's driving us to do this thank you council pina have council high tower in the cube yeah I wanted to just first share a few comments which um the first is I know some of you know this is deeply personal to me I've never been evicted but I have been um involuntarily houseless for a time and you know it was after I graduated college top of my class for two different degrees and I didn't have I didn't necessarily have the money to pay rent and when my living circumstances changed I lived out of my car and so this matters to me so much and it's been such a vibrant debate and I think a lot of counselors also know um CDNR passed this on a charter change and then just kept working on it and kept talking through it and it was um it was really great to work through it with um counselor carpenter and counselor pine and to continue to have some of those debates um um and to and to try to get this right so appreciate how many months of work this is gone has gone into this um for a lot of us and those on the charter change committee um and the with that said um I'd like to make a motion to make a few amendments um to reflect some of that discussion that we've had um the yeah I guess I'll make that motion and take a second and then ask for the floor back okay so are you counselor high tower just for clarification are you moving the amendments that are on board docks yes okay great so um counselor high tower um is moving the the amendments that you can find as um zh amendments be to on board docks um is there a second to that motion to amend seconded for counselor hanson what information um sorry yeah is is this so is the motion the underlying resolution plus the amendments or did I miss the motion on the underlying resolution oh sorry I'd assumed that counselor pine made that motion but counselor pine didn't make that motion uh okay I'm sorry yep so this is a motion to amend that that um initial got it got it okay sorry about that yep so counselor high tower you have the floor back yeah and so just to explain a few of the amendments the first one um is is I think in lines 50 and it just includes um an additional clause that I think frames up the um issue so it's a bit of a context the second one is to delete to or to delete what just cause may exclude and we had some discussion on personal agreement disagreements and it I think it just led to more confusion than led to clarification um and the expiration of rental agreements is then incorporated into the second thing which we had wanted to we had talked a lot about some of the potential exemptions to expiration of rental agreements and what kinds of um housing or properties and what situations may be exempted from ending um ending at the expiration expiration of rental agreements to the ones that I think are important are sublets and in-unit rentals and owner-occupied duplexes and triplexes I wasn't a fan of a lot of the arguments that people made from duplexes and triplexes including things like I want to figure someone if they get a dog because that's a worthwhile thing to get evicted over but I do think that it's a worthwhile policy goal to encourage more duplexes and triplexes in our city and I know that's something that a lot of my constituents would like to see um and then there's a few more exceptions just such as being withdrawn from the rental market and the need for substantial renovations um there's also some clarifying language around providing um limits on unreasonable rent increases I think we heard all I think we have heard and continue to hear a lot of fear mongering about this being rent control and a whole lot of other things and I think if anyone who's doing that is misconstruing it and this is kind of to emphasize the point that this is not meant to be rent control it will not regulate the market as a whole it is just there for the purpose of preventing individual evictions and then the last one is just that the ordinance shall define what is unreasonable and adequate notice in the statements of us great thank you for that um the floor is open okay counselor carpenter go ahead thanks um as you know I too have proposed an um an amendment so I guess I want to speak to um what counselor hightower has proposed we spent a lot of time today and I guess regretfully we should have spent more time prior to today um we weren't we cd and i were not at a place to deal that and unfortunately we did not organize a joint committee with um charter change um I appreciate people's interest in having sort of a straightforward what we've referred to as permission language to get this going I appreciate um the fact that this is a complex process um but I think having said that we need more clarification and I do want to step back and say I really appreciate counselor pines lead up I mean I worked for 35 years in affordable housing all the property I never managed had a just cost provision I feel comfortable with it um so I don't think it's something to be fearful of I wish the United States and the state of Vermont had universal social housing but we don't at least not yet I'm hoping that'll come down the pike and acknowledging that we don't have social housing yet um we need to deal with the fact that some amount of our rental housing um is is provided by private owners and families that want clarification and understanding of what it is we're talking about just causes not an easy concept the states that enacted it spent a number of years doing so educating their population their citizens their voters um and as counselor pines pointed out there are hundreds of communities to have this so this is not brilliant and leading the pack by any means um it has worked well in those communities there has not been dire circumstances uh and it is time for us to do something um so I think we're at that point in time but I think we need to be clear to voters what we're talking about people need to understand what it is that we're suggesting um be done and that's what I feel like I've proposed in in the amendment that I hope to propose uh council high towers is um more minimal than mine and and I and I have some concerns about it I do want to point out that the opening clarifying sentence um while in and on face value um may not uh be a problem as erhard manka pointed out it may be a problem for the legislature who who may perceive it as our asking for a more open-ended um permission to govern landlord tenant law but I'm not really going to focus so much on that um I think the really substantive issues where council high tower and I um have had some concerns I'll try to point out I in the opening paragraph of um her recommendation um we list three reasons around why um or definitions of what just cause would be I've proposed really a fourth which I think is critical to some property owners that um the refusal by a tenant to not renew a lease also needs to be a consideration in ending a tenancy landlords and property owners need to understand um that if they're going to rent they can have a lease and um what the terms of the lease are you know what's the end date what's the start date and if the terms are similar um I think it's important for the the tenant to um be considering of that um council high tower eliminated um the definition around personal disagreements I don't actually have a problem with that um we sort of entered into it and it was it was getting fuzzy um so eliminating it really doesn't necessarily um assist in the conversation what then kind of gone is and I think is a little bit of gap is the language that we had originally proposed um also defined um just cause as eliminating or allowing for the illumination of the expiration of a rental agreement um as as not being just cause and there's sort of a to me a little vagueness uh around that um and it only speaks to written rental agreements and I would think we'd want to include all rental agreements some are written and some are uh verbal the the sticking where we had sort of following that was but can we allow for exemptions and what I've proposed in part is what is the baseline and all of the just cause eviction um ordinances that I've read and as I haven't read hundreds but there are at least four states that have statewide legislation and I've looked at a number of city ones and um the conversation around owner occupants duplexes and triplexes I'm certainly in agreement with that sub lets and in unit rentals um are complicated and I support exemptions for that projects or properties being withdrawn from the rental market in those in need of substantial renovations that preclude occupancy where um council high tower and I had um disagreement is around also allowing for an exemption um if your family or you the owner want to move in and I know there's some concerns and fears that large family uh owners of real estate will try to use this as a some loophole this is a very common provision and just cause evictions in fact it's included in the kebek ones that councillor pine mentioned um and I just think it's important a real estate when you buy a piece of real estate you need to understand what can you do it in the in the future can I move in there if I want to can my daughter move in there if I want her to and I think that is an exemption would be unfortunate to display something but I think since the real estate itself is not a public good we do need to allow the owner or his family or their family to be able to