City Council Meeting June 24th, 2024

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Meeting Link

City Manager’s Agenda

Appointments

  • #1 (CMA 2024 #134) – Rayna Jhaveri and Emma Pan – Appointment – Cambridge Commission for Persons with Disabilities
  • #2 (CMA 2024 #135) – Kathleen Kelly – Reappointment – Cambridge Water Board
  • #3 (CMA 2024 #136) – Tom Stohlman – Appointment – Election Commissioner

Communications and Responses

  • #4 (CMA 2024 #137) – An update on City efforts related to PFAS concerns
  • #9 (CMA 2024 #142) – Results from the 2023 Transportation Demand Management Program Report
  • #10 (CMA 2024 #143) – A response from the City Solicitor stating that the city would have a hard time enforcing density minimums and limit down conversions. Such zoning restrictions could, “results that are inconsistent with the goal of providing a variety of housing options,” could, “result in a net loss of housing units,” and potentially, “violate the uniformity provision of the Zoning Act.”
  • #11 (CMA 2024 #144) – A summary from the CDD of all zoning initiatives
  • #12 (CMA 2024 #145) – A draft “Request for Information” on how the city should redevelop the parking lots at 84 & 96 Bishop Allen Drive for the benefit of the community
  • #13 (CMA 2024 #146) – An explanation of the city’s plans for public outreach about Central Square zoning changes
  • #14 (CMA 2024 #147) – A letter from the City Manager about how he’s working to accomplish the council’s goals and the general state of the city

Appropriations and Grants

  • #5 (CMA 2024 #138) – $200,000 grant from the Opioid Settlement Stabilization Fund to purchase and upfit a supplemental van for the First Step Street Medicine program
  • #6 (CMA 2024 #139) – $437,333 in Cable Franchise Fees to fund CCTV, 22-CityView, CPS, and CEA-TV
  • #7 (CMA 2024 #140) – $50,000 grant from from the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) Accelerating Climate Resiliency (ACR) Grant to help establish a Resilience Hub
  • #8 (CMA 2024 #141) – $250,000 spending limit authorization for the FY25 Renewable Energy and Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Reduction fund
  • #15 (CMA 2024 148) – $300,000 spending limit authorization for the FY25 Fresh Pond Golf Course Pro Shop revolving fund

Policy Orders

  • #1 (POR 2024 #87) – That the City Council recognize July, 2024 as “Disability Pride Month”
  • #2 (POR 2024 #88) – Requesting that the city keep the public, “informed about the status of current and future inter-jurisdictional transportation projects.”
  • #3 (POR 2024 #89) – Support for providing high quality health care to all residents and in strong support of H.1239/S.744
  • #4 (POR 2024 #90) – That the City report on the status of PILOT discussions with Harvard
  • #5 (POR 2024 #91) – That the City Council recognize September as Childhood Cancer Awareness Month
  • #6 (POR 2024 #92) – Requesting an update on the Children Savings Accounts Program with the East Cambridge Savings Bank
  • #7 (POR 2024 #94) – Requesting that the city consider the number of city application processes and find ways to reduce paper and printing waste
  • #8 (POR 2024 #94) – That the City Council support of the Massachusetts State Ballot Question to Decriminalize Natural Psychedelics For Therapeutic Use
  • LATE – Requesting that the city work with state and federal governments to look into adding laws requiring truck side-guards, look into informing truck drivers of the challenges of driving in the city, and determine what safety policies and requirements the city an enact now.
  • LATE – That the council thank city staff and local partners for making the NCDA conference a success.

Charter Righted Policy Orders

  • #1 (APP 2024 #21) – Curb Cut – Raghu Chivukula – 12 Linnaean Street

All comments are from members of our comment team.

3 responses to “City Council Meeting June 24th, 2024”

  1. Charles J. Franklin Avatar
    Charles J. Franklin

    A lot of things that I want to comment on this week. I’ll be back later for that. Until then, I want to draw attention to:
    – CMA 2024 #142, which has the results of a transportation study showing how people get around the city
    – CMA 2024 #144, which is a summary of all city zoning initiatives
    – CMA 2024 #145, which states the goals for the future of the parking lots at 84 & 96 Bishop Allen Drive

  2. Charles J. Franklin Avatar
    Charles J. Franklin

    What you won’t find anything regarding today’s cyclist death as the city publishes the agenda on Thursdays. It’s possible that a councillor will file a late policy order on Monday, but don’t read too much into one not being filed.

    Edit: A late policy order was filed and passed unanimously.

  3. Charles J. Franklin Avatar
    Charles J. Franklin

    CMA 2024 #142 isn’t as broad in scope as I thought it was, and therefore not as interesting, but is still useful. The Cambridge Transportation Demand Management (TDM) Program. The goal of the program is to reduce car traffic by requiring new commercial properties with a certain number of parking spaces to provide incentives to not drive and track how their employees get to work. And here I was thinking that my employer provided a BlueBikes discount out of the goodness of HR’s heart. Nope. It was legally required.

    Either way, fewer people come into work at all so there’s less traffic of all kinds. Unsurprisingly, people said they’d take public transit more often if it worked better.

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