Regular City Council Meeting

Hi folks, it's 5.30, so we'll get started. A quorum being present of the City Council, I wanted to call tonight's March 9th, 2026 meeting to order. The first order of business is a roll call of members present.

Al-Zubi? Present. Vice Mayor Azeem? Present. Councilor Flaherty? Present. Councilor McGovern? Nolan, Councilor Simmons, Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler, Councilor Zusy, Mayor Siddiqui, you have nine members recorded as present.

Please join me in the pledge of allegiance and pause for a moment of silence. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Per Chapter 2 of the Acts of 2025, adopted by Massachusetts General Court and approved by the Governor, the City is authorized to use remote participation at meetings of the Cambridge City Council. In addition to having members of the Council participate remotely, we've set up Zoom teleconference with public comment. you can also view the meeting via the city's open meeting portal or on the city's cable channel 22 to speak during public comment you have to sign up at You can also email written comments for the record to the city clerk at cityclerk at cambridgema.gov.

We welcome your participation and you can sign up until 6pm. Please note that the City of Cambridge audio and video records this meeting and makes it available to the public for future viewing. In addition, third parties may also be audio and video recording this meeting. We'll move to public comment. Public comment may be made in accordance with the Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 30A, Section 20G, and City Council Rules 23D and 37. Once you finish speaking, the next speaker will be called. Individuals are not permitted to allocate the remainder of their time to other speakers. I ask that you state your name and address for the record and the item on the agenda you're speaking on. We have 18 speakers who have signed up. Each speaker will have three minutes.

Our first speaker is Nathan Hoffgen Harvey, followed by Marlene Lundberg. Nathan, three minutes. Nathan, if you can turn the mic on.

OK. Hello. My name is Nathan Hefkin Harvey. I live at 22 Haskell Street in Cambridge. I'm a graduate student at Boston University School of Social Work and a social work intern in Councilor McGovern's office. I'm here to voice my support for policy order number one. opposing the Department of Education's proposed reclassification of professional degrees. And policy order number two, recognizing March 2026 is National Social Work Month. Social workers work in many different spaces and serve in a variety of roles. For example, social workers make up the majority of the behavioral and mental health workforce in the United States. Social workers are also, among other things, case managers, academic researchers, community organizers, nonprofit leaders, grant writers, policy analysts, and even elected officials.

What unites all social workers are core values like service to those in need and the dignity and worth of all people. The Department of Education's proposed reclassification of professional degrees would exclude nursing, social work, and other helping professions. Professional degree candidates can borrow up to $50,000 annually in federal loans, while students who are not enrolled in professional degree programs are limited to borrowing $20,500 annually. Tuition for full-time master's social work programs in the Boston area range from $40,000 to almost $80,000 per year. Many low and moderate income people who want to pursue careers in social work won't be able to afford it under the Department of Education's proposed changes. The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects a deficit of 74,000 social workers per year for the next decade. The Department of Education's changes would only make the social worker deficit worse.

I ask that the council vote in favor of policy orders number one and two. Please oppose the Department of Education's damaging reclassification proposal and celebrate National Social Work Month. Thank you.

Our next speaker is Marlene Lundberg followed by Alex Marthews. Marlene. Marlene, you're unmuted. If you can please go ahead. Marlene is not speaking. We will go to Alex Matthews. Good evening. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Please go ahead. Marlene, you're unmuted. You have the floor, three minutes. We can't hear you right now. We're gonna skip Marlene and come back. Alex, Marlene?

Yes, Marlene, please go ahead. Nicole, if you can just mute her, we'll come back. Alex Matthews, you have the floor, three minutes.

Hi, my name is Alex Matthews. I am the volunteer chair of Digital Forth. For those who are new on the council, We are a local group of volunteer civil liberties interested people. We include attorneys, nerds, regular citizens, and we focus on issues of privacy and government surveillance and since 2012 we have worked with mainly Cambridge, Somerville and Boston and also on Beacon Hill to advise on privacy and government surveillance issues. I am here to speak on item number one on the city manager's agenda, the annual surveillance report. The good news for you all is that out of all the technologies that are on there we have no problem with 68 of them. On the other hand, there are eight that we have some questions about.

The first thing I'd like to emphasize is that as city councillors, you have full power annually to approve or disapprove of any surveillance technologies that are deployed by the city under the terms of the surveillance ordinance. The items that we are proposing that you revoke approval for this year are, one of them is a little bit of a formality, the automated license plate recognition because you guys already revoked the contract for flock safety. We propose revocation of authorization to deploy ShotSpotter and also the CCTV cameras at Central Square. We have extensive written testimony for you which we will be supplying by email after the meeting to go into the reasons for those proposals. There are two technologies that we believe need more information and auditing.

One of them is the city's partnership with BRIC, the Boston Regional Intelligence Center. and one is the Magnet Forensics cell phone intrusion technology. There are three technologies that need restrictions. The Cambridge PD's use of covert cameras, whether the police department should be permitted to use the Sprout social media surveillance software, and also some questions about where the data is going for the water department's automated meter readers. We look forward to working with the city on these issues and we look forward to consideration by the Public Safety Committee of the more controversial technologies among the many that are before you this evening. Thank you.

Thank you. We're going to go back to Marlene Lundberg, followed by Marilyn Meyer, then Young Kim. Marlene, you are unmuted. Please go ahead. Marlene, you don't need to press anything. Yes, please go ahead.

Can you hear me?

We can hear you.

All right. Good evening. My name is Marlene Lundberg. I live at 4 Canal Park, Cambridge. With respect to Wednesday's March 11th Ordinance Committee meeting, I am requesting some fine-tuning of the Cambridge Street zoning regulations. I strongly support the following. Number one and most important, careful expert review of any plans for bio labs. It is of utmost importance that the city reviews each bio lab's bio risk management to make sure it will safely control the handling, storage, and disposal of biological agents and toxins. There must be no bio labs as of right. Number two, annual reports on net counts of trees, retail space, market rate, and affordable housing. i.e.

the amount demolished and constructed for each of these. Number three, rear setbacks. 10 feet to allow for green plantings and small trees. Number four, height setbacks. 45 degrees on the south side of the street specifically 10 feet on the fifth and sixth floors and number five open space where ever possible to make the street more humane. In closing, I want to restate the importance of my first point. We must have careful review of any plans for BioLabs.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Marilee Meyer followed by Young Kim. Marilee, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

I'm Marilee Meyer, 10 Dana Street. Today's agenda reminds me of Council's priorities when it comes to passing pet projects. The goal is the final vote, not the comprehensive plan to get there. We saw this with certain councilors ignoring the zoning history and consequences of the Dover exemption as they solicited religious groups for multifamily zoning support. The multifamily zoning open Pandora's box showcasing religious and educational expansions into neighborhood. While this is a federal issue, Cambridge was exempt. Is there a viable pathway to amend guardrails for educational expansions? This needs to be looked into. The bigger issue now that both Mass Ave and Cambridge Street rezoning has been ushered through is what is lacking in critical discussion. The mode of operandi continues to be rapid approval and too little discussion before consequential votes.

One councilor touted at one point 83 amendments in the AHO proving that they do listen. But wouldn't it be better to fix all those details prior to the final vote? It is a waste of time. Cambridge Street addressed heights from eight stories to six stories as a singular check box. Ground floor use is up next. But what about labs, open space, setbacks, and design elements pushed off for later discussion? When Cambridge Street advocates wanted to continue these talking points, they were dismissed. Again, vote now, fix later. Perhaps the mantra of the ordinance committee, which seems to think that reexamining ongoing issue is tantamount to relitigation. These issues should have been resolved before the final vote, not after the coordinated push. This is not relitigation.

Next up, Central Square, where the same zoning councilors will again ignore crucial discussion. Council will continue to be the machine pushing through their agenda. I hope personal and civil engagement which tends to be lacking in these monumental citywide changes are taken seriously. Please resolve these ongoing issues for a better product. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Young Kim, followed by Susan Markowitz, then Shelly Rehman. Young, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

in the context of CMA number five. When you place the two agenda items side by side, What picture do you see? A picture of good governance or setting of dangerous precedent? The Council has asked the Coordinates Committee to include a description of additional items related to the Cambridge Street Zoning Amendment in the upcoming meeting. even though that amendment was adopted barely two months ago. EMA number five explains the reason. It states that during the Council's review of the Mass Ave and Cambridge Resorting Petitions, a policy order was submitted asking

have to return with the further zoning changes to strengthen requirements for active ground-flow uses. CTD is now prepared to discuss this recommendation and potentially draft a follow-up zoning amendment. This raises a serious and important question about questions. I will now adopt a major joining amendment with the expectation that an additional amendment will immediately follow before the effects and the impacts of the recent adopted changes have even been observed or evaluated. We saw something similar during the multi-family housing zoning discussion. That petition moved forward even though the additional zoning proposals affecting non-AA2 corridors and non-AA2 squares were already anticipated and waiting in the reading.

And we are seeing it again with the Mass Avenue Corridor Amendment. In fact, one developer was sufficiently constant that the amendment would be adapted to the community meeting of began Preliminary plans were developed and the planning board as far as we knew was within weeks of its adoption. Over the past few years, the city has adopted several significant zoning amendments, expansion of affordable housing overlay, the elimination of accessory parking requirements, and Quentin Rees-O'Neill along Mass Ave and Cambridge Street. Each of these changes has its own policy objectives, but when adopted,

Thank you very much. are already beginning to appear along Mass Avenue between Warehouse Street and Elway Parkway. We have a number of projects.

Thank you for your public comment, Young. Feel free to email us the remainder.

Our next speaker is Susan Markowitz, followed by Shelly Riemann, then Richard Krushnick. Susan, you have three minutes.

Hi, my name is Susan Markowitz. I live at 20 Oak Street. I'm speaking to Charter Right Number One. At the upcoming March 11th Ordinance Committee meeting about the Cambridge Street Ground Floor Act of Use, I'm urging you to also include discussion of the following Cambridge Street neighbors positions. 1. No labs as of right, in particular wet labs. 2. Rear setbacks of 10 feet in order to avoid weed infestation. 3. Step backs. A 10-foot step back above the fourth floor in buildings on the south side of the street and any additional setback from the sidewalk can then be subtracted from the 10 feet. 4. Open space adjacent to Miller's River Apartments should be rezoned as open space. Five, project review. One community meeting for buildings above three stories, two community meetings for buildings above four stories.

Six, annual reporting, market units created and destroyed, affordable units created and destroyed, annual retail created, annual street trees planted and destroyed and annual street trees that have died. These positions reflect what the Cambridge Street study called for, but unfortunately they were not discussed during the previous rapid approval process of the Cambridge Street upzoning petition in January. discussing them now does not mean approval, but it does mean consideration. Cambridge Street is one of the last unique neighborhood-focused streets, and many of us would like to preserve it. Hopefully with discussion, we can come up with a more fine-tuned zoning. And if there is not enough time to have this discussion at the next ordinance committee meeting, then I request that an additional meeting be scheduled. Thank you.

As an aside, my husband is number eight and his computer doesn't work. Is it possible for him to speak as number eight on my computer?

Yes, Susan, we'll call when we call him.

Thank you.

Our next speaker is Shelly Reimann followed by Richard Krushnick. Shelly, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Hi, this is Shelly Reimann. 201 Franklin Street in Cambridge. I'm speaking about the Cambridge Street upzoning and the upcoming Ordinance Committee meeting. The Cambridge Street Group of Neighbors are an inspiration to all Cantabrigians. They have met and flyered and reached out to neighbors and businesses all along Cambridge Street. The Aryan comes as many different cultures and lifestyles and groups who have varied native languages. What they all have in common is the right to be part of the decision-making processes that affect their lives in their specific vicinity, including East Cambridge, Miller's River, the area near the Galleria Mall, Webster Ave, the Valente Library and King Open School Complex, and Inman Square. The episode lacked community input and a democratic process. I'm running to ask that the reasonable concerns of the Cambridge Street neighbors be respected and that their priorities

are listened to at the meeting on the 11th, including regarding first floor uses. No wet labs, setbacks, and step backs should be addressed at that meeting. Inman Square is a wonderful historic square. More development there would ruin the tranquil yet purposeful feel of Inman Square. I live on Franklin Street, steps away from the Cambridge Central Square Library. We have a neighborhood feeling and identity here, even though there is so much bustle and activity in Central Square. Central Square could never be low-key or relaxed like Inman Square. It's a transportation hub. By definition, it is transient. I know Central Square Rezoning is the next big projects. Next big project. Residents will want to preserve what we can of the history and character of our neighborhood. We will have the Cambridge Street neighbors as inspiration and role model. We'll need that.