move in the other provision that has both had some misunderstanding but um I tried to clarify as did um council high tower is a provision that would not allow for an unreasonable rent increase and the examples of that are are on a specific level not a community broad level but if a property owner is trying to be retaliatory and and get you out um they can't just come and double your rent and so the provision I proposed and more modestly to what council high tower is proposing is based on a model they have in New Jersey where it's really case specific if there's an egregious rent increase for the purposes of just trying to get you out of your apartment you need to write provisions around this and again because this is pretty skeletal it's hard there's several pages of this in most things so that is something we'll have to be worked out but I appreciate the clarification in hers as did I that this is not to be construed as any kind of community rent control it's specific to a specific property in a specific tenant lease um so again I'm just trying to point out where I feel um we need some additions to her proposal um we agree that the landlords should in fact require um notice of all these provisions as part of their rental agreements and a side project I love cdnr to do is in fact spend some time on developing some model model leases but something that I felt necessary to add in addition is that landlords be able to have essentially um a trial or reasonable probationary period for initial occupancy California and Oregon all don't require their just cause provisions to take effect until after a year of occupancy um and I had originally suggested that and it's um try it's a little more open-ended and um Castle High Tower does not talk about that and I think it's important if you're gonna allow a landlord um to or require a landlord to renew leases and only evict on cause it's awkward and difficult to understand day one um whether that's a relationship that's going to continue beyond that and I think it's a fair um provision to allow landlords and tenants to have a sort of a trial period uh to make sure that tenancy that tenancy works um the only other provision where there's not really a difference uh Castle High Tower does not speak to property types that may be excluded um I think we can actually agreed on that her I spelled them out as specialty transit housing hospitals licensed schools um seasonal properties um that in fact could be substituted for reference in Vermont state law that um provides for what provisions residential rental agreements apply to um so I think it's an area that needs clarification and needs to be included in any ordinance that we um we adopt or charter change that we adopt and I feel like um I had a provision just that we could would allow ourselves the ability to add additional exemptions in the future if that's what we came down to so again I spent a lot of time trying to craft an amendment that um incorporates what I've seen in all of the just cause eviction ordinances that I've reviewed I understand people would like it simpler and would like to work it out um through an ordinance process but I think for voters and for constituents we need to give them a better baseline of information thank you for that I might have counselor mason to be followed by counselors jane and hanson uh thank you president tracy I will pick up actually where counselor carpenter ended um I but I first want to acknowledge and and express my appreciation for the work all of the work that both cd and r and charter change put into this I know just from the volume of changes and meetings that a lot of work has gone in my struggle has been I think a fundamental or a policy choice that I disagreed with at the outset which was to go with broad enabling language as opposed to specific language I think as counselor carpenter was just referring to ryan pine or counselor pine you know very uh emotionally articulated we would all agree that you know the type of just cause evictions that he's trying to stand up for we as a city don't want to stand up for but the challenge is when you start drilling down as to what just cause is um it becomes apparent that we have fundamental disagreements as to what that is um my first sort of epiphany in talking to counselor carpenter and pine was the realization that they were thinking that you know just cause meant you know didn't include the end of a term um I'm a lawyer I live by contracts that have a defined term if you want more than a one-year term you sign a lease for two or three year terms that's the way you know our entire student rental market operates and I I struggled mightily then and still have those concerns of you know what the impact of not being able to be sure that the students that you rented through through June are going to be leaving in June and that those four new students that you're bringing in are going to have a place to move into our entire market is set up on a time frame to allow that orderly transition and this from my perspective turns that on its head um and what what happened I think is they you know that we started with this very broad enabling language and then I think there was they were hearing from people that wanted more specificity and I appreciate this is an attempt to provide some but not have it be limiting but my read of this in terms of the direction it provides to future councils whoever is the ordinance committee tasked is that you're pretty much limited to what's passed in here because it does include specific exemptions for each one of course it's not binding but I think it will be a challenge so from my reading you know this is too specific but also not you know doesn't address some of the issues that I have concerns about and also that I've heard from a number of constituents I've actually been surprised that you know that those who have reached out to me expressing reservations and concerns are not the red stones and you know the big landlords of the Bisonettes it's rather you know it's my neighbor up the street who still owns the duplex you know that he and his wife first moved in before they moved on to my street and I've been surprised at the number of people that I thought might have been supportive of this who when they've actually read this are very concerned in particular about the inability at the end of a term to dictate you know whether they want to continue in this relationship with their tenants or not so for that reason I will not be supporting this amendment nor the underlying motion thank you thank you councilor mason I have councillor jing to be followed by councillors hanson and paul yep um thank you president tracy I think it's um it's good that we have in this conversation because this is a very important issue that affects maybe 60 percent of burlingtonians not live here work here some of them raise kids and the families that I know they have never any problem about eviction the problem that they have usually is about the condition of the apartments they write the the the communication with their landlord but no one has ever come to me I'm getting evicted for reason calls or just calls or no calls right um and I think this is important this is important but the question is is it ready for all of us to rally behind it and make sure that it passes when it goes to the bonus I think that's my fear voting today sending it there it fails it's completely a failure to me and we none of us wants that now the question that I have is for the city attorney if she's if she's if she's here sorry if eileen is here eileen today is uh november right you're not in december yet and I think the ballot has to be ready in a certain time when would that be when should we have it this ready to be we know that it is going on the ballot for the right now the as as usual the the the deadlines don't line up with with your scheduled city council meetings very well um the in order for us to um meet the timelines I just asked um uh amy bovey for a an update and and amy if I say something wrong please uh please um unmute yourself and and chime in here but with the the schedule as it is now what it in order to practically get everything printed and to get the warnings out because there's a time limit in which you can do the work in which you hold the the public hearings that are required for charter changes there have to be two public hearings there's a time limit for when you can send the warnings out for those and so we would have to have all of that um um the warnings posted and out on december 20th so you have meetings right now scheduled on december 7th and december 21st so so with your current schedule this would mean you would have to decide all charter changes at your december 7th meeting now that doesn't mean you couldn't schedule another meeting the following week um to do charter changes and we have done that in the past um but that'll be an issue for you all to to to yeah um I know that people who thank you thank you city attorney I know that people who live here need this I know it's a must but at the same time I know that this is not ready it's going to be a fight and it will end up we will end up losing and all of those that have been waiting for this will be losing too so the question that I'm asking to my colleagues is should we wait on this and allow maybe carpenter consular carpenter consular uh high tower you know to sit