MHS Spring Sports Season begins April 2 See page 10 Vol. 20, No. 12 -FREE- www.advocatenews.net Published Every Friday 617-387-2200 Friday, March 22, 2019 rida March 22, 2019 Celebrating O’ The Green Council opposes a big-ticket item By Barbara Taormina W hat will no doubt go down as one of the most popular proposals discussed by the City Council this year hit a quick standstill this week. Ward 3 Councillor John Matheson asked the City Council to consider refundMalden Ward 2 School Committeeman Rob McCarthy is shown with Everett Clerk of Committees John Burley, his father Atty. Robert McCarthy and Michael Dantone at State Senator Sal DiDomenico’s recent St. Patrick’s event fundraiser at Knights of Columbus Council in Charlestown. City Council begins search for a new city clerk Tom Brennan expected to retire in near future By Barbara Taormina he City Council this week took the first steps toward hiring a new city clerk. Councillors agreed to post an advertisement for the position and voted to have Council President Jadeane Sica work out the timing and details of City Clerk Tom Brennan’s departure from City Hall. T “This item is on the agenda because Clerk Brennan notifi ed me earlier this week of his interest to retire at the end of this year,” Sica told fellow councillors. City and town clerks are jacks of all trades in municipal government, and as Sica pointed out, it takes time to fi ll this type of key position. Brennan took over the clerk’s offi ce in September 2016, when former City Clerk Karen Anderson retired after 32 years on the job. Prior to his appointment, he served as an assistant city solicitor in Malden’s legal department. In addition to managing the $2.57 GALLON clerk’s office, Brennan helped oversee several elections. He worked with offi cials from the Department of Justice who monitored Malden’s last vote to ensure the city was in compliance with minority language provisions in the Voting Rights Act, which required the city’s ballots and election information to be available in English, Chinese and Taiwanese. More recently, he has been working with the legal department and the City Council on tightening up the city’s compliance with the state’s Open Meeting Law. There have been, however, some problems during Brennan’s tenure. During last year’s primary, some residents were forced to wait in line to vote after several polling locations ran out of ballots. And in response to reports about low morale among staff and poor communication, Mayor Gary Christenson asked the City Council to review operations in the city clerk’s office. Councillors approved additional training and support for the clerk’s offi ce, including bringing Anderson back in to help coordinate last November’s election. Sica said the City Council has the 2016 post used for the search for a city clerk which will be updated and posted again. That search drew dozens of applicants, which led to six semifi - nalists and ultimately to a choice of two candidates: Brennan and local lawyer and Malden native Jenelle DeVits. Although both fi nalists were endorsed by the Personnel Committee, councillors voted 8-3 to hire Brennan. “I just want to congratulate our Clerk Brennan on his decision to retire,” said Councillor-at-Large Debbie DeMaria, who added that deciding to retire is always a tough call. “I think he has served us well and I wish him the best of luck,” added DeMaria. “All of us do.” ing money paid for all street sweeping tickets issued during 2017 and 2018. Councillors responded with questions and objections, and rather than see it defeated with a vote, Matheson asked to have the paper placed on file with a promise to look more closely at the details. The problems with street sweeping tickets isn’t new, but it has become more of an aggravation for residents since 2017 when the Traffi c Commission doubled the fine for parking in the way of sweepers from $25 to $50. But the real issue is that there are no signs posted to let residents know when sweeping is scheduled, and when their cars need to be moved from the street. And this week, Matheson presented some staggering statistics. During the past two years, 19,422 street sweeping citations were issued for a total of $971,000 in fi nes. Matheson also mentioned several cases involving people who received tickets while parked just to drop a child off at day care, and residents who were ticketed after streets had been swept. “For various reasons, I don’t think these fines were applied fairly,” said Matheson, who added he was inspired to propose the refunds after the city waived fi nes for residents who parked in the way of snowplows during a snow emergency that ended with no snow. But other councillors saw major problems with Matheson’s proposal. Finance Committee Chairman David Camell, who was willing to discuss the proposal in his committee, wondered about the financial implications and whether it might lead to a review of other parking regulations and fi nes. Councillor-at-Large Stephen Winslow, who has himself paid a couple of street sweeping fi nes, opposed the idea and credited the onslaught of tickets with cleaning up the city. “I remember the days before we did all this, we had really dirty streets,” he said. Ward 5 Councillor Barbara Murphy worried about the avalanche of administrative work that would be needed to trace all the tickets, appeals, demands and consequences with the Registry of Motor Vehicles. Others echoed Ward 7 Councillor Neal Anderson, who focused on the appeals process open to residents. “We have an appeal process in place, and if someone feels they have gotten a street sweeping fi ne unfairly, they can appeal that,” he said. “Our policy has been to cancel citations if they are the fi rst one issued. But the biggest concern seemed to be the specter of $971,000 draining out of city reserves. “I am deeply concerned with the recent trend of what I consider to be fi scally irresponsible papers submitted here,” said Ward 4 Councillor Ryan O’Malley. “I do not think that something like this, which is suggesting that close to a million dollars be taken out of our revenue reserves, be given any time in the Finance Committee. It’s not a realistic paper.” But Matheson disagreed with the objections based on city fi nances. “I think it’s irresponsible to take a million dollars out of the pockets of our residents for innocent mistakes,” he said. “I think this is a discussion worth having.” Matheson also disagreed with councillors who suggested that street sweeping tickets were the same as citations for other off enses that aren’t spelled out in signs, such as parking in crosswalks or next to hydrants. “We are TICKETS | SEE PAGE 6
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