Thank you for all your work for the city we love.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Richard Krushnick, followed by Henry H. Wardus, then Lee Ferris. Richard, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Thank you. As a member of the Cambridge Street Neighbors group, you've heard several iterations of our I have a list of six priorities, so I of course also are mashing for the same thing. The caveat that there were two versions of the setbacks mentioned, I support the one that simply calls for a 10-foot setback above the fourth floor. and if there's a setback on the sidewalk that can be credited against the 10 feet on the fourth floor. These should be discussed now as requested and not kicked down the road and dealt with in a new petition in the Long-Term Planning Committee or failing that by a citizen's petition,

These other alternatives are just going to be more inefficient. They're going to take more of the council's time. It should be done as requested by us right now in a very efficient manner and it We've eliminated a lot of requests. We just have six that need to be discussed and it can easily be done in one meeting. So please do that. I would also like to speak regarding the proposed consolidation of housing offices into a single office. reflecting the position that's been adopted by the Cambridge Housing Justice Coalition. Activities that support individual tenants should not be folded into activities that develop and build housing.

We think the mission is really different enough that it should retain its separate identity. And we think that identity should be housed in a new Office of Housing Stability, mirroring many of the accomplishments that the similar offices in Boston and Somerville have accomplished. And that would not only continue the work in support of individual tenants that currently happens in our city, but it would add to that a research and public information function and advocacy for new policies to reduce displacement President. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Henry H. Wardis, followed by Lee Farris, then Gail Sharpens here. Henry, three minutes. Please go ahead.

Yes, Henry H. Werdes, 106 Berkshire Street, speaking on behalf of Our Revolution Cambridge. With respect to Cambridge Street, I just want to make one simple point. That is that there needs to be a series of updates perhaps at three-month intervals to let the council know whether as the result of rezoning there is an increase in the number of units available to low and modest income If instead the rezoning results in a continuous flow of displacement,

That is the loss of housing by destruction and rebuilding. Then it is up to the council to review It's rezoning and to reset the zoning parameters so that we do not achieve gentrification and displacement as a result of policies meant to increase affordable housing. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Lee Ferris. Lee, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good evening. I'm Leigh Farris on Norfolk Street in the Port. I'm speaking for the Cambridge Residence Alliance on the issue of what to discuss in the second Cambridge Street zoning petition. I live a block from Cambridge Street and I've gone to The Cambridge Residence Alliance appreciates that the Council lowered the heights to six floors along much of Cambridge Street in the We support adding requirements for active ground floor use as is going to happen in the next piece of zoning. In addition we joined with dozens of neighbors who would like to discuss other issues during this second piece of zoning.

Although we raised these concerns during comment on the previous petition, the council did not take up these issues and we see these as fine-tuning the previous zoning. We'd like the council to discuss these issues. Labs should not be allowed as of right. While labs are overbuilt now, there will be a time when developers want to build them again, and Cambridge Street would not benefit from having labs as of right. We think there should be six rear setbacks of 10 feet behind a building. People who live or work in the building would be able to use this open space, and the space should be permeable, not paved. the developer should hold a community meeting for input on a building over three floors and if there's over four floors there should be two public meetings because The taller building will have more impact.

On the south side of the street there should be a step back above the fourth floor. We'd like to see the space in front of Miller's River Apartments be open space, either through rezoning or deed restriction. We'd like to see the annual report of changes on Cambridge Street be required, as you've heard. In addition, the Residence Alliance thinks the city should proactively contact residential and commercial tenants when a building is sold to inform them of the We support the objectives and proposals of ECPT regarding active ground floor. If there's not enough time to have this discussion at the ordinance committee on Wednesday, then we'd like there to be an additional ordinance meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Gail Charpentier, followed by Dan Totten, then Beryl Lipton. Gail, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Thank you. My name is Gail Sharpentier. I live at 19 Murdoch Street in the Port, and I have lived there 37 years. I am a block. I also have a block from Cambridge Street and spend a lot of time walking through and supporting the businesses in that unique Land . I join other city residents in the following. to have the Ordinance Committee at its next meeting discuss all the pertinent issues in the second upzoning petition regarding Cambridge Street upzoning. I support the Council's goal of active ground floor use, but this petition fails to address critical issues that many Cambridge Street residents have raised during the previous rapid approval process in January.

These issues have already been described, but I'll quickly say the labs, we should not have them as of right. OpenSpace, as has been described, Setbacks, Stepbacks, and others. I join other residents in wanting to discuss these issues at the next Ordinance Committee hearing March 11th. If there is not enough time at that meeting, I call for an additional ordinance committee meeting to be scheduled to discuss these issues, which are urgent for the Cambridge Street neighborhood. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Dan Totten, followed by Beryl Lipton, then Helen Walker. Dan, three minutes. Please go ahead.

Yes, hi, thanks. My name is Dan Totten, 54 Bishop Allen Drive. I do want to start by saying I support some of the elements of Councilor Zusy's order about Cambridge Street, especially the piece around not allowing as of right biotech development. And I hope that the council can find an appropriate forum for that discussion. I also want to talk about social housing since it's on the agenda twice tonight. I've been a part of the team that has been working on this for years through the Cambridge Housing Justice Coalition. It felt like a major breakthrough last September when the previous city council unanimously adopted such a clear and specific policy order. Then we had a hearing in December which we were told at the time could only happen if city staff did not need to be present because they didn't have the capacity. Now we've reached the report back date from the policy order six months later and we've been presented with a vague timeline in which nothing will happen for two more months and then It doesn't exactly inspire confidence that anything's going to happen before the end of the year. It kind of feels like we're kicking the can.

I do appreciate that Central Square seems to be proceeding a great deal more thoughtfully. As a resident of the district, I can attest that myself and many of my neighbors are concerned about what the upzoning will mean for our ability to remain in the city. This isn't West Cambridge or even Mid-Cambridge. There are still a lot of working class renters just trying to hang on on my street. Come hang out on my block if you don't believe me. Another existential concern about Central Square is the fact that all of the cultural institutions and nightlife spots are located on large one-story parcels The exact kind of parcel that would be developed under the rezoning. They are sitting ducks. I'm not against trying to find a way to build more housing in the square at 20% inclusionary. But do we care about having a cultural district? And don't tell me that we're going to get there through the Cambridge redevelopment authorities process. That is yet another process coming out of nowhere, blindsiding the neighborhood based on a study that had minimal community engagement. We can't rely exclusively on the public lots to keep the cultural district thriving.

Finally, I just want to say I support a compromise of two minutes on public comment Unless there are a large number of people signed up, I believe Boston switches down to two minutes at 80 people, which is largely in line with what we have. One minute is challenging and benefits people like me, who have experience giving public speaking. So it actually has the opposite effect of The intent, some people have said, oh, public comment's not inclusive, but if you lower it down to one minute, you make it even less inclusive. I'll give up the remainder of my 40 seconds to show that I'm bought into the two minutes as a compromise. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Beryl Lipton, followed by Helen Walker, then Phyllis Bretholtz. Beryl, three minutes. Please go ahead.

Thank you. Good evening. Beryl Lipton, Oak Street, Inman Square. I am here to also have a conversation about zoning on Cambridge Street as part of the forthcoming discussion related to first floor retail. I mentioned previously to the council that I had submitted a public record for More details and data related to the previous petition for zoning on Cambridge Street. And this was because I understand data and details and the records and...

The information that is being used to create some of these proposals and it is a bit frustrating that after having paid the fee limiting the request to only the economic analyses that would have included affordable housing, would have included any economic analyses related to first floor retail. and paying $150 after two months. As you know, public records laws exist.

Beryl, we've lost your audio. Beryl? We're going to go to the next speaker. Beryl has a minute and 36 seconds. We'll try to come back to her at the end. Our next speaker is Helen Walker, followed by Phyllis Bretholz, then John Pitkin. Helen, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Can you hear me?

We can. Please go ahead.

Helen Walker, 43 Linnean Street. Thank you for the chance to speak on Cambridge Street zoning and on institutional use regulations. We all want to get these right. Regarding lamps as of right, our Cambridge Street says, limit certain types of land use on Cambridge Street. Remember, a BSL-3 lab is suitable for work with agents that may cause seriously or potentially lethal disease through inhalation. that doesn't belong next to six stories of apartments, especially since it will be lower, exhausting up toward the apartments, and the mechanical system will be very noisy. What about that rear setback of none for six-story buildings? CDD's June 2025 presentation to housing and neighborhood long-term planning said, Rear setbacks are used to transition from the main street to the neighborhood, and it gave that number specifically as 10 feet. So how did 10 feet become none? What kind of transition is that?

What kind of use or privacy? In the future, are you planning to regularly paint and caulk the cement fiber panels by staging over the neighbor's property and trees? Then what about CDD's June 2025 narrative? Good Main Streets have some scattered open spaces like pocket parks and plazas. There's even a photo called View of Miller's River Apartments Set Back from Cambridge Street. That's one little open space, maybe the only one since the zoning requires no open space for six-story buildings. Please protect this particular one by rezoning it as open space. We also need to consider the unfinished business of institutional use regulations. It's okay to edit to conform with state language, but we're not done. We need to follow the planning board advice to secure agreement from our institutions to concentrate growth within existing campuses and to provide more student housing.

or we need a new home rule petition regarding a new exemption from the Dover Amendment. Never forget that the new Harvard House system and Peabody Terrace evicted over 300 families. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Phyllis Bretholtz, followed by John Pitkin, then Jacob Brown. Phyllis, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Good evening. Let me begin by saying to the city councilors and Mayor Siddiqui that I'm very appreciative of the fact that you have already lowered the heights of buildings on Cambridge Street, and that is of significant, mostly to six stories, and I'm very appreciative of that. I'm also speaking to the issue of the second Cambridge Street zoning petition and I'm urging you to include in your discussion the following points which were not taken up in during the Council's previous Council discussion. I also want to acknowledge that having been given the Charter writing, this gave some of us an opportunity to think a little more deeply about some of the issues that we're concerned with.

So number one is that no labs should be allowed as of right since this would do nothing to increase housing which we sorely need. On the south side of Cambridge Street, there should be a step back above the fourth floor with a 45 degree angle to reduce the shadow cast and the impact on neighboring streets and homes because it will be dramatically impacted by the taller buildings. The space in front of Miller River's apartments should absolutely be preserved as open space through rezoning or deed restrictions. Our seniors, I among them, though I don't live in those apartments, deserve an open space, and that's becoming less available all over the city.

There should be rear setbacks of 10 feet behind buildings, and it's critical that it should be permeable, not paved, so people who live or work there can use this space. It's very important that the developer should hold a community meeting for input on a building over three floors, and if the building is over four floors, There should be two community meetings since the taller building will have a greater impact. And I'm also very aware that when I walked along Cambridge Street a few weeks ago and talked to the managers and owners of many of the buildings. They had heard nothing yet of the plans for the street. An annual report of changes on Cambridge Street should be required, including both affordable housing units and market-based units.

Those have been created and those that have been taken down. Any active first floor space that's been created or destroyed and all the street trees that have been planted or destroyed. I'm very appreciative of this opportunity to address these issues. Thank you very much.

Thank you. Our next speaker is John Pitkin, followed by Jacob Brown, then Gary Mello. John, you have three minutes.

Good evening. My name is John Pitkin. I live at 18 Fayette Street. I'm speaking about the Cambridge Street rezoning. Cambridge Street is a unique neighborhood-focused street, and many residents would like to preserve this character. A neighborhood street is a microcosm of America. And I urge you to remember how Jesse Jackson described America. It is not, he said, like a blanket, one piece of unbroken cloth, the same color, the same texture, the same size. America, and I say Cambridge Street, is more like a quilt Many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven and held together by a common thread.

The white, the Hispanic, the black, the Arab, the Jew, the woman, the Native American, the business person, the environmentalist, the peace activist, the young, the old, the gay, and the disabled make up the American quilt. And so is Cambridge Street. It's a microcosm of America. The two-year Cambridge Street Study was a community effort to find a common thread, to hold the neighborhood quilt together. With your discussion, In consideration of the study's recommendations, hopefully we can come up with zoning that does this.

Our next speaker is Jacob Brown. Jacob, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Hi, can everyone hear me?

We can.

Please go ahead. Hi, my name is Jacob Brown. I live on Magazine Street in Cambridge. I just wanted to talk about I guess charter right number three and the proposed upcoming restructuring of the housing department and obviously the homeless services um I just wanted to upon that I guess yes I I believe that with this restructuring and the change that it entails and the potential efficiency it entails, just to emphasize that this also represents an opportunity to change the structure of how we view housing as Thank you for joining us today. obviously done by I guess just Yeah, this is something that could be done through increased programs for social housing.

And I think that this restructuring is a chance to really put the city's emphasis on a social housing forward policy. I believe that with the housing department restructuring into, I guess, affordable rental programs and home ownership programs that a potential pillar of this could be specifically a department of social housing underneath this restructure. and that by continuing with this Yeah, I think that it would just be a great opportunity to show that the city cares about providing better things for its citizens. Furthermore, I think just that the current timeline of study for social housing is something that could be moved up and that I I would just love to emphasize that it is something that obviously is an urgent need in the city and I would just love to see that Cambridge is able to emphasize in the structure of its very government that it's capable of and willing to

provide social housing for its residents as something that's tenant managed. Thank you so much for your time. And yeah, I yield my time.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Gary Mello, followed by Heather Hoffman. Gary, you have three minutes.

