Malden City Council Committee of the Whole 04-28-2026

Moodle.

Okay, the time is now 7.06. The council will come to order. I'll rise and salute the flag. 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. Please remain standing for a moment of silence in honor of our veterans, service members, and those who have given the ultimate sacrifice. We honor and acknowledge the Massachusetts, Pennacook, and Pawtucket peoples whose ancestral lands we now call home and on which we gather today. We express gratitude to the indigenous peoples who have cared for this land for generations, predating European colonization, and continuing to the present. Moving forward, we are committed to ensuring that the histories, voices and contributions of indigenous peoples are recognized and respected in the life of our city. Clerk, will you now please call the roll?

Council, Colón Hayes. Here. Council, Condon. Here. Council, Crowe. Here. McDonald, O'Malley, Sica, Simonelli, Taylor, Winslow, President Linehan.

Here. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Okay, under the provisions of the Open Meeting Law, for those of you in attendance, please be informed that UMA, Urban Media Arts, will be recording this evening's meeting, so just be aware there will be audio and video recordings of tonight's meeting. We also have resident Brian DeLacy recording audio and video tonight. Is there anyone else present tonight who was recording in addition to Uma and Mr. DeLacy? Can you please self-identify at this time? Okay, thank you. Next order of business. Councilor O'Malley.

We have a number of members of the public that would like to comment for public comment. It's not normally on this agenda, so I would move that we suspend the rules to allow public comment tonight.

Okay, so just to explain on Councilor O'Malley's motion, seconded by Councilor Colón Hayes, for those watching, so this is a committee of the whole night, We typically do not take public comment on Committee of the Whole Night, but in recognition of the sizable crowd that we have, we are gonna vote to suspend our own rules. take a vote on whether to suspend our own rules to be able to allow public comment. So a yes vote would allow public comment this evening. Oh, yes, sorry, Councilor Winslow, I didn't see your light. You have the floor.

so normally public comment we limited that to 30 minutes and we have a sign up or do we have are we prepared to correct so yeah if this vote prevails what we will do is we will take uh

Public comment from the audience. I will ask folks to approach the podium. identify their name and address and you can give your full address or just your street per our rules. We do limit public comment to two minutes per person and our comment period is limited to 30 minutes so that will leave us with an opportunity to hear from 15 and Attendees.

Does that sound sufficient? That's what the motion is going to be, correct?

Thank you, great. Yep, no problem. Okay, I think we're ready to call the roll.

Condon, Crowe, McDonald, O'Malley, Sica, Simonelli, Taylor, Winslow, Linehan, will now allow for public comment.

Okay, so anybody wishing to give public comment, please come to the podium. I will turn on the microphone in just a moment. And again, please state your name and address, or again, you can state your name and your street and town. and we will let you know if you're approaching two minutes.

Sure. Steven South, 106 Damon Road, Medford, Massachusetts. Before I begin, I just wanted to see, I only have one other person that's going to speak. and the purpose of me being here is to provide you all with information that the mayor's office has not. So I would respectfully request five minutes and one other person have two for seven. Not the full 30 that we talked about, if that would be acceptable. Because I have a significant amount of info to go through that I provided you all with copies of.

How do folks feel about extending the amount of time? Okay, we'll extend to five minutes, thank you.

Excellent. Thank you very much, first of all, and thank you all for being here. My name is Steven South. I'm the Secretary-Treasurer of Teamsters Local 25. and represent over 200 City of Malden employees for the Teamsters Union. We were notified about a week ago exactly that there was going to be significant layoffs within the city of Malden and specifically with the Teamsters Union bargaining units. I met with the city off the record last week just to get an idea of what was going on. They gave me a list of what they were saying was going to be the layoffs, which was pretty shocking to me because our collective bargaining agreements, which is the red document, provide that the layoffs are by seniority. I actually tabbed it and wrote layoff. If you open that and look at the highlighted language, it specifically says that layoff shall be in seniority order

in each department in that employees can lay down, if an employee's position is eliminated, they can bump someone in another department. So when I saw that, One of our most two senior employees in the entire city was to be laid off is Michelle Conley, 41-year employee. and that the city had just hired new employees as recently as four weeks ago. And they were saying that Michelle could not bump because she wasn't qualified. She's been here 41 years. She's worked. in three or four different departments. She's more qualified than any of the other clerks, especially the ones that have been here for five or six weeks. I also wanna point out We can take you through these documents. This is an email just showing the first one, showing the employees that were affected. just the Teamster ones, not if there were others.

The next document that I have is the letter that went to the actual people that are being laid off, which there's more than a dozen. And I just wanna point out one part in the letter that is pretty disturbing to me. It talks about, as you are aware on March 31, city residents did not vote in favor of the proposed operational override for fiscal year 2027. as a result, the city is facing an economic crisis and is forced to reduce its budget as projected revenues for fiscal year 2027 are insufficient. So basically blaming the residents for the layoffs. I find that to be ridiculous. Obviously, the residents' votes aren't... and many more.

from Teamsters Local 25 telling him that the layoffs they were doing were both illegal and in violation of our collective bargaining agreement, which is prompting you know, litigation right now and a lot of litigation. The next letters are the two letters that were sent to the Teamsters today When the city officials already told us that this was their decision, it was final, and the mayor approved it, well, today we got letters at Local 25, two different letters, one to President Mari, one to me and Brian Hatch, business agents saying that they want to meet with us, they're going to meet with us, and they're willing to discuss bumping. when previous to that we were told there wouldn't be bumping. So I find that to be interesting and obviously because of the rally. The next thing I have for you are the three labor charges that we filed with the Massachusetts Department of Labor Relations in the last five days for the illegal actions of the city.

Next, now this I found to be very, very, very peculiar. Citi knew these layoffs were coming. Why in the last three months have they hired 22 new hires, including 13 new hires in the last six weeks or so. And now trying to lay off people that have been here for 10, 15, 41 years and keep all the brand new hires. I find that to be really ironic and I find it really to be ironic that some of the new hires have connections to the mayor and his inner circle. I find that to be peculiar. Next, this is every salary of every employee in the city. and I want to talk about four of the employees that their jobs are being eliminated, the police cadets. And you might say, what is a police cadet? In other communities, they call them dispatchers, different titles. They answer the phone when you call 911.

