Agenda
Town Council · from the Town's website · released Aug 6, 2024 · 7 pages · 1.9 MB
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Meeting ID: 861 9937 3058 Passcode: 137684 Phone: 1-646-558-8656 Zoom Information WINTHROP TOWN COUNCIL Town Council Members Town Council President James Letterie MEETING AGENDA Precinct 1 Councilor Costigan AUGUST 6, 2024 Precinct 2 Councilor Munson TOWN COUNCIL MEETING 6:30 PM Precinct 3 VP- Councilor Belcher HARVEY HEARING ROOM Precinct 4 Councilor Swope Precinct 5 Councilor Aiello Precinct 6 Councilor DaRos Councilor at Large DeMarco Councilor at Large Tassinari een 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. PyeNr CALL TO ORDER COLL CALL TOWN COUNCIL PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE MINUTES Approval of Minutes, July 16, 2024 as circulated Approval of Minutes Ex. Session 2-21-23 GENERAL INFORMATION AND RECOMMENDATIONS Proclamation-Winthrop a Purple Heart Community-VA Director Phil Ronan Mothers Out Front PUBLIC HEARING PUBLIC COMMENT. *€ORRESPONDENCE COMMITTEE REPORTS Rules & Ordinance SCHOOL DEPARTMENT REPORT School Override Request-Vote to Accept TOWN MANAGER REPORT COMMISSION OF DIVERSITY, INCLUSION AND COMMUNITY RELATIONS UPDATE POLICY MAKING COMMITTEES OLD BUSINESS -_zreeFire House Update NEW BUSINESS Motion-Town Council accept & sign letter to MassDOT Sec. Tibbits-Nutt & MBTA GM Peter Eng Waive Town Council Rule 2(a) adding a Special Meeting Trash Pick Up Discussion Appointment PUBLIC COMMENT. PUBLIC RELATIONS / UPCOMING EVENTS e Winthrop Farmers Market Dates: June through October- 2"¢ & 4" Sunday of the month Ingleside Park 9AM — 1PM © 8-24-24 Accesible Adventures Fun Day at Deer Island 18. ADJOURNMENT Military Order 7 Of the a Purple Heart 3) TOWN OF WINTHROP, MA PROCLAMATION PURPLE HEART COMMUNITY WHEREAS, the people of the Winthrop, MA have great admiration and the utmost gratitude for all the citizens of our community who have selflessly served in the Armed Forces that has been vital in maintaining the freedom and the way of life enjoyed by our citizens; and WHEREAS, citizens of our community have been killed in action while serving in the Armed Forces and have been posthumously awarded the Purple Heart for their ultimate sacrifice; and WHEREAS, citizens of our community have been awarded the Purple Heart for their bodily sacrifice of being wounded by the hand of the enemy while engaged in combat; and WHEREAS, the Purple Heart is the oldest American military decoration and was created as The Badge of Military Merit, made of purple cloth in the shape of a heart with the word "Merit" sewn upon it, on August 7, 1782 in Newburgh, New York by General George Washington, then reestablished as the Purple Heart on February 22, 1932 by General Douglas MacArthur; and WHEREAS, the heritage it represents is sacred to those who know the price paid to wear the Purple Heart; and WHEREAS, August 7" is nationally recognized as Purple Heart Day; and NOW, THEREFORE BE IT PROCLAIMED, We the Winthrop Town Council hereby proclaim Winthrop, Massachusetts, a Purple Heart Community, honoring the service and sacrifice of those from our community who were awarded the Purple Heart while serving in our Nation wars; and ALSO, BE IT PROCLAIMED, the Town of Winthrop, Massachusetts will recognize August 7th annually as Purple Heart Day, and urge our citizens and organizations to display the American Flag as well use other public expressions of recognition of our Purple Heart recipients. TOWN OF WINTHROP WINTHROP SCHOOL COMMITTEE To: Jim Letterie, Winthrop Town Council President From: Winthrop School Committee Date: July 31, 2024 RE: Request for Override to be placed on November Ballot Greetings Mr. Letterie, As representative of the citizens of the Winthrop, the Winthrop School Committee is dedicated to creating a learning environment that supports all of our students in achieving their full potential. Our vision is to create an educational system that serves as a cornerstone of our community's success and well-being. Every student deserves access to outstanding educational opportunities, cutting-edge resources, and a safe, nurturing learning environment. We want to be a model of inclusivity in education, inspiring lifelong learning and civic engagement. Through strong community support and strategic investment, we seek to cultivate a generation of well-rounded, empowered individuals prepared to thrive in a rapidly changing world. In reviewing budget projections and recent budget allocations, it is clear that the schools can not continue to provide the current level of services without an increase in budget