Good evening, folks. My name is Gary Mello, and I live on Franklin Street. You guys don't see a whole lot of me. I'm not really interested in the broad range of topics. And tonight's comments largely repeat old stuff I last raised years ago. CD Manager's item number two is the annual pat yourself on the back multiple AAA bond ratings. While there are some vulgar terms for that ritual, let's just settle for self-gratification. A AAA bond rating is indeed important as an indicator of markets' confidences in our creditworthiness. It is not uncommon. Plenty of municipalities qualify. Boston is AAA bond rated, so is Summerville. New York City, which is a basket case, is a notch and a half below. Still impressed? What irks me is the suggestion that Cambridge is recognized by three major agencies. These ratings aren't earned, they're paid for, and that expense runs into six figures serving only redundant purposes. One is plenty. A municipal bond rating is kind of like your own personal FICO score.

If your bank gives you a complimentary FICO from, let's say, Experian, do you then run out and pay TransUnion and Equifax just to puff out your chest with three identical numbers? So this year, instead of congratulating the city manager for being one of only 27 cities dumb enough to waste the money for the triple-triple, let's have him commission Dun & Bradstreet, The Kroll Agency, and Egan Jones Reports for another $100,000. Think about it. We'll be the only city in America with six, yes, six AAA bond ratings with nothing worthwhile for the effort. P.S. No sneaking the parking sticker thing in tonight. That goes to committee.

Thank you. Our next speaker is Heather Hoffman, followed by Mark Truant. Heather, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Hello, Heather Hoffman, 213 Hurley Street. I'm going to start with the lawsuit settlement. I hope that the city council will not approve any payment until the Thank you very much. and so many other things, housing and zoning and all of these things. It seems to me that the city council has decided that efficiency is the great thing that it should chase. and that good governance should always give way to what it considers efficiency. Cutting off public comment because it's inefficient to listen to the great unwashed. Cutting off

consideration of what proposed legislation is based on and what it is expected to produce and then determining whether it actually did produce that. you know it just cuts off the string of wins you pack something you move on it's efficient I think that every last one of you is better than that and I would be thrilled if you would prove it to me. With respect to the AAA bond rating, I am always amazed at the notion that Cambridge exercises fiscal discretion when you're spending $7 million on linear park and various other things that all of us could name.

I guess they don't talk to people like me. People before me have said, What needs to be said on Cambridge Street. You were ever so efficient. You got your win at the last minute. And you just do not want that interfered with. Even though you knew that you had moved forward on something that needed amending. I don't see that as efficient, but I'm me and you're the elected. Now with respect to the housing and zoning priorities, I want to read you something. Inclusionary housing. CDD is engaged with a consultant who is working on a new nexus study and feasibility assessment in order to evaluate the inclusionary housing requirement and recommend possible changes. Funny thing that none of that

was thought about before you passed all of these upzonings, assuring yourselves and the public that inclusionary zoning was perfect and you didn't need to think about that because we were going to get that stuff.

Really? Thank you. Our final speaker is Mark Truitt. Mark, you have three minutes. Please go ahead.

Hi, good evening. Mark Truant, Warren Street in Cambridge, where I've lived with my family for 40 years now. about Cambridge Street. Werner Gumpertz, an MIT professor and founder of STH, a world-renowned engineering consulting firm, once said, There always seems to be time to fix problems afterwards, but never time to design things correctly up front. We always seem to find the time afterwards to fix them, and we have to fix them. His firm was frequently hired to repair buildings that leaked so badly people couldn't inhabit them, failures that took years and millions of dollars to fix. I worry we are seeing a similar pattern with the Cambridge Street upzoning ordinance.

As enacted, it shows a striking lack of understanding of scale, form, and the relationship between buildings and open space, the things that truly make a city livable. If you would, just for a moment, picture yourself standing on Cambridge Street. If all of you know where the railroad tracks across Cambridge Street, where the Grand Junction hopefully will be, the walkway. and look towards Lechmere. And what you'll see is 75 foot high continuous walls stretching More than half a mile to Lechmere on both sides of the street with no open space in sight. That's the outcome of the zoning that has been enacted.

And some buildings along the way will be taller than 75 feet. Down by Lechmere, but also if people build with H-H-O guidelines. So you're, and to give you a point of reference, because I don't know how many of you know or know many buildings that are 75 feet tall. But at the head of Cambridge Street, Cambridge Street and Quincy, running between Broadway and Quincy, is what was the Sackler Museum at Harvard. I don't think it's a museum anymore. and that building is 75 feet tall so that could give you some point of reference it was also designed by a world-class architect who

did some things with the building to reduce the scale and effect of the mass. It also is a building that runs between Cambridge and Broadway, so it's very long that way, which in most of Cambridge Street.

Thank you for your public comment.

Thank you, Mr. Truong. Your time has expired. Please email the remainder of your comment. We're going to go back to Beryl, who is joining us in person. Beryl, you had about a minute and a half left. Please go ahead.

Hello, thank you so much for letting me have the remainder of my time so I could run over here. As I said, I would like my records. I already paid for them. I asked for the economic analyses. It seems like they should have included things related to first floor retail and I think it would be helpful for the conversation if we could have a better understanding of how those things are and aren't being considered. I don't much like having to be in an antagonistic relationship with my city and I would just like to have some detail with which we can all be having a sort of common conversation. As I said previously, I didn't really have a problem with heights from the first petition. It was sort of the problem with how everything was coming together. And I do want to point out that what we do have from our Cambridge Street proposal did really highlight how important first floor retail was to everybody. Those pictures did have setbacks.

and I fully support the idea of collecting more data so that as we go on and have more of these conversations, we can actually be looking at how progress is being tracked I think that would be really helpful. I've said it before, I'll say it again. I do think that slow is smooth and smooth is fast and I would like to see more affordable housing in this city and I'd like to see it in a way that we can all be proud of. So, thank you.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. That is all that we're signed up to speak.

Thank you to those who've spoken at public comment. We'll now go ahead and on a motion by Councilor Nolan to close public comment. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against? Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. Public comment is now closed. We'll move on to the submission of the record. There are two sets of minutes. City Council minutes of November 24, 2025. and minutes of the special meeting of the City Council on December 17, 2025 on a motion by Councilor McGovern to place these two sets of minutes on file. All those in favor say aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. Those records have been accepted and placed on file. There are no reconsiderations. In the few minutes we have left, we'll go ahead to the city manager's agenda items and poll which items that you'd like to poll. So pleasure of the city council.

Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler and then Councilor Nolan.

Number six.

Sobrinho-Wheeler, polls number six. Councilor Nolan?

Number two, three, and four.

Number two, three, and four. Pleasure of the city council. Al-Zubi.

Through you, Madam Chair, I'll pull one and five.

All right, we've pulled all the items. Since we only have three minutes left, I guess we can go quickly to number one. Usually the action is to refer this to... Zubi.

Yeah, thank you. Through you, Madam Mayor, according to our surveillance ordinance, we, as you said, we're required to hold a hearing on this report by the end of May, so I'll be planning to hold a hearing by late May in the Public Safety Committee on technologies that counselors and our community members wish to discuss from the report. And I will also notify My colleagues in advance of the hearing to submit any questions about the technologies that you care about or want to discuss in the committee so that we can ensure efficient use of staff time. I will also note that I'll be intending to hold a standalone meeting on ShotSpotter, otherwise known as also, I believe, Sound Thinking because that is a topic of significant community interest. I'll yield.

Any other comments on this before we go ahead and refer this item? Hearing none, on a motion by Councilor Al-Zubi to refer city manager agenda item number one, to the Public Safety Committee for a hearing. We'll go ahead. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. City Manager Agenda Item Number 1 is referred. So the time is almost 6.30 and so at 6.30 we will be moving to our... Next public hearing. So we'll come back to items two, which were pulled by Councillor Nolan. She pulled two, three, and four. No. 5 was pulled by Councilor Al-Zubi, and then No. 6 was pulled by Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler. So, packed agenda, City Manager's agenda after, but now, with the time almost being 6.30,

We will go ahead and switch to this public hearing of the City Council momentarily. So the time of 6.30 having arrived, the city council will recess the regular city council meeting and move to the public hearing. Persuade to Article 5, Section 5-1 of the Charter of the City of Cambridge to consider the recommendation of the City Manager, Ian Huang, on the reorganization of the Housing Department. to consolidate city housing and homeless service programs currently provided across three city departments into one city department and resume the regular city council meeting immediately following. We'll do a roll call to recess.

Al-Zubi, Vice Mayor Azeem, Councilor Flaherty, Councilor McGovern, Councilor Nolan, Councilor Simmons, Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler, Councilor Zusy, Yes, Mayor Siddiqui? Yes. Yes, and you have nine members recorded in the affirmative.

We are adjourned. So we've adjourned from the public hearing. We're going to go back to our regular scheduled programming for the city manager agenda. We have items 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 to get to. It's almost 7.30 as a time check, so we'll go ahead to city manager agenda item number 2.

I think I present.

We'll go ahead before we do that. We'll do a roll call moving in back to the city council.

Assuring a quorum. Councilor Al-Zubi?

Present.

Present. Vice Mayor Azeem?

Present.

Present. Councilor Flaherty? Present, Councilor McGovern. Present. Present, Councilor Nolan. Present. Present, Councilor Simmons. absent, Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler, present, Councilor Zusy, present, Mayor Siddiqui, present, and you have eight members recorded as present and one recorded as absent.

We are going to city manager agenda item number two, a communication transmitted from Ian Huang, city manager relative to the city of Cambridge, retaining its AAA rating from the nation's three major credit rating agencies. Councilor Nolan, you have the floor.

Thank you Mayor Siddiqui and through you to the staff. Thanks so much for these reports. Great news overall. Solid ratings. It continues our track record. I also want to highlight and thank the staff and appreciate the refinancing of the debt, which saved $2 million. I noticed that in the reports. And also I want to note that the key element of strength to remind us all as we enter this budget season is the availability of our funds including restricted funds which are supposed to represent the benchmark is about 35% of budget but also the unrestricted funds about 10% and we do meet those goals but it is critical to their rating which of course then reduces our Barring costs, which is one reason we were able to save $2 million. So I just, as we tie this all together, I think it's important for us in this, we're going to enter a fairly challenging budget time that we're

We're doing great but we have to continue these. It's the one area where I think the city can be proud to be a little bit conservative. I'm very happy to have confirmation that we're in a strong position. And yet, having read through some of the reports, there are some notes of caution. Notably, pension in our OPEB and debt service are areas for monitoring and caution. It is raised in all of the reports that it's kind of within some parameters that are set and yet it's something that is higher than some many other municipalities and similarly situated cities. Given that, that those are the items that I picked out, and we know that, the debt service is because we do phenomenal work, and yet we do need to, and our own plans are to make sure that that doesn't blow up further. Are any actions or contemplated reviews or changes being considered to ensure that those elements in particular are taken care of and don't cause us to have an even more challenging budget season?

Because as we know, our projections are on just a A pretty steady state, not even the worst case. We're going to have very large increases in our tax rates again next year. So any comments on those particular ones? And then I have one more question. Through you, Mayor Siddiqui.

CFO Spinner?

Yes. Through you, Mayor, thank you, Councilor Nolan, for your comments and your questions. I think I mostly want to say that I'm going to ask Budget Director Taha to share a few words, but Each year when the city goes through this process, it's an extremely rigorous process that we go through to pull information together and to prepare both for our meetings with the rating agencies, But also to pull together all of the information that we have to pull together in order to put together a bond sale using our bond council and putting out an official statement. And so I do want to first appreciate all of the work that the community development department, the assessing department, the budget department, the finance department does to do this each year because I think it is important for us in order to continue to be able to invest in our infrastructure.

The fact that we both continue to get our AAA ratings, which contributes or is fully responsible for how low of an interest rate that we get. and in fact this year with our true interest rate of you know just below 2.2 percent the lowest interest rate that we've actually had since 2021 I think was really a great result for us. And as you mentioned, we had made a decision because we were able to refund Some older debt and the fact that by, you know, refunding or essentially refinancing that, we were able to save $2 million in future interest costs on that.

So with that I think I'll turn it to Mr. Jennings to sort of talk about some of those items that the rating agencies actually particularly noticed. about our financial management that really has resulted in these ratings.

Thank you. And through you, Madam Mayor, to Councilor Nolan, you got it exactly right in terms of the messaging that we got back from the rating agencies. I'd like to always point out that we don't budget to get a AAA rating, but we get a AAA rating because of how we budget and how we manage our finances. The rating agencies really look at criteria related to the local economy, the city's management, our financial situation, including our reserves, and our debt burden. and getting the ratings is really a strong outside objective opinion about the city's financial strength, our financial stability and planning, our policies that we have in place. and notably our ability to withstand outside factors and economic factors that a lot of times are not in our direct control.

