WESTFIELD—The City Council will be coming together this Thursday for its first meeting since the city’s election earlier this month.
The City Council will meet Thursday, Nov. 2, at 7 p.m., with communications from Mayor Brian Sullivan beginning at 6:30 p.m. in City Council chambers at City Hall. The agenda is expected to be quite short for the City Council this week, with just six total items on it, including mayoral communications.
Westfield City Council (WNG file photo)
First, in “Communications from the Mayor,” Sullivan is expected to submit a resolution to authorize an agreement to allow funding to be used by the Westfield Redevelopment Authority (WRA) on the Elm Street Urban Renewal Project.
“This is authorizing the WRA to use the money from the budget approved for them,” Sullivan said.
The money, according to Sullivan, is expected to be used to put stone in several parking lots in the area before winter comes.
Then, Sullivan is expected to submit an appointment of William K. Tatro to the Off-Street Parking Commission.
Sullivan said that Tatro is “a long-time resident who has asked to give something back to the city.”
Then, the City Council is expected to begin on “Petitions, Remonstrances and Other Papers.” According to At-Large Councilor and City Council President Brent Bean, II, a public hearing is expected to be held for J. Dog Junk Removal and Hauling LLC. They are applying for a junk collector’s license with the city.
“We’ll have a public hearing and then that should go to License [Committee] for further review,” Bean said.
Then, “Reports of Committees” is expected next, with three total items coming from two committees.
The first item expected is from the Finance Committee, which is the managed appropriation reduction originally from Sullivan for about $1.57 million.
According to Bean, the Finance Committee still has to meet on this, which may include meeting with city department heads on the cuts, and that is expected to take place before the City Council meeting on Thursday.
“There is a reduction and there is going to be some conversation on if we should do it,” he said.
Then, two items are expected to come from the Legislative & Ordinance (L & O) Committee.
The first is on the resolution petitioning the Massachusetts State Legislature related to converting certain private ways in the city to public ways.
According to Bean, the process has had some legal questions related to it. However, he said that the additional public ways could open the city to more Chapter 90 funding from the state since the formulations are partially based on total road mileage in a given municipality.
Then the final expected item is a motion from At-Large Councilor Dave Flaherty on amending the Code of Ordinances to reduce the City Council compensations from January 2018 to June 2018 by $1,000 a year.
