Board of Aldermen 11-23-2021 Page 32
Alderman Caron
Thank you. So | just wanted to tell everyone that the senior outing that was held at Stellos Stadium for the second year in a
row went over very well. Sorry Mayor that you weren't there. It was a nice day. They gave out about 200 meals. The staff
was jovial, they had a good time, everyone was happy, and | apologize because DPW did not send out the invitations to you
whether you could have come or not. | think it's important that we remember our seniors. They’re part of our community and
if this is the one way we can say thank you to them, | think that it's worth noting that this happens.
As far as me voting no on suspension of this particular resolution, | don't usually but | had a lot of concerns about it and
certainly | will be at all the events. I've lived at Greeley Park for 40 years when | worked there. So | Know how important that
facility is but we have to stop and make sure that we're not jumping the gun and buying things every time somebody comes
in. Because | have property near us that's all wooded and people use it and there's going to be about 15 houses going in at
the $500,000 to $600,000 range. I'd like to see us not have that develop but things move along and we have to look at it
realistically. | will always listen and make a decision based on what | think is important for the city as a whole.
I'd like to wish you all a happy Thanksgiving and don't eat too much turkey and enjoy the football games. Thank you.
Alderman Dowd
Yeah two quick things. 1) | appreciate any celebration relative to the Pearl Harbor and the Arizona Memorial. As a former
naval officer who's actually stood on the memorial and listened to the stories that are associated with this country owes a
great debt to all the people that served in that conflict. It was a sneak attack and fought it off as best they could. There were
a lot of people lost and | think any recognition we give to those heroes is well worth it.
The other thing is | am sponsoring the legislation on the Barker property. | think there are a lot of unanswered questions and
| think this came upon us very suddenly. | just want to ensure that all the questions get logical answers. Quite frankly having
been on the Chairman of the Zoning Board before him, I'm not sure that the Planning Board would allow what was being
proposed. But there's still a number of questions that we need answered before we allow that kind of a development in that
neighborhood because it's well out of character with the neighborhood.
Alderman Klee
Thank you, Madam President. A couple of things. First, I'm going to start with Happy Thanksgiving to everybody. For those
in the north, the football game on Thursday morning. | hope you'll be there and bring your canned goods.
I'd also like to congratulate CFO Griffin on his new position.
And then seeing that it's been discussed, I'm going to discuss the 15 Bartlett. It is not a 55 plus community. They're just
trying to entice people 55. That's how they feel that the build would be. It is also not in Greeley Park. There have been
some people who thought it was in Greeley Park. It is just surrounded mostly by Greeley Park and it would actually
purchase you would connect a piece up on Columbia and would kind of finish that corner of it.
But putting that aside, one of the issues is partly the neighborhood and the change to it. To me that was secondary and |
apologize for all those that live there that I've talked to them about. | know how they feel. | also know about how important it
is to have housing of all kinds, but especially affordable housing and this is not affordable housing under any circumstances.
Additional cars do create a safety issue. | think the plan that was put forward they showed a very beautiful plan. They
showed gorgeous homes. They invited people to go and look at some of their other things that they've built. | think that
would be very reputable and very good people. | have nothing bad to say about them. The gentlemen that I've been dealing
with and speaking with, he has been very honest and forthright and I've been very appreciative of that.
The issue with Greeley Park is the amount of forestry that will be destroyed on the Barker property. Mr. Barker - Alan Barker
used to pay people on a regular basis to clean that area. And truthfully, | think that area is probably even cleaner than
Greeley Park is. It didn't have any dead trees in it. Towards the end of his life, | don't think he was keeping quite up to it but
he was very proud of that property. He kept it as a conservation area. This will get rid of at least one side of Greeley. We
will completely get rid of all the trees, all the forestry. The homes will go right up against the border of Greeley Park. As you
walk through Greeley Park, and | think somebody had mentioned that, take a walk. As you walk by Greeley Park, you'll see
a barbed wired fence, kind of a ground stockade fence. You'll see houses there now. Even if they put certain pieces of tree
and foliage in, you will still see houses. The missions from the vehicles will affect Greeley Park. We have bears. We have
deer. We have raccoons. We have foxes. We have coyote. We have the little annoying squirrels and chipmunks but
they're adorable to look at. We have all kinds of flora and fauna in Greeley Park. This will affect it wnether people want to
agree to it or not, 43 homes that close together. They show this very beautiful, beautiful kind of park and you can see right
