The Springfield Finance Control Board held a meeting on Thursday, July 19, at which ten people participated in a now-routine 30-minute public speakout session. Below is the transcript of what was said, provided by resident Sheila McElwaine, and slightly edited for brevity.
Springfield Finance Control Board meeting, July 19, 2007
Public Comment
Present: Chairman Christopher Gabrieli, Mayor Charles Ryan, Robert Nunes, James Morton, City Council President Kateri Walsh, City Clerk Wayman Lee.
Chairman Christopher Gabrieli: We’ve decided that in regard to public comments going forward, we’ll do two things a tiny bit differently. One, we’re encouraging or supporting control board members asking clarifying questions in case somebody raises something that we just don’t understand so that we can get the full benefit of the topic. Second, we’ve asked staff to provide us a follow-up memo on all the issues raised at control board meeting speak-outs so that we can understand the context, the [unintelligible] of the department response and whether there is some piece of information that it is really important for us to know for the future, or not.
We won’t have that memo from last time, because we just asked for it today. We would hope, on a timely basis going forward, to be able to know for each control board what the follow-through was on items raised. We may or may not necessarily comment on those. Some of these are sensitive matters, as you can imagine, but I want to make sure you all realize we intend to try to benefit from the opportunity to hear from people who may or may not be part of the administration or part of the city—that anybody can walk up and bring up an issue, and that those of us who don’t know the context will learn it. So, thank you very much.
City Clerk Wayman Lee: For those of you who’ve never attended a public comment session, we go with three minutes per party. We have ten people that have signed up today, so I will ask that you keep your comments brief. I will give you a heads-up at one minute, at 30 seconds, and at ten seconds. Our first speaker today is Miss Lois Smith.
Lois Smith: Once again, it’s a great pleasure to see the wonderful energy and the chemistry in this room between all of you, and, respectfully, I want to thank you for letting me speak with you.
Lack of recess and physical education in Springfield schools is the predominant reason that children are not learning and that health problems abound. Know that all valid research indicates the need for consistent and scheduled breaks with physical activity. And, knowing the serious health issues our children face and knowing the lack of physical activity is causing false identification of ADHD and serious drug use, our school administration has continued over the two-and-a-half years that I have brought this research into light to continue down the slippery slope that has exasperated these problems and increased crime and drugs in our city. Please remember that I talked about “return on investment” at the last control board meeting.
We do need to immediately begin a nation-wide search for a new leader in our school district. This is even more evident as we evaluate SABIS Charter School in Springfield, which is doing a magnificent job. They do have recesses, extended physical education extensive and other things. Today I would like to offer some historically valid comments on the selection of a new superintendent of schools. Finding the dynamic man or woman to replace Dr. Burke has challenges. When we try to entice the best, we find ourselves looking at a group of existing superintendents who are either leaving under pressure from their present jobs or have not found their present opportunities satisfactory. so we’re predominantly recycling bad news. I suggest looking in new fields, looking at an exemplary school and offering an upgrade of title or post to an assistant superintendent and allowing that individual if they need extra credentialing, and it’s limited in scope, to go back and get it while they’re performing.
In California, I tested this; I know it works, the upgrading aspect. There was a small company that was of unknown ilk, limited budget, and they wanted to get executives from a company that was being bought out. And eight people that were requested to move over with an upgrade did so. I guess that I would like you to look into.
And I do want to comment on the drug situation, that if we called the 13 most-used ADHD drugs in school by their proper street name, “meth,” and “methamphetamines,” no parent would allow their child to be put on those drugs. We call them when they’re in school by 13 nice names, like Ritalin and Adderall. When these kids drop out, it becomes “meth.” Think about that; it’s really important. It’s the most serious drug. I want you to carefully consider what I’m proposing regarding a search committee—which we’ve talked about before—an independent search committee that would be comprised of people we select from the community who are not attached in any way to the school district.
I appreciate your time in listening to me. Thank you.
WL: Miss Ann Poliak.
Ann Poliak: [Passes out something to board members.] First page is a letter and then stapled is just a statement that I’ve summarized, so it’s right now referring to the letter itself. I’m here in regards to this letter that I received which is self-explanatory and I passed it out.