They take the police report at the front desk when you come in. They do a lot of assisting police officers.

You're at five minutes. Can you wrap it up in the next 10 to 15 seconds?

Yes. The city wants to lay them off and obviously keep all the... the highest paid employees in the city and replace the cadets who are the lowest paid city employees and replace them with the highest paid. I don't want to see anybody get laid off, but if you're truly Laying off to save money then laying off the lowest paid and replacing them with the highest paid on overtime. That's fake. That's not saving money. I would ask that all of you vote this budget down until the mayor fixes all these issues. And I would ask the mayor to follow the law in our contracts and treat these employees with respect. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, Denise Belboni-Cowie, 81 Newland Street. I've sat through many council meetings and listened to several of you justify your decisions by referencing your personal lives and the realities you face at home. Today I'm asking you to hold yourselves to that same standard because here's mine. on February 20th of 2025, I lost my husband unexpectedly. There was no life insurance, his 401K had been spent helping his son get sober, which is a decision I stand through to today. I applied for Social Security benefits. It was denied because my income. At that point, I had no choice but to face reality and make some very hard decisions. I cut out anything that wasn't essential, moved money around just to maintain basic stability. Projects I wanted were put on hold indefinitely while necessary repairs were financed through an equity line. Through it all, I made sure the fundamentals were covered.

My mortgage, my insurance, my healthcare, and providing a home for my mother who depends on me. None of these decisions were easy. Most of them I did not want to make, but they were necessary and I made them anyway. And I know I am not alone. Many residents in the city are doing the exact same thing every day. So as you approach your budgets, I am asking, I'm really expecting you to do the same. Prioritize what truly matters, fund public safety at the levels required to keep our community protected, stop allocating money to projects that are not essential to the city's core infrastructure. If capital improvements are necessary, plan responsibly, set funds aside, or finance them over time. but stop spending money we do not have and stop spending on what we do not need. It's not complicated. It's about discipline, priorities, and accountability.

Hard decisions are part of leadership. I've had to make them. The residents of this city are making them. Now it's your turn. put aside your own personal agendas, do the job you were elected to do, run this city responsibly, protect the services we depend on, and respect the financial realities your constituents are facing on a day to day basis. Thank you.

Thank you.

Can everybody hear me? So my name is Michelle Connolly, 258 Lebanon Street, Malden, Mass. I'm gonna use my time to read a letter from Shanae, one of the cadets that was laid off as she doesn't like public speaking. My name is Shanae Igbenosa, and I'm here not just as an employee, but as a single mother of two and a dedicated police cadet of over three years. Becoming a police officer has always been my dream. This position wasn't just a job to me, it was a pathway to a future I've been working toward every single day. It also gave me the stability I need to raise my children, while continuing to serve my community. Recently, I received a layoff notice. What makes this especially difficult is knowing that there are newer employees within the police department with less time served who are not being laid off. I'm here today because I believe in fairness.

I believe in the value of commitment, hard work, and showing up for our community. And I believe those things should matter. I'm asking for the opportunity to continue doing the job I've dedicated myself to. and to keep working toward the future I've earned. Thank you for your time. She's a single mother of two who's not going to be able to pay her rent when she's laid off if she's laid off in July. And I think everybody should be ashamed of that.

Is there anybody else that would like to come up for public comment at this time? We do still have plenty of time.

Hey, Dave Ball, 79 Wade Street Extension. It's a condo building. If anybody wants to dox me, they're going to have to read that. doorbells at the front, sorry. Proud member of local 902 Malden Fire Department, volunteer with the Friends of the Malden Public Library, proud citizen of Malden, proud worker, proud... Person going door to door three months ago, knocking on doors, pleading residents to not cut our jobs. Proud person to speak up at Q&A meetings. to ask the tough questions to people in front of audiences that were complaining about immigration and how laws weren't being followed.

How the two and a half was too much to bear and how the voters deserved better, city councilors, mayors, governors, gods, parents, what have you. I am standing here three months later after the vote, tough vote, loss, loss by 100 and something. and I'm wondering, where were the Teamsters? Maybe it takes a while for the mail to get to Medford, maybe they didn't see the bat signal in the sky over Gotham, but I'll tell you, If you were there at the Q&A, if you were there doing door-to-door, if you were there talking to city councilors and the mayor, if you were there pleading for your jobs instead of

at the finish line, which is what this is, to be honest. You know, we could have had a chance. We lost by, what, 100 and something votes if the Teamsters had sent out a flyer, if they had urged their membership and retirees to vote for the two and a half. Maybe we would be in a better situation, which is how I see things. Dave Ball, thanks very much.

Thank you. Anybody else seeking to come up for public comment at this time? We unfortunately cannot take response or comments back. I'm sorry. Thank you. Thank you for understanding. And I do also want to let folks know that we did not receive any comments by email. Sometimes we do read comments by email. We also don't take comments from viewers online. I should have said that at the beginning. So anybody in the chamber seeking to give public comment, Okay. Oh, absolutely.

Councilor McDonald.

Yeah, thank you. Thank you all for coming and engaging with us as your elected officials. I'm Councilor McDonald. I'm chair of the Finance Committee. I just wanted to offer a quick point of and information, which is that we're definitely not voting on anything today. And in fact, we always make sure that we have a public hearing in which folks just like you are welcome to come and tell us what you think about the proposed budget. That's not gonna happen for a couple of weeks, but it will happen before the finance committee takes any votes on what will happen or not happen. So we will make sure that that is of course publicized. You are all welcome to come to that public hearing. It has often been a low turnout event, but I suspect that will not be the case this year. So I just want to make sure that you all know that there are multiple points in this process where you are encouraged and welcome to also engage with us.

and the decisions that are the council's to make about the proposed budget and that we will make sure that we hear from you before we take votes on the city budget and the choices before us. and we will, and just so you know, all of the council, all of the finance committee meetings are also streamed online and they're public meetings. So you can come and observe. We don't take comments at those meetings but we do have a public hearing. and then you'll be able to submit public comment when ultimately the full council votes on this again.

