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2:55:19

Thank you, Mr. President. Um, there was just a recent letter to the editor, um, that was written about me in regards to my absence of a meeting, and I responded, and I just wanted to read it on the record at the council, on the council floor. So it says, correcting the record on, on the lead, on correcting the— excuse me, correcting Correcting the record on the meeting regarding lead poisoning. In response to recent commentary from a member of the community regarding my absence from a meeting on lead poisoning in Utica, it's important to correct the record. In 2022, I introduced legislation specifically aimed at addressing lead poisoning. That legislation was placed in a committee on February 2nd and discharged from committee on March 3rd. Councilmembers Aiello, Burmaster, Fran Meola, and Moody voted to discharge the legislation rather than to continue the discussion in committee. Myself, along with Councilman— Councilmembers Betrus, Williamson, and DiBrango voted to keep the legislation in committee so the discussion could continue in a meaningful and substantive way before any final action was taken. I have participated in and supported multiple presentations and efforts related to lead poisoning. The appropriate and effective channel for that work is through committee meetings and the presentation of legislation where dialogue and transparency and accountability an impossibility can occur. In this instance, I had a prior obligation to my children and properly informed those organizing the meeting that I was unable to attend the 6 PM meeting, providing sufficient notice for the meeting to be rescheduled so that all interested parties could participate. I did, however, attend the 7 PM meeting where I received the full presentation of materials directly from the same presenter who spoke at the earlier meeting. Rather than acknowledge these facts, the writer who represents the Democratic Women's Party of Oneida County chose to single out a mother honoring a family commitment instead of engaging honestly with the legislative history and process surrounding this issue. This is particularly troubling coming from individuals and organizations that claim to support women. I encourage Heather, who sits next to me, whom the right of clarity supports, and to present the legislation on this issue, perhaps even the same legislation I introduced in 2022, which could be co-sponsored and thoughtfully advanced through the proper proper process. Lead poisoning is a serious issue that deserves more than performative discussion. It deserves sustained legislation, legislative action, and I remain committed to addressing it through the proper channels. I wanted to read that on the floor because I think that it's important to explain my position in the history that's been done by this body. With that said, my my son got Student of the Month today for optimism. Um, it's amazing through all the negativity that I encounter, um, not only as a councilperson but on a day-to-day basis from some people that surround me, that I am fortunate enough to have such— to raise kids with such positive attitudes. So I want to congratulate my son on that, and, uh, that's it. Thank you, Mr. President.

33:20

And Marques, I, I, we have a piece of legislation that's in committee that I submitted quite some time ago. I mean, previously when I was a council before I got reelected, is I think that that would be an easier streamline thing to do as far as vacant registries for buildings. And I, I just think that that would be less burden, a lesser burden on you So if you are to amend it, at least take into consideration that piece of legislation. Well, you— we talked about it together. I know, I know.

17:54

Marques, before you start, can you just tell me the difference between this legislation and what's on the books now and how it helps you kind of alleviate that? Because I think that that's kind of the—

23:49

And Marcus, I think with any piece of legislation that we pass, whether it's through codes, fire, police, whatever, you can use your discretion if you need be when going and understanding a situation. Like, it might look like it's on surface that something's wrong, but if you see, oh, maybe it's not wrong and they might be violating the code You can talk to them, say, hey, you know, it might not be the right thing to do, but I think that this is just a—

3:04:57

Okay, a motion, a second to introduce proposed resolution Right, I'd like to make a motion to keep this and put this into committee because I'm doing Community Readers Day, um, on Friday, and I drafted the legislation so that I could show them for Friday and then pass it after.

And Marques, I, I, we have a piece of legislation that's in committee that I submitted quite some time ago. I mean, previously when I was a council before I got reelected, is I think that that would be an easier streamline thing to do as far as vacant registries for buildings. And I, I just think that that would be less burden, a lesser burden on you So if you are to amend it, at least take into consideration that piece of legislation. Well, you— we talked about it together. I know, I know.

Marques, before you start, can you just tell me the difference between this legislation and what's on the books now and how it helps you kind of alleviate that? Because I think that that's kind of the—

And Marcus, I think with any piece of legislation that we pass, whether it's through codes, fire, police, whatever, you can use your discretion if you need be when going and understanding a situation. Like, it might look like it's on surface that something's wrong, but if you see, oh, maybe it's not wrong and they might be violating the code You can talk to them, say, hey, you know, it might not be the right thing to do, but I think that this is just a—

Okay, a motion, a second to introduce proposed resolution Right, I'd like to make a motion to keep this and put this into committee because I'm doing Community Readers Day, um, on Friday, and I drafted the legislation so that I could show them for Friday and then pass it after.

I think it's right, but what your legislation says is that a proclamation constitutes the approval of a flag. And again, that goes back on the previous legislation that you coincided the Pride Month flag with the flag raising, and that's not right.

Okay. Very briefly, the only thing that I want to say is the difference from Rome and Utica is that there is a lot of open space in Rome. Rome's a city, right? And they've got fields, they've got this, they got that. If you're trying to tell somebody that lives on, I don't know, any random street in the city that their neighbor's got to take a tree off their fence that's in a backyard, that's when you go into a problem from what I see, the way this legislation is written, from anything that I could understand. Okay. With that said, Rome might be able to do it. I don't see how we can do that in a city our size that's as condensed as it is. So I mean, maybe that's the only way that Rome's able to get away with it, but—

28:53

Oh, I think Joe's legislation is actually—

Yeah, but if you were to put it in legislative form, I think Joe's legislation makes sense. I just think that compared to Rome, there's a lot of things that we can do that's comparable to Rome. Just maybe this one's—

Right, exactly. With trees blown over. So, I mean, there is a little difference between— so don't hate on Rome, who's your sister city, and try and benefit Utica from that, because either way, they still deserve what they've gotten, and obviously they've been able to get away with the legislation that they have—

The only thing is, there's a couple of pieces, and I'm still working on some things, so I appreciate everybody giving me some time leaving this stuff into committee. One of the local laws that's introduced is the registration and posting of owner and manager information. I would still like to see how passing the two ordinances that we had in regards to the city being able to go after property owners, I would like to keep that one in there. Obviously, the loitering, aggressive begging and soliciting, camping, um, that didn't have any teeth. I mean, we could probably dismiss that one. I have sent Chief Williams a couple pieces of legislation in regards to our Parks Department. I'm working on him with a couple things that might add that into it. So if we want to, we can dismiss, um, rescind and replace ordinance number 2. Um, as far as ordinance number 4, I'm still working on that one. Ordinance number 3—

Yes, and this I worked on with the public safety commissioner. So there was a couple of other things that I had talked to him previously that we want to work on. I just haven't had the time to sit down with them and kind of resolve what we wanted to say. And maybe it doesn't work out, maybe it does, but this was the last piece of legislation. And even Mark Chieco was included in the meeting. So I would like to— this to stay in there just so that we can talk about it for a little more, unless you have something else.

Matches to the last piece of legislation in regards to fees, what the city does, what the city doesn't. And again, we're talking about new softball, things like that. I mean, there's definitely fees that go into this. So this is something that we can't call a meeting.

10:05

Sorry, they gotta be two separate pieces of legislation.

20:44

Sorry, legislation number 5, resolution number 5 is the same rules of order as last year, right?