beyond the town’s current projected resources. Therefore, we have voted to ask the Town Council to place a vote on the November ballot for an override of proposition 2.5. The proposed Override is $4,950,000 to fund the Operating Budget of the Winthrop Public Schools. If approved, the Override would go into effect July 1, 2025. We anticipate that this override will sustain funding for 3 years (FY26-FY28). On behalf the Winthrop School Committee, thank you for your attention to this matter. Sincerely, Jen Powell Winthrop School Committee Chair TOWN OF WINTHROP OFFICE OF THE TOWN COUNCIL Town Hall, 1 Metcalf Square, Winthrop, MA 02152 Telephone: 617-846-1742 MOTION Submitted By: Councilor Aiello Date: July 31, 2024 Motion for the council to accept and sign the attached letter addressed to MassDOT Secretary Tibbits-Nutt and MBT‘A General Manager Peter Eng regarding operational concerns surrounding the Winthrop-Quincy Ferry. The letter should be sent to the following email and physical addresses: Recipient Email Address Physical Address Secretary Monica Tibbets-Nutt | m.tibbits.nut@dot.state.ma.us 10 Park Plaza, Boston, MA 02116 GM Phillip Eng peng@mbta.com 10 Park Plaza, Room 3910, Boston, MA 02116 Senator Ed Markey Ed@edmarkey.org 975 JFK Federal Building 15 New Sudbuty Street, Boston, MA 02203 Senator Elizabeth Warren info@elizabethwarren.com 2400 JFK Federal Building 15 New Sudbury Street, Boston, MA 02203 Representative Katherine Clark | MA5District@mail.house.gov 24 Beacon St., Room 410, Boston, MA 02133 Senator Lydia Edwards lydia.edwards@masenate.gov 24 Beacon St., Room 413-C, Boston, MA 02133 Representative Jeffrey Turco jeffrey.turco@mahouse.gov 24 Beacon St., Room 473B, Boston, MA 02133 Attorney Cipoletta jcipoletta@town.winthrop.ma.us | 1 Metcalf Square, Winthrop, MA 02152 Winthrop Climate Committee 1 Metcalf Square, Winthrop, MA 02152 TOWN OF WINTHROP OFFICE OF THE TOWN COUNCIL MassDOT Secretary Monica Tibbits-Nutt MBTA General Manager Phillip Eng July 31, 2024 Dear Secretary Tibbits-Nutt and General Manager Eng, We write this letter in frustration and with a straightforward request - please make the Winthrop ferry a permanent service, characterized by direct service to the East Boston, South Boston, and Downtown Boston waterfronts. As we have written before in concert with representatives from Quincy, Winthrop and Quincy service need to be separated from each other. We were stunned by the MBTA’s unilateral decision this year to take a Winthrop provided boat and gut the service to our community while favoring Quincy. Given this, Winthrop ridership has decreased while Quincy’s has increased as would be expected. During the Sumner Tunnel closure, Winthrop riders have been turned away on the dock as the boat is reaching its capacity rendering the service unable to be utilized and leaving our residents stranded. We also have a high level of concern regarding care of the Valkyrie. When the boat was given to the MBTA last year, the Valkyrie had just had two new Cummings engines installed, new wiring, and other improvements implemented. We are disappointed with the performance of the boat and the measures your vendor may have needed to take to keep the boat operating as expected. Winthrop ferry service needs to run year-round, 7 days a week, with no more than 2 hours maximum between trips This level of service also needs to remain affordable to our community members. We believe that this service should be made permanent because: 1) The MBTA has a long history of underserving our community despite the relative payments we make to the T. As you know, the bus service is provided by a private vendor. The cost of this service relative to directly provided MBTA-staffed service is about 50% of those normal costs. A) Until 2017, the outsourced bus service took the form of school buses. These buses failed to provide a number of amenities found on your bus fleet. These missing amenities included air-conditioning, a comfortable ride , no security tie-ins to your OCC etc. B) Until 2019 the T did not provide MBTA bus stop signs, did not provide T fare collection equipment and basic marketing info such as inclusion of these bus routes as part of the T system. Our signs were either the vendor’s or painted stripes on 2) 3) 4) 5) telephone poles. This caused potential customer confusion, hindrances in using fare media, and a higher cost for our residents because of a lack of transfer credit. C) Our current public transportation offerings are inadequate. Today we have NO MBTA-PROVIDED BUS SHELTERS! Very little direct marketing from the T to our residents take place. We don’t have