Search

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 23

ensuring that we will continue to make it a priority next year. So | see nothing but strengths in all of this and |
think if we don’t move forward on this, we are going to regret the opportunities we are missing.

President Wilshire
Is there anyone else? Alderman Laws?
Alderman Laws

Thank you. I'll be very brief. | just also wanted to point out while | was the liaison to the Downtown
Improvements Committee, they have that wonderful Wayfinding Package, the signage that we have downtown,
and then all of the permanent up lighting that is on Main Street right now were big projects. And then the
signage that goes on the light posts on the Broad Street Parkway and down Main Street. | just want to give
them credit for that. Thank you very much.

President Wilshire

Thank you Alderman Laws. Anyone else? Seeing no one, would the Clerk please call the roll? The motion is
for final passage of Ordinance 20-047.

A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:

Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderwoman Kelly, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Clemons, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Laws, Alderman Cleaver,

Alderwoman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire 13

Nay: Alderwoman Lu, Alderman Jette 2

MOTION CARRIED
Ordinance O-21-047 declared duly adopted.

O-21-048, Amended
Endorsers: Mayor Jim Donchess
Alderman Richard A. Dowd
Alderman Linda Harriot-Gathright
AMENDING THE RESIDENTIAL DISTRICTS ORDINANCE WITH RESPECT TO RESIDENTIAL
DRIVEWAYS
Given its second reading;

MOTION BY ALDERMAN TENCZA TO AMEND O-21-048 BY REPLACING IT WITH THE GOLDENROD
COPY OF AMENDMENTS MADE AT THE PLANNING AND ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE, BY
ROLL CALL

ON THE QUESTION

Alderman Tencza

Madam President, | am happy to explain the amendments that are being made.

President Wilshire

Please do.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 24

Alderman Tencza

Thank you. Madam President, the overall purpose of this Ordinance is to basically clarify and consolidate
some of the different provisions regarding driveways from various different parts of Land Use Code and the
DPW Code that they use, which is what it does. In doing that, in putting this together, there was one
paragraph #4 of the original ordinance which dealt with basically the ends of the driveways and how they were
going to be measured. It appeared that there was some conflicting information between the different areas as
to how that should be handled. So rather than try to explain it all in this Ordinance, Paragraph 4 has just been
stricken and the rest of the provisions of the Ordinance have remained the same.

President Wilshire
Thank you, Alderman Tencza. Motion is to amend Resolution 21-048 by replacing it with the Golden Rod
Copy of amendments made at the PEDC Committee by roll call. Any further discussion on that, the motion to
amend.
A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderwoman Kelly, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Clemons, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderwoman Lu, Alderman Jette, Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Laws,
Alderman Cleaver, Alderwoman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire 15
Nay: 0
MOTION CARRIED
MOTION BY ALDERMAN TENCZA FOR FINAL PASSAGE OF O-21-048 AS AMENDED, BY ROLL CALL
A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderwoman Kelly, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Clemons, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderwoman Lu, Alderman Jette, Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Laws,
Alderman Cleaver, Alderwoman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire 15
Nay: 0
MOTION CARRIED

Ordinance O-21-048 declared duly adopted as amended.

0-21-049

Endorser: Mayor Jim Donchess

AMENDING THE CONSERVATION SUBDIVISIONS SUPPLEMENTAL USE REGULATIONS
Given its second reading:

MOTION BY ALDERMAN LAWS FOR FINAL PASSAGE OF O-21-049, BY ROLL CALL

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 25

A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:

Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderwoman Kelly, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Clemons, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderwoman Lu, Alderman Jette, Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Laws,
Alderman Cleaver, Alderwoman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire 15

Nay: 0
MOTION CARRIED

Ordinance O-21-049 declared duly adopted.

O-21-050
Endorsers: Mayor Jim Donchess
Alderman-at-Large Ben Clemons
Alderman-at-Large Michael B. O’Brien, Sr.
Alderman Patricia Klee
Alderman Jan Schmidt
Alderman-at-Large Shoshanna Kelly
Alderman Thomas Lopez
Alderman-at-Large David C. Tencza
Alderman-at-Large Brandon Michael Laws
Alderman Richard A. Dowd
Alderman Skip Cleaver
Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright
Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire
RELATIVE TO TEMPORARY ROAD CLOSURES AND ELIMINATION OF CERTAIN ON-STREET
PARKING FOR USE BY RESTAURANTS FOR OUTDOOR DINING IN 2021
Given its second reading;

MOTION BY ALDERMAN LOPEZ FOR FINAL PASSAGE OF O-21-050, BY ROLL CALL
ON THE QUESTION
President Wilshire

Discussion on that motion? Alderman Lopez?