down again and craft their both amendments to have something ready to amend this and pass it is my question and I don't know if anyone can can can can can answer that I am in support of both of them I am in support but what I want to see is all of us come together and just make sure this passes but the language we still don't have it from what I'm hearing and I attended one charter change meeting it was when the when you hired um that staff she was presenting her report I attended also a cdnr so there is already a divide between landlords and renters about this specific issue now it's up to us do we want to rush it vote on it tonight and then after we know one of us so those who did not support it will not support it on the ballot will not ask the their custody and why they should vote for this that's a question that I want to put on the table and maybe to task both of these amendments um to to to just come together and just by December 7 we have something concrete we put it on the ballot and we're already behind it and make it happen but right now I can vote yes but if I vote yes I will not be supporting it on the ballot or asking people to support this this is just a question and I think we just did something beautiful with john's uh consulate stoneberg's uh resolution very beautiful unanimous vote unanimous support it was nice but waiting more work that's where I am thank you okay if councillor hanson to be followed by councillor polino councillor hanson yeah so I I think the majority of the council agrees with the basic premise that councillor pine laid out at the beginning and from my perspective because of that I would rather see the language simple and really asking that question of voters around the basic premise of you know the city um regulating um evictions more strongly and and requiring just cause for evictions and then within an ordinance process debating the specifics of that um but I understand that other councillors again including councillors who agree with with that and that the city should have that ability want to see you know those details in the language they feel that voters need to see the details in the language they feel the legislature needs to see those details in language so for me this these amendments from councillor hightower are good compromise between those two positions because what this does is it it does lay out for voters and for the legislature some of these issues and considerations and potential exemptions but it doesn't bind us it doesn't get ahead of the ordinance process and it doesn't get ahead of that work by binding us to certain exemptions that a many of us don't even agree with to begin with but be aren't necessary to be in the actual charter itself they could be done at the ordinance level and debated at the ordinance level so I feel that this language is a good middle ground because it it lays it lays out a lot of those details that folks may want to see and understand but it doesn't um get ahead of of the work that needs to be done in ordinance after we hear from voters on the judgment question and the values question of should the city be able to ensure just cause for evictions and and getting that to the legislature which I think it's so critical to councillor jang's point that we we get this authority and we get legislature so I want to move forward on that again my preference would be the simple enabling language um but I hope that we can at least compromise on something that um if folks can't you know if councillors can't get behind that enabling language I would hope they would at least get behind providing these details but again not forcing or predetermining in the charter and baking that into the charter what the exact ordinance language is going to be I think that would be a mistake to try to rush that process right now especially when we disagree on it and that might kill the whole thing from even making it to the ballot so I do think this is a good compromise um and and I would support these amendments okay I have um councillor polino to be followed by councillors hi tower jang and pine good councillor polino so I guess uh I agree and I want to thank everybody on the committee who worked on this but I have some concerns specifically to paragraph number two c the term just cause refers to a valid reason justification a reasonable reason a good reason and to me this goes far beyond that standard um to say your good reason is not good enough we're going to make it more than just a good reason we're going to tell you which reasons are good and which reasons are bad and I think I have a problem with that um you know specifically if a property becomes too expensive to operate for example a balloon mortgage balloons um and that interest rate comes up or our taxes keep going up a rear um or that person's you know situation regarding their own personal finances and they need to sell that property according to this that person is forced to stay into this provide a rental housing and cannot sell it that includes a property that needs substantial renovations that owner wants to prepare maybe wants to keep it on the market for few years but renovate it um maybe add an ad you um all those things so for that reason I have I don't I think this is taking the term just cause and making much broader um and without clarity on that I don't think I can support that thank you president Tracy I have counselor high tower to be followed by counselors jing pine and shannon great um I do it like just like I know that the started with like what counselor carpet and I disagree on but we got surprisingly close to almost getting the exact like same language and really it came down to one word in terms of what we couldn't agree on and so then I reverted back to being more of like more of a like a general compromise and took out some of the stuff that she had meant so like for example on D I didn't have a problem with her wording it's just we didn't quite like the first so the first paragraph the part D I didn't have a problem with her language it's just it wasn't substantive in terms of changing anything and we couldn't figure a good language for it so I thought it would be better just to put it out it's not a substantive change we're not disagreeing on any like policy significance um on written I that was I was that is a little bit of a mistake um it wasn't an impression that verbal agreements were month to month and therefore didn't have an expiration of a lease but if that was an misunderstanding on my part very easy to take that one word out not not a problem um there were a few things so the things that we actually disagreed on and that we came very very close to agreement on I don't know I don't think we will get to that last piece I don't think the two of us can work together make that final decision because it's really it's a I think it to that point it's coming to like a personal disagreement that we probably won't get to but just to kind of show one of the things that Councillor Carpenter did move on was not defining how long that period would be because I a period would be before you know a tenant would fall under just cause eviction and she had originally proposed a year and I was very worried about that because like we heard one of the speakers Ezra the Ezra I don't know their name correctly but the social worker who was a property owner basically was like oh I'd rather just rent to students then because they leave every year I didn't want us to have something baked into the charter change that then says one year is the term and act like for before you do it and then we end up seeing evictions that happen in a year just because and this is this isn't for everyone that everybody would do this but some property owners would then evict those people after a year just so that they could continue to have control over who lives there as we just heard in public forum and so I didn't want us to bake things into the charter change not because we disagree on a policy level but just because I care more about flexibility in terms of how we're regulating that and it's that's the reason that I put it in there and it's like mine just says may because it's not that and just like and Councillor Pellino I think misunderstood just cause you can sell the home you can move in you can all of those things are not true all of those things are you can definitely still sell the home um you can move in that's withdrawing it from the rental market those are all exceptions that are like Councillor Carpenter said that are pretty normal to have we all agree that like their exceptions it's not uh it's just about what that looks like when you're actually saying what it means and what it doesn't mean and so um yeah so if you're moving it that that's that's both of us agree that that should be an exception both of us have that in our amendments it's really just a clarification and I think some things it's just Councillor Carpenter's language for example has it as an exception where I am fine with you know if your daughter wants to move in you know maybe you can end the rental agreement but then I think there should be some relocation assistance or something like that and if we just put it as an exception into the charter change then it's an exception we can't change that anymore we can't say oh actually you're an exception but we still want you to do this extra thing because it's baked in so we