So thank you.

Thank you. Thank you for coming and we will be. as Councilor McDonald said, having a sequence of meetings on this. So please do stay engaged. And I think seeing no other hands, I will move on to our next order of business. Thank you again.

Council will hold a public hearing on National Grid petition to install underground conduits. Paper 153-26.

Could I ask for folks to please stay quiet as you leave the chamber? We do have more business to get through.

Paper 153-26, petition. Massachusetts Electric Company DBA National Grid Plan Number 31239416 National Grid to Install Underground Facilities on Main Street trench and install six four inch concrete encased conduits from MA A118 to switch gale located at 1100 Main Street approximately 60 feet on public right of way. Hearing required. This is what we hear tonight. We have a representative from National Grid. Thank you.

Thank you so much for joining us again. If you could please introduce yourself.

Good evening. My name is Zane Luma.

Nice to see you again, Zane.

You too.

So before we start the hearing, do folks have any questions? Do you have anything that you want to add? It's been a few weeks since we discussed Oh, this is a new one. Is this a new one?

This is the one that we had to re-hear.

Re-hear, correct.

There was a problem with the abutters.

The abutters list, right, okay. Anything to add before we open the public hearing?

So I do have updated drawings that I can provide to you guys.

Yeah, if you can just hand that down to Councilor Simonelli, we'll pass it around. Thank you so much. That's fine, I don't need one.

You can take one.

Is this the car wash? Right, it does say car wash, which is really coming along construction-wise. I was down there the other day. O'Malley, do you want to speak to this before we open the hearing?

Sure. The purpose of this is the original hearing was not the correct address and there was some redesign. I'm still working with National Grid and the property owner to get to the final tweaking of this, but I think it makes sense to have the hearing tonight, receive this new, Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. and hear from National Grid. There has been progress and so I do appreciate that Zane and National Grid have been following up and working towards that.

Okay, great. So is there an incorrect schematic on the agenda or this is just simply not included yet?

My understanding is what is on the agenda is what was originally proposed when they applied. And this is an updated one. Great. Whether or not this is the final one is still to be determined.

Okay, great. So we'll hang on to this. All right, so hearing that at this time, I will declare the public hearing open. So anyone wishing to speak in favor of this petition, please do come forward and state your name and address or street for the record. Anyone wishing to speak in favor? Okay, hearing none and seeing none, I declare that portion of the hearing closed. Anyone wishing to speak in opposition to the petition, please come forward and state your name and address for the record. anyone wishing to speak in opposition? Okay. Seeing none and hearing none, I declare that portion of the hearing closed. Any additional questions, discussion? of course, Councilors Sica. How bad is the difference?

So we're just, We're just moving the equipment further into the lot as Ryan O'Malley suggested in the last hearing. That way it's not visible from the street. Well, it will still be visible from the street, but it's just deeper into the property. and I discussed with Ryan potentially putting a fence around the equipment, which is completely fine as long as it's behind the bollards.

Okay, so are you okay with us not voting on this tonight? It seems like they're just moving right along over there. I would hate to stop the project from moving forward because honestly, I think it looks like a terrible eyesore. I'd like it to get done. as quick as possible. So I just want to make sure that...

Yes, so National Grid and I are generally on the same page. Okay. We're at what I'm trying to do is get the property owner to be on the same page when it comes to screening and stuff and location of dumpsters.

I think I may have had a conversation with the building commissioner about

Yeah, so we're going the right direction. I just need a little bit more time to get us to a... So yeah, and again, we're not...

So we're going to do the public hearing. We did the public hearing. That's all set.

and we're not talking about relocating, the building is built. So like, we're not talking about changing anything like when it comes to that. This is really about how are they gonna try to fence off and screen this two giant, Okay. Got it. Okay. but I do appreciate that National Grid and Zane have been great partners here. The property owners and I have been in communication through their attorney. There have been a couple of missed calls both directions. I do see it getting resolved in the near future.

Perfect. Okay.

Thank you. I would table this tonight. Sure.

Okay.

If you're making that motion, I'll second it. I would make that motion with the understanding that we're going to take this up very soon and hopefully get this over the finish line as soon as possible.

Okay, I do have one light from Councilor Winslow, so we can take that up in just a moment. Councilor Winslow, you have the floor.

Yeah, I guess I'd have to go. Are the plans like for the actual result of the construction? with being changed. Because one of the things I'm just looking at is parking. It doesn't show any of the vacuums and all that type of thing. I mean, that's not National Grid's responsibility showing this plan. No, this is our drawing. It's not the custom drawing. So I just have a question.

The vacuums are going to be along the building, just like on Broadway.

Okay. I think they're along the sidewalk on Broadway. So, but in any case, I mean, one of the challenges we have on Broadway is people wanting to pull into the vacuums and backing up onto the streets, so I guess that's, Not something National Grid needs to get involved in.

Yeah, not what we can probably discuss here.

Yeah, but yeah, just something I, you know, I don't know if that's a discussion, but just...

The only other thing that is outstanding with the building... owners, is a automatic garage door and the distance between the dryers and the exit.

Okay.

It's, it's, so yeah, so We're working towards coming to a resolution when it comes to that. There's a big question about are they making it more like the one in Medford near BJ's or like the one on Broadway? So we're just trying to get to a happy medium. They both have their problems in different ways. Okay.

So yeah. No, no, appreciate your effort, Councilor O'Malley. Thank you.

Okay, so we have a motion to table by Councilor O'Malley, seconded by Councilor Sica. I guess we need to call the roll on that. Can we do a voice? Okay. Okay, no problem. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, so that is tabled. Thank you, Zane, for coming in again.

We'll get this- So, since this table do, would we have to come here, petition again, or just talk to you, and then, okay.

Yeah.

You might have to come again. Well, yeah, I'm sorry, Councilor.