Alderman Lopez

So Mr. Anderson did bring up a good point and this is one that we had struggled with last year even.
Wingate’s being a pharmacy during the day that people are able to stop and pick up goods and that kind of
thing does struggle because the parking barriers have been arranged in a way that was difficult. | know that
Director Cummings did work on that last year to try to make it a little bit more palatable for them. We have
asked him to evaluate that plan additionally through all of the Committee meetings we have discussed. | know
some other businesses have approached me with concerns, such as WineNot, when they have to compete
with the bank for two spaces. | mean it would be really nice if people going to Santander Bank would park in
the giant parking lot that it has, but they choose to park in front of WineNot and then not goin. So itis a
struggle for businesses downtown when they lose their convenience parking.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 26

| do think there is some merit in looking at the time frame for implementation, because | think we were using
the same model as last year where we were making sure that there was maximum exposure for outdoor dining
so that there would be most the safety. But | mean the vaccinations, as long as people continue moving
forward with them and taking them as much as possible, as long as we build our herd immunity. As long as
people make responsible decisions with the upcoming holidays, we can keep our numbers low, we can keep
our systems from being in danger of being overwhelmed. We can look at how we approach this throughout the
summer, we do still have the ability to change those kind of dates within a reasonable amount of time based on
the contract.

| just want to make sure that it is clear that those concerns are heard and we are not just throwing away the
commercial businesses in favor of the restaurant ones. There’s a lot of need in the area and we kind of have
to figure out how that plan is going to work out.

President Wilshire
Thank you Alderman Lopez. Anyone else? Alderman Klee?
Alderman Klee

Thank you Madam President and again | want to echo what Alderman Lopez just said. | think we do need to
make sure that we are taking care of those businesses. | know | have spoken to parking and so on about, well
can we put someone’s name on a parking space and that is against the rules. You can’t designate City
Parking to any one particular household or person, you can’t even put a permit up there and say this is for this
parking only, not when it is City Parking. | would hope that what Alderman Lopez brought up for places such
as WineNot, that the residents will just go around the corner for the bank and just park in that bank because
the people from WineNot cannot park in that private parking lot; they are not supposed to do that. | hope that
residents will be a little bit more considerate. | know they are probably not thinking when they are just running
into the bank | think they are going in real quick and out and this is a nice convenient parking spot and they are
going to take it.

But again, | also believe that Director Cummings will work as much as he possibly can to try to give them as
much parking as possible. Maybe we just have to tweak it a little bit more but | still think that this is a
worthwhile project and | will be voting for it.

President Wilshire

Anyone else? Alderman Dowd?

Alderman Dowd

Yes, | talked to Director Cummings just a couple of hours ago, three hours ago now and he is going to be
calling Wingate’s tomorrow and setting up a meeting with those shop owners in the area and hopefully they will
have a resolution that they can all agree with and | think we will be fine.

President Wilshire

Anyone else? Alderman Jette?

Alderman Jette

Thank you Madam President. | think everyone or most people think that what we did last summer was a great
thing, it was very helpful to the restaurants. | know a lot of people, | think it was an added bonus in that it

provided us with a real time experiment on could we narrow Main Street? Could we provide for more sidewalk
dining areas? Could we slow the traffic down?

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 27

Could we live with the idea of Main Street being a destination as opposed to a thoroughfare where you are
trying to get from one end of Main Street to the other as fast as possible. The people who use Main Street as
a thoroughfare were very frustrated because it took a lot longer to get from end to the other, but | think in many
ways that’s a good thing.