And I think we've seen, especially in this current environment, are really important. and there are some benefits that come along with getting a AAA rating. As Ms. Spinner noted, we can borrow money at lower rates. and it really demonstrates our fiscal discipline and sends a strong message that the city is really a safe and reliable investment overall. and I think include it also you know provides it validates our position as a fiscal leader and that can a lot of times translate into other areas as well just in terms of being at the forefront and how we're doing things. to your question about some of the items that the rating agencies noted as areas to watch moving forward. We're familiar with these areas. We understand the potential for impacts related to things like pension liability, OPEB, our debt burden.

and I think you'll see, as you have over the last couple of years, more communication and collaboration with the Council as we look to address some of these issues and come up with strategies looking forward. But again, we're very proud of the ratings that we received. It does take a lot of work, but I think, you know, it's a team kind of effort. It's city council, it's management. It's the departments and it's even community buy-in on the importance of being strong and fiscally sound. because that's really what's allowing us to make the kinds of investments that we do in the city that we're all very proud of.

Nolan. Thank you, yes, and approve all of that hard work that went into it and yet also both pension and OPEB and debt service are Some of those items that have been noted as ones that are slightly above what we would want, and I know, for instance, with I think it was the pension or OPEB, we actually extended the timeline, and that gave us a and Ability in our budget over the last few years. However, that just puts it off. That's the unfunded liability across the Commonwealth. I know we're not the only ones. We're ahead of some, but we're also and ours is so large it's really important to keep that in mind. So I appreciate that we're watching it closely and certainly we stand here to work with you to address that in the future. The other question I had about any assessment of how the rating agencies understand the risk for our financial future, it was noted of course that

We have really strong underlying financials, and yet it was also the concentration of our economic engines is viewed as a credit challenge. Five years ago, it might have been a strength because who was going to attack higher education or biotech? And this year, everybody knows that financially there's a big attack on exactly those two of our strongest economic drivers. And also one of the other areas of risk that was noted was the environmental risk, that it's something that affects us directly, the hurricanes and the weather changes, which would be very relevant to our planning. are capital investments in sewers and climate resilience. That's also noted that that is something of a risk. So in those areas, just what's the summary of the assessment of how the rating agencies understood those because I think while they've been mentioned in the past particularly that environmental risk has just gotten more and more challenging and worse and we know for sure the economic engines

has changed because the entire economy and economic conditions for our two largest sectors, higher education and biomedical, have changed pretty dramatically since the last time. So any thoughts or... Again, rating agencies' comments on that that we should know. And then that was my second question, and I will yield.

Through you, Mayor Siddiqui, to you, Councilor Nolan, thank you for the question. And maybe the city manager will chime in as well. But I think the overall tenor of our conversation with the three rating agencies, because we were very forthcoming in our own presentation of data, about what has happened in this moment of a commercial softening in the region and in our community as well. But also noting the overall strength of the local economy is still there. and Harvard and MIT are significant institutional anchors in our community. We have very high per capita income, very high education. very high education of our population.

In addition still a lot of economic activity happening in Cambridge. and so as development is slowing down, one of the things that we noted is that some of the slowdown of the development leaves that space for some of that Vacancy to get absorbed, so the market responding in some ways and allowing us to absorb. And so yes, while there is a caution where we have labs being one of the most significant sectors, For me, I felt that the tenor of the conversation and even in the reports, not a great deal of concern, you know, something to keep an eye on. But I think that one of the things that they really noted was how the city

is planning and doing our own analysis based on some of those potential weaknesses and macroeconomic headwinds that we're facing and the fact that we're working together to put in place those budget targets that we have in our real estate. and others, property tax targets, in order to conserve that excess property tax levy that we have, duly noted, I think, in all of the rating. As well as doing things like beginning to pull back on some of our capital expenditures in order to slow down our debt. I think it was definitely noted, you know, we have such strong financial policies and procedures. So I think the upside of that was a real acknowledgement that the city's

Financial Management, and overall management, right? Overall team management, because that is one of the things that they note as well, is strong and we are looking ahead in our planning.

We'll move to Councilor Nolan.

Do you have a question? Yeah, it was part of the old one, the environmental risk.

Through you, Mayor Siddiqui. Yeah, just in terms of the environmental risk, I think one of the things that every year we talk to them about are things that we're doing in terms of protecting the community in terms of climate change. And that comes both in terms of the planning that Claire talked a little bit about. When you think about the flood viewer, you think about the resilient zoning that the council passed. Those are really critical ways that we're protecting the community, protecting new development, protecting existing residents. We also, when we're talking and overviewing the capital programs that we're doing, This year, one of the big pieces of work that we're funding is in the port. And that work is being led by the fact that that is our most vulnerable neighborhood

in terms of flooding and so it is a priority investment area in terms of our capital program and similarly with the combined sewer overflows, River Street and a number of our other capital programs so both on The planning side and the capital implementation side, we're really talking about how do we make our community more resilient to climate change, less susceptible to heavy flooding. And so that is a theme that comes out. both in the presentations and the conversations that we're doing with each of the rating agencies and it is sort of a fundamental piece of the work and I think it does lead to the fact that people are really being thoughtful about these risks and working to decrease the risk to the community.

We'll go to Councilor Zusy and two questions and then we can go again. Go ahead.

OK, thank you, Chair Siddiqui. Fantastic work. I feel very lucky that our finances are so ably managed and have been for so long. So I thank you for your leadership. I wanted to ask, so what is the total amount of our debt now? So we've had before our new obligations, we had $694,000. Thank you. Thank you. to refinance. So the number I came up with was just over $750 million in debt. Is that right? Because somewhere in here it listed... listed as 800 million, but if we were refinancing old debt, wouldn't we be at like 750?

I'm going to ask, through you, Mayor Siddiqui, I'm going to ask Deputy Finance Director Michelle Kincaid to speak to it. But you are right that essentially The refinance debt is not new debt. We only borrowed 110 in new debt. Zusy, and I think perhaps was that in one of the rating agency?

Councilor Zusy? In one of the reports, it lists the debt at $800 million, but I thought it was $750.

Through you, Mayor Siddiqui, I mean, I think probably it's helpful. There's a snapshot in time in terms of how much direct debt we have. I think that's about $700 million in 2025, which is the latest number. In terms of when we come and authorize additional debt, from the conversation we were having about capital in the last finance committee, I think we just want to also Note, there's debt that we authorize that we can then go out on the market to borrow. But then exactly the process of issuing bonds is what ends up adding to the total direct debt. And then as we move out over time, some of it is that we're taking on new debt, but we're also paying off existing debt. So that $700 million is also coming down as we pay off some of the bonds that are now at the end of their 10 years.

So there's a bit of a cascade in terms of as we ramp up on new projects but those older projects were paying off. So I would probably say we just have to figure out like which date you want and then we can kind of give you the number. But trying to calculate sort of forward in terms of new debt we're taking on, you'd have to also get the number of debt that we're paying down, which we'd have to look up.

OK, I'd love to know that number. And as Councilor Nolan was saying, Yeah, I also was noting that we're doing a great job, but people are concerned about our level of debt, and they also are concerned about our pension and OPEB obligations. And in the... Not the Moody's. I don't even know.

Do you mind speaking into the mic?

Yeah, I will speak to the mic. On page 124 it says, and maybe you can help me understand this better, so it says the city's net OPEB liability... of $728 million was 6% funded as of fiscal 2025 and represents 5% of personal income. I don't know exactly what that means. Maybe you can help me understand it. It sounds a little scary to me if we have a liability of $728 million and it's only 6% funded. And I know this is something that you've been... Watching carefully, but I know we have a very generous pension program, we have generous salaries, we have a generous pension program, but I wonder if in the long term that's something we'll need to be thinking more about. Zusy.

So OPEB stands for Other Post-Employment Benefits. and so essentially that so the three things that they note there of our long-term liabilities Debt, which we are talking here about. And the number is approximately $800 million in debt now that we have added the $110 million. City Manager says as we get to the end of FY26. So 694 was the amount of debt that we had as of June 30th, 2025. And as you know, our debt service payment this year is $109 million, of which $75 million of that approximately is actually principal. So we are paying off principal every year. and then we're adding some debt and so I think that in terms of our long-term liabilities, debt is obviously a significant one.

We have very strong debt policies around there in terms of how much We want to be paying off at any one time as a percentage, our debt service as a percentage of our operating budget. And we have very strong policies in terms of how quickly we retire our debt. So typically at this point we have a policy that says we retire Seventy percent of our debt within 10 years of borrowing it. And at this moment, actually, the rate at which we are retiring our debt is about, I think, around 85 percent of our debt is retired within 10 years. So that lets you know that any year we are paying off debt very aggressively, even as we are borrowing more to continue to invest in our infrastructure. So that's one piece.

Then we have our pension liability that Councilor Nolan noted that we did in this past year change our Our funding plan has us fully funding our pension liability. by 2029. So the plan is that by 2029 we are fully funded in our pension liability, meaning that our pension fund will have enough assets To essentially be self-supporting to support our retirees' payments, essentially.

Yeah, fantastic, and we can talk later. Because I was confused by on page 109, this is in the Moody's rating report, it lists the... It lists the debt, and then it lists other long-term liabilities. And it lists $592,709. So that doesn't relate to pension.

The third piece is this other post-employment benefits. Beyond our pension system, we also have obligations for the health insurance of our retirees. And so that OPEB is our liability related to our health insurance obligations, our long-term health insurance obligations to our retirees. And so we have been making some modest investments in moving towards funding that. Our long-term plan is as we hit our fully funded point with our pension system, it is to move some of the funding that we have been putting into getting our pension system fully funded

Then we will start moving those funds into trying to get our OPEB liability funded to bring down that long term liability. So we have this overall plan both in debt Pension, and OPEB to basically address all of those liabilities.

Thank you so much for clarifying that. So anyway, I'm glad that you're planning for that. And yeah, that makes me nervous. Thank you. I yield.

Other questions from the body? Councilor Flaherty.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, and through you. One question, two parts. Ms. Spinner, how important... in your estimation was the excess tax levy to the bond rating and secondly What is the obstacle, if there is any, to refinancing a larger portion of our debt?

I. Question number one, through you, Mayor Siddiqui, to Councilor Flaherty. I think it is a very important part of our overall Higgins, and others. We talk a lot about free cash. They don't call it free cash in the rating agency or in our financial, but those are our unassigned fund balances. So both of those things are extremely important. In terms of refinancing, it's pretty technical. Once we borrow the money, we can't just immediately refinance anything. There are terms in our borrowing. And as there comes a moment at some point several years in, I would have to ask Deputy Finance Director to give us the specifics.

But at each moment that we have an older bond that is available for refunding, we take a look at it. To see if it makes sense for us to include it in our bond sale. It costs us a little bit of money to reborrow money. There is financing costs, as I am sure we are all aware of when we borrow for our own homes. And so we do that analysis on an annual basis to make a decision if there is any old debt that is eligible for refunding and if it makes sense for us to do it in that year.

Councilor Flaherty.

I just congratulate you on the refinancing interest rate you were able to obtain for the city. That's exceptional.

Vice Mayor Azeem.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. So I forgot what number we settled on for the debt. What was the current rate?

Do you, Mayor Siddiqui, go ahead.

The total debt number.

It is approximately $800 million, including going back to where we were on June 30, 2025, and adding the new issue.

So my understanding, because I had many curious questions, I think my first time around about the AAA bond rating as well, is that the reason to get it from three agencies is that different lenders will use different agencies as metrics. or Baselines, is that correct?

I don't think that's the way it works. I think that it is when we have triple A ratings from all three rating agencies. It actually results overall in our having an overall lower rate. And while it does cost us a little more to go to three different rating agencies, It is also just a long-term beneficial for the city to get the absolute lowest rate each time we go out to the market to borrow.

Got it. And that's basically because even if we saved like 0.01%, that's like $80,000 a year because our debt is so large. Got it. All right. I just wanted to clarify that up. Thank you.

Any other questions on this from the body? Yes, Councilor Al-Zubi.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, and thank you for all this information. I actually just want to leave this with a comment on the framework here, because as we praise the rating, I just want to... reflect on not forgetting our vulnerable community members. Many of us attended the first day listen forum hosted by the Cambridge Economic Opportunity Commission, which was a very insightful and productive event. And that night, we heard from a vulnerable community member talk about how food insecurity makes it very hard for her to feed her family. And when we talk about physical responsibility, we're talking about her and her son going hungry. Our AAA bond rating is a testament to our community's success. But the question I'm holding is, what does that success mean if it comes at the cost of our neighbors going without food or shelter? The purpose, in my opinion, of strong finances is to ensure a dignified life for all of our residents and not necessarily to protect

a rating from the judgment of for-profit credit agencies because when we adequately serve our residents, we will also attract more investment if anything. I'll yield.

Any other comments, questions from the body before we go ahead and place this on file? Hearing none, we'll go ahead on a motion by Councilor Nolan to place city manager agenda item number two on file. All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Those against say no. The ayes have it. City Manager Agenda Item 2 is placed on file. We now move on to City Manager Agenda Item 3. Nguyen, Transmitting a communication from City Manager Yan Huang relative to the 2025-2026 Green Jobs Initiative report. Councilor Nolan?

Thank you. Before I just ask my question, since some of the staff is new, it might be good through you, Mayor Siddiqui, to have the city manager introduce the fabulous green jobs team.

Thank you so much. Through you, Mayor Siddiqui, I would like to introduce Assistant Director Walsh and Director Mintz. Maybe, do you want to introduce yourselves?