My understanding is you might have to come again, but you won't have to petition again. This is now the active petition. And I think that we would probably just between scheduling with the Clerk, yourself, myself, and the property owner determine when this will next appear on the agenda, but hopefully in the near future.

Okay, and Councilor Crowe, I'm going to put your light on because I know you have some other issues that you wanted to take up as well.

Yeah, since he is here, I wanted to see about taking 15026 off the table as well as 151-26, and that's 204 Main Street and 213 Main Street.

Okay, so on Councilor Crowe's motion to untable 150-26 and 151-26. Seconded by Councilor Sica, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, those are off the table.

And the last time that you came and we did we did the hearing. It was about where bollards are and it's how it impedes sometimes the sidewalk and the other public ways. And so for 104 Main Street, they are being pushed back. No ballads are going to be necessary so it won't be on the way. One of the issues is that property, everything's pretty much, there's not a lot of movement and to be able to access the equipment They can't move it to the back because it's kind of too tight. So it is in a, and I wish I meant to print it out, the schematic where it is. So it is in a much... I didn't bring a copy with me either. Sorry about that. It is in a better location as far back as we could with being able to access the equipment when needed. So I make a motion to grant.

Second. Okay.

I was actually going to recommend that since we need to suspend our rules to vote on these, I might be looking for a motion to suspend our rules to take up the rest of the docket so that we don't have to do this on every item if anybody is open to making that motion. I'll second it. Okay, great. On a motion from Councilor Sica, seconded by Councilor Crowe, to suspend our rules to take up our remaining docket items. O'Malley has stepped away. Is that a problem? He said he's recusing himself. Oh, he's recusing. I thought he said he needed to step away. I'm sorry. No.

I didn't hear him say that. I thought he was using the restroom, I'm sorry.

It's not unanimous.

We need eight out of 11, so we still have nine people sitting at this bench, so it's fine.

to do a voice vote. Okay. All in favor of suspending our rules? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. The rules are suspended. Therefore, we can take up your motion, Councilor Crowe, I apologize. So you move to, oh, sorry about that, Councilor Winslow, thank you.

I just have a quick question for Zane. I mean, do you have like a, for these two, do you have like a date of a plan that we can just, Crowe, just to say that the plan dated X, so that's in the record. Because right now, these updated plans aren't in the record. So how should they phrase it?

The updated plans. One of them's not going to be updated, though. Right, 213 Main Street was not updated. Um, the, we can get to that when we get to that one.

So I just want clarity as to kind of, are we approving what's on the record or is there another plan?

For 204 Main Street, it's not what's on the record, it's just getting pushed back about 13 feet into the property. I don't have a print on me. I mean, I know I emailed it to you.

Yes.

and I can't get my email unfortunately at the moment.

We could have that attached to the agenda.

We'll have that attached, yeah, I'll Okay. Make sure that gets attached. All right.

So just for the plans that have been submitted to Councilor Crowe or whatever. So yeah, I just want to make sure we're clear. That's perfect. Great. Thanks.

Okay. So we had a motion. I'm sorry, a motion to grant by Councilor Crowe, seconded by Councilor Simonelli with the following conditions. one, that the engineer be called when dig safe is notified, and two, that the streets and sidewalks be restored to the satisfaction of the Director of Public Works. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay. Next door.

Was that for both papers or just 150?

That was for both, correct? Or did you, I'm sorry, I may have misheard.

We can do both. I just wanted to say about 213, and when we had talked about this, since they were across the street, we said, Let's look at that again. As you know, 213 is the old Salvation Army site. And that topography and everything that's happened, every piece of that piece of land is being used. So there is no place to move it at all. You know, trucks really can't get into...

Exactly, the driveway is too narrow for our trucks to go in the back, so it's not possible for us to place the equipment or maintain. We need to maintain equipment 24-7. so if we can't access it.

And I did speak to the property owners which is ACDC and they confirmed that there's no place to really move it and we really kind of looked at it and anything that we possibly could do. Again, every piece of that piece of property is really being used. Yes. So make a motion that we grant it.

Okay, great, so we'll do that again. On Councilor Crowe's motion to grant, seconded by Councilor Simonelli with the following conditions. One, that the engineer be called when DigSafe is notified, and two, that the streets and sidewalks be restored to the satisfaction of the Director of Public Works. All those in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, great. That is granted. Thank you. Thank you. Next order of business. And thank you, Zane.

Thank you.

Going back up to the top of the agenda to paper 233-26. paper 233-26 order. The mayor will submit the fiscal year 2027 annual appropriation order for the general fund. I have a memo that I would like to read into the record on behalf of Mayor Christensen. It reads as follows. I submit for your consideration the proposed fiscal year 2027 budget. This proposal begins a difficult yet necessary process of reducing expenses, one that may need to continue if conditions do not improve. Following the failed Proposition 2 1⁄2 override, as anticipated, we are facing a structural deficit of nearly $10 million. Addressing this challenge will require a combination of personnel reductions and the use of reserves.

The proposed reductions are across multiple departments, starting at City Hall and spanning across the city, including Public Works, the Library, the Police and Fire Departments, and several boards and commissions. where possible, we eliminated positions that recently became vacant due to retirements and resignations. In total, this proposal contains nearly $4.5 million worth of budget cuts. These reductions would have been significantly deeper without the continued use of reserves. The proposal includes the use of $5.2 million in reserves in amounts well above the ideal annual range of $3 to $4 million. but necessary to further lessen the impact on core city services. I recognize that this approach runs counter to the views expressed by many residents who during the override campaign urged us to continue maximizing the use of reserves.

while doing so would make my job much easier in the short term, it would be irresponsible of us to spend in a matter of a few years what we have saved while not addressing the structural concerns that brought us here. It would also undoubtedly undermine our long-term financial stability and leave our city without the capacity to respond to truly unforeseen events. The use of reserves requires a careful budget and I anticipate a discussion with you on achieving that balance. I strongly encourage full council participation in finance committee meetings. While this body cannot add to the proposed budget, I will be open to any proposal supported by a supermajority of the city council. I am attaching to this memo a copy of my transmittal letter that further details the proposed fiscal year 2027 budget. In addition, you will have received an email containing a link that will take you to a PDF version of the budget.