don't fundamentally disagree we just think that we just think differently about what should be in the charter change versus what should be in the ordinance so I'm just hearing a few things that are like we fundamentally disagree we don't ever like and some of the things you know that councillor made some mentioned I was also surprised about the expiration of a written rental agreement I was like that wasn't something that I expected to see um I don't know if others felt the same way but once I educated myself on it I was like oh this is something that's pretty normal Burlington is not we're not leading the way on this this is something that other communities have done this isn't this isn't out of the like this this is not extraordinary and so um I do want to emphasize like again councillor it's not we're not exactly different there's not huge disagreement we got one word away from agreeing so um I like we're doing okay so I don't think it's as problematic or substantive as people say and I think I think there's just that one kind of argument that's underlying a few of the things I have councillor Jang to be followed by councillors Pine, Shannon, and Carpenter thank you President Tracy and I think you know the disagreement is not maybe just between the city councils here but the disagreement is again between big landlords and small landlords and how this will affect small landlords you know um yeah and also you know someone spoke here earlier about the tax base that we will be losing you know those who invest it and I think we need that as well right and um yeah let me leave it let me just leave it to that thank you President Tracy okay councillor Pine to be followed by councillor Shannon and Carpenter uh my um that quote what's that quote um don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good comes to mind because I think we're trying to get something pretty darn close but not perfect and there are some pieces that I think we could spend a long time as councillor Jang suggested we could spend a long time to get the consensus and then there's a way to get us there which is we're giving the voters a chance to weigh in on something that then gives us a chance to go to the legislature to seek permission to then come back to the city council and go through the ordinance development and adoption process so keep in mind that this is not a decision that's going to necessarily lead to the exact provisions being baked into the ordinance it may in the end but I think we then have the ability to to tweak it and to work on it and yet if we bake it in to our charter change it's part of our essentially our local constitution we then have to go back to this process all over again to make changes so I think that's what we're trying to avoid we're trying to work our way to a viable solution that recognizes there are some exemptions I may support some that councillor Hightower doesn't like and we may end up there but I think right now what we're just saying is please find a way to get to the point where we can put this out for more public discussion public debate get the voters sentiments and then move forward from there and I know we have a little bit of time left not a lot until the next meeting but it is two weeks away and I would suggest that we not act tonight because I don't think we're there I don't think we've reached that point and I'd like to give ourselves we're a deliberative body we can deliberate more we can come back on this and I'd just like to give ourselves that okay council Shannon to be followed by council carpenter thank you president Tracy I'm only going to speak to the amendment at this time and it I will not reiterate what councillor carpenter said but there are there are many omissions in what this amendment is doing but even as far as this amendment goes it really does not do much it does and it all comes down to one word and that word is may um it does not say shall and I think that because it says may it will be misleading people will think that they are protected if they're a subletter who is subletting an apartment and wants to get that apartment back they will think they are protected here but they are not because it is not a commitment to allow people to sublet it is not a commitment to allow somebody to stop renting because they're withdrawing it from the market and they want to move in and it's not a commitment to allow people to do substantial renovations because the word in there is may and I'm I know that and councillor high tower has has told us tonight that that word is very intentional so I'm not going to move to amend it because I think that that's a key part of why she has proposed it as as she has but this is not a commitment and when people read this quickly I think they might think it is so I won't be supporting the amendment okay council carpenter thanks um there is a disagreement or difference obviously between me and chelle I will say in the conversations that I had with council hot tower earlier we actually were closer together on that and then we really had sort of a disagreement about the family exemption and each decided to stick with our paths I am even though we don't have a lot of time more than willing because in fact I don't think we gave ourselves enough time to try to relook at this at least one more time I'm not quite sure how to propose that we have an amendment on the floor but council high tower to amend an underlying amendment uh or a proposal um and I would welcome some wording from someone that essentially sends us back to the table at least one more time um so I'm sort of putting that out there I think it is hard incredibly awkward to wordsmith it at this level although that's happened in the past it's not very productive we may not come to a fundamental agreement but we certainly can have a deeper conversation around it I don't know if I could amend the amendment in a with a set of words that would postpone this if that's the proper term I mean if that's a proper amendment and I I guess I'll ask um city attorney Blackwood to guide me if my end game is to go back to discussion and bring this back to the council can you guide me on a way to have that happen with where we are at this point in this discussion I mean Blackwood um so you could postpone you could move to postpone to a date certain but I would want you to understand that what you would then be doing is you would be postponing the the amendment and you would start with that amendment so if you're comfortable doing that if that's what you want to do then you then you could move to postpone and so essentially we'd postpone the discussion on the amendment and then in theory could come back with an amended amendment for consideration and I I believe I would be fine with that personally if person I cannot vote for the straight current wording from the charter change I need it to be amended in some fashion and what I'm suggesting is that perhaps Councillor Hightower and I could amend the come back with an amended amendment for consideration which would then either pass or not pass the body um so that's that would be fine so yes I'm I would move to postpone this to is it December 6th 7th 7th um I would move to postpone this to December 7th okay we have a motion to postpone is there a second seconded by Councillor Jang further discussion on the motion to postpone uh discussion of this further discussion inside and Councillor Paul thank you very much um I uh you know I got the uh amended language from Councillor Hightower around quarter or five this evening and um was sort of knee-deep in and in working out language for um a couple of other things particularly relating to the Board of Finance and I you know I can look at these two amendments side by side it's going to take me a little bit of time on you know I'm not a legal mind it's going to take me a little bit of time to see what the differences were and be able to understand what they are um I know for myself that um that I would like to pass something I would I I don't want to just pass something because other people vote for it I would like to pass something because I vote for it and I would prefer that we be we allow ourselves that time now there may be some you know some of you that have already made up your minds and and and good great you know I mean that's that's wonderful you'll you'll have an an easier next two weeks if that's if this passes um for me I would prefer to have a little bit more time I prefer to be able to ask Councillor Hightower you know what some of the some of the reasoning behind some of the things that she has put in her resolve in her amendment um and I just didn't get that opportunity so I will vote in favour of the motion we have before us and I and I hope that others might be willing to do that even if you've made up your mind um it would just be an opportunity for others to have that additional time thank you Councillor Macyn go ahead thank you President Tracy I guess I have really a point of information or more of a question for maybe the makers is the intention I appreciate there are two councillors is the intention to take this back to a committee hearing or part of I think the problem has been exactly as Councillor Paul just alluded to getting substantive changes at five o'clock you know on the night of a meeting when we've already put out you know via front porch forum or other to our constituents it puts