AGAWAM – At the Aug. 1 City Council meeting, conducted at the Agawam Senior Center on Main Street, councilors discussed moving the regular meeting place for their biweekly meetings. Ordinarily, the meetings are on Monday evenings at the Junior High School auditorium in Feeding Hills.

“It hasn’t been a great experience going to the junior high,” said Council President Chris Johnson. “My fear is that someone’s gonna get hurt going up and down those stairs,” he added.

The auditorium, a multi-aisle setup, has moderately steep stairs descending towards the stage. In addition to the tripping hazard, the capacity far exceeds typical council meeting attendance, hindering a sense of community; and wheelchair access to the stage is only available by passing through the cafeteria and taking a service elevator.

Two options were discussed as alternatives, the library and the senior center. Councilor Anthony Russo is among several councilors who had originally hoped the meetings could be moved to the newly renovated library, as it is in the center of Agawam, and thus easily reachable by all residents.

But Russo, who called the library his “top choice,” said it may not be feasible.

“There were scheduling issues because many other groups have been meeting there for years,” he said.

Generally, councilors deemed the Senior Center meeting hall acceptable.

“We can always relocate to a different spot if we’re anticipating a large [attendance], but this room seems to be perfect. This is bigger than the community room at the library This seems like it’s perfectly sized to be able to handle 99 percent of our meeting,” said Johnson.

Councilor Dino Mercadante also brought up the topic of televising the council’s subcommittee meetings. Meetings of the full council are broadcast on local access, and live-streamed online, where past meetings can also be viewed on-demand, but subcommittee meetings are not.

“There’s so much of the council work done ... within those subcommittees and so much discussion and so many points are brought out,” said Mercadante.

The council generally has the power to change the venue of their meetings as necessary without any formal process.

“This is more of a friendly, informal discussion about what would work best for the community,” said Russo, who added that other than an informal discussion at the end of the last council meeting, the council had not had a discussion on the issue. While it seems likely they will opt to continue to hold meetings at the senior center going forward, a final decision has not yet been made.

The council meets only once in July and August. The next meeting will be in September.