Hello, we're so happy to be here. I'm Sue Walsh. I'm the Assistant Director for Adult and Family Services for the Department of Human Service Programs.

And I'm Susan Mintz. I'm Director of the City's Office of Workforce Development.

And then Miss Arellano. We are joined tonight by our relatively new green jobs specialist, Rebecca Arellano.

Councilor Nolan, your questions?

Thank you. Yes, I'm thrilled we have a green job specialist. It's been a long journey to get here. Many of you know this annual report as a requirement of the Green Jobs Ordinance was passed in 2023. We had a report in 2024. We didn't get a report in 2025, so this is the first report we've kind of skipped a little bit. at some point it would be helpful maybe as part of our charter required ordinance review down the road to ensure that we have a calendar of annual reports not just from this but from others. Anyway, thanks to staff for getting this report to us. Again, a little delayed, but I'm thrilled to meet the staff in place. and after talking with staff they've indicated we'll also get the next updated report possibly in June in order to get back on track to the reporting schedule so I just want to ask a question about What is that timing? And I hope and expect the updated report at that point will include, which I asked the staff for, SMART goals in order to track progress.

So my question is, is that the correct timeline that we might be able to do that at which point we might then have a health and environment committee meeting after that whenever that updated report is in and Has the staff moved to developing SMART goals for the Green Jobs Initiative?

Through you, Madam Mayor, thank you. And a heartfelt apology for not getting the report in on time. and we are planning to submit the report in June with a focus on the work. As I had said to the Councilor, we're not going to see a lot of change in labor market information in one year. or even in two years, or a significant increase in the number of training programs that are available in one or two years. And so we are tracking that. What we hope to see is an increase in awareness among residents, Partnership Development with Employers and Training Programs, and that's what we will have in our report, and we will track those and name those with SMART goals.

Great, thank you. And yes, we all recognize that we're in an environment where at the federal level, and even there's some possible rollback at the state level, but we're totally understanding that we need both and. That the federal government is not doing its work, and yet we critically need it to address emission pollution, also jobs in the clean energy sector. We can do that locally. And also, possibly with Butoh and many of the other decarbonization efforts going on, we actually will see some action. And this was particularly started in order to ensure that our local Zubi. I know that Councilor Al-Zubi Al-Zubi, and then Councilor Zusy.

Thank you. Through you, Madam Mayor, I know I got the chance to reach out to you all. I'm glad that I can be here. I'll focus on one of the sets of questions that I sent to you all focused on the strategies being deployed. Especially when I noticed that we are identifying that recruiting more women, people of color, and youth into the program is a particular challenge. So what are we trying to do to address that? Have we considered marketing campaigns like Sunny Cambridge to increase awareness? because I did a quick Google search and I didn't see anything necessarily come up. So like, what are ways that people are getting access to these opportunities? How are they finding ways to engage? And have we considered reaching out to any specific low-income housing projects like the Rindge Towers or Newtown Court.

Thank you. Through you, Madam Mayor. Thank you for that question on outreach. So I think, in particular, you had noticed that there was a new program starting up in Somerville and how we had gotten the word out about that. But I would say that for most of the programs that we are aware of, we are working through our Cambridge employment program. which is Director Mintz's staff. And so those are individuals and residents who are low income, usually individuals of color. And so if you're coming to us, you're going to hear about these programs. In terms of getting the word out to folks who are unaware of these, that is what Rebecca is going to put most of her energy Thank you very much.

for outreach and Rebecca with the team is in the process of developing marketing materials right now that will start to take some of this information that is pretty inaccessible. There's a lot out there already So we're looking to create marketing materials for particular audiences. and we are also updating the Office of Workforce Development website as required by the ordinance and wanted to do that anyway so that there will be a specific landing page on green jobs.

Zubi.

Thank you for sharing a little bit more about what you all are doing to address that piece and looking forward to seeing how that work evolves.

Zusy. Thank you through you, Chair Siddiqui. A great report, and I realize this is really for 23 and 24, so I look forward to seeing the 25 report. I just wondered how many Cambridge students participate in the Somerville HVAC program? Sounds like a great program. And I also wondered about How many Cambridge residents are in green job training programs? And I apologize because I should have shared those questions earlier, but I'd love to have a sense for that, and I realize... As Councilor Nolan was saying, this may be a challenging time to be recruiting people for green energy jobs when our... The presidential administration is not supporting green jobs, but I'm eager to hear how many students are engaged.

Thank you. Through you, Madam Mayor. Right now, with the Somerville program for HVAC, it's a brand new program. Residents must live in an environmental justice neighborhood in order to be eligible for that program. So in Cambridge, that's a very small number of neighborhoods. And it's for adults. It's not for youth. There are two Cambridge residents that are enrolled in that HVAC program now. The program started in February. We've also had at least two residents that have gone to other HVAC programs since August. And that's what has come through our door that we're aware of. In terms of individual training programs that are funded through the more regional system, I asked for data on how many Cambridge residents have been enrolled in green jobs training.

over the last three years, none. And that's through, that's federal money coming into the system. So what that says is there's no awareness of these programs. There's not a lot of programs, but there's also no awareness of these programs. And so the fact that we have two Cambridge residents from environmental justice neighborhoods in this brand new program in Somerville is impressive. Councilor Zusy.

Yeah, well, I'm grateful to Councilor Al-Zubi for asking about outreach efforts because clearly that will be very, very important. Thank you. I yield. Councilor Simmons.

Thank you, Madam Chair, through you too, Ms. Raspusen. I don't think it's just outreach. Sometimes there are other social impediments that you may not have drilled down deep enough. Years ago, when we had the Green Jobs Program or some very similar initiative, what we found was people didn't have access to a vehicle. And that was a huge piece. So I would not put this on just outreach alone. I think there has to be something in the screening when you get applicants to apply if they're applying. If it says on the application you must have a mass driver's license, well, they're not going to apply. And so maybe you take that off to get them in, because getting a mass driver's license, now that you have some other kind of impediment, is something that you can...

you know you can you can get around that so I don't want to put us I don't want us to put us our eggs all in that we don't have enough we're not getting the word out enough that's number one number two people don't necessarily There's a feeling amongst some people in some quarters of the city that you can apply to the city, but you're not going to get a job. So just using the... Usual methods of outreach aren't always going to work. You may have to use ambassadors, people that know people, putting some money into people that provide the contact with people they have credibility. You know, the city's a great place. We all love it. You know, we're all that in the Tic Tac. But at the end of the day, if you don't look like the people you want, they're not coming. So it's a little bit more. It's not as simple, in my opinion, about outreach as someone who's done outreach a lot.

know how much it takes to get people to cross the threshold. So I would like to just revisit that a little bit and come up with some other practices and ways We have an outreach person that we've hired that does that for the city. Have you sat down with that individual to develop an outreach plan? I'm just curious.

I would say we've not sat down with that person yet. We are, as you know, within the Office of Workforce Development and within DHSP, very familiar with the barriers that Our residents are facing that prevent them from accessing or sustaining participation in programs. So I absolutely think you are spot on. It's licenses, it's access to vehicles, So there is an issue of outreach, and with Rebecca on board, we need to go where the people are. We need to go into the public schools. So we do intend to do that. And I think one of the things that you're speaking to is another part of the challenge is that we can get the word out and we can reach out to residents and the residents need to have the skills. and so it's making sure that even as we're introducing these opportunities what we're finding is that folks aren't coming to us necessarily for the skills that they need and so how do we make that match

For adults, it's going to be a longer road if you're not coming with those skills already. Rebecca is working with individuals who are adults who are interested in these fields but just don't know how to access them. Those folks are going to be relatively easy. It's individuals that are coming to us who either have no awareness or really want these opportunities, but need some skill building.

I think I called you by your wrong name, but that's what I do. So it comes with not enough airflow. I guess, so what I'm basically saying, because we have an Office of Community Engagement, let's use that individual in his or her department. Let's be a little bit more aggressive. I think what it, and I shouldn't say aggressive because I think you're being aggressive, but we're doing the same thing the same way looking for a different result. It's not going to happen. We have to really look at, before we can roll out a program, or while we're thinking about rolling out a program, what has to be a part of it? is how do we do authentic community engagement? And I'm going to argue sometimes you have to put some money, if you really want the program to pay the dividends, You have to put people in front of people that look like them, that they trust. It doesn't mean... Did you say the woman's name is Rebecca? Okay, hello, Rebecca.

Welcome to the fray. I'm sure Rebecca's very nice, but if Rebecca walked up to me in my neighborhood, I might give you side-eye. because you're not part of my community. So all I'm saying is we have to work at finding folks, I'm going to call them ambassadors, that go out into the community to make those connections. and or going to departments or organizations or agencies that have relationships be invited by them so you become a trusted ally otherwise you're not a leader you're just out taking a walk So I'm going to ask that we do get a report back in writing to tell us what the community engagement plan is going to be. You know, every one of us here have a good idea what a community engagement is because we do it every other year. It's called getting elected. We do door-to-door. That's how we get elected. That's what you might have to do. Not to say that it's a campaign, but it is.

The campaign is to get people in this program that we fund, that funds your position, and we want it to be successful.

I yield the floor. McGovern, and time check, it's 8.12.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, through you. I would agree and I appreciate the conversation about the need to do outreach and to connect with people. and part of that being also finding out what are the obstacles and how we can help them overcome those obstacles. It's one thing to, you can notify everybody in Cambridge about a program, That's great, but if they can't access that program because they can't get to that program, or usually we don't pay people for participating in these programs, right? So do I have to give up my job to go participate in a program that maybe someday down the line is going to get me another job where I can make more money. That's a lot to ask of people. So if we can think about not just the outreach and letting them know about the programs, but also helping them overcome those obstacles and I know you think about that and I just think that's important.

I also appreciate in I think on page seven here he talks about the collaboration with Pathways, the Job Connector, the unions, you know, just making sure that we're establishing those relationships. and I know that it's difficult to talk about adding new expenses to things when we're talking about financial issues facing the city. But, and I think, you know, I know Mayor Siddiqui has talked about this too on the school side, but it boggles my mind that Rista doesn't have programs for electricians and HVAC. I mean, I've said this a million times. I said this when I was on school committee. You cannot outsource an electrician. You cannot outsource a plumber. These are good jobs, good jobs when they're connected to unions, good jobs when people can go into business for themselves.

and you know maybe they're not so good that they can help someone buy a two million dollar house in Cambridge but there are a lot of you know I mean they are the gateway to the middle class and they have been and and so you know really you know having lots of conversations and talking with the school department and Rista it can't all be about the innovation economy and biotech there are you know good old-fashioned labor jobs that you can do very well in and so as long as I hope we keep those conversations going and look at expanding you know Rista into some more traditional trades I yield.

Would anyone else like to say anything before we place this on file? I'll just say, Rebecca, I look forward to working with you, especially on the Rista piece and other things, so my office will be following up on that as it pertains to the school committee work. Would you like to say anything?

Thank you, first time. Thank you so much for all of your questions and your valid concerns. I am so excited about this job. It really comes at the intersection of my passions of sustainability and equity work. To speak to Councilor Simmons, I think you made a lot of really good points there. Just to give you a little bit of background, I was born and raised in Hawthorne, California, right on the border of Inglewood, Compton, Lenox, Watts. So I know what it's like to come from a very hard background. I understand that Cambridge is not LA and it's not Boston. And I've also been an active community organizer for well over eight years now. and I can really appreciate your comments when you say it's not just, oh, you know, I hope somebody sees the flyer. It's making those connections. It's reaching out. I don't mind cold calling, showing up. and really explain to folks where they are, why this is important and why it's needed. And to also speak to some of the things that was brought up tonight. We know that the biggest barrier to entry into green jobs for women, people of color, youth and low-income folks

is simply lack of awareness. So that's where I'm really excited to pound the pavement and get our campaign launched to really educate the residents of the city of Cambridge all about green jobs. and I think all three points are valid and very well taken and thank you Mayor Siddiqui.

Thank you. We look forward to working with you. So we'll go ahead. on a motion by Councilor Nolan to place city manager agenda item number three on file. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. City manager agenda item No. 3 is placed on file. We're going to move on to City Manager Item No. 4. Transmitting communication from Ian Huang, City Manager, relative to the appropriation of the Mass Save Community First Partnership Grant in the amount of $250,000. to the grant fund Office of Sustainability Other Ordinary Maintenance Account. These funds will be used to contract Nolan, you have the floor.

Thank you Mayor Siddiqui. Quite exciting grant, very needed to support energy efficiency programs for residents and small businesses. My question is, So what is the expectation of the impact of these funds? The memo states that some of the funding, and I don't know how much of it is some or all of it, or... How much of it will go to mailers and marketing? And we just talked about outreach and the effectiveness and the importance of outreach. So do we have evidence that steps we have taken along those lines are effective? I've received mailings as a resident in Cambridge to sign up. I've already done my mass save things every few years that I can, but I'm really curious about what were the results of those mailings, how many people actually signed up, how many followed through, how many actually did took the steps to ensure that their emission pollution went down. So I'm just curious, as again, we're talking about outreach, that this is a lot of money. It's $256,000. What exactly do we expect? Have we set goals?