us in a very challenging place so I before I know whether I'm supportive of this I'm curious is the intention to actually have another CD in our hearing or how are we going to have a meaningful opportunity either to participate as well as the public um as well as ensure that we get something back maybe the Tuesday before our Monday meeting or what's not to put it on and I don't know who to ask but for me that's relevant in terms of whether I support this effort or not okay councillor jake yeah I mean I guess what well councillor Manson just said I think it was supposed to also be part of the the motion that will allow both the maker high tower and carpenter to come up with basically and just an agreement between those two even though they're not committee members or they're not in the same committee but we postponing and allowing carpenter and fight our to bring one joint um amendment to the to the to the resolution that's what I thought that the motion would include but since it did not I think we should all expect that what what we talking about they would get together and talk more on the phone or text until they have a good language and yeah and yeah I think this has to pass in one way or the other but the time like current for councillor Paul is talking about is is critical to this important issue councillor shan thank you president Tracy I think um and uh attorney blackwood please correct me if um wrong here but uh as councillor high tower and councillor carpenter are two members of the three person committee that has been discussing this for a year um I think it has to be a publicly warned meeting not a phone call between councillor carpenter and councillor high tower any information yep we have a publicly warned meeting um that will be happening next um next monday well uh we'll be adding that to the uh to the agenda momentarily okay um councillor hanson that was basically I just wanted to clarify that but it sounds like we're clear that this would be discussed um within that meeting unless I'm misinterpreting um okay councillor freeman oh I just set a point of clarification um around the charter change deadline since we are talking about timing and um I I just was under the impression that we had until the I would actually till the 20 maybe second or 23rd and that's why that meeting was on the 21st was to kind of be the final meeting I just wanted to make sure that it that that was that you were I just I thought I had counted it at some point and it was not the 20th so I just wanted to make sure if you get a moment to just double check yes I'm um Amy Bovee just gave me the her her re her double checking herself and I have not double checked that we usually go through like multiple of us double checking all the dates and I have not gone through that um but my understanding is that the distinction is for example the league of cities and towns I think on their on their website has a 20 set the December 22nd is the deadline but that doesn't necessarily take into account our publication of um of the annual meeting um warning and our ability to get the ballots printed and back because that depends on an estimate from our printer as to how long it takes for us to get that those those things printed and back so that's why it's the 20th and yes so that's why it took us back to the 20th um thank you for that clarification I will double check it again but that's where we were as of this morning thank you okay don't have anyone in the queue are we ready to vote on this item postponement go ahead Councillor Carpenter just um guess the point of clarification from Councillor Pine and uh others we do have a meeting CDNR has a meeting on the 30th and in fact we had not finalized the agenda so this certainly would be appropriate um um I'm just asking or and are hoping that the agenda could be structured so that it's really um fairly focused on a working session um in language and certainly hope that interested councillors would be invited to participate um so that we could get their input we we haven't in fact until today collectively had your input so while I understand all of you may not agree and all of you wouldn't be able to join us that we propose a meeting structured somewhat in that way um we have taken significant testimony from both tenants and landlords and I think heard their perspectives and we're kind of at a point where we need to make sure we get potential language so I guess I'm just pulling that out as my desire and hoping that can be accomplished on on the 30th and I suppose if need be wedging in another meeting between the 30th and the 6th if we can't finalize it on that date Councillor Hightower has an aggressive schedule with her police work so that has been but maybe in this case if if we're working focus on language we can find a time to make that work and Councillor Pine and I'd really like to move us to a vote but before we do before I recognize you Councillor Pine may please have a motion on suspending the rules as it is 1030 Councillor Stromberg yeah I'd move to suspend the rules and complete our agenda mm-hmm okay we have a motion to suspend the rules seconded by Councillor Pine any discussion on that hearing none all those in favor of suspending our rules to complete the agenda please say aye aye aye can you post okay hearing none that passes we've since suspended our rules Councillor Pine uh Mr President I just to assure you to assure Councillor Carpenter here that we will um we will make this our focus of the committee's work on the 30th for sure and while we will certainly welcome public forum and public input we will set aside enough time to have it be a productive hopefully a very fruitful meeting of this committee Councillor Carpenter just for Councillor Pine and others just we have a little scheduling problem because the Regional Planning Commission is having a housing forum so I don't know if we've worn the time yet we might have to adjust that okay Councillor Pine can we please go to a vote on this yeah yeah I was just gonna say it's at four o'clock and we will meet till six so that was what the plan was thank you okay great thank you very much so now we are on the the motion to postpone ready for a vote all right so all those in favor of postponing this to our next meeting please say aye aye aye okay hearing none we have postponed this and we'll take it up at our December seventh meeting which brings us to our final item of the evening which is an ordinance with regards to parking Councillor Mason thank you President Tracy I'd like to make a motion to adopt the ordinance as presented and ask for the floor back after a second you have a motion is there a second to Councillor Mason's motion on the ordinance seconded by Councillor Hanson go ahead Councillor Mason thank you President Tracy before you tonight are proposed amendments to our minimum housing code dealing with parking plans this flows out of conversations between Councillor Busher and Director Ward that started in 2019 they went back and forth for over a year we're looking really to Amharst Massachusetts which does have some similar provisions sort of as a model those conversations didn't come to agreement but as Councillor Busher was departing she put forth the this proposal in March of 2020 it was referred to the Ordinance Committee which held two hearings based on the initial proposal there were some modifications made and I think progress made dealing with markings signage consultation with the fire marshal if adopted this amendment would require that landlords of residential housing produce a scaled and detailed site plan depicting existing and proposed on-site parking spaces with dimensions boundaries driveways walkways structures fencing barriers and landscaping this would require that that plan be submitted with the first rental application due after applicability date and the ordinance proposes a basically phased-in approach starting with new construction over the next year and then moving through the remaining four districts over the next four years it also requires that the parking plan be attached to the lease provided to the tenants and also posted in the common area if there is a common area at the premises it also requires signage or clear the lineations of the parking areas at the proposed site one thing that this does not just for the public's benefit does not require and we had this discussion at the committee it doesn't require that you provide parking for your tenants this just requires if and to the extent there is parking that it be provided on a plan and that be afforded it doesn't specifically require that each tenant be given a parking spot that very well may be on-site parking or there may be or excuse me on-street parking or there may not be parking available during our hearings I think even before actually and continuing through tonight's memo director Ward has voiced some concerns that permitting and inspections currently requires a similar site plan elements and enforcement actions involving yard parking violations his perspective was that this was very effective in dealing with repeat offenders which I think this was the intent was to capture those repeat offenders director Ward also has pointed out that more than 90 percent of rental property owners have not had a violation in the past 10 years so it was his concern that given the high level of staff involvement that will be required