The City Council denied unanimously two requests in 2002 and 2006 for the zone changes referred to in the letter. There’s not enough time for me to go through all the reasons they denied the zone change so I’ll proceed with what I have. I feel it’s important at this time. At the first zone change hearing, in fact, it was Councilor Timothy Ryan who lives in the neighborhood that made the motion to deny the zone change. Mr. Kushner, the petitioner, filed an appeal with the court, and if the city lost the court case, the results would be the same–as indicated in the letter—a zone change would be granted. That would be no risk to the city or the financial control board or whatever. The city solicitor, Michael Mulcahy, never presented his entire case to Judge Tina Page for the first denial, and no presentation was ever made for the second zone change denial. One of the reasons for the denial of the zone change was the petitioner, Mr. Kushner, was dumping on his own property. The city ordered Mr. Kushner to clean up the trash in August 2006. This is a picture of how the property looked in June 2007. [Approaches the board with photos] Will you pass these around?
Granting the zone change is overriding two city council votes, rewarding bad behavior, and punishing the neighborhood. It’s also setting a precedent for other businesses in the neighborhood to request a zone change for parking. I’m hoping the Financial Control Board will reconsider and return this issue to the court. I’m confident that if Judge Tina Page is presented all of the information, she will uphold the city council’s votes. And if the Financial Control Board is also given the information, they would agree with the votes. That’s about it. Just, if you reconsider, look over the documentation that I represented that was done very rapidly because I wasn’t given much notice by getting the letter over the week-end, and thank you for your consideration.
CG: Thank you very much.
WL: City Councilor Domenic J. Sarno.
City Councilor Domenic Sarno: Good afternoon, James, Mayor Nunes, Chairman Gabrieli, Mayor Ryan, Council President Kateri Walsh. Before I go into my statement, I’d just like to echo?Miss Poliak says she’s worked very hard?the neighborhood came out adamantly opposed to this and now to have it moved to the Financial Control Board after two votes of the city council and also with the pending court case is wrong. The neighborhood has worked hard to keep their neighborhood area and you can see how the petitioner keeps his property.
I’m here to ask you to terminate the street sweeping contract which was given out some two years ago to a private organization. It is evident two years in a row that this establishment cannot do the job. We are six months behind. Al Chwalek has had to activate—reactivate—our old city street sweepers to do this job. It is not fair to the citizens and taxpayers of the city of Springfield to keep footing this bill. They’re burdened too much as it is. And, again, two years in a row with this private contractor, the city itself has had to come in and do the job that residents expect. I would ask you to terminate this contract. You can do it with or without cause with 30 days of written notice. And I would also ask you to bring this service back to the DPW who was doing an outstanding job. Thank you for your time and consideration.
CG: Thank you.
WL: Ann B. Leavenworth.
Ann B. Leavenworth: Good afternoon. I had a thought and I thought I’d just bring it to you. If you’ve heard it before, just stop me, but it has to do with?I’ve been reading in the paper a lot about having a clean city and a lot—especially letters to the editors—about the people that go around with picking up bottles and this idea came to me when one day—I live in the inner city and I was sitting on my porch, and I saw a man go into a field, and he picked up a bottle and then he put it back down. Obviously, it wasn’t refundable, and that’s understandable; they have enough to carry around. But I thought maybe the city could do a partnership with these people and could pay them $10. a bag for all the trash they picked up. And I know you have street sweepers, but there’s the sidewalks, there’s the tree belts, there’s the terraces that aren’t owned by people. There’s the little parks and the fields. And perhaps you could even buy them really nice carriages and maybe find them a place to store their other stuff while they’re working. I just think it would give them respect. They obviously want to work and if they will collect things they will only get a nickel for, it would help the city, and it would help those people.
That’s all for that. I don’t have the details. I figured I’d see how you liked this first, but I’d be willing to work on the details if you’re at all interested. And since I have time, one other thing, Holy Family Church and Holy Cross Church is having a community celebration on August 4. It’s for all the people of the city. We have food, music, everything, no cost, raffle prizes (no cost). So you’re all invited so please come.
CG: Thank you.
WL: Kevin Noonan.
Kevin Noonan: Thank you. Mr. Morton, Mayor Nunes, Mr. Gabrieli, Mayor Ryan, Councilor Walsh. Just outside that window in 2004, a man was found dead at the steps. He was homeless and he chose not to go to the Worthington Street shelter for fear of his safety. Prior to that in December, another man was found dead at my favorite shopping place at the corner of Lyman Street and Chestnut. He had tried to shimmy through the bars and sliced his gut open and either bled to death or froze to death, whichever came first.