And given our past efforts at marketing and mailers aimed at people to take some of these steps to take advantage of MassSave, what were the results and how have we assessed the impact? and I will note it's critically important these days because the state legislature is now possibly eviscerating the program of mass save taking away a billion dollars of the 4.5 billion that the The Senate has not yet done that, but the House already did. And it's definitely on the chopping block, partly because people don't understand The intersection of every dollar that this goes to that gets people to work on their energy efficiency, it will save them $3 in future energy costs. So this is not that we're just spending this money We know that when we spend it on energy efficiency it reduces not only pollution but future spending but I'm very curious about how we're going to allocate these funds and specifically laser focused on the effectiveness. Deputy City Manager?

I'm hoping Chief Sustainability Officer Julie Wormser is online. I am. Oh, perfect. All right. I'm going to turn it over to Julie. Thank you.

Thank you so much. And through you, Mayor Siddiqui, so this is a three-year grant. It's the second time we've had this grant through MassSave. So it gives us about $85,000 a year in order to hire a full-time person. It's not a staff person. It's from All Energy. And we get access to all their technical support as well. Almost all of that money goes to that staff time, about $2,500 is to actual materials. We do do mailings, but it's not from this grant. So this is part of our Community First Partnership we do with Eversource. We provide a lot of information to people, as you mentioned, about MassSave, both the technical support people can get and also the subsidies and grants people can get. This is our program that is for non-Buta buildings.

So it's for all residences and for small businesses. And the answer in terms of how well do we know we're doing, we haven't gotten the data. on energy use post participating in our programs until this round of MassSave. So we look forward to having that effectiveness data and that has, limited our ability to do A and B tests on what works best, but we'll continue to do that. So this funding, it's about a quarter of our overall I would say that I would say also in terms of the bills going through the state house

We are right in the mix working in both the House and the Senate to try to get the best we can, not just on mass save, but on other policies and funding to move us off fossil fuels. Mastave is getting hit. The Senate is much more pro-climate. We're hoping we can win that back. I also think, though, that the original bill filled by the Healy administration really did some very important reforms to MassSave that made it much easier for renters and multifamily buildings to use. And that's been a weakness of the program. So we not only want to bring that funding back, we want to point it towards the folks who are most challenged in terms of energy conservation and decarbonization. Nolan.

Thanks for that. The reason I thought, it says it's to perform outreach services and it specifically says the staff person will actually be developing and sending mailers and other marketing collateral. That's fine, but again, I know we have some data. This is the second grant we've tracked it before because I've asked for it and gotten it. How many of the people who actually get the Mass Save Audit then take the next step? Do we not have any of that data for the last year?

We have data, so this is our, this should be our fifth year. Even before it was called Community First Partnership, it was called Mass Save Municipal Partner. We've been doing this since 2021. We can tell you data on our efforts, which is to reach thousands of people, not just with mailings, but in person. We can tell you how many people we talked with through the Cambridge Energy Helpline. But what we haven't had until this three-year renewal of MassSave is those folks we spoke with, address by address, did they do something with it? So we don't track in terms of that follow-through. We track in terms of our effort to connect people with these programs because we didn't have access from Eversource for that data until this round.

Nolan. Thanks. That's just surprising because I have data in my office from when we tracked it in the past and we followed up ourselves. So I encourage us to do that ourselves even if it's not direct from the program because otherwise we have no idea If this is even working. So I know it may be challenging, but I know we had it because I got it a couple years ago. So I encourage us to look in our own records and figure that out because it's critically... What we need to be doing and it's really important for us to do it because we know every single resident across the city needs support so I'm glad that's going on but I I do hope that at the next time we talk about this we we will be able to get that data because I know it exists and we we should be following up with people even if it's not coming directly from Eversource and so with that we can follow up with you That'd be great. Thanks. And with that, again, we just need impact very much and to help all the residents across the city because this is an important program. Thank you. With that, Mayor Siddiqui, I yield.

Any questions on this appropriation before we do a roll call? Hearing none on a motion by Councilor Nolan to appropriate these funds, we'll do a roll call.

Councilor Al-Zubi?

Yes.

Yes. Vice Mayor Azeem?

Yes.

Yes, Council of Flaherty. Yes. Yes, Councilor McGovern. Yes. Yes, Councilor Nolan. Yes. Yes, Councilor Simmons. Yes. Yes, Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler. Yes. Yes, Councilor Zusy.

Yes.

Yes, Mayor Siddiqui. Yes. Yes, and you have nine members recorded in the affirmative.

The order is adopted. We do need to place the communication on file on a motion by Councilor Nolan to place that on file. All those in favor say aye. Aye. As opposed, say no. The ayes have it. That is placed on file. We're going on to city manager agenda item number five. The communication transmitted from Ian Huang, city manager, relative to the 2026-2027 housing and zoning priorities. Councilor Al-Zubi, you have the floor.

Thank you, through you Madam Mayor. I have a question about the social housing piece of this. I noticed that the timeline for social housing doesn't start until May and even then it only says scoping underway through It seems like the end of the year. I am representing a large number of constituents and community members who want to see immediate action on social housing. So are you able to better help us understand what is meant by scoping underway? Why that activity doesn't begin until May and why it's the only step on the timeline?

Thank you, through you Mayor Siddiqui. So we are really excited about this ambitious work plan for this calendar year. It really is looking at the City Council priorities, regulatory requirements, and kind of a culmination of our Housing Strategy to kind of wrap up some of the zoning priorities that we started the last couple years ago. And social housing is a new idea. We're excited to look at it. We do know there are some ideas about how to, whether that be a task force or other format, to better define what social housing is and then think through We have seen some ideas that staff are commenting on and we are working with some counselors to kind of refine that.

and we do hope to start in May but the actual details of the frequency of that and what that looks like is still yet to be determined.

Thank you. I appreciate more of that information. I will say it's a bit disappointing to see how the pace of this conversation has been moving. I know that there are other housing priorities and pieces that I see on the On CDD's plate, and I know that there was a policy order passed unanimously last fall that called for response by this early spring, and it was... and the intention that's also being mindful of CDD's plate. Like you all have a lot to do on your plate and I do appreciate the effort you're pouring into the work that you do. The hearing that also happened in December was a good start to the conversation, but my understanding is also that staff weren't present because they didn't have the capacity to participate, which is okay, again, recognizing that there's a lot on your plate. We're also now six months later after the council unanimously asked for something with explicit steps on what things we can look at and

We're sitting here having to wait another two months and that two months is waiting for things to start being scoped and getting underway. So I don't think that's necessarily the best way to go about this and feel that it encourages the type of I believe there's been a level of clarity given on what social housing means and to its resonance. publicly owned, it's tenant governed, and it's permanently affordable. And we came in with that, my understanding of the last council, we came in with recognizing that we want to look at things like funding models, for example. We know that we have community members that have put a lot of years and time into this work to help move it forward and brought a lot of detail around what this could look like.

So if staff need further clarification from the council on finer points, I think it could be great to get a report back on a memo of some sort that lays out some of the trade-offs for our consideration. I know you also brought up the task force. We can also work about going that track path so that we can also discuss these topics more deeply. I just don't think I agree with this timeline. We can't really just put the majority of our staff resources into zoning discussions and think that it's gonna produce the solution that we need to the crisis. I really do think that we need to start being more serious about conversations around prioritizing social housing. And just before I yield, I just want to note that for the record that I'm leaving right now to attend a religious obligation as we have entered the last 10 nights of Ramadan. So any additional thoughts that I have, I can raise them to the city manager as needed, and I'm sending all of my blessings to you all.

through Mayor Siddiqui. I think happy for us to continue to have some of these conversations. You know, I would say that One of the challenges has been more clearly scoping what we mean by social housing, not necessarily in terms of those high-level principles, which I think have been very clear, you know, permanently affordable, publicly financed, publicly owned. I think the challenge is situating what the more hybrid model being proposed looks like compared to what we have today. I think Cambridge is very unusual in terms of the very high inclusionary rate that we currently require and so when we think about market rate housing developments that have a 20% inclusionary requirement 20% inclusionary in many other parts of the country is seen as social housing. And in fact, the public financing to actually create those permanently affordable units at a 20% threshold is often seen as social housing.

I know that's not what we're talking about here, and we're thinking about higher thresholds like 30 or 40%, and that's where the challenge is in terms of how we think about public financing. And so if we're publicly financing 100% affordable housing, that is our current sort of bread and butter. It's everything we do through the Affordable Housing Trust. We're deploying $250,000 to $300,000 per unit of public taxpayer dollars to produce 100% affordable housing. And the advantage is we're leveraging state and federal tax incentives and tax dollars. The challenge in terms of how we're figuring out this model, which we're very committed to exploring and pushing forward, is what is that middle ground where if we're actually Producing social housing at a 40% threshold but we're paying for that without any state or federal tax credits, we're gonna be spending a lot more for those affordable units.

And so I think some of that is, both working out the model and thinking through how we create that hybrid and I would say ensuring that we're doing it together. I think one of the issues we don't want to get into is I totally understand the frustration and the feeling that we need to move more quickly And I think that's part of what we're saying. That's also where it does take up a lot of staff time to work out those details. And I think once we get that nailed, we're actually able to move a lot faster.

and Zubi.

Yeah, through you, Madam Mayor, I definitely hear you on some of those comments. I will say you missed a specific tenant to social housing, which is tenant governance. And so how we approach these models, a big piece of how we define it, Whether you're engaging with market rate housing and inclusionary zoning, that piece of tenant governance also helps identify really what sticks out. These other models that we're seeing across the US and across the world. Definitely want to highlight that piece, but I think Director Cotter, you also wanted to share a comment or two.

Thank you. Through you, Mayor Siddiqui. Yeah, just to add, I think the other piece that we've thought, and we were at the meeting in December, and appreciated the presentations on social housing and the perspectives and the models but I think the other takeaway that we had was there really is more that we need to talk about because in some ways the social housing model is very and in fact, there may be some overlap with some of the 100% affordable housing that we do that is fully affordable. Some of the same groups may be interested in developing that type of housing. Certainly the community control, public ownership makes you think of public agencies like the Cambridge Housing Authority that owns I think that would be helpful to have a bigger conversation

I think the other piece that came up was looking at the investment that would be needed and thinking about how those dollars are invested as the city manager said and what's the return in that, what are the goals, what is the and so forth. would be good to pilot. I think those are the discussions that I think we want to have with the council. The other piece that's affecting the work plan is a little bit of I think what we've mentioned here as well is just the volume of work that we have underway with the fully affordable developments and taking away from that discussion, a clear idea that the folks that are working with the affordable housing providers, the affordable housing providers themselves,

those of us that are working with the resources that are available to the Affordable Housing Trust really need to be in those conversations looking at it from that perspective. and right now that team is really overwhelmed with all the AHO developments that are moving along and kind of looking at this. This is where we think that that probably best slots in though, you know, with, and you'll get a report on the AHO at an upcoming meeting. You'll see that the volume of activity with the AHO developments is really off the chart. It's been hugely successful, which has really had a big impact on our capacity for that planning and development work. Looking at that and factoring on top of other things that we've got going on, just thinking about when reasonably we think we could come to that and give it the attention that it needed to really surface some of those questions that came up from that meeting.

We have to get going. There's a lot of other people who would like to chime in, Councilor Al-Zubi, so I'll give you one last word, but then we have to move on.

Yeah, I was going to say through you, Madam Mayor, I appreciate you sharing more about the affordable housing piece, and it's great to see that work happening, and really definitely don't want this to just be kicked down the road. I'll yield. Thanks.

Vice Mayor Azeem, and then Councilor Nolan, and then Councilor McGovern.

I just had a quick point for my colleague, Councilor Al-Zubi, just saying that I know that it looks like the committee is a little bit delayed or the working group perhaps I was going to say happy to think about committee hearings as well or if you would like I think that we can also do smaller discussions perhaps with staff and like less formal settings I think that maybe like getting a few colleagues together and just talking about it I think we could probably move through some of the details quicker that maybe don't have to have a committee hearing which can take a little bit of time to organize but I'd be happy to be part of those.

On that, my office has been working with Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler on some of this, so we'll figure out a way to get others involved. Nolan, and Councilor McGovern.

Thank you. Very excited. I think it's really great to have this work plan in front of us so that we can understand what the work is. I have two questions. One is related to the I understand there will be some report relatively soon, even if we don't have all the information, we're going to have some more information after a full year of the change from multifamily. is the, and we're already seeing some impacts across the city, some of which we're thrilled with and some of which we may be asking questions and saying that's the time to say, Should there be adjustments or amendments? The question is, is there an expectation that there will be more than this one meeting that's here, which is the joint NLTP and Housing Committee presentation? Because I do think at some point once we have some conversation and we have those reports and We get some more understanding about where we're moving. Is that the expectation? I just wasn't sure how much of this plan was baked in.

