City Council Agenda Preview: June 29
The Worcester City Council meets Tuesday at 6:30pm. The agenda is here.
This week: At last, a reasonably short agenda! Shade trees, technology and public meetings, sewer rates, streets, sidewalks.
Virtual Meeting: https://cow.webex.com/cow/onstage/g.php?MTID=e7f6e186ed195fc5e0a706458b86684ca
Sidewalk Repairs: So many sidewalks are scheduled to be paved.
475 Chandler Wants Street Improvements: A bunch of people, many at 475 Chandler Street (Bet Shalom Apartments), have submitted a couple citizen petitions asking the city to do a better job of reporting road and sidewalk conditions on its website, and to generally fix issues on Chandler Street and Park Avenue.
Resident Parking for DeMarco Terrace?: John Ferdella has a citizen petition asking for resident permit parking along DeMarco Terrace from Shrewsbury Street to Lyon Place. It’s pretty hard to get resident permit parking.
Stop Cutting Down Shade Trees: Usually a petition to the City Council is not what we think of as a petition. You’re not trying to get a bunch of signatures—you can be the only one to sign it, and it could still be considered. In this case, almost 90 people have signed a petition that the city not destroy 100 shade trees as part of upcoming improvement projects. The Council will decide whether to send this petition to a specific committee, to ignore it, or to come up with a bunch of items of its own and send those to various committees.
City Council Meetings on the Radio: Bill Coleman asked the Council’s Urban Technologies Committee if we can start broadcasting Council meetings on the radio. That committee wants a report from the City Manager as to any legal issues that might arise.
Verifing Public Commenters: The Urban Technologies Committee wants to know how we can verify “background information” on people addressing public meetings online, which I take to mean verifying their identities.
Increasing the Sewer Rate: The Council will vote whether to raise the rate from $8.15 to $8.48 (per 100 cubic feet of usage).