Immediately after, Open Pantry Community Services, an agency which I run, responded by asking the downtown churches to open up their doors, and they did. We housed upwards of 85 to 95 people per night. We went among three churches, Christ Church Cathedral, Old First Church, and South Church, until June of 2005 when the St. Joseph’s Church opened up, and we were able to stay there until the mayor asked us to go to the former jail at York Street. We stayed there until, as you know, July 12 of this past week.
We receive funding from the state Department of Transitional Assistance. We have several contracts with them. We run shelters—family shelters in the city of Springfield. We received funding from them in March of ’06, but one of the problems that developed is that the city of Springfield declined to give us occupancy permits for longer than six months at a time.
They cited zoning as their issue. They never identified any problems with code in the building until afterward, July 8 or 9 when they were in court. They claimed this was an emergency, but for 22 months, they retroactively tell us that we were there in an unsafe situation. Now they’ve blocked us from receiving the $400,000. a year, and they’ve basically stuffed everyone into Worthington House.
We ran this program between 1989 and 1994 after a man who was homeless died in Agawam, and the city of Springfield—different administration—at that time responded by adding 12 beds in the basement of Worthington House. Now, they’re counting those same 12 beds again as if they were new. The conditions at the jail, which they told us were unsafe, they’re now moved people into the kitchen which has no sprinkler system.
On the eve of the court case filed by the guests, the basement space flooded which is a common problem on Worthington Street. We were told it was just ground water. We’ve worked on that street before; we know it’s not healthy to?the kind of water that comes in.
The Housing First [program], we support it totally. Of the 100 vouchers that the city has allocated through the SHA, not one has been issued to date. We’re saying, “Why would you cut the safety net before issuing those vouchers?” The Warming Place didn’t in fact close on the 12th of July; we continued to operate at 287 State Street. Some of the guests are here today, and they’d like to speak with you. They’re afraid to go to Worthington House. They are concerned for their safety, and they’re looking for an alternative.
What we’re asking the control board to do today is to let us reopen the Warming Place with funding from the state—from the city—because the city has blocked us from our state funding, and let us provide an alternative so that there are no other deaths in the city of Springfield. Many of the people who left that day went to the bushes, and the other people who are here are sitting up in chairs at this point, and they’re sitting up in chairs just so we can get around the draconian measures of the city which will insist that we can’t run a shelter in that space. So they sit in chairs all night, and that’s how they sleep. Thank you very much.
WL: Dianne Maquire.
Dianne Maquire: Good afternoon. My name’s Dianne and I am?22 months ago, I walked into the Warming Place, and it wasn’t “home” to me, I felt warm. Since I’ve been at the Warming Place?well, actually since they’ve closed the Warming Place, I reside at the Worthington Street Shelter. When I walk in those doors, I fear. I’m scared, because as I look in the walls, as I look at the ceilings with water leaking on us while we’re sleeping on mattresses on the floor, overcrowded, girls arguing because they want the bathroom next, because there’s only one bathroom to use, it’s very stressful. And me being three months pregnant, it’s not well for me. The Warming Place being open, not only did it help me find myself, but I found other people that I can trust in, that I haven’t trusted in a long time being to the shelters, that staff really cared about me as to I could talk to them about things that I couldn’t talk to nobody before not even my therapist and they were there to help me with stuff that I’m coming now together with my housing, my income that I couldn’t do on my own, that I couldn’t, that I was confused about. I just feel that being?the Warming Place being closed has put a gap in me. It put a gap in not because of my life going on, but it put a gap I met people that cared about me. I’ve been in Springfield for about ten years. I’m not originally from here, but since being homeless in and out of the Worthington Street shelter, which I was in the past, I didn’t like it. I’ve been disrespected, I’ve been put down because I was homeless, and being at the Warming Place, they never did that to me.
So now that I’m residing at the Worthington Street shelter, which I have no choice to be there right now, and so we supposedly get our housing vouchers which I’m number 14 on the list and I’m still waiting for and we were promised a month ago, I feel that we was lied to, that we was put down. And not only am I speaking for myself, for others also. And we’re confused. At the Warming Place, they was honest with us; they was open with us. These people are lying to us, and I don’t feel that it’s right that we should be lied to about certain things, especially somewhere to live. The place that we had to live was torn down, and that was a big family I knew about. Over here, I can’t be like that. I mean the staff is like, “What do you need?” I need some help. I asked a question the other day, and I got yelled at and just disrespected and almost got banned, thrown on the street. I’m just asking for myself and my child. If there’s a future? people that are homeless?if they can have another Warming Place to open up to for them. Thank you.