in order to basically review each parking plan as it comes in and given the few number of offenders that we not move forward with the sort of the staged implementation rather take a one-year trial period with a report back assess the program at that time and then make a determination as to whether to continue the program um it was clear to me as chair of the ordinance committee that that what director ward was advocating at the committee level was not supported by the majority of the commission so this was voted back subject to the reservation I made at the ordinance committee that I reserve the right to make a further amendment so with that I will actually propose the amendment that is already up on board ducks that implements the changes that I just referred to that director ward has asked which is a one-year you know implementation involving new rentals as well as any offenders and then with a report back to the full council in January of 2021 in terms of the successes the challenges and a potentially a new schedule for implementation so if there's a second to my amendment I've spoken to it and don't need to speak further thank you so um is that a second councillor jing okay so we have a motion in a second room councillor jing um we are on the amendment itself um any discussion on the amendment that councillor uh mason just put forward okay hearing none we'll go to a vote on that oh councillor thanks thanks um yeah so I've been involved with this since I think the beginning with councillor busher and some of those discussions uh with director ward and others that code enforcement um been a long and often circular conversation and debate um over the past year plus um and I feel like it's funny with this amendment I feel like we're circling back to the same you know some of the same issues that we've been going around and around on um so we had a discussion our last meeting I'm I'm totally comfortable and I remember councillor high tower also indicating definite comfort with this this idea of a report back uh in a year that was not a problem I'm fine with that amendment but I don't I don't support the other amendment which is basically to to limit this just to to new properties and and basically the the disagreement that we talked about in ordinance is you know are we assuming that this isn't going to make sense are we assuming that this isn't going to make it isn't going to be effective be an effective policy um or are we going to assume that it is essentially and so we would still because you know even without the amendment as long as we get that report back in a year and revisit it we would still have the opportunity to make adjustments if if it really wasn't working and it didn't make sense um but for my part I didn't want to just assume that that would be the case so I wanted to leave in the idea that this policy does make sense which is hopefully why we would even be supporting in the first places because we think it's it's good policy and that we would then expand the policy out over time unless there was serious concerns or issues um so yeah I don't I don't know if we'll end up you know dividing the question or if we can vote on the amendment separately but I can't support the entire amendment I'm fine with the report back I'm fine with looking at it I'm open to the idea that it it might not make sense but I don't I'm not in a position where I want to just assume that it's not going to work and plan on it um not being expanded and and just to just to zoom out too I mean I think Councilor Mason gave a good summary but basically the idea is that tenants should know where they're supposed to park and there's different motivations for that there's different reasons that make sense I mean I think it's kind of basic sort of consumer information that makes sense to me on that level but um it's also a way to help prevent and deal with a lot of these parking issues in terms of um people parking illegally especially on lawns or on other grass surfaces and compacting the soil leading to runoff um Professor Paul Bierman at UVM has done a lot of analysis with students on how these small violations and these small parking on grass leads actually to a pretty large amount of runoff when you accumulate the total amount so it's trying to address the health of our lake it's trying to make things simpler and clearer for tenants um and I think it's trying to make it easier for the city to enforce so I support it as is I support the checking in any year but I don't support the stripping away of the expansion of the policy thank you thanks Councillor Hanson and got Councillor Hightower to be followed by Councillor Carpenter yeah um not to articulate too much of what was done but I came into this debate um later than the other two committee members and I definitely saw at the beginning we had started with one group wanted all units to have the all rental units to have this the other one was just new ones and so this lines 33 through 36 I thought were the they are the compromise kind of that the group came up with um and so I think it's important to maintain that compromise um because I think it it I think it's a valid compromise is to kind of have it roll out year after year and then um the I forgot what my second point was so I will I will end with that Councillor Carpenter thanks a couple of different concerns I mean I think it's conceptually every layer lord should have a plan but that doesn't prevent people from parking on lawn or doing things they shouldn't and um I am concerned about quite the detailed plan of getting the detailed plan of getting plans from everywhere and the priority of the workload of permitting inspections so as I understand Councillor Mason's sort of proposal is that the concept is you should have a parking plan we're going to try this for a year we're going to focus on offenders and that when we talk about new but really to me it's focusing on the offenders and to give permitting an inspection uh enough time to sort of figure out how this whole process works um I have great concern about this relative to the workload you know following up on minimum housing inspections um so again I think Councillor Mason's proposal as I understand it would focus on this for a year for offenders and new housing and as I understand it that's people who haven't previously registered um with on the housing rental and then come back in a year I mean and see how it is it it's presupposing for example and I say this to my colleagues in the north end that every rental and the all the new north end will have a housing plan and um we're not sure if that's what we need I think we need to focus this year and figure out from the staff's perspective how burdensome or not burdensome this whole process is and where it could stand in the priority of the other work they have to do. Councillor Paul. Thanks President Tracy um so uh Director Ward is um on uh on zoom with us this evening um I was hoping that maybe he could speak to um the memo that he had sent to us I realized we we all read it um but uh thought that he could explain his reasoning behind you know wanting to take this in a a slightly different approach I don't think it means that he is against the um uh the spirit of the ordinance change but I think has a different take on it slightly different take on it I was hoping if he's still here I I don't see him on my screen but if he is still here um if he could speak to that I'd appreciate it. Certainly uh go ahead Director Ward. Thank you and uh thank you uh Councillor Carpenter I think that's a great way to sum up the focus of the department is really what I'm concerned about in the memo uh Councillor Paul I mentioned the 90 threshold that you know more than 90 percent of the folks who own rental properties haven't had a violation in the last 10 years while I've been the director this year um there have been it's fewer than two percent of the rental properties have had uh and a substantive uh identifiable yard parking violation so I think what I was concerned is that these future years we will be putting focus on 98 percent of those properties that are do somehow they're doing it right without this so I do think that they probably know better than me what the plan should be and I'd like to take that time to to find out the variety of different ways that they're managing their plans and put the focus where it rightly belongs and that is on the people who are violating the ordinance and our our report back would include that both where the violations are happening and I think um it would be helpful for you to know for everyone to know really that if there are properties that are owned by similar people or by the same person in multiple places that's a great piece of data for us to report back to you because that's part of the problem as well it's not so much uh having a plan but it's the way you implement it it's sloppy property management because there are really good property owners who don't have a plan they don't have a site plan for their property but they're very clear with the tenants about where they can and where they can't and they know that they'll be towed if they park in a different spot because that property owner is managing the property well so again I think to sum it up I would say I would like this year to be able to report back to you on what we learned from the violators and from the new rental properties