Yes, thank you. Through you, Mayor Siddiqui. So the idea is to kind of launch that discussion with the annual housing report to kind of serve as a baseline of what we've been seeing, how could we refine and reform the zoning moving forward. and that there would be subsequent city council hearings on the topic and I believe Councilor Zusy is planning to hold some neighborhood and long-term planning committee hearings and joint housing committee meetings on the topic and then ultimately get feedback from a range of stakeholders and then look to staff for some recommendations on how to reform multifamily zoning if that's the path forward.

Councilor Nolan? Thank you. And now the second question is, so when will future alewife zoning happen? It's not on your list, which I understand is just 2026, but I don't want to forget that. Parts left off when we zoned the crowd, and I know that ACM Peters was central to the community process that led to a very successful rezoning based on a moratorium that this council passed. but there was some parts of that that were not included. The terminal road connection is still in the air, the small triangle near the traffic circle, the Fresh Pond Mall. I know we had all said we would get to that eventually because that was not part of this and yet it's again the last piece of Cambridge that has not gone through this. I understand that the MBTA development might affect the timing, but that's in a different part of that area. And we do need to be proactive, especially because HealthPeaks plans are now being refined. They now are moving towards going to the planning board.

The MBTA study, I think it was MBTA, but there was a Department of Transportation study which was totally exciting. If people haven't read it, read it. Great because it concluded there was likely justification to add a commuter rail stop. They did an extensive study of the transportation, which has been something I've been I know that Council also believes with this development that it would make a lot of sense to add a commuter rail stop there which would also have to bring a bridge into the area. So the question is, Is that on our radar? And if so, is it for 2027 or some other year?

Yeah, thank you. Through you, Mayor. So certainly the remaining areas of Alewife are on our radar. We originally planning to do it alongside the MBTA schedule. But as you know, they canceled that RFP for the Alewife Station redevelopment. We really do find that those types of processes are better when there's a developer at the table. And so really recognizing that it's still on their medium term plan to circle back to that when market Thank you very much. The Fresh Bound Shopping Mall is owned by a single owner who hasn't expressed interest in redevelopment. So we do think we have time to kind of wait for both more...

ownership activity and interest as well as the economy to approve while we move forward on some of these other priorities.

Nolan.

Yeah, thanks. But we also know that the Department of Transportation is rebuilding that bridge over, right, I think on Fresh Pond Parkway. And let's not forget the commuter rail stop, regardless of what happens, and take advantage of the opportunity of HealthPeak. Goebbels. So glad to hear it's on the radar and I yield.

Thank you, Madam Mayor, through you. First, just thank you for the report. And just on the... I know Councilor Al-Zubi left, but I'm sure people are watching. Just on the social housing piece, I just... You know, we... We started talking about this and started moving forward with this not too long ago, actually, with social housing, and I have heard The term social housing and the discussion of social housing more in the last couple months than I have since I got here. That's because we're making progress on it and the city is now You know, Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler brought it up a number of times, but the city wasn't really on board at that point. I don't think the majority of the council was on board. Now you've got nine city councilors that voted for it. The city is looking at it. Whether it's officially seen on the chart here as having an official process, it's obviously something that is

now in the realm of discussion when any kind of zoning is being, that's a lot of progress in a very short amount of time. And when I look at this chart, the AHO five-year report, it's required in the AHO zoning, That's already, I mean, not that I'm complaining, but that's already behind. It was five years in October of 2025, right? I'm not complaining about that, I understand it, but it does need to get done, right? The Mass Ave Cambridge Street active use, we're having, The first meeting about that on Wednesday, but there's going to be more news. A new ordinance has to be written. We have to make some corrections. That's going to take time. The annual housing review is also something we're required to do. Multifamily zoning is a yearly update. That was passed in February of last year, so that's due. We've been talking about central square rezoning for, I think, since I was like four years old, it feels like.

So there are a lot of things that are in front of the social housing process, and that's not To me, that doesn't feel like we're kicking the can down the road or ignoring it. There's a lot of talk about it. But there are also some other things. This is a lot of work. You have a lot of things on your plate that you have to do. And so, and I would also, you know, we're about to enter the middle of March, believe it or not. Starting this process more vigorously in May is a month and a half away, and no one's going to be building anything or permitting anything I don't see this as delaying that. I just think you have a workload, you have a schedule. There are things that you're required to produce. So I just don't want anyone who is supportive of social housing to walk away thinking, oh, this isn't happening.

I think this is going to be a very important conversation and one we've all agreed to have. but there are other things in front of it that need to happen too. So I just, I have a different feeling about that. And as long as we get to it in, you know, in May and have, In a more formal way, I think we're going to be fine. And I would just lastly, Madam Mayor, through you, I just want to say that this chart is really important. What it doesn't show is usually every year we get one, at least one, if not two or more citizens petitions. And as we know, a citizen petition by law has to go to the ordinance committee, has to go to the planning board. CDD has to do a ton of work on that. I fully anticipate that we'll get one or two this year as we do. And we can't...

Those have to go through the process, so those will jump the line in a lot of things. And then, you know, we're all talking about reopening zoning that we recently passed to kind of try and fix it. This doesn't even show all the things that we don't know about yet. And I promise you that the things we don't know about yet, we're going to know about at some point this year because they're coming, because they always do. So this is a lot of work. I appreciate the work you're doing. I hope that we as a council can show some discipline around adding more to this workload over the course of the next year. And if we can get through all of these things, between now and the end of the year. That will be a very successful year for us. So I thank you. I thank you for the work that you're doing. And I think the schedule, I'm fine with the schedule.

Zusy, and then Councilor Flaherty.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I want to thank you for this chart too because it gave me a better sense for your full workload and I understand that you're doing many, many, many things and it's fabulous that there are so many The two things that I don't see on the list are we need to make some amendments to the Cambridge Street Zoning, and we'll be talking more about that later in some committee. But I just want to urge us as we We've got to really be thinking about urban form. We need renderings. to be discussing on the floor the nuances of the zoning that will impact livability in the city.

I feel like with another conversation about some amendments to the Cambridge Street zoning, there are things that should have been discussed before the zoning was passed. That many people shared ideas during public comment, but I feel like just there's fine-tuning that needs to be done. It's Dotting Eyes, Crossing Tees that will make that zoning so much better and help to preserve the magic on Cambridge Street. And then we need to be talking about reintroducing institutional use regulations, or maybe it won't be through zoning, maybe it will be through A different mechanism to make sure that we're doing long-term planning with our universities to ensure that they're the best outcomes for the city. I know I was reading a planning report from the 1990s. At that time, the city would meet quarterly with...

University Administration, City Administration, and University Administration. Maybe that's what will be required going forward, but it certainly, we've got to put something in place. And again, that may not be through zoning. I'm not exactly sure how that will happen, but we need to make sure that we're aligned and that we're planning together. So, anyway, I thank you for overseeing all this work. It's all very, very important work, and I'm just amazed at what we accomplished together. Thank you. I yield. Councilor Flaherty?

Thank you, Madam Mayor, through you. So I was wondering if there is a drop dead date on the annual housing review, because I know that will be the kickoff for the multifamily housing zoning ordinance. And the reason why I ask is because I'm aware of some real consternation and some agitation from people on Cushing Street, on Lexington Street, on Wyman Street, on on Hawthorne, on Jackson, on Sherman, about proposed developments that are happening in the neighborhood and their impacts on their livability. So I'm wondering, When should I expect an opportunity to weigh in on this?

Yeah, thank you. So the Joint Neighborhood Long-Term Planning and Housing Committee meeting is scheduled for the week of the 24th. I believe it's either the 24th or 25th. So that has been scheduled and so we will be giving a presentation on what we've seen in the permitting environment and that will be informed by what we've seen. with the Historical Department, ISD, CDD, Housing Department, and that will help to give a better picture for that discussion.

Thank you.

Other questions? Councilor Simmons, are you set? Anyone on this side? Okay. So hearing none, the only action we're taking is to place this on file. I agree with a lot of what's been said. I know that our office has been in touch with you around the social housing piece, so we'll continue to work on that. and then look forward to all the other updates that you all will have. With that, on a motion by Councilor Zusy to place city manager agenda item number five on file, we'll do All those in favor say aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. This item is placed on file.

We will now move to city manager agenda item number six, transmitting a communication from city manager Ian Huang regarding a free cash appropriation in the amount of $400,000 to the general fund law Department Travel and Training, Judgment and Damages Account for the Settlement Payment Related to Ahern v. Sig Sawyer, Inc., and City of Cambridge, United States District Court, District of Massachusetts Docket No. 1-21-CV-11007-DJC. This is filed by Councilor, this is pulled by Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler. You have the floor.

Thanks, Madam Mayor. I will be voting no on this settlement. I am going to speak carefully in my remarks about this vote because it is an ongoing legal matter, but it is important for me to be able to provide an explanation of my vote. and the city's law department has reviewed my remarks here to confirm that I'm not waiving any attorney client privilege in them. The facts of this case have been widely reported by Cambridge Day, WCVB, and elsewhere. For some reason, in 2019, a Cambridge police lieutenant removed his gun from its holster. Inside a vehicle with several other city officers while on duty at a public event, which according to the city is not an approved practice. A bullet was discharged, which thankfully did not strike anyone else in the vehicle. The police department recommended disciplining the lieutenant for this incident with his gun and he's arguing that he did not deserve discipline because of issues with the gun.

While I appreciate the work from city staff on this case and the proposed settlement with the officer that is being brought before the city council tonight, I will not be voting to approve these funds because I believe that doing so will ultimately cost the city more money and cause more harm to Cambridge residents. During my time on the council, every few years this body has been asked to settle a lawsuit involving the police department, sometimes for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Because of that settlement, details of the case that would have been known had the case gone to trial are as a result not shared with the public. because of this fundamental issues with the police department are never addressed. And we are back in the same position a few years later with the city council being asked to settle another lawsuit involving the police department for hundreds of thousands of dollars. While I understand that a settlement would save the city money in the short term compared to the possibility of losing the case at trial, in the medium term and the long term, I believe settling the case will undoubtedly cost the city far more money.

regardless of whatever the outcome of the trial would have been because the settlement will sweep the details of this case under the rug. That cost is both in dollars and also in harm to public safety and transparency that we owe to Cambridge residents. In my first term, I was in the minority of no votes when the city council voted to settle a sexual harassment case involving the Cambridge Police Department for $1.4 million. That settlement then hid harassment claims against a high-profile Cambridge police officer until details of the incident were reported by the Boston Globe nearly four years later. I believe moving forward with that settlement was wrong then and I believe approving the settlement would be wrong now. I go back.

We will go to Vice Mayor Azeem.

So I just had a question for my colleague. So, you know, we know what the settlement offer is now. I think all of us understand that if this was to go to trial and even if there was you know a small settlement against us we would be on hook for many more legal fees that would be a much larger infraction a much larger cost potentially in the millions of dollars to the city of Cambridge I think that it was given as an example of you know this case that happened in prior that the details came out many years later and then there was a claim that like you know Actually in the long run, this would save Cambridge money. Could you give us an example? I'm not sure I understand that point of how we would save money in the long run.

Yeah, an example I think of, this isn't even the first example I can think of, of a police officer discharging his gun in a public incident. We have a case, you know, Last term where another police officer discharged his gun in the middle of a public high school when it was going on. That was the case there. Ultimately, these questions we're facing tie to whether every police officer should have a gun at all the time. By paying $400,000 here, we are, in a sense, paying to push that conversation aside to buy the officer's silence. By having this go public, we could have a conversation about whether every officer should have a gun so that we aren't in this situation again where another officer has their gun discharged and we're settling another case for hundreds of thousands of dollars a couple years later. That's a public conversation I think we should be having rather than paying hundreds of thousands of dollars now to not have that conversation.

Waismer?

I'm not sure that I fully understand the logic there and that there's nothing stopping us from having a conversation now. And like the details of the other case were made public, right? And so there's nothing that's keeping us from revisiting that case now. I think I understand the desire to have these details made public in that I do as well. And I think at this moment at least, I'm excited to see how the conversation goes. I just don't understand the risk of potentially having a lawsuit settled for millions of dollars in a way that we talk about having a budget crisis now and having a budget crunch and those million dollars go to these different sorts of uses in the city for... hypothetically having an easier conversation about police officers owning or having guns, which I think is also just regulated at the state level in large part and in many different limitations and I think we have lots of other information for that conversation as well.

So it's just something that I don't particularly understand at this point, but excited to see how the conversation goes.

just super briefly in response. It's possible the details will come out later. Maybe the Globe will do another story four years from now and we'll get details years down the line. Maybe we won't. and the conversation about guns having police department. We got that answer last year. It's within the realm of our police department. We don't need to wait for the state to regulate. It's not a requirement for our police officers to carry guns at all times. Get back.

Folks who haven't stated anything will go to Councilor Flaherty.