CG: Thank you.
WL: Kevin Ryl.
Kevin Ryl: Good afternoon. I, too, came from the Warming Place. I haven’t been there long, but since I have been there, I noticed that the Warming Place has a sense of love up in there. All the staff are just outright going to help you with anything, any kind of problem. Now that the Warming Place is closed, everybody is jammed up in Worthington. Worthington is not a place of best shelter; it is not. I mean quote unquote they say they “fixed everything.” The sinks are still stopping up; the toilets are still backing up; the showers are still backing up. downstairs in the basement, every time it rains, they have to take people out of the basement and stick them in the kitchen, and I don’t think that’s right. Plus the thing is, not only that, they run it like it’s a jail, which I feel is not right neither. At the Warming Place, everybody?you know there was just lover there, you know what I mean. It wasn’t run like a jail, know what I mean. We could come in and get our every situated and everything, and we could sign back out until 10:00.
At the Worthington, once you in, you in. You can’t leave the property; you can’t do this; you can’t do that; you can’t do nothing, you know? I would like on you all behalf to take deep in your heart and see how us people that are homeless feel. I believe there will be trouble in Springfield, because people don’t want to go to Worthington. People living in the waterfront bushes, sleeping on the library grass; nobody wants to go to Worthington. So if you could dig deep down in your heart, please help us to at least open up the Open Door [sic] or to borrow some other place suitable for us to go. Thank you very much.
WL: Ruben LaGares, Jr.
Ruben LaGares, Jr.: Good afternoon. I’m homeless, too, was staying at Worthington first and then the staff members, they mistreated—not in the sense of abuse, but with words and stuff like that. And I had problems, used to be working, I had my house and everything, I was married, but since I got hurt, things just went chaos, I just ended up being homeless, so I was staying at the Worthington shelter. I had difficulty there with a staff member, so I ended up going to the Warming Place, and, over there, I felt the warmth of the staff and the consideration they had on us and they looked forward to us to have a place to be and help us with whatever kind of help we needed.
When I found out that they were closing the Warming Place, I headed back to the Worthington about a month before they closed. And when I got back there, some of the staff, apparently they got involved in some situation, and some of them got kicked out from the staff. One of the members there, I don’t know what was his problem, he was picky towards me and I got papers stating that I needed to be sleeping on the bottom bunk, because I can’t climb, I got back problems, knee—I got to get some surgeries—and they didn’t take that into consideration. They always had me jumping from bed to bed using the top bunks and no consideration at all.
I made a complaint over there, and I spoke with the man in charge over there and apparently pulled somebody out—pulled some strings and put him on the spot. But there’s always issues over there, and they’re making it hard for us to get around, and by 6:00 you got to go in there and they treat us like we’re in prison or something. They don’t let us go do things that we’ve got to do like paperwork, go outside and do meetings and stuff like that. It’s a lot of strictness, and in the Warming Place, it was different, because we took papers and they understood and let us go and do what we had to do and solve the problem.
At the Worthington place, they don’t take nothing into consideration. Just because we’re homeless doesn’t mean that we’re not human and we care, and we got feelings and things to look forward to, like finding our own places and [looking] forward. But they make it hard on us and they mistreat us with words. They look at us like we’re down there [gestures], and because they got a little up, they’re better than us. I think it’s kind of wrong, so that’s why I left to [the] Warming Place.
Now that I’m back over here, it’s different. It was better at the Warming Place, because they consider us like humans and they helped us. Over there, it’s just mans over there, they treat us with unnecessary words—not nasty words, but just the way they talk to you, harsh and loud, and then you cannot tell nothing back, because they write you up, they look to throw you out into the streets. The streets are dangerous out there, especially now with the drugs and they see you sleeping, they think you got money and they jump you. I’m a man, and I could stand on my own, but it’s hard. When you’re sleeping, anybody could come and just hurt you. So that’s all I got to say. I would like to see what can we do about the situation in Springfield with the homeless situation and get a better place so that we can look forward to. I thank you for the attention.
