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Happy Friday, Ward 5! Included in this newsletter are my initial highlights from the Mayor’s proposal for the next budget, as well as some updates about the proposed firearms industry regulations, which I know many of you have been waiting for more information on. Additionally, this newsletter gives some brief updates on Finance Committee work and Village Center Zoning Redesign community engagement.
If you are a voter in Ward 5 (but only Ward 5!), please consider signing up to be one of the 50-75 people to sign my re-election nomination forms. The forms need to be physically signed, so I would contact you to set up a time to get your signature, or drop off a form at your house. Your signature puts my name on the ballot in November. (If you missed my re-election announcement video last week, check it out.)
Today, I received my second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, so I plan to begin knocking on doors again in two weeks to check on how residents are doing and provide updates on what the City Council has been working on!
Make sure to sign up to get your vaccine, if you have not already! Children aged 12-15 are now eligible for the Pfizer vaccine as well.
Mayor’s FY22 Budget
Mayor Ruthanne Fuller addressed the City Council on Wednesday night to present her proposed FY22 budget for our consideration and approval (apart from the Schools budget details, which are voted on by the School Committee). As a reminder, the Council does not have the power under the city charter to add money to any line items – only to reduce or eliminate lines and to vote “yes” or “no” on the departmental budgets and the overall budget.
The proposed FY22 budget grows Newton’s budget by 5%. The theme this year, as stated by Mayor Fuller, is a budget “to support the vulnerable, to recover and reopen, and to make critical investments in Newton’s future.”
Beyond the operating budget proposals, the capital improvements plan this year emphasizes investments in our roads, sidewalks, parking lots, athletic fields, school buildings, and more.
Key departments
We will take a close look at all of the departmental operating budget changes in our City Council committees as each department head comes to present to us on the changes. Some changes represent policy changes or personnel shifts, but in some cases (such as a big change on paper in the Public Buildings and Public Works budgets), increases or reductions merely represent a transfer of something between departments and not an actual policy change or new initiative.
Some of the largest proposed budget increases include a 15% increase to the Planning department to “support our land use and planning efforts with more resources,” and a 13% increase to the Parks, Recreation, & Culture department (particularly for forestry and athletic fields). The Department of Public Works will receive 6% more on paper, with a practical net increase that is even greater if we exclude a function being moved to Public Buildings.
There would also be a 4% budget increase for schools and – one point I know will be of interest to many in the public – the FY22 budget proposes a slight increase (3%) in the Newton Police Department budget over the final FY21 proposed budget passed last year. But the police budget remains smaller in overall dollar terms than it was the FY20 police budget, and the changes this year primarily reflect vehicle replacements that we deferred last year.
My hope is that this year's Newton Police Department budget – with relatively minimal funding increases this time (and no additional personnel numbers) – signals a transitional period with a new incoming chief and the recent Reform Task Force recommendations and that we might see some deeper inter-departmental reorganizations ahead. I still fundamentally believe that we need to partition out the functions of the department.
Critically, as noted above, the City of Newton’s "quality of life" departments that residents care a lot about because of their daily impact – like Parks, Recreation, & Culture; our Library; and our Department of Public Works – received greater proportional increases than the police budget (and in some cases greater absolute increases).
Last year, we received hundreds of emails from the public expressing concern that the Newton Free Library (unlike police) was facing significant defunding under the budget revisions made in light of the pandemic, and some of these cuts were reversed before passage of the final budget last year.
In absolute terms, Newton Police would get about $670k more in the proposed FY22 budget (again, heavily reflecting vehicles budget lines). Parks, Recreation, & Culture would get about $854k more, the Library about $208k more, and DPW nearly $2.1 million more!
Federal relief dollars
Unusual this year will be the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds from the federal government. The city should be receiving $63 million, which must be incurred or used by December 2024. These are best viewed as one-time funds for one-time investments (And they are clearly delineated within the budget documents to differentiate them from non-emergency funding sources). The uses are also constrained: Public health, revenue replacement for revenues lost specifically due to the pandemic, and economic recovery from pandemic damage.
$2.5 million will be used to reverse funding cuts to the paving program made last year, and $4.6 million will be put toward replacing lost revenues during the pandemic like the meals and hotels taxes.
The Mayor emphasized an equity focus on the use of these federal funds: “We will invest the funds using the lens of equity, ensuring all geographic areas of Newton, all ages, all races, all ethnicities, and all people are supported while we help those hurt by the pandemic.”
Here are some additional specifics on how the Mayor intends to use these federal funds:
Providing more on-ramps to the road to financial self-sufficiency for Newton residents at all different life stages. We will start with a targeted community needs assessment focused on our most financially vulnerable residents to help us design and implement effective support programs.
Finding more ways to support the mental health of all our residents with partnerships, education and services.
Improving the facilities, especially for training, at Newton Police Headquarters as training is the foundation by which NPD ensures that officers and employees provide fair, just, respectful, safe and effective policing.
Expanding our work on roads and sidewalks, pedestrian and bicyclist accommodations, trees and athletic fields, playgrounds, and arts, culture and community efforts.
On Thursday in her email newsletter, Mayor Fuller also added this great announcement about support for our most vulnerable: “The City will allocate [via 13 organizations] a total of $449,083 in federal FY2022 Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) funds and Emergency Solutions Grant (ESG) funds to support vital services for our low- and moderate-income Newton residents and those experiencing or at-risk of homelessness in the Brookline-Newton-Waltham-Watertown area.”
(Newton is in charge of distributing these federal funds to the communities mentioned, not just to our own residents.)