So generally speaking, | think this is a good thing. But we have to be sensitive to the area, the merchants who
are most affected by this. We are doing this for them and we ought to listen to them when they point out
problems. And | haven’t heard anyone say that we shouldn't do this at all, but lve heard a lot of people say
that barriers should be in a different location than where they are, there ought to be some tweaking. The next
Ordinance that we are going to be dealing with the 15 minute free parking. Mr. Anderson spoke about how
that affects him; he pointed out that the restaurants really don’t get going until later in the afternoon and the
evening, whereas the Main Street Retail Establishments are there during the day. Their customers can’t —
parking has been eliminated in favor of the restaurants and the restaurants are pretty much only using them at
night.

| think there is some tweaking that can be done. | attended a meeting a couple of weeks ago where downtown
merchants were invited to express their opinion. A lot of people said to me that they didn’t know this meeting
was happening. | think we have all experienced the fact that getting the word out is a very difficult thing. We
oftentimes, | think we fail in letting people know that we are about to do something and giving them ample
opportunity to give us some feedback. But more particularly at that meeting and | know of not only Mr.
Anderson but | know other people who have tried to talk to, well they have talked to Mr. Cummings about
suggestions and he has said that he welcomes their input. But this project is being put into place and | am
having difficulty understanding how we are going to be moving barriers around to improve situations. Once
they are in place, are we going to be able to move them around?

During our Committee hearing, the Infrastructure Committee, | think we were all, | shouldn't say that, | certainly
was under the impression that changes could be made by Director Cummings and the Mayor and the City
Engineer and the Fire Department, the Police Department, you know, that they could make some adjustments
and stuff. But when | look at the Ordinance, the Ordinance says that we are adopting the barriers and the
parking restrictions and changing the handicap parking and stuff in accordance to the plan that is submitted
with the Ordinance. And the plan is basically an aerial view of Main Street and showing where the barriers are
going to put, where the parking is going to be. So this Ordinance adopts that plan. The Ordinance goes on to
say that upon the recommendation of the Director of Public Works and the Parking Manager, the Mayor may
approve additional road closures, elimination of on-street parking and creation of handicap spaces to
accommodate outdoor dining locations.

| hate to do this to Corporation Counsel, but | don’t know if you have time, | tried to alert you to this earlier
today but | couldn’t reach you. Is that, | don’t know if you have time to look at really quickly, but does that ...
some of us were under the impression that this thing could be tweaked as we go along; that it was a work in
process. But | look at this language and | am seeing that the plan, those aerial views showing where the
barriers are, that’s the plan, that is going into effect and that the Mayor can with the recommendation of the
Director of Public Works and the Parking Manager, he can provide for additional road closures and eliminate
additional parking spaces. But does this allow the Mayor to change the barriers, change the location of the
barriers, change the location of the parking areas? If this is unfair to you, just say so, but through you, Madam
President, can | ask Corporation Counsel that question? Or do we need to give the Mayor some additional
authority in this Ordinance to make those changes as we experience, as the summer goes on.

Attorney Bolton

| think the short answer is that would be preferable. So maybe if you added a clause that said, “Alternatively
on the recommendation of those same officials, the Mayor may adjust the location of the barriers, 15 minute
pick up parking spaces, and location of handicap parking as circumstances warrant”.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 28

Alderman Jette

Madam President, could | follow up?

President Wilshire

Yes, | am sorry | was on mute, sorry.

Alderman Jette

So if we amended this, if you have it in front of you, the paragraph that says, “be it further resolved that upon
recommendation of the Director of Public Works and the Parking Manager, the Mayor may approve additional
road closures ...” etc. If we struck “approve additional” those two words and replaced them with “adjust as
necessary” so that it would read, “Upon the recommendation of the Director of Public Works and the Parking

Manager the Mayor may adjust as necessary road closures, elimination of on-street parking and creation of
handicap spaces to accommodate outdoor dining locations”. Would that be an acceptable ...?

Attorney Bolton

Well | think you may want to talk about adjusting the location of the barriers themselves, adjusting the 15
minute parking spaces, adjusting the handicap parking spaces, you may have said some of that. | would leave
out the words “as necessary”. | think you might want to say “as circumstances appear advisable” or “as
circumstances appear to warrant”. I’d hate to be somewhere arguing about whether it was necessary or
whether it was just a good idea.

Alderman Jette

OK, | accept your recommendation. So, Madam President, could | make a motion to adopt the amendment
that Attorney Bolton is proposing or the wording that Attorney Bolton has proposed?

President Wilshire

Yes. So the wording would be “to adjust as circumstances warrant”. Is that what you recommended Attorney
Bolton?

Attorney Bolton

| would say the location of the barriers, handicap spaces and 15 minute free parking zones as circumstances
appear to warrant.

