Utica, New York Common Council Meeting Records

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Common Council Meeting January 21st, 2026

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Common Council Meeting January 21st, 2026

8 matches · 3 unidentified
25:58
Yes, and I'm going to let Marcus talk to us. So this is basically just helping our Codes Department to give them some teeth on, uh, problems. So I've been having a lot of issues where people are calling me, uh, one specific area on Riverside Drive where, um, you know, a resident cut a bunch of trees down, has 7 or 8 big large trucks there. And, um, so I, I talked to Marcus every time they send people there, and it's not just this property, it's all over where people are bringing dump trucks home, um, taking— buying a bus. Um, we have a place on, uh, Lorain Ave where a person has a bus that they bought a bus and they're redoing it into a camper. Um, and when we send our codes there, there's nothing in codes. So I've gone to Marcus, uh, he's been extremely helpful. I'll let him— he helped me draw this up and I'll let him speak on this a little bit. And the only thing I do want to say about this, I'd like— we're in the next month or so, we're going to have a lot of stuff going on. To bring this out for a vote tonight, it has to be unanimous. I'd like to, you know, I'd like to get this done and pass it. It's, um, you know, I did my homework, I worked with the Codes Department, and it's something I think it benefits all the residents of the city. The one thing I want to say beforehand, if anybody's listening, you know, we have, we have a code that you have to have 4-foot fencing. There's a lot of people that will come in front of the zoning that they have a 6-foot fence, and if they have a reason, it gets sent that they can, you know, if it's proper, they can put the fence up. The same thing with this. If somebody has a food truck that's parked on the side of their house that is not being, you know, a deterrent to the neighborhood or making things bad, they are able to get a special permit to be able to do that. This is basically to stop, you know, what's going on in a lot of places— people running businesses out of their house with large vehicles. And guess what? All of you guys sitting around here, you all have people in your, in your districts doing the same thing. So I'll let Marcus speak on this, and I have another piece, um, after, um, kind of the same type thing, um, and I'll let him talk on that too.
Unidentified speaker 30:57
But there's times too that they're in the middle of the road at night when we're out plowing, and me and Ed talk about this all the time. They're out in the middle, they're on the side of the road, residential roads. They leave it overnight. Yeah, they leave it right out there. We have to lift the blade up. I know it doesn't sound like it's a big deal, but 2-3 day storms the way we're getting them, they don't move. And then I have to call Ed, who's 2 or 3 different times already this month.
Unidentified speaker 1:10:45
Good evening. My name is Shayna Dolan, and as some of you know, I wear many hats in the community. But here I am tonight. I'm here to wear my NAACP Environmental Justice Committee member hat as well as the policy and advocacy chair for the Lead-Free and Healthy Homes Mohawk Valley Coalition. So I just want to reiterate everything that Betty Jo mentioned earlier. And just remind the council and the rest of the city government that no amount of lead is safe. Again, right now kids are being used as lead detectors, and right, the damage is permanent, but it's 100% preventable. It just requires action and political will. As stated before, this isn't just a public health issue, it's a racial justice issue, a socioeconomic and housing justice issue. I brought some other handouts that I can share with everyone that kind of outlines the ripple effect, that it's not just on the individually poisoned child, but it has impacts on the school system, right, the healthcare system, the taxpayers, et cetera. So I was actually hired by over HUD, 6 years ago to work on a campaign in the community to end childhood lead poisoning. And again, one of the asks was to create local legislation to end childhood poisoning in the City of Utica. And under that grant, I was able to work with different folks at the coalition and with folks at what's called Alterum Institute, and we submitted a bunch of different data to help create a city-specific, um, cost-benefit analysis. So again, this is in the handouts I'll give, but essentially it kind of gives a breakdown on the economic impact to the City of Utica if you don't address this issue. And then it kind of breaks it down into 3 levels whether the city implements lead hazard controls, lead service line replacement, which was talked about earlier, and finally renovation, repair, and painting standards enforcement, which again affects the housing. And then finally, I'll just end by saying that I have a list of recommended videos on YouTube. One is the documentary that the County Health Department and Cornell Cooperative Extension put out a few years ago, as well as other videos that talk about the real history and impact of lead. So I just want to offer my services as someone who has been working on this issue for many years now to help the community get leaducated. My info is on the sign-up sheet. And I hope to hear from you all. Thank you.
Unidentified speaker 1:19:01
Hi, I'm Carol Gable. I'm a Utica resident and I work in Utica, and I'm the treasurer of the NAACP Oneida County Utica chapter now. And I was here 2 years ago to talk with people that were on council then about Utica, its lead poisoning situation, because our statistics are so bad compared to so many of our sister cities. We'd really like to see improvement made there. And thank you, Betty Joan, for such a great presentation. We really want to support this work so Utica is not known as this top lead poisoning city in the state of New York. And I think we provided 2 years ago the ordinances Rochester and Buffalo and Syracuse have passed to reduce lead poisoning in their city. There's really effective ways to get this done. And we really are excited about the new council that we hope will be much more interested in doing some work on this.