Again, the decisions outlined in this proposal will shape our city for years to come. It represents a coordinated effort across many departments to address the challenges before us. while some may be focused on the next mayoral election, this is not a moment for politics. It is a time for us to remain focused and work together to navigate this difficult budget year and its long-term implications for our community. And I'm now going to distribute the transmittal letters with the appropriation as was mentioned in the memo. Oh, that's great. I do have a hard copy.

and I do see that we have that in our email. Will those be attached to the agenda as well? I'm sorry. The email, I did see that the email that the mayor referenced.

The link that the mayor is sending out tonight will be attached to the agenda.

Okay.

To this paper, 233, and then everybody will have access to go in and look at the fine details of the larger budget.

Okay, great, and I do want to just say for the public watching that that file, so on our docket tonight, the file number that has this order, that will become the source file that our future attachments, we can go to to find subsequent additional items related to the budget. So this will become the starting point. You can find everything from there moving forward as well.

That's correct. Paper 233 will follow this all the way through the Finance Committee and the public hearing and all the stuff.

Okay, great. O'Malley, I see your light. You have the floor.

Yes, I just wanted to inform the council and the public that based on the conversation that we had in finance a couple of weeks ago, I requested from the financial team an Excel sheet that will have all of the account numbers, the account number descriptions, 2019 actuals by account number, 2025 actuals the 2026 budgeted amount which was appropriated for this fiscal year and also the 2027 proposed budget that we just received. Having that in an Excel sheet I think will really help aid I know not all of us are necessarily whizzes as Excel, but I'm sure in the Finance Committee, by sharing a screen, we'll be able to better dive into the challenges. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor O'Malley. And I did also want, again, for the public's benefit, I'm trying to find, right, so on the cityofmalden.org website, if you go scroll down to the common links section, you can see already the proposed budget for next year. That takes you to our ClearGov Transparency Center where you can dive into the different sections. I'm now gonna go to Councilor McDonald, our Chair of Finance.

Yeah, thank you, Council President. So everybody should have got you should have in your email. You do have in your email right now of city councilors a link to the full budget book. This is just the first couple of pages, but the whole thing is like 200 pages. and as Council President Linehan said, that is then going to be uploaded to the detailed clear gov city budget site. So if you don't, if you can't remember where it is on the homepage, you can also just go to cityofmalden.org slash budget and you can get it from there. So that includes the line by line, O'Malley, Sica, Simonelli, Spadafora, Taylor, Winslow, Malden, Councilor and our CFO and controller assured me that we will have that in our hands by the time we have our first meeting about this next week.

So I just wanted to very briefly review the planned schedule for how the Finance Committee's gonna talk through this budget, which we just discussed in the Finance Committee, but I wanna share very briefly here. Once the budget is submitted, state law gives us 45 days to review and approve the budget. And so that clock starts today. And next week we will have an overview meeting with the mayor's finance team about the budget. that's a chance to certainly ask questions and get clarifications about the big picture and a lot of our income sources. For the following three weeks, we do anticipate meeting with our different budgets and excuse me, different departments and digging into their budgets. including the schools, including an opportunity to hopefully speak with every department that is affected by these cuts and reductions, which I think is every department. We do need to also have a public hearing that's in our rules and that is just good practice. And so, as I said, that will happen before the committee vote.

We are planning that for June 2nd. We'll let you know if that changes, certainly before it gets formally noticed. And that would set us up for a final set of votes on June 9th for the budget within that 45-day timeline. We do think that we can have the discussions we need at that time, but we always reserve the right to add another meeting if we need to. It's just that the council also has other things that we need to do in that time. And so we cannot only do this, but we will make sure that we have the time for discussion that is needed. For the public following along, you can, of course, tune into any of the Finance Committee meetings. You can come and share at the at the public hearing, and there will be time for public comment ultimately when it comes back for that full council vote, kind of like we just did here. The public hearings are usually a little more you have a little more time. We're not limited to 30 minutes. We will have some guidelines, but you can usually get a little bit more than two minutes for sure.

and so stay tuned for that. You can also follow along as I said at the detailed city budget site. I just personally on my social media tried to post I already did an update on our expected process last week. I'll do another one this week to help folks who are perhaps not tuned into every single minute of these meetings follow the thread over time. So that's a lot of process. I do just want to say that, you know, from my perspective as Council Chair, we only have and so forth. And I think it's a very painful and bad choices at this point. and still significant cuts. And we've heard from the public tonight about how painful some of those cuts would be if actualized. And I just want to reiterate the hope that we can all

bring our best and most constructive approaches to trying to find that path forward. We're not gonna be able to dig into every single idea between now and the 45 day window, but there is certainly, it's helpful to flag things that might take longer than a couple weeks to finalize and be able to work on those too. because this is not going to lead to full budget stability even if we enacted all of this right now without any further changes. It's going to take multiple years to bring us into alignment given the structural forces that We face. So this is the this is what's before us this year. We will make sure that we have a good time to discuss at the council level, engage with our schools and our school committee about their decisions and recommendations and move forward. and I just want to, one other point that I'll just make is that we do expect some updates about our health insurance savings after open enrollment

We won't know what all of those savings are until the end of May. We'll have a better projection, and we will also know more about state funding at that point. one of the biggest drivers of this budget gap this year and over time has been state funding requirements. It's been the minimum required amount we spend on our schools. It's good to invest in the schools. It's been the way that and many more. and I'm happy to make a motion to refer to the Finance Committee if now is a good time to do that.

Thank you, Councillor McDonald. We do have one more light, but I would definitely welcome that motion in a moment. Councillor Colón Hayes.