Well, just briefly, I think this is an issue about fiduciary responsibility to the city financially. And by practice, by trade, I happen to be a trial lawyer and I've got some experience in these matters. and I do know that the The firearm in question here has been the subject of more than 100 lawsuits across the country and there have been multiple million dollar verdicts against the manufacturer of the company for a defective for a defective manufacturing issue with that particular firearm. Now, not talking about the facts in this case, I will say that If the city does have an opportunity to resolve the case, which it appears that we do,

and limit the potential liability to the city in this case we should take full advantage of it very quickly we can set aside anybody's Political opinion, and everyone's entitled to their political opinion, about whether or not police officers should be armed. My political opinion is Different. And I'm a former prosecutor and I've got an awful lot of experience dealing with law enforcement issues and police officer issues. and firearms and things of that nature. But I think in this case, the real issue is having A risk analysis of this particular case and whether or not it makes sense for the city to in effect roll the dice. And I think that it would to do otherwise would be improvident and imprudent. So I'll be voting yes. Thank you.

Councilor Nolan? Do you want me to come back to you?

May I, I need to check with the city solicitor first to see if what I'm going to say is legally allowed, because I didn't do that as councilor, so can I just have a minute to do that before I...

Simmons. Thank you, Madam Chair.

I understand the sentiment of my colleague, but having someone who has been around for just a little bit, I remember taking a stand very similar. to yours. And I stood behind it because I thought it was the right thing to do. And we could have settled at that time at 4.5 million. But we held up. Again, I was one of those people right down to the last day. At the end of the day, we ended up paying $10 million. So I understand what you're saying, but having gone down that road a few times, $4.5 versus $10 million, we do the math. So I understand on the one hand. I don't agree with everything you said, like comparing what happened in this case with what happened in another case, because they were somewhat different. The point I'm trying to make sometimes It may be more prudent to...

accept the settlement if we want to do some groundbreaking investigatory work after the fact to make sure it doesn't happen in the future. I'm on board with that, but I'm just very concerned about rolling the dice, to use my colleague's term, and then end up three years paying. So I respect your decision. I don't agree with because of that. So with that, I yield the floor.

We'll go to Councilor Nolan. Thank you. I will not say what I was going to say, but what I will say is I really wish we were not in this position. I don't agree with the claims. and I am sad that we're here and yet I have decided that for the city finances I will be supporting the recommendation.

Anyone on this side who would like to say anything further? I know Councilor Al-Zubi is not here, but I think we can go ahead and proceed with the vote. You know, I'll say that You know we can't say too too much but I feel like reasonable minds could differ on this in some ways and so I do appreciate kind of what everyone is saying. I think I do find what Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler is saying compelling, remembering that prior I know it's not the same. And I also understand the risk assessment and the recommendation and I think I agree with a lot of the points made. So I will... You know, I'll vote when the vote comes.

I think it seems from the conversation there is a majority to support The appropriation, you only need five votes to move forward. So I think given that no... I think... While not everyone has spoken, I think I have clarity that I need to move forward with the vote, so I'll entertain a motion. Call the question. to go ahead and vote on the appropriation on a motion by Councilor Simmons. And for that, we'll do a roll call.

Councilor Al-Zubi? absent. Vice Mayor Azeem?

Yes.

Yes. Councilor Flaherty? Yes. Yes. Councilor McGovern? Yes. Yes. Councilor Nolan? Simmons, Sieniewicz, Simmons, Sieniewicz, Simmons, Sieniewicz, Sieniewicz, No. No. And you have six members recorded in the affirmative, two recorded in the negative, and one recorded as absent.

The appropriation is approved, so we are done with the City Manager's agenda. We will now move on. We have to place the matter on file on a motion by Councilor Nolan. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. The communication is placed on file. We're going to move on to the calendar. The calendar has a policy order that... Policy, what is it? Oh, no, we're going to not skip over the policy orders. We have two. Councilmember Govan, did you want to pull them or are you all set?

I think we can vote them.

on a motion by Council Member Govan to adopt Policy Orders 1 and 2. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. Those policy orders are adopted. We now move on to the calendar. The charter right here was on Cambridge Street zoning at the upcoming ordinance committee meeting about active ground floor use. Number one? Yeah. Yes, number one, yes. This was... exercise by Councilor Al-Zubi. She's not here. I wanted to just point out something that last meeting there were two points of orders from my colleague and upon reflection I think my practice moving forward and I'm happy to have a further conversation about this is that

I will go to the person who has exercised their charter right unless, I will always go to them unless we haven't heard in a prior meeting from the lead Sponsor. So what I'm saying is if we've heard from the lead sponsor then we'll go to the person who then has exercised their charter right because that person has already spoken at probably length on the matter and so I will allow the person who's down the Charter Right to go first and then we can have all the sponsors, other folks who presumably already spoken on it to respond to the person who's exercised their Charter Right and their argument. Here, Councilor Al-Zubi is not in the room, so I know Councilor Zusy would like to speak, but sure, Councilor Simmons, what would you like to say?

Just very quickly, because Councilor Al-Zubi is not here, and due respect to her, But I mean, I know my other colleague is here as well. Did we want to give her the, so she would have the opportunity to speak to it. And she was the one that, did she exercise her charter right or was it somebody else? Yes.

Yes, she did.

Right, because she did exercise her charter. In respect to her, I would.

Something wrong, Councilor? I've checked in with her to kind of know where she's at.

As long as it's all right with her. I mean, if I moved my charter, I'd done something and wasn't here to speak to it, I'm might be a little taken aback if it was voted in my absence. If you've talked to her and she's good with it, then I'm good with it too.

Yeah, I'm not sure when Councilor Al-Zubi is back. I'll come to you in a moment, Councilor Nolan.

Hopefully we'll have insurance.

Yes, Councilor Zusy?

Oh, I doubt it.

So I... I understand that this will be moot if we don't do something with this today, but I guess I respect, though I would like I ask these things to be discussed at the ordinance committee meeting this week. I understand that there The leaders of the ordinance committee don't think there will be time to discuss these items, so I will introduce a neighborhood and long-term planning meeting. where we will discuss these items so I would like to withdraw this policy order and we will discuss these items but at a different forum. So I would like to withdraw the policy order.

So, Councilor Zusy has a motion to withdraw that will require unanimous consent. That's the motion before us. We'll speak to that motion, Councilor McGovern.

Yeah, just real quickly. Thank you, Madam Mayor, through you. I can't say for certain. How long the meeting on Wednesday is going to go? It's really more of a question of the call of the meeting does not include these topics. So just for folks who called in today, who are probably likely going to call in on Wednesday to talk about the items that Councilor Zuzi raised. That is not the call of the meeting on Wednesday. Those issues will not be discussed by CDD. I hope colleagues don't discuss them either. And I encourage everyone to keep their comments to the call of the meeting. Sounds like Councilor Zusy is going to schedule another opportunity for people to talk about those issues. So if you're watching, please stick to the call of the meeting. Thank you.

So, Councilor Zusy has moved for unanimous consent. Go ahead, Vice Mayor.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. I was going to say, I think the neighborhood long-term planning meeting makes a lot of sense. It has both of the co-sponsors. I'm on that committee as well. I would just say that the one thing I'd love to figure out as we go into that is that it was not on the CDD timeline so what are we going to push if we're going to have a discussion about Cambridge Street just because I think that CDD is a bit capacity constrained. So just wanted to bring that up as we talk about scheduling. Thank you.

Other points from the body before we proceed to that vote? Hearing none, we'll go ahead and do a roll call.

Al-Zubi is absent. Vice Mayor Zien? Yes. Councilor Flaherty? Yes. Councilor McGovern? Yes. Councilor Nolan? Yes. Councilor Simmons? Yes. Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler? Yes. Yes. Councilor Zusy? Yes. Yes. Mayor Siddiqui? Yes. Yes. And you have eight members recorded in the affirmative and one recorded as absent.

That policy order has been withdrawn. We do not have any tabled items or unfinished business to get to today. We do not have any applications or petitions. There are 24 Communications on a motion by Councilor Simmons to place all communications on file. All those in favor say aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. Those are placed on file. We move on to resolutions. There are three. Pleasure of the City Council.

Move to adopt the resolutions and make them unanimous upon adoption.

We'll go ahead on a motion by Councilor Simmons to adopt the resolutions, making them unanimous upon adoption. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. Those resolutions are... Adopted. We now move on to committee reports. There are two committee reports.

Move to accept the committee reports and place them on file.

on a motion by Councilor Simmons to accept these two committee reports and have them placed on file. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. The two committee reports are placed on file. We don't have any roundtable minutes, so we move on to communication and reports from other city officers.

Siddiqui?

Yes. Councilor Nolan? Number two. Councilor Nolan pulls number two on a motion by Councilor Sobrinho-Wheeler to place Communications from other city officers 1 and 3 on file. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed say no. The ayes have it. Those two are 1 and 3 are... placed on file. We're going to communication from City Councilor Nolan transmitting a calendar update on the Health and Environmental Committee. Councilor Nolan?

Thank you, Mayor Siddiqui, and through you to my colleagues and to the community. I did pull this since it's a communication transmitting a calendar update on the Health and Environment Committee. I had worked with department heads and the mayor's office. I wanted to provide a clear schedule so that people were able to prepare for various discussions in advance. Many of these topics are newer, including the very exciting geothermal Thermal Energy Network pilot work, which will be discussed this week at the Climate Committee, and it's been ongoing for several years now. But much of the schedule builds on previous work we have done together in the council, including the updated zero waste master plan, the forest master plan, a review of the net zero action plan. So I want to put this out there so my colleagues understand what the plan is for this year.

and also make sure that if there's any items that are not on here or that should be further discussed as part of any of these, please make sure that we can get them onto the agenda and we can let folks know when it is that it makes sense. Again, the letter is there. The plans are there. Some of the dates are set. The staff is working to establish the dates for the others. But I did hope that we were going to be able to move forward and get a lot done this year in health and environment. There's a number of Really important topics we'll be working on.

Thank you, Councilor Nolan. That was a very helpful talk and a good governing agenda. Any other questions on this? Hearing none, on a motion by Councilor Nolan to place this on file, all those in favor say aye, aye, those against say no, the ayes have it. Communication from other city officers, number two is placed on file. Are there any late resolutions, clerk?

There is one late resolution. It's a resolution sponsored by Councilor Simmons. Okay, we'll have to bring it forward and we'll do a... We'll move suspension.

We'll move suspension. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. We're in suspension with a late resolution.

Simmons is the sponsor in its condolences to the family of Raymond T. Coleman on his passing.

Simmons.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I rise in honor and respect to Raymond T. Coleman. Mr. Coleman is a member of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Mason's past grand historian, but most importantly, had a very dominant hand in the placing of the Prince Hall Memorial, which is on the Cambridge Common. Fine gentlemen, very good friends of Red T. Mitchell, who most of you know, some of you may not, who has served... Redbean of Cambridge, Ray Knott, but he spent a good deal of time putting his heart and soul into the history of Prince Holly, making sure that all that came within His ear, anyways, would know more about him. Unfortunately, he passed away just a few days ago. His funeral is Wednesday. And so that's why I'm bringing this in as a late resolution. I'd like to be able to present it to...

to him and his family in the Grand Lodge on Wednesday evening at their funeral, showing that we do respect and acknowledge his passing but thank him for his work. I yield.

Thank you, Councilor Simmons. On a motion by Councilor Simmons to adopt the late resolution, all those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. On Tuesday night, tomorrow night, the Harvard Square Business Association will have a

meeting at St. John's at Lesley University at 91 Brattle Street. And then on Thursday at the library, I know Gavin Kleespies will be introducing a program about George Washington's tour of the United States. And then finally on... On Friday the 13th, between 5 and 8, there'll be an exhibition opening of, I think, featuring six artists at the Mod Morgan Art Center. It's all artwork of Mayo, Ireland.

So they all sound like fun. We'll go to Vice Mayor Azeem and then Councilor McGovern.

I just wanted to encourage everyone to look at the city calendar. At the end of the month, we'll be having two housing committee hearings, one that will be joined with NLTP, which will go over The one-year review of the multifamily housing ordinance and what the results have shown. The goal of that conversation is just to start it with that review. There won't be any amendments introduced at that meeting. and then there's a separate meeting on Central Square and again no zoning will be introduced at that meeting. The goal is to review what's been happening over the last year and to figure out again how to pick up that conversation. So just wanted to make everyone aware of both meetings but also to say that you know There will hopefully be lower stakes reintroductions to the conversations.

McGovern, and then Councilor Nolan.

Thank you, Madam Mayor. On Wednesday, 11 to 1, the Human Services and Veterans Committee We'll be holding a meeting regarding disability services in the city. A few different departments will be presenting on What services are available to folks who are disabled, but also how do we think about the needs of and disabled residents in our planning. So it should be an interesting conversation. And then as we already mentioned, on Wednesday, 2.30 to 4.30, the ordinance committee meeting will be meeting to talk about active use Nolan.

Thank you, Mayor Siddiqui. It's a reminder that tomorrow at 10 o'clock we're having a finance committee meeting on the required police department budget for FY27. Just to acknowledge, we did get a... It is a little confusing because we are having the meeting before we actually know for sure what the police department budget is. However, the idea is to have a Hearing, and a Finance Committee meeting with the City Council prior to the submission of the Police Department so they can get some input on that. So that's at 10 o'clock tomorrow in the Sullivan Chamber.

Hearing no other announcements on a motion by Councilor Flaherty to adjourn. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those against say no. The ayes have it. We are adjourned. Good night, everyone.