President Wilshire
Alderman Jette.
Alderman Jette

Excuse me, Madam President. So Attorney Bolton, | would like to remind you that the next Ordinance talks
about the 15 minute free parking.

Attorney Bolton

That isn’t in this ... if you think it is more appropriate to deal with it there, that’s certainly a valid way to go.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 29

Alderman Jette

| just wanted to point out to that there is a separate Ordinance coming up the next one that talks about the 15
minute parking.

President Wilshire
So what’s your pleasure Alderman Jette?

MOTION BY ALDERMAN JETTE TO AMEND IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE LANGUAGE SUGGESTED BY
ATTORNEY BOLTON BY ROLL CALL

ON THE QUESTION
Alderman Jette

And | think as long that it is clear we are adopting this plan but it does give the Mayor, upon the
recommendation of the Director of Public Works and the Parking Manager the ability to make adjustments.

President Wilshire
OK, you’ve heard the motion. Discussion? Alderman Klee?
Alderman Klee

Thank you Madam President, I’m sorry | think Alderman Lopez was first, so please let him go first and | will
come after.

President Wilshire

Actually Alderman O’Brien was first and then Alderman Lopez.

Alderman Lopez

Alderman Klee, if | go before you, you’re just going to have to say, “I agree with him” so you should go first.
President Wilshire

Alderman O’Brien?

Alderman O’Brien

Thank you, Madam President. | know there was a little bit of a delay there, thank you. The thing is here as the
Chairman of Infrastructure, let me kind of remind you of what is going on. Since we are discussing about the
Jette Amendment to this, at the very least | would probably offer something else, the Mayor or his designee
and if it's the Mayor and/or his designee then that would make Director Cummings, to which Director
Cummings has been dealing with this all along. So | don’t see the absolute necessity to get the Mayor in.

But | want to make the Alderman aware of there is a lot of concerns with this. Number one is whenever you put
up barriers, you have got reinstitute or reteach the public to follow the proper traffic patterns. There is some
barriers, as Alderman Jette and all of you may remember, that were kind of like bump outs, but they existed
only to assist with the traffic pattern. But whenever you put barriers up on Main Street, we are not the City of
Boston or the State of Massachusetts, we do not have like, I’m going to date myself to Southeast Expressway,
but we do not have the HOV Barriers and these cannot be moved. As a matter of fact, | think in order to put

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 30

the barriers out, | don’t even think we get that great of assistance, because we do not have the equipment in-
house within the Board of Public Works, so we have to pay a contractor to do so. That was done last year, it

was done in the installation and removal. And from what | understand from Director Cummings it will be done
as they are installed for this year.

But that does not mean that certain issues that get brought up; historically the facts are one of the gentlemen
that did bring the concerns up, he was allotted a 15 minute parking space. But when his concerns were noted,
there was a pushback to one of the restaurants adjacent to his property and | think two spaces were granted.
So this has been a very fluid type of thing in dealing with this. It comes down to, it basically gets we are going
to have to make a decision on it. It may not be popular with some but is popular with the majority. | think all of
you have heard very positive things about the support, particularly from our dining community, people that
have enjoyed outdoor dining. And | didn’t mention before with the COVID we are coming up to about basically
one year of the restrictions. But let’s look at Main Street. | don’t see plywood shuttering up the windows. What
we have done has worked. | haven’t seen too many restaurants close, so it is good. | think Director Cummings
in his capability of his appointment in his station is quite capable of dealing with the individual people down on
Main Street and tweaking this type of thing. It is something very fluid so | would not be supporting the
amendment as such because | think it is in capable hands with Director Cummings. Thank you.

President Wilshire

Thank you Alderman O’Brien. Alderman Lopez?

Alderman Lopez

Sorry Alderman O’Brien, but | am comfortable supporting the amendment just because | think it has been fluid
and adaptable in the past and so | don’t see any harm in codifying it. | also think it is important to support all
businesses and make sure that they don't feel like they are being subsumed under the more popular or more
visible businesses. So Wingate’s Pharmacy is very important there, a very historic business, they've been
there for years. They have business needs and nobody knows their business needs as well as they do. So |
think we need to support businesses in a way that allows them to come forward with these issues. But | also
think that the Board of Aldermen is a pretty clumsy tool for that, pretty ponderous in terms of how quickly we
can respond to some things. So it makes sense to me the way it was presented that, yes Director Cummings
has the recommendation power but also DPW since they are probably going to be the ones who move it and
they are probably going to be the one who have a whole bunch of construction coming up anyway. So | don’t
see that as particularly harmful. | would like to point out to Alderman Jette that in the previous meeting he was
concerned with the absence of a map and this week he is concerned with the presence of amap. But thank
you for being diligent.

