Board of Health and Finance Department offer quarterly reports at Council meeting

Dec. 4, 2019 | Dennis Hackett

EAST LONGMEADOW – The East Longmeadow Town Council met for a regularly scheduled meeting on Nov. 26 to discuss several issues, including the town’s quarterly budget report and board of health’s quarterly report.

Interim Town Manager Mary McNally began the meeting with her regular report. This week her report included some updates on the actions from the last meeting. She said the Department of Revenue approved the town’s tax rate, the town’s new voting machines arrived and she signed some of the preliminary paperwork for the purchase of a second ambulance.

After the Town Manager’s report and several motions to move items out of order, the town’s Finance Director, Sara Menard, came before the council to discuss the town’s quarterly budget report for the town’s general fund. She noted that three departments are currently in deficit, including the legal, the worker’s comp, and liability insurance departments, but they could receive credits to bring the deficits down for the latter.

Menard added that the town has currently used about three quarters of its budget for the year. “76.9 percent of the budget has been used as of Oct. 31,” she said, “One of the reasons that is so high is that there are certain things that we encumber or accrue for every year, including things like the payroll for the schools.”

As a result of the budget discussion Menard and the council decided to update the report from here on out to include to see percentages for that quarter of the year, not the entire year’s projections. Council Member R. Patrick Henry said, “This is really an accounting report. But for a management information report, it’s unusable for us, the percentages are meaningless without you here.”

The council also requested that Menard bring the report on the town’s enterprise and revolving funds for the council’s next meeting.

The next order of business at the meeting was a brief public hearing for the approval of a change of officers, directors, LLC managers and change of ownership interest for 99 Restaurant and Pub before the council discussed the issue.

One sticking point for the councilors was the fact that no one came to represent the restaurant. Council Member Thomas O’Connor said, “There ought to be a spokesperson addressing this issue to answer questions. In the future they need to be present, it’s in the council rules and they need to be present.” However, the motion passed with a unanimous vote.

The next order of business was a request to for a change in LLC managers at Chipotle at 42 Center Sq., which the council also voted to approve.

The council then discussed a recommendation from the town council bylaw review committee about a bylaw for liquor license offenses and penalties. Henry announced that they would be adding the offenses and penalties to the existing bylaw under general legislation and alcohol. He then added that they would be holding a public hearing for the proposed bylaw change at the Jan. 14 meeting, which the council unanimously approved.

The meeting then moved into new orders of business and began by bringing up the town’s Health Director Aimee Petrosky and Board of Health Member Dr. Sarah Perez McAdoo to discuss the board of health’s quarterly report. McAdoo said she thought the quarterly action plan was important to everything the Health Department is doing. “That action plan reflects the work we have been doing, what we plan to do, our goals and the impact of what we’re doing. We see it as a tool for transparent communication and accountability for our work,” she said.

Petrosky then gave an in-depth power point presentation about everything the Health Department has done throughout the year including its programs, expenses and revenue. One of the issues Petrosky discussed revolves around inspections of local businesses and selling tobacco to minors. She said, “In the last round of underage checks, which started in July, we found five out of the 12 businesses we inspected sold tobacco to minors. We have a lot of work that we can be doing on that so I’m going to look at how we can better educate our retailers.”

During the presentation Petrosky also discussed the new trash bins residents of East Longmeadow received and said that residents can call the Health Department to pick up. She also added that since the town switched over to the 35 gallon trash limit, in December of 2018 the town has saved just over $34,000 on trash disposal.

After the Health Department’s presentation, the council discussed an executive order to increase the town’s involvement in refugee resettlement. McNally brought the issue before the council after talking to Maxine Stein, the director of the Jewish Family Service prior to the meeting. She explained that signing on with the order would allow the town to take in refugees if necessary, but there is not a high likelihood of that happening.

Council Member Donald Anderson immediately said they needed more time to discuss the issue before making a vote on it after only receiving notice of it on Nov. 21. “I don’t like something that was just dated the 21st and today’s the 26th. And just make a decision in a couple weeks, especially when the letter suggests we should contact the department of state.”

McNally explained that she thought the executive order was a uniform request that goes out to every community regardless of if the community is suitable for refugees. After council chair Kathleen Hill and McNally discussed why East Longmeadow wouldn’t be a suitable town for refugees, the rest of the council agreed. Anderson summed up several of the council’s concerns when he said, “My instinct is we may not be the perfect community based on lack of comprehensive public transportation as well as hospital facilities and so forth to have an undetermined amount of refugees in East Longmeadow.”

The council ultimately voted against continued refugee resettlement in East Longmeadow at this current time but explained that could change in the future.

The next order of business at the meeting was a revision of the town council’s rules, which Hill explained they go over every November. In this section the council voted to amend several of the council rules, including adding an exception to allow public comments at a meeting, even if they did not register at the clerk’s office by the 3:45 pm deadline the day of the meeting, at the council chair’s discretion. The council also voted to remove the restriction that did not allow the vice president to be the chair of any committees. Overall the council amended six policies in the town council rules.

The meeting concluded with discussion of the council’s second December meeting which Hill announced would be on  Dec. 18 at 4 p.m. Otherwise the meeting would have fallen on Dec. 24. Hill added they will also be interviewing the four finalists for the Town’s vacant town manager position at that meeting.

The East Longmeadow Town Council’s next meeting will be on Dec. 10.

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