but there will be a big workload in the years to come with dealing with administrative violations for people who don't do the things that they're required to do through the administrative portions of this ordinance but um their violation is nonetheless even though there may not be a car parked out on the lawn at that property that's where I'm worried we'll shift our focus and I don't want that I want it to be so that we make a big difference to help the lake okay thanks thanks president Tracy don't have anyone else in the um okay I see Councillor Hightower and then Councillor Carpenter and Hanson yeah and this is um I remember what my second point was so I'm going to go ahead and yeah and I think Councillor Hanson already made this point but um it's about the assumption of like what will happen and I think if you know um I'm all about flexibility in um ordinances and management and so if we come up with a better plan great nix this one say never mind those lines it's just a resolution so the next council can easily but I would rather if something doesn't come up I would rather have something in place that we will fall back on I would like the default plan to be something will change and if we find a better plan I trust the future council that will be here in a year they'll say good you know direct award please implement what you have found instead that sounds better just regard what we've already done and so I guess I just kind of want to keep the pressure on to find a better solution if there is one and if there is a one then we have this to back off we don't have to have this debate again okay I have Councillor Carpenter to be followed by Councillor Hanson just a point to make which is this is focused on owners and managers of rental housing and it really isn't focused on lawn parking which is sort of a you know some number of the complaints are small tiny houses that have three or four occupants they're not rentals they got mom dad and two kids and a boat or two boats and so this isn't going to address any of that so I again I think the concern is it's creating an infrastructure of plan review just plan review for a whole bunch of people where there's not not necessarily a problem and again I think the year trial is intended to say well where do we have problems and how does this compare to what people perceive to be the problem okay Councillor Hanson great yeah so I think I as I said so I think many of us or most of us agree with the year trial and review and this is how it's written even without the amendment that there would be a year that it would just be for new properties and offenders so I guess my motion then would just be to we should I think we should get that part out of the debate out of the way because I keep hearing people bring that up even though we all agree on it so my motion would be to divide the amendment so that we can vote separately on that because I think we could pass that fairly easily am I able to divide the amendment in that way I mean I'm going to have to put the tree black but I believe you can sorry yes I don't know I think you could move to divide the question you just need to be clear on how you're dividing it so the there's two amendments there's the change from well I guess I guess there's three amendments um I my my motion would be to separate out this third amendment of in order to request that the head of permitting inspections report back to the city council in January of 2022 on the success or shortcomings of this ordinance amendment and to provide suggestions for modifications and or further implementation to divide that amendment out on its own and so that we can vote on that separately okay so we have a motion from Councillor Hanson is there a second seconded by Councillor Hightower any further discussion on dividing the question okay hearing none we'll go to a vote on whether to divide the question so um all those in favor of dividing the question please say aye hi hi hi hearing none that passes unanimously so now we are we are on the the question as divided now attorney blackwood are we able to entertain further debate on the question as divided because there's now several different motions on the table okay yes okay so now we have divided the question and we'll have to take two motions um so um Councillor Paul go ahead thank you President Tracy I just want to make sure in the reason I I didn't voice voters because I'm just trying to make sure I understand um uh Councillor Hanson's motion to divide and I'm looking at the email that came from Councillor Mason um regarding the amendment that you want to divide where it says first and second and you want to divide that from where it says finally to a bend am I right that was the yeah that was the motion okay all right thank you just want to make sure I understood um thanks very much okay so is there further discussion on this on this um the amendment as divided Councillor Hanson go ahead yeah just to say before we vote on these um just to say that the workload piece is something we've we've talked about many times in in this debate and you know I I agree that the workload should be focused on um the offenders I've I've always agreed with that and I think the intention here is still to focus uh the work on the offenders but to have I I think the folks who who don't offend and it shouldn't be really an issue I think the folks that don't violate this are communicating clearly and are posting um the parking information to their tenants so I don't think it's going to be a big burden for the property managers that are already doing this to just to to continue doing it um so I I do agree with that and um I think yeah I don't want to go in circles again but um I will yeah I'll end it yeah thanks okay we're ready to vote on the the question as divided I'm sorry point of information yep go ahead I'm not entirely sure what we're my assumption is we vote on one you know what first the proposed first and second and then finally am I misunderstanding that you're correct Councillor Mason so that's how I was going to do it I was going to vote on those two clauses um do a roll call on those two clauses and then the finally section of the amendment as divided so just uh now if I may speak to the first and second I just to be clear the I think the burden is not necessarily on the landlord it's the burden that's placed on permitting the staff that permitting inspection I I Councillor Hanson just referred to the burden on landlords I think the concern that's been articulated is that we're asking staff who may not even be hired yet to review hundreds and hundreds of parking plans for properties that have never had an issue so that's why the proposal so I will be supporting the first part of the divided question as well as a second thank you okay thank you anyone else Councillor Hanson go ahead yeah sorry to go back and forth I just wanted to clarify that piece too because yeah I didn't articulate that well but we did talk about this in our last meeting which is that the plan wouldn't wouldn't need to be reviewed unless there was a violation that was my understanding from the conversation that we had because I specifically had raised that point in terms of the way that this was written um so I just wanted to clarify that okay are you ready to vote on the question as divided I'm ready to vote I just want to be clear I'm voting on the proposal that it be a one year come back in one year no what am I voting on voting on the first two the first two pieces of Councillor Mason's amendment which say first to change all in line 27 to certain and second to delete lines 33 through 36 and that's the staged part okay yep so this is the first part this is the first part of the question that we that we're dealing with everyone clear not really but we'll do my best so can I Councillor Tracy I think if if you are supportive of a one year uh sorry of a non commitment to a phased approach you would vote yes in favor of the first part of the amendment if you believe as drafted that we should have east district west district north south over the next four years then you would vote no on the amendment the first part the first of the two amendments okay clear now yep okay so now let's head to a vote will the city clerk please call the roll councillor carpenter yes councillor jane yep councillor flamin no councillor hanson no councillor hi tower no councillor mason yes councillor paul yes councillor polino yes councillor pine yeah councillor shannon yes councillor stromberg no council president tracy no six eyes six nays okay so the first part of the question fails we're on to the second part of the question are we ready for a vote on that this is the paragraph beginning with finally okay will the city clerk please call the roll on the second part of the amendment councillor carpenter yes councillor jane yeah councillor freeman yes councillor hanson yes councillor hi tower yes councillor mason yes councillor paul yes councillor polino yes councillor pine yes yes councillor shannon yes councillor stromberg yes council president tracy yes that's unanimous so now we are back to the original motion as amended and councillor shannon thank you president tracy i um i'm having trouble understanding the value of this for the difficulties it causes the department i don't think it's really a big deal from the landlord perspective i mean a landlord is going to