Alderman Klee

Thank you Madam President. And | hate to disappoint you, Alderman Lopez, but while | do agree with what
you said, that was not going to be my comment. My comment actually is for Alderman Jette, | think |
understand what you are saying but could you specifically state again the paragraph and what the word
changes are going to be, rather than just saying “what Attorney Bolton said”, just so that we have it for both the
audience as well as the members who are voting that we know exactly what it is we are voting for seeing as we
don’t have it in front of us.

Alderman Jette

Madam President?

President Wilshire

Alderman Jette.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 31
Alderman Jette

I'd be happy to do that if | had that in front of me. But what | had proposed, Attorney Bolton made some very
good suggestions so he is more able to repeat what it is that he said and | would defer to him.

President Wilshire
Attorney Bolton?

Attorney Bolton

I’ve said it four times four different ways so we could try for five | suppose. The upshot is there is already
language there that talks about a recommendation of the Director of Public Works and the Parking Manager.
The Mayor will have further authority to close other streets and so forth. And | think in order to meet Alderman
Jette’s issue in adding language saying “or upon such recommendation the Mayor can adjust locations of
barriers, parking spaces and other installations as circumstances appear to warrant”.

Alderman Klee

Madam President?

President Wilshire

Alderman Klee?

Alderman Klee

| am not a lawyer and | see nothing wrong with what was just said, but | guess | don’t see what the difference is
from what is already written to what we are suggesting. And, again, | don’t disagree with it because | do agree
that we need to not bring every little minute detail to the Board of Aldermen and | want to make sure. But |

thought this already gave the approval of it. | am fine voting for it, but | just don’t see the significant change of
it. And, again, | am not a lawyer, so maybe | am just missing something.

Attorney Bolton

| guess if | am being asked, right now it allows for the Mayor to make additional closings of streets to
accommodate outdoor dining. | think what we are talking about now is relocating certain features not
necessarily to accommodate outdoor dining, but perhaps to accommodate convenient parking for other
businesses.

Alderman Klee

May | ask a follow up?

President Wilshire

Alderman Klee.

Alderman Klee

Thank you Madam President. So the way it reads now it says, “Approve additional road closures”. Does that
mean it would not allow them to make adjustments such as they did last year with the changes in front of

Wingate or other ones? So as it reads now they would not be able to make those adjustments is that correct,
without coming to the Board that is.

Board of Aldermen 03-09-2021 Page 32
Attorney Bolton

Correct.

Alderman Klee

OK then | absolutely agree with what Alderman Jette is recommending. With this new adjustment, would that
allow them to do additional road closures as well? No?

Attorney Bolton

Yes.

Alderman Klee

OK, thank you.

President Wilshire

Alderman Dowd?

Alderman Dowd

Yes, as far as the people that had concerns with the parking as | thought | mentioned earlier, that Director
Cummings is meeting with them tomorrow to try to resolve things. But the other thing involved is when | was
talking to Director Cummings is the traffic flow on Main Street as under the control of the DPW and Wayne
Husband who is the City’s Traffic Manager. The way the barriers are configured to flow the traffic is his call
and not the Mayor or the Board of Aldermen’s call at the current time anyway. So my concern is we are trying
to get these out for March 15 and I'd like to ask Attorney Bolton, if we change anything to this Resolution does

it have to go back to the DPW for approval and then back to the Board of Aldermen, because we will be
playing with this for a month?

Attorney Bolton

No.

Alderman Dowd

So there is limitations as to what either the Mayor or Director Cummings can do without DPW blessing the
traffic flow. So that’s what they are going to try to work out tomorrow. | don’t see a need to change the
Ordinance right now because last year we were able to move things around and there was no big hell raising
downtown and the barriers were moved and | think we can move selected barriers. | think we hire a company
because we are dealing with such a large quantity of barriers. But, you know, | don’t see the necessity to
tweak this to try and get the resolution that probably is not going to be needed anyway.

President Wilshire

Alderman Clemons?

Alderman Clemons

Well actually do see Alderwoman Kelly has had her hand up. I’d be happy to yield.