Thank you. So thank you. I wanted to say a couple of things. I had talked to a few people outside earlier. just to let people know that we just received this now. I did anyway, I'm assuming everybody just received it now. We all just received it. So we are not here, if anybody was here, anticipating that we would have some answers or have a discussion. I just wanted to let everybody know that we haven't even looked at this yet. So you'll be hearing from us in the finance committee meetings and that's where people should definitely go. That's where a lot of the discussion is. and I will also be interacting online like I do. I'll be asking questions from you because I really believe that I need to hear from the people of Malden. what their thoughts are as well, but also to get some answers. A lot of folks were already asking questions on how some of these cuts were made, what was the process, what was the thought process, and that will all come out in these meetings, but I just wanted to make sure that people

watching, just weren't expecting that we were going to talk about this tonight. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Colón Hayes.

Okay, so we have a motion seeing no other lights. We have a motion by Councillor McDonald, seconded by Councillor Sica to refer this to the Finance Committee. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, that is referred. Next order of business. Now we sadly have more things on the docket.

Wishful thinking.

Paper 234-26, the City Council will address the open meeting law complaint submitted on April 16th, 2026 by Bruce Friedman of 8 Marvin Street, Malden against the Council related to the release of Executive Session Minutes on April 14th, 2026.

Thank you. I'll invite our City Solicitor to the podium. Thank you, Solicitor McNeil.

Hi, Alicia McNeil, City Solicitor. Am I addressing, is this receiving?

This is the one you're going to be receiving, a brand new one you're gonna be receiving this evening.

So what do we need to do, just refer?

We need to just refer it to legal, give them the authority to work on responding. I know, they just really all blend together. And also because the deadline is running really tight, I would suggest that you consider allowing the legal department to respond without coming back to the council. Because if that happens, we might miss the deadline. I can't remember the deadline off the top of my head. I was going to say, can you remind me of the deadline on this one? I don't have it in front of me off the top of my head.

Is it 30 days or 14?

It's 14. 14 business days. It's 14 business days. So this was submitted April 16th.

Right, it was from April 14th. So this was submitted on the 16th.

We might be able to get this done on May 5th. Okay. Yeah.

Okay. So I'm looking for a motion to refer this to the legal department. So moved by Councilor Sica, seconded by Councilor Crowe. all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Councilor O'Malley is present. Thank you, Ali. Next order of business.

Paper 235-26, Communication. The Fiscal Year 2027 Community Development Block Grant has been sent by the Mayor's Office directly to the Finance Committee to avoid delays on the City Council's review and adoption thereof. The CDBG budget will come back before the full Council with recommendations for a final vote after review by the Finance Committee. and again, like we did last night with the CPC, last week with the CPC budget, this is just a communication to let you know the paper is active, but it went directly to subcommittee.

Great, I do see a light from Councilor Crowe. So I need to recuse myself.

I don't get paid out of the CDBG, but an organization that I do work for is on the list to receive money.

Okay, thank you for that, Councilor Crowe.

Well, this is just being placed on file. We're not actually discussing. It's up to you.

Yeah.

I probably would, yeah. Does anybody else want to speak to this or are we okay to? take a vote? Councilor McDonald, do you wanna? Okay, great.

Just very briefly, we can talk through this when the actual paper is on the floor, but we did, since it is a committee report, we did take advantage of this time to make sure we could get this done. it does have a federal deadline in May before we were in full on budget season. So thanks to our strategic planning and community development folks who bring their separately grant funded salaries that do not, Burden, the general fund so much. We appreciate that and look forward to talking through the grants next week when they're on the forum.

Great. Thank you for walking us through that. So we'll be looking for a motion to receive and place this on file. Okay? Oh, sorry, Councilor O'Malley, you can go right ahead.

We had this conversation in finance, but I think for the full council and the public, these are funds that we don't always aren't guaranteed to get from the federal government, but we are lucky that we have received them. And so one of the things that I'm happy that our OSPCD director will be looking at in future years is there a way to use our CDBG funds to make capital improvements to our public facilities, whether that be like roofs or HVAC or other accessibility, ADA. If these are things that we're spending out of our general fund, but there's a way to use funds that are coming from the federal government, any amount helps. and so I just wanted to put that out there at the full council level and for the public and I appreciate working with the director. Thank you.

Thank you. Okay, almost done, Councilor, sorry. So on a motion by Councilor McDonald, seconded by Councilor Colón Hayes to receive and place this on file, all in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, that is received and placed on file.

Next order of business. Paper 236-26, Communication. Pursuant to MGL Chapter 30A, Section 22G1, With the approval of Council President Linehan and City Solicitor McNeil, on April 17, 2026, 11 members of the Malden City Council were invited to review draft executive session minutes in the privacy of the City Clerk's office. The members were asked for a review to both finalize draft minutes and to review for public release.

If there were any motions for amendments or needs for further discussion, a date would be set to meet an executive session to deliberate. Otherwise, if there were no objections on behalf of the body, President Linehan would be tasked with the approval of said minutes. On April 23rd, Council President Linehan authorized the approval of draft executive session minutes from April 7th and 14th to be finalized. Concurrently, a periodic review was completed to determine if a number of minutes warranted continued nondisclosure. Council President Linehan, under the advice of counsel from Solicitor McNeil, has now ordered the City Clerk to release the executive session minutes from the meeting of April 14th, 2026. under open meeting law, MGL chapter 30A subsection 22F, certain executive session meeting minutes are being withheld as publication may defeat the lawful purpose of the executive session. Under the public records law, these same sets of executive session meeting minutes are being withheld based on attorney-client privilege.

The meetings were held in executive session with the city solicitor and city officials, creating an attorney-client relationship The City officials sought legal advice from the City Solicitor and the communications of these meetings have not been waived. For the above reasons, the following meeting minutes are withheld from public release and that would be April 7th, 2026.

Okay, thank you so much to our Clerk. Councilor O'Malley.

I'm just, and I appreciate the Clerk, I know you had reached out to me on a Friday and I apologize for not having a chance to return your phone call, but I we should probably catch up offline. One of the things that I think would be helpful is in addition to the dates, if we could put what the subject of it was, because I'm just hearing random dates but if it also had like Benevolent or Dris or something like that, I think it would help me understand like, oh yeah, that makes sense that this is being withheld or not withheld. but I do appreciate and want to recognize that you did reach out and I apologize for not calling you out.

