There was nearly uniform disappointment on Monday night from the City Council due to the choice by the new Diversity, Equity and Inclusion director’s decision to forego Chelsea and to live on Revere Beach. City Manager Tom Ambrosino informed the Council of a residency waiver at the Monday meeting.
Candace Perez, who comes from New York and is eminently qualified for the job, had requested a residency waiver from the City due to relocating from New York to Revere Beach. Already, the Council has grown weary of City employees almost weekly requesting waivers to live outside of the City, and said they were getting concerned about it at the previous meeting. With the new director, who is to be immersed in the culture of Chelsea, five councilors Monday night questioned her dedication due to the decision to live in Revere.
The COVID-19 pandemic hasn’t slowed down the City’s Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) as it did last year, with City Manager Tom Ambrosino proposing a $16 million plan with 40 projects at a Council subcommittee Monday night.
“This is a big investment and we have the funding for all of these projects,” Ambrosino told the Council.
The projects in the CIP range from the mundane – such as routine replacement of police cruisers and DPW dump trucks – to more high ticket projects like re-tooling the DPW City Yard and enhancing a flood mitigation project on Willow Street.
One of the requests if for $750,000 to upgrade the drainage system in the Central Avenue and Willow Street area – part of a $9 million project that will lay the groundwork for the mixed-income redevelopment of the Innes Public Housing Apartments.
The Council voted decidedly against a nearly $300,000 expenditure that would have funded an extensive Beautification Program concentrated in the downtown areas, noting that there were more critical needs for the money at this time.
The Council voted 2-7 in the defeat, which had been championed for some time by Councillor Naomi Zabot.
Councillor Naomi Zabot advocated
just under $300,0000 – but the matter was defeated 2-7.
“This is something I’m very, very passionate about,” said Zabot. “In terms of the pandemic and the financial situation we’re I, we are getting federal funding to fill in those gaps. According to our City Manager we are in a good place financially and the addition of even one more job in the community is helpful to the community…This money would go back to the community and we’re cleaning up the streets which has become increasingly harder for the DPW to clean up. It’s increasingly hard to keep streets clean and some neighborhoods are spotless an
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The Chelsea Public Schools (CPS) vaccination clinic has become the hot place to be for educators from across the region, as the district seeks to vaccinate its staff and others in preparation for re-starting school this month.
Supt. Almi Abeyta and a huge collaboration between many folks came together for the third and largest vaccine clinic for educators on Friday, March 26, at the Burke Complex. Offering the one-shot Johnson and Johnson vaccine, the district opened up the clinic to the Five District Partnership (Chelsea, Revere, Malden, Winthrop and Everett), Lowell Public Schools, Excel Academy, Phoenix Charter, the Community Schools, For Kids Only and CAPIC.