One miscellaneous note of general interest: This year’s proposed budget “does not increase our Water, Sewer and Stormwater rates this fiscal year for our residents and other property owners.” This should be welcome news to some.
You can watch and read the Mayor’s full speech online here.
Finance Committee update
The Finance Committee met on Monday night (5/10) to discuss city hall tech upgrades and reforms to the dog license fees and fines and to leaf blower fines (and a registration fee), among other things.
The Finance Committee voted 6-2 to reverse the reform proposal set forth by the Programs & Services Committee last month to end Newton Police enforcement authority on leaf blower misuse.
There is finally a likely compromise on this issue, as the Mayor announced during her budget speech the creation of a new seasonal Inspectional Services field position in the spring and fall to monitor landscaping contractors and help guide them into compliance with the new contractor registration system and other general regulations. Police will still need to help out with much of the enforcement, but we hope these proactive steps by Inspectional Services will significantly reduce the need for field enforcement.
I believe the members of the Programs & Services Committee (of which I am also one) plan to accept this compromise on leaf blower enforcement on Monday, when the full Council votes on the overall reform package, including the new contractor registration system and shifting the burden of violations away from the individual equipment operators who typically don’t control what equipment they’re given to use.
The Finance Committee also unanimously voted to support the Programs & Services Committee’s recommendations on changes to fees and fines for the two dog licenses and violations. (As noted in last week’s newsletter, we will be circling back to work on other important dog ordinance reforms later this term.)
The Finance Committee also approved a $1 million transfer to the Rainy Day fund, equaling 5% of the FY22 budget, consistent with the City’s target ratio over the past five years. While I continue to have big picture concerns on (potentially too much) money being set aside annually for various investment accounts instead of being applied to current year programs & services (or to long-term capital projects), 5% to the Rainy Day fund is a necessary compromise with the credit ratings agencies.
Village Center Zoning Redesign Community Engagement
I’m passing along a message this afternoon from our Planning Department’s Community Engagement staffer about community opportunities starting next week (with additional, narrower focus groups to follow):
We’re trying to learn as much as we can about Newtonians’ visions for their village centers to inform our future zoning decisions. Want to be heard? Ways you can participate will include a Vision Kit* to explore your village center(s), an interactive survey*, and Focus Groups for equitable participation. Sign up for a Community Engagement Info Session on Thursday, May 20, from 6:00 – 7:00 p.m. here and fill out this Focus Group Interest form here if you identify as a renter, younger person (age 15-35), BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and People of Color), someone with a disability, LGBTQ+, of the creative community, and older adults (65+). Learn more at newtonma.gov/zoningredesign. *The Vision Kit and survey will be available online by May 20th.
I’m especially looking forward to hearing from some of our younger families and teens about what kind of housing opportunities, local businesses, and village center streetscapes they’re hoping to see in Newton in the future.
Gun stores regulation update after public hearing
The Zoning & Planning Committee held an hours-long public hearing on Monday to hear from residents and then held an extra virtual meeting on Thursday night to continue working on zoning regulation for firearms businesses. Ultimately, the committee recommended to the full City Council approval of a set of strict regulations on the possible locations of firearms businesses (see my last newsletter for a wide list of sensitive location categories and proposed buffers), the special permit conditions to approve them, and the conditions for operation if approved. More on this in a moment.
Our Law Department reiterated their view on Thursday that a strict regulation approach to the authorization of firearms businesses is a better approach than an outright ban, which some Councilors have floated – not because there’s no risk of litigation, but rather because the danger in the potential (or perhaps even likely) outcomes is much more serious for a total ban being rejected than merely losing in court.
Why is that? If a conservative federal court issues a wide-ranging opinion striking down a ban, they might well say that all local ordinances regulating firearms sales anywhere in the country are unconstitutional. The risk here isn't just to us, but also to potentially the entire rest of the country for any municipalities where local regulations on gun stores currently exist.
So, what is the approach we are pursuing if not a total ban? Strict regulation includes zone restrictions, substantial buffers from sensitive uses, and a set of standardized non-waivable requirements for operation, but also a special permit review process requiring 2/3rds of the Council to approve any given site, with further criteria for approval.
As with any special permit petitions in Newton – which is to say without even adding specific industry-related criteria – one of the special permit requirements will be a finding that “the location and operating characteristics of the proposed use promotes and will not be detrimental to the public health, safety, and welfare of the neighborhood and the City.”
I will leave it to your imaginations as residents on how the City Councilors are likely to evaluate this particular special permit criterion when considering a proposal. For my part, I can imagine that we will be seeing a lot more candidate questionnaires asking us how we would be likely to vote on such a special permit request.
(This is also to say nothing of the market incentives commercial landlords in the approved areas might now feel against accepting a proposed tenant in the firearms industry for their properties.)
Councilor Krintzman has also offered a proposed restriction to limit any such businesses to one in the entire city, if one were actually to be approved through the special permit process. I agree with this idea.
One concern raised in the public hearing was that the likely locations allowable between the zones and buffers are at the borders of Newton and could potentially adversely harm people or sensitive uses just across the city borders. The Planning Department explained to us that if we want to add external buffers beyond our borders (which are not currently reciprocated by our neighbors), then we would need to vote for far less restrictive buffer zones within our own municipality around sensitive uses (e.g. 500 feet instead of 1000 feet), in order to free up allowable areas not near Newton’s borders. (Alternatively, we could merely consider cross-border proximities in the City Council during special permit evaluations on a case-by-case basis.)
The full City Council will consider and presumably vote on the final proposal this coming Monday evening. I intend to vote in favor of the regulations.