Thank you, sir. Quite all right. Yeah, no, I think that's a good suggestion. We're definitely trying to be responsive to your suggestions too. Thank you. Okay, so... Thank you for reading that into the record. I'm looking for a vote to also receive and place this on file. Okay, so moved by Councilor Crowe, seconded by Councilor McDonald. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, seeing none, that is received and placed on file. Next order of business.

A representative from the solicitor's office will follow up on paper 203-26 with an update to the counsel on the investigation into the open meeting law complaint filed by Bruce Friedman of 8 Marvin Street on April 7th, 2026 against the council related to the executive session posted on April 7th under the provisions of MGL chapter 30A subsection 21A3 and subsection 21B3.

Thank you. Solicitor McNeil, you have the floor. Just to remind folks, we were in court today and we asked for this update, so this is why our solicitor is here.

That's the second update. This is the first one.

This is the first one. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I misread my own notes.

take it away. In response to a open meeting law complaint by Mr. Bruce Friedman, the city solicitor's office did an investigation and from the investigation, we found that it was reasonable that we actually not put on the meeting minutes, on the agenda rather, the purpose of our meeting that we went into on April 7th and the reason for that was because again we believed or I believed that it was It would likely compromise the purpose of the executive session. And although we did not state specifically why we were going into executive session, it We did state that it was for budgetary concerns.

I turned off my microphone because it was making that ringing sound before. Do folks have any questions? Okay, so we're looking for a motion to authorize sending a report to both the complainant and the Attorney General? Yes, please. Okay. So moved by Councilor Sica, seconded by Councilor Winslow. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Right, Councilor O'Malley, you're no, okay. So that is so authorized.

Next order of business. Representative from the Solicitor's Office will offer an update to the Council on the proceedings held in open court on the afternoon of April 28th regarding the matter of Drist Corporation v. City of Malden.

So there was a hearing today, this morning. And just to be clear, the court ordered or really ordered the city council to go into executive session to discuss this further. in fact the court wanted us to go into executive session tonight and I told the court that we couldn't because the agenda was already out so what I'm about to tell you is everything that happened in open court if you have any questions or comments I would I appreciate it if you would hold those questions. If it's not specifically about what happened at court, hold those comments until we convene in executive session. So just to clarify, Although the docket read that we were going into a hearing for both Benevolent and Drist, the court made it clear that we were only going to be talking about Benevolent today.

Today we talked about benevolent and the purpose of the hearing was that on March 25th, the court made some comments about what her ruling was. and she ordered the plaintiff, Benevolent, to file a motion for clarification, which they did. In their motion, and I'll summarize, Benevolent essentially said the court should not, the court should permit the city from seeking a special permit for them to open up their marijuana establishment because the court said several things at the hearing on March 25th. My position, the city's position rather, was that

although the city is willing to allow and to look for a pathway for the plaintiffs to move forward based on the court's written decision it appears that to the city that they still needed a special permit and the reasons being is as I've stated before there are many other ordinances, which 12-12-190, which is invalidated, point to. And if the court is going to now say that they don't need a special permit, then a lot of things in the ordinance would be required to change. The court, so really the conversation today was based around the special permit

the court did acknowledge at the beginning of the hearing that she was not asked to nor did she invalidate or say that the Benevolent did not require a special permit. And I pointed out to the court that the plaintiffs, in fact, asked the court to, in their complaint, the plaintiffs asked the court to order that the city give them a special permit. And in my view, that indicated that they knew they needed a special permit. Goal of the hearing for me was to, and I believe for the plaintiffs, was to get clarification as to what the court now meant with her comments on March 25th.

The plaintiffs suggested in the court also is agreeing that the city stipulate to a certain pathway that Benevolent should follow in order to open up their business. So the court ordered that Benevolent provide to the court and to the city what they believe the procedure is for them to move forward from here in order to get their business up and running. The court in a nutshell said that the city has treated Benevolent unfairly She wants the city to treat them fairly. She mentioned also in the hearing that she may order the city to give benevolent A special permit.

So that was something that she was thinking about towards the end of the hearing. She also talked about again about sending us to mediation. The So the order that I believe is coming from the court is that Benevolent will provide the court and the city, again, their idea of how we should move forward or they should move forward and they will provide that by May 8th. I also brought to the court's attention that on the March 25th hearing, she said that her intent was to sue was to throw out the entire marijuana regime, regimen. And I told her I really wasn't clear what that meant because we had a licensing portion of our ordinance and the court said, well, I don't have

any jurisdiction over the licensing portion of it, but my goal is that these people should get or this company should proceed and open up their business. So after Benevolent provides me and the court with their process of how they should move forward, the court would like us to go into executive session review that, go into executive session and discuss whether we think this is the right path and eventually the court wants the city to also provide them if there is no stipulation we can't agree to how they move forward, the city to provide the court with our viewpoint of how they should move forward in the process. And that document is due May 20th from the city.

The court also said that she will decide and provide a clarifying decision. She said that she was not very clear in her previous decision. And so she will be eventually providing a clarifying decision. There is no new court date. The court wants to gather all of the documents from both parties and think about what her decision will be. Again, towards the end, the court said that she wants the city council, the city to work in good faith and use its best effort to try at least to come to some resolution with Benevolent Botanicals. That's basically it.

Okay, thank you so much. I see a couple of lights. I'm going to go to Councilor O'Malley first.

So I just want to say that I was in attendance today. I believe Councilor Colón Hayes was also. and I appreciate that this was put on the open session docket. But as we just heard, Drist was actually not discussed today. And I believe that this discussion is just entirely related to benevolent and so I would just like to object to us really deliberating this as currently docketed but I appreciate that we did and I would like us to do that maybe at a future meeting, maybe the next meeting, and I would be willing to put a paper forward related to that. Thank you.

Okay, thank you, Councilor O'Malley. Did you want to address that or no?

