Despite the title, the actual budget doesn’t get presented. Normally, the “presentation” or outline comes out in late May as part of a regular meeting. The full budget is debated a few weeks later. This year, the schedule got disrupted by the “cyber incident,” so the council called a brief “special meeting” to receive the…

1. A Broad Motion With A Specific Intent C. Gitschier – Req. City Mgr. Have The City Solicitor Provide The City Council With A Report Outlining Haw A Resident Can Appeal A Zoning Board Decision With Estimated Cost To The Resident. I’m no big city lawyer, but I’m pretty sure you can find this answer…

1. Homelessness Is Now a Public Health Crisis – “But what does that mean?” This was the the question posed by Maura Fitzpatrick, our director of Homelessness Initiatives after the Council voted 10-0 in support of the following motion: C. Rourke/C. Robinson/C. Scott/C. Yem – Req. City Of Lowell Declare Homelessness A Public Health Crisis….

As the city had a computer issue last week, there was no new agenda for this week’s meeting. Rather, the Council used this week’s time to clean up a small handful of items that they did not reach last week. Clocking in at about an hour and a half, this was a relatively quick meeting,…

I usually try to keep these light and/or stupid, but there’s just no way to work nonsense into a discussion on human rights violations and arresting the homeless. 1. Twisted Sister The meeting was far and away dominated by the following motions: M. Chau/C. Yem – Req. City Mgr. Have Law Department Provide A Report…

Walking back into the meeting recap game after taking a week off: Unfortunately, the meeting itself was a bit of a drag, and skipping two in a row is tempting. However, I’m seeing a disturbing uptick in Dracut-politics on Inside Lowell lately. God only knows what those rubes are always fighting about but someone needs…

1. Law Department Update 2. Bad Bills Every so often, Comcast skips my monthly bill, then sends me a “double bill” the following month. There’s no extra charge or late fee – so I’m not sure as to how they’re screwing me – but I’m certain it’s happening somehow. This has nothing to do with…

…the Lowell City Council: our heroes painted themselves into a corner with an agenda that would take well over 3 and 1/2 hours to complete. As such, they voted to continue the meeting to a Saturday. You mess with the bull, you get the horns. I’ll try to keep it brief as I’ve already outdone…

In his final State of the City address, Haverhill Mayor Jim Fiorentini said the most critical challenge the city faces today is to provide enough housing for residents, which he called a “moral issue.” “To combat this, we’ve changed our zoning laws to allow for more housing and accessory dwelling units.” When I look at…

There was a very full agenda for the March 14th meeting. Tragically, that meeting got cancelled due to a snow storm and all items on that agenda carried over to this week’s meeting. I assumed that they would go easy on adding to that agenda for the March 21st meeting. My assumption was wrong as…