Medford council reviews governing agenda, hears committee updates; no formal policy votes taken

Medford City Council’s Committee of the Whole met Dec. 18, 2024, via Zoom to conduct its scheduled biannual review of the council’s 2024–25 governing agenda and to hear updates from each committee on work planned for the coming year. No substantive votes on new ordinances or budget items were taken during the meeting; the one formal motion — to adjourn — carried on a roll-call vote.

President Baerz opened the meeting and framed the session as a check-in on the council’s workplan. ‘‘There’ll be a meeting in the Medford City Council Committee of the Whole at 6 PM on December 18, 2024 via Zoom only,’’ he said, and directed councilors to the draft governing-agenda document posted to the council portal and the city website. Vice President Collins called the biannual review a way to get a ‘‘bird’s-eye view’’ of which large projects had advanced and to improve transparency in council work.

Committee chairs summarized progress and next steps. In Planning and Permitting, Collins said the committee has moved the city’s official zoning map into a GIS digital file and has completed the Mystic Avenue Corridor District, which was ordained by the council the night before. She said the Salem Street Corridor District is mid-process and that the committee will continue geography-by-geography zoning reviews into 2025, with neighborhoods such as South Medford, North Medford, West Medford and Wellington scheduled for later review.

Councilor Lemming reported that a home-rule petition to allow regular updates to linkage fees has been submitted to the state, and that the council intends to pay for an affordable-housing nexus study before amending the ordinance. ‘‘She’s told me to actually fund this $80,000 nexus study to put money from the capital improvements program into the affordable housing trust,’’ Lemming said, describing conversations with the mayor about the study’s funding.

On budget and finance matters, President Baerz reminded the council that it adopted its first budget ordinance this year and has established general, capital and water/sewer stabilization funds to build fiscal reserves. He and other councilors discussed an item in the packet showing a $3,000,000 supplemental appropriation to Metro Public Schools that replaced $1,750,000 of ARPA funding; public commenter Gaston Fair asked how that reallocation occurred and whether the ARPA balance had been spent. Baerz said the mayor’s office reverted the ARPA funds to city use and that about $850,000 of the reverted funds was used to purchase a fire truck; he said a final ARPA expenditure report will follow after Dec. 31.

Public Health and Community Safety chair Councilor Lazaro listed several completed and in-progress ordinances: a wildlife-feeding ordinance has been adopted; the committee worked on rodent-control and overgrowth ordinances; and paper 24021, a plant-medicine decriminalization resolution supporting state-level change, was passed within the committee. Lazaro said the committee plans to revisit proposals on gender-affirming care and reproductive-health protections in early 2025.

Public Works chair Councilor Callahan emphasized roads and sidewalks as a top resident concern and said she will invite DPW leadership for twice-yearly public updates. She previewed a tree-planting volunteer network intended to help the city restore its tree canopy.

Resident Services chair Councilor Lemming said the committee has produced an English resident guide (with plans for multilingual versions), expanded council communications with a newsletter and YouTube streaming, and advanced a welcoming ordinance (first reading passed) and a proposed veteran rental-assistance program slated for council consideration in January.

Vice President Collins reminded residents that this meeting was a status review and not the venue for final actions: ‘‘we’re not going to take anything, we’re not going to remove anything from committee … Not in this meeting,’’ she said.

Before adjourning, councilors reiterated several follow-up directions: staff will circulate the updated governing-agenda document on the council portal and in the January newsletter; the administration will be asked for a status update on the Collins Center compensation-and-classification study and on capital-improvement priorities; the planning department will complete or begin the recommended nexus study to underpin linkage-fee changes; and the mayor’s office will provide final ARPA expenditure reporting after Dec. 31.

A motion to adjourn, made by Councilor Lemming and seconded by Councilor Callahan, passed on a roll-call vote with four ‘‘Yes’’ votes and the meeting was adjourned. The governing-agenda paper (24006) will remain in committee for further refinement and formal actions will be taken at future meetings.