WL: Robert Wilson.
Robert Wilson: Good afternoon. I represent the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, Local 7, and today I’m speaking on behalf of the Pioneer Valley Building Trades who represent over 700 working residents and their families in the city of Springfield. I’d like to talk to you about the upcoming two school projects, Putnam Vocational and Forest Park Middle School.
As I’m sure you’re aware, the building trades are trying to secure a project labor agreement on these schools. There’s reports out there that are favorable on the project labor agreements, and some that are not. We would like an opportunity at an upcoming meeting to perhaps give you a presentation that may take about 20 minutes, which will outline some underlying facts on jobs in the area that were done under project labor agreements and some that weren’t.
In our opinion, there’s a value of a project a cost an actual cost to build a quality school, and there’s a perceived cost on projects that were done without a project labor agreement. We’d like to share with you some of the costs incurred on some of these school departments three, four, five years after these projects are built. We feel we have some valuable information that may be most beneficial to you when weighing your decision on a project labor agreement on these two projects. I ask you to grant us an opportunity to give you a short presentation at an upcoming meeting. Thank you.
WL: Elinor Hartshorn.
Elinor Hartshorn: Thank you. I am a retired political science professor, and at various times I have served as chairman of the Planning Board of Springfield and of the Riverfront Development Commission, and at one time I had an organization called Landscape Springfield. I was chairman of a committee to get money approved for the new high school, which was quite a while ago.
I think it’s been a very useful exercise for the city to have somebody come in from the outside who has no vested interest in the city and use your expertise to help us with some of the problems we have. I realize this has been hard for some of the employees, but I think in the long run it will be good.
One of my major concerns at the present time is the schools. We don’t have enough teachers. We don’t have enough money. Suburban communities can provide lots of things for their children, but Springfield can’t. Suburban communities—Longmeadow is the more prominent one here—their parents have income triple that of students in Springfield. They take them on trips, etcetera, and they have a smaller class size. And I think that we need to somehow be able to get more teachers for our school, and hopefully provide a pre-school and cut down the class sizes.
There are some wonderful teachers in the schools, but a lot of them have left because they have so many students and they can’t manage the students. I think the schools cannot be improved and it will take money. How one gets it, I do not know. I would like to encourage you to really look and to see if more money could be got for the school so we can give these students, many of whom come from very poor homes, have an education which they need for this century. Thank you.
WL: Mary Tzambazakis.
Springfield CFO Mary Tzambazakis: Good afternoon, gentlemen. Today, I’m speaking to you as a CFO and also a resident of the city. Today marks a true milestone in our city, and that milestone is the departure of Philip Puccia, our executive director. I’m reminded of the first sentence of A Tale of Two Cities, “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” Truly, Philip joined us at the latter.
I joined the city in 2004 with the mayor, and I can tell you, the first two or three months of my tenure here prior to Phil’s arrival, I was wondering what I’d gotten myself into. There was a lot of denial around here, and some people still to this day do not want to face the realities of what existed. The realities were not a $21 million deficit, but a true $41 million deficit. The street lights were turned off in front of every other home. For the first few months, we weren’t sure whether this city was going to go into receivership and bankruptcy or not.
I couldn’t even prepare a cash flow. I had to use a calculator to look over paper books. It took me three months at night. The once finance department staffed by six people had been obliterated to one person, the CFO—no staff, no people, no secretary. Nothing. There was a lot of incompetence in many areas. There were a lot of untrained professionals in many areas. They needed to be developed, not through fault of their own, but because their managers didn’t take the personal interest in preparing them for the future.
When Philip joined us, I’ll be quite honest, I didn’t trust him. I was a Democrat; he was a Republican, and we had a few rounds the first few weeks in my office. But as we began this long journey, and I started calling him at 7:30 every single morning for the past three years, I realized that this wasn’t a Democratic issue or a Republican issue, this was a business management issue. And that those ideas and principles of accountability, integrity are not unique in either party.
I came to respect him for the integrity that he has and also to appreciate how he’s had to manage the delicate balance between the public entity, the people living in the city of Springfield, and the employees. Because it’s a balancing act. Sometimes you do something that the employees aren’t happy about, but it benefits the residents. And sometimes you do things that benefit the employees hat the residents aren’t happy about. And it’s a very delicate balance.