adequate outreach to our middle and high- school students to try to shift the culture to more transit utilization. And its not clear to most residents on how to obtain a Charlie Card or a Senior Fare Card. D) Through the Bus Network Redesign project, bus service in the town of Winthrop will be permanently altered, eliminating service to large sections of town, removing our most frequented (and only covered) bus stop, and bifurcating the route making Winthrop’s Center business district inaccessible without transferring buses lines within our minute 1.2 square mile community. Winthrop has limited means of egress. We must have a ferry because both of our vehicular pathways out of Town are one lane in each direction, each threatened by climate change and each unable to be expanded. As an example - the DCR-controlled Winthrop Parkway runs between the Atlantic Ocean and Belle Isle Marsh. The roadway is frequently closed by the Commonwealth- decreasing our exit capacity by 50% This results in backups of more than an hour delay. Ferries are a mitigation to this problem. Ferries are a mitigation to public safety challenges in Winthrop. In addition to limited roadway access (which would be alleviated by an acceptable ferry service) Winthrop hosts two significant state authorities: Massport and MWRA. Each of these contributes to our local and regional traffic (by example Massport related travel accounts for more than 50% of the Ted Williams tunnel traffic). Each represents a major public safety risk if they have certain emergencies. Winthrop has no emergency room, as well as relatively small police and fire departments, thus the ability for a regional response of ambulances and public safety is essential. If our roads are shut down or congestion in our access roads remain at their current high level, public safety will be endangered. Winthrop is a very dense Environmental Justice community. Setting aside Boston, Winthrop is already the 4" most dense municipality in the T’s service area. The 3A housing law proposes to make us even more dense. For the reasons stated above we need better bus service and permanent ferry service in ail their dimensions. Because of the historic lack of care by the MBTA, the T needs to also promote a more transit-oriented culture. Regional equity - we are frankly tired of hearing about the T’s lack of funds and the poor cost benefit of the Winthrop ferry. The T’s own analysis shows that ferry service is the second most cost effective forms of transit when based on life-cycle costs (which represent the true cost to the taxpayer). The T has spent multiple billions of dollars over the past 5 years on three of the four main rapid transit lines. The T spends about a billion per year subsidizing the commuter-rail system. Have cost-benefit studies ever preceded that work? Multiple billions in expenditures have been made on the Southcoast Rail system with no cost/benefit study - not even an updated ridership study The MBTA has informally communicated to us that it cannot afford to run the Winthrop ferry system in the manner requested, and yet they have just agreed to add weekend service with no apparent hesitation over its costs nor its unknown revenue. Let us be clear - we want and need T to invest in our services. Winthrop has been ignored for too long. We need commitment, not idle chatter. Send us a proposal for calendar year 2025 that provides for year round, seven day per week service that runs directly into the three Boston ferry stops and not to Quincy at all. Improve the frequency and a seasonally adjusted time span. Consider a fare reduction and a discounted transfer at Aquarium station for those that need to travel beyond the waterfront. Regarding the bus routes in Winthrop- restore Point Shirley service (per our earlier letters) in the Bus Network Redesign plan, install at least 10 bus shelters within the next 60 days, as well as create a comprehensive marketing plan so all relevant parties can know more about the ferry, bus, and Blue Line and all about fare media. Winthrop has multiple green and climate initiatives on-going. Join us for the sake of our future. We look forward to your response. Sincerely, The Winthrop Town Council President James Letterie Vice President Hannah Belcher Councilor At-Large Max Tassinari Councilor At-Large Rob DeMarco Councilor Patrick Costigan Councilor John Munson Councilor Suzanne Swope Councilor Joseph Aiello Councilor John DaRos Ce: Senator Ed Market, Senator Elizabeth Warren, Representative Katherine Clark, Senator Lydia Edwards, Representative Jeffrey Turco, Attorney Cipoletta, Winthrop Climate Committee