tell their tenants where it is that they have to park so if they have to draw to scale kind of a hassle but not really a big deal but from the city's perspective i'm just not sure what this accomplishes because you can you know a landlord submits their parking plan where they want their tenants to park that doesn't that it's not necessarily legal and unless the city is going to look at all of these parking plans and determine if they're legal why are they collecting all of these parking plans and it it seems like it's kind of endorsing parking plans that may not be legal um so i am and and you know if if somebody doesn't park according to the parking plan that also is not necessarily illegal so i i just don't see what this accomplishes there might be many ways to park on a property that are legal from the city's perspective it's just not where the landlord wants you to park and the city doesn't really have any role in that so i don't see what this accomplishes and i'm very concerned that um you know our code enforcement director who now has a new title sorry um but when we're hearing that concern that there is a lot of work involved in this and i think that the model uh and maybe somebody can correct me if i'm wrong about this but the model that was being looked at was part of a permit application whereas our process is not part of a permit application in a permit application you're actually saying this is okay or this is not okay but our rental registration process is just you fill out the form nobody says it's okay or it's not okay it's um and now now we're submitting information that creates this strange acknowledgement that something's been submitted that you would think would be approved but it's not really okay councilor mason uh thank you president tracy um yes notwithstanding that language councillor shannon my recollection of the conversation in committee was that it will be reviewed and it will require staff time in order to ensure compliance with all of our setback requirements lock coverage etc and that was why there was concern you know about submission the language that's in there that the non-binding was put in by assistant city attorney sturdivant and um mr agustin to sort of say hey we're not reviewing this but my understanding and bills on this call is that yes the city will be reviewing every plan that gets submitted which will require significant staff time can i just very quickly say that's impossible um and it's not i don't see how it accomplishes the goal because even if you come up with a legal plan it's not the fact that somebody doesn't stick to that plan doesn't make it illegal okay anyone else on this are we ready to vote councillor hanson yeah i can i can try to speak to some of these things so one of the pieces and now i'm remembering all the way back to some of the earliest conversations um there were a couple pieces one of the pieces was the ambiguity between was it the tenant that um violated you know who whose fault was it basically that um there was lawn parking did the landlord not communicate where they where the tenant could park or did the tenant just ignore what the landlord said um who's sort of to blame that was one of the pieces to being addressed this other piecing was piece was that illegal parking spaces if they're not caught early enough and if they're not reviewed early enough they can essentially become legal and become legitimate um over time so that was another piece that we were trying to address and then in terms of the review piece i guess we're there's still confusion around that because i had thought at our last meeting that in the way it was written that it doesn't require um every single um submitted parking plan to to be reviewed i had thought that it was written flexibly enough that these would be submitted that doesn't constitute as it says that doesn't constitute approval um and it doesn't force a review on a certain timeline the idea being that if there's an issue they could then they now have it on file and can look at it and can review it so sounds like there's still confusion but again we have a year before this even hits outside of new rentals so we have time to look at these things and the the debate was do we assume that this doesn't work and and to Councillor Hightower's point i think this forces us to if we're not going to proceed at least it forces us to come up with something um better in the intervening year rather than the default to be to do nothing essentially. Councillor Hightower to be followed by Councillor Mason. Yeah and i'll be brief i also wasn't under the assumption that they had to be reviewed in a timely manner and just want to quickly i think the reason the east district is first and the reason that um former council Richard and council Hanson were working on this is it's a big deal in the east district this is something that comes up a lot in our npa um and that people that folks really care about um but i was also underneath and based on that i was under the impression they wouldn't have to be reviewed in a timely manner one and that two um the submissions as kind of you know the department is working on getting things um online and having it would become part of kind of public something that the public could access so more importantly for me and for my ward it's about that neighbors can access and to basically be like this is something that's this is supposed to be grass and somebody's parking here that it kind of gives the folks in the neighborhood a way to deal with some of these grass parking issues um to to give enforcement a little bit more local support i guess so that was my understanding of it so i do want to emphasize that okay Councillor mason uh president president i know director ward is his hand up maybe okay go to him first and then come back sure go ahead director ward we're gonna say the confusion for my staff will be if an inspector is on site and looking at the site plan that a property owner has posted according to this proposal uh in a common area that's i think councillor shannon hit on that that it's not going to really mean anything because what's truly the the the dividing point is what's on file in the land records with the zoning division through a zoning permit um it's actually in the parking ordinance under chapter 20 section 55 general prohibitions for parking it's unlawful to park on the lawn unless it's in an area uh that's approved by the Department of Planning and Zoning for vehicular ingress or egress for parking so we have that and so the parking plan needs to be on file with planning and zoning in order for it to be valid um this is a secondary site plan that if we don't review it against that we're we've got two different divisions with my within my own department that are going to have two different part site plans and we're going to have to do some uh justifying between the two it's going to create some confusion okay councillor mason that was what i needed thank you okay anyone else we're going to do vote council carpenter i guess i still need clarification on what i'm voting on which is to say a little more articulation if i vote no then just the whole thing go away or if i vote yes then it's now going to require permitting and inspection to review all these plans and justify them yes that's what sounds like hand thing please be brief yeah no just to clarify maybe this can help councillor carpenter and others it still is set up where the first year is just new rentals being looked at as well as folks who violate the ordinance and then there's still a review in a year but unless there's an amendment made within a year it would then expand so there isn't that immediate situation but i think one of the important things to know is that we've been please be brief i will i think this is really important though which is that director ward has been raising these concerns for a really long time and we've been sort of begging uh attorney bergman councillor busher and myself have been like begging for alternatives begging for other ways forward and just still have not got that which is why i think it is really important to put the onus on them to come up with something better okay okay councillor mason again please i'll just i mean i i think unfortunately i'll be brief i feel the need to respond to that i i respect um councillor hinton that you've been asking but the reality is something was proposed you just disagreed with it so you know now we as a body are trying you know forced to decide which is the right path i push back on the assertion that you know there has not been an alternative offer there has it's just not one that you agreed with so thank you okay were you ready to vote okay seeing no one um would the city clerk please call the roll in the resolution as amended councillor carpenter no councillor jane no councillor freeman yes councillor hanson yes councillor high tower yes councillor mason no councillor paul no councillor polino no councillor pine yes councillor shannon no councillor strongberg yes council president tracy yes six i six nays okay so the resolution fails um and that completes our agenda motion to adjourn is in order so moved moved by councillor freeman seconded by councillor pine any discussion seeing none all those in favor please say aye all right aye any opposed we are adjourned at 11 12 have a good night everybody good night happy thanksgiving thank you