I know we've got a lot of microphones on, sorry. I was just saying that when we put together the agenda, which was last Thursday, We were told that the city solicitor was going to go back into court on this day and that we would need an update like we're getting right now. But the court case is named Driss, I don't have the docket number, but the court case is named Driss et al. v. City of Malden. that's the information that we had at the time that we put this agenda together. We didn't purposely miss docket it. It's that we didn't know that when the solicitor went to court today, the judge was gonna talk solely about benevolent botanicals and not about dress. Had we known that, we could have docketed it or included that differently when we did the agenda, but that was posted last Thursday, and so this was an unforeseen situation that the judge kind of inadvertently put us in.

And I understand, Councilor O'Malley, what you're saying, and I hear you, and I appreciate your thanks for us trying to be proactive at the same time, but I understand what you're saying in terms of the concern. Thank you for explaining that. I have next, Councilor Winslow.

Yeah, I just, I mean, one thing I might suggest is to have someone from the City Council take the lead on maybe reaching out with benevolent botanicals and the solicitor's office to try to resolve something. So when we come to executive session, there's something. So I would be willing to serve that role if that is of interest. It seems like this is particularly in my ward, and I've been holding back on getting directly involved out of respect for executive session process, but I think that may be inhibiting resolving the confusion here. So I just offer that. I don't know if that's something we could vote on tonight or just the council president sign me to do that with the solicitor. I just offer that, so yeah.

Okay, thank you. McDonald.

Thank you so much for this update, Ali, and I just want to make sure I understand kind of the thumbnail sketch of what is being required and expected of us. So the judge wants us to promptly set a pathway for benevolent botanicals to be able to get a special permit from the city, and they're gonna propose that? They're gonna propose that process?

No, not a special permit. Benevolent believes they do not need a special permit and the court is leaning towards the fact that they do not need a special permit.

Okay.

And so they want a pathway. The court wants us to come or wants the city council to come to some if you want to come to your own decision as to the pathway for benevolent to go from where they are right now to opening their business. and Benevolent's position is they do not need a special permit and I believe that's what the court is leaning towards as well.

Okay, so I'm sorry, so the correction is that It's not just to get special permits, it's to get open and operating as a business.

Yes, without a special permit.

Okay. And did you also say that the court agreed that she had not previously invalidated the special permit? Yes. Okay. But given where we're at, she's like, you know, I might just go ahead and do that.

Well, given the argument that she heard today, I believe that that's her position. That's the direction where she is heading.

Okay. And the process then is benevolence going to tell us how they think we should get there. will have a, they together, we're gonna have a chance to respond and say if we can agree to that or find some other point of agreement and that that is the most urgent thing that the court wants to see and that there will then subsequently at some point be a clarification of ruling or are those things bound up together?

They are not bound up together. So whether we come to a decision or not, I believe the court really needs to be clear about what her decision should say. So she did say that she's going to clarify her judgment after she gets that paperwork. So I believe that it is two separate things.

All right, well, I am eager to see us find that pathway to resolution and be able to then make sure that we do get that clarification. I agree with you that I think it's essential that we need that clarification so that we can in fact Adjust our ordinances appropriately.

Yes. So the clarification obviously would come after we file the paperwork with the court, both the plaintiff and the city.

To clarify the pathway.

if we come to an agreement, that will be the clarification of the pathway. However, the court will clarify her Judgment, so that it's clear on the record.

Got it.

Okay. Thank you very much.

You're welcome.

Thank you, Councilor McDonald. I next have Councilor Colón Hayes.

Thank you very much. Thank you. That was, being on the call, a great synopsis of what happened. But I originally hit my light because I had the same question that Councilor O'Malley did about why it was docketed as DRIS. And so we already went over that, but that's why I originally put that on. But I do remember that we were asking for a clarification on benevolence. So I'm not sure. Why it's listed as Drist, but it sounds like it's because that's the name of the actual case. Just to clarify that.

If I can sort of clarify that. On March 25th, the Hearing was specifically for the Drist matter. Benevolent was not included in it, and this is part of my pleading to the court. Benevolent wasn't included with it. I had no idea that benevolent was going to speak. and that particular hearing was converted from a deris matter to a benevolent matter. And so when the court docketed it, she docketed it or the court docketed it for, I believe, maybe both Driss and Benevolent. I know she provided it to all three parties, including the city. So I'm not sure how it was documented, but that was because it was an originally a Driss versus the city of Malden matter. So that's for clarification for the record and why it may have been unclear on the agenda tonight.

Thank you. Yeah, because that even confused myself. The other thing was... I heard that we're going to be making sure that Benevolent moves forward as fast as possible, but you did ask some questions, and I'm thinking if you can clarify the answer to whether or not we are only making a decision on benevolent about a special permit and not like on all other cannabis license that comes before us.

Could you remind? What the court said today? Yes, what the court said today. Yeah, the court said she doesn't know. Okay.

You're all set, Councilor Colón Hayes. Oh, yes. Okay, no problem. Thank you. Okay, so I don't think we need to take a vote. We're just receiving an update tonight. To Councilor Winslow's point, I think the solicitor and I can confer on what makes sense in terms of Outreach to Benevolent and what that representative, what makes the most sense. I'm happy to have a conversation over the next day or so and we can circle back on that. Is there anything else that you wanted to add?

Yes, I just want to add two things. Court wanted us to have the executive session ASAP. I'm not sure that I'm going to be available next week. I'll find out by Thursday, so it may have to be postponed until the week after that. But when we have the executive session, I know Councilor Condon brought it up at the last time. I really think that it would be appropriate to include our building commissioner in this conversation since he is the person that would be enforcing the zoning, and also Ron Hogan, since he is the chairperson of Clerk.

Yes, thank you for reminding us of that. That sounds fine. And I'll work with you on the scheduling the executive session. Okay, thank you. Thank you so much for being here. You're welcome. Okay, next order of business. The docket is clear. Okay? Okay, we have a motion to adjourn by Councilor Winslow, seconded by Councilor Taylor. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? I hope not. We are adjourned at 822.

Sure. Oh, Jesus.