2026-09-29 - City Council

00:12I'd like to call to order the September 29th meeting of the Quincy combined finance committee

00:17and oversight committee. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

00:20Councillor Ash, Councillor DiBona, Councillor Hubley, Councillor Jacobs, Councillor Mahoney,

00:25Councillor McPhee, Councillor Ryan, Councillor Yuen, Chairman Riley.

00:30Present. Thank you, Madam. I'll just read in the open meeting law. Pursuant to the open

00:36meeting law, any person may make an audio or video recording of this public meeting

00:40or may transmit the meeting through any medium. Attendees are therefore advised that such

00:44recordings or transmissions are being made whether perceived or unperceived by those

00:48present and are deemed acknowledged and permissible.

00:51Okay. I want to welcome the public here to this open meeting tonight and I want to thank

00:56you all for being here in person and online. I want to remind those in attendance of the

01:01need to be quiet in the chamber and to maintain order. If you need to have a conversation,

01:05please step outside. And to the council, I would like to say that I know we have a lot

01:09of ambitious on our agenda here tonight and a lot of material that has been distributed.

01:14So I want to set the expectation that I do not think that we will exhaust every item

01:18tonight but I think we can have meaningful discussions with actionable follow-up initiatives.

01:23I do want to make sure we have some discussion on every topic that we have on the agenda.

01:28So please allow me, if we get too deep into a single topic, to defer for future follow-up.

01:33Okay. So the first item on the agenda is 2026-106, Order Oversight of the Public Works Enhancement

01:43Fund, Chapter 92, Act of 2004. This was introduced on September 8th and referred to the Finance

01:49Committee for discussion. It was brought to my attention by a member of the public

01:53in response to the mayor's decision to use this fund for the paving of the Nickerson

01:56Post parking lot. Upon further research, it became clear that the use of these funds

02:00and compliance with the statutory requirements since it was established in 2004 warranted

02:06further review. The Council has been provided with details of the fund's deposits and expenditures

02:12from 2006 to 2019. Since 2006, the fund has received $5,363,695, expended $3,921,000 and

02:30has incumrances of $96,000, a current balance of $1,179,984. And I want to thank Madame

02:38Auditor for compiling all the information we received here tonight for this meeting.

02:44I know it was a lot of work and I really appreciate it. So with that, I'd like to open up to the

02:50floor for any discussion on this item from my fellow Councillors. Anyway. So in looking

03:05at the spreadsheets, I know there was a lot that we presented. And there were a number

03:12of things that jumped out at me. Certainly in 2022, there was power equipment from Stewart's

03:19Power that was purchased. And that should have required a vote of the Council. We had

03:26fence work, house neck granite bench in 2017, landscaping, bronze plaque, signage for a

03:37middle school, more landscaping, cleaner greener t-shirts, and some design work that I'm sure

03:51would have fallen into the purview of this fund. The trend towards landscaping and other

04:00non allowed uses must be examined. We need to get a handle on some of the on call and

04:05open ended contracts. Meeting minutes from the November 10, 2003 Ordinance Committee

04:12meeting indicated the minimum guaranteed revenue in the new lease would be $400,000 annually

04:18with $200,000 going into the DPW fund. But we did not realize those until 2017. So we

04:27did not realize that level of funding for many years. Noteworthy in the meeting minutes

04:36on this item, there was a lot of debate among the Councillors at the time. Councillors

04:41Conley, Coughlin, Finn, Gutrow, Hanley, Keenan, Macaulay, Newton, Romondi offered three friendly

04:48amendments that were proposed. However, only one was passed. There was a lot of banter

04:54according to the meeting minutes that they agreed on some things and did not agree. And

05:01with that, this had to go to a home rule petition to the State House. So I think what we're

05:07looking for is that there be more examination of this fund. I don't know if anyone else

05:13has any other comments. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. I have a question

05:25about this fund, the 4,000 oversight fund, 10%. Yeah. So it shows in regards to payroll

05:42account project manager salary, $120,199. I'm wondering when did the city start to hire

05:55this project manager? Maybe ask a count auditor. Oh, I didn't. Sorry. Okay. So for the fund,

06:12the 4,000 oversight fund, the 10%. This fund is being used to hire a project manager whose

06:20salary is $120,199.97. My question is, when did the city start to hire this project manager?

06:35I have a partial answer for you, Councillor Yuan. The employee that is currently the

06:40project manager did start with the city in 2017. However, I'm not sure if that is when

06:48he actually took over the role as project manager. It could have been after that time.

06:54I'll have to do a little bit more research to find out the exact year he started as

06:59project manager. Thank you, auditor. My next question is, the funding in this fund is not

07:11enough to pay this project manager's salary. So which other funds have been allocated

07:18to pay this one's salary? Because this fund already in red is the last time is the $197,000

07:30wait in this oversight fund. So currently, this particular fund is in a deficit of,

07:39I believe, about $181,000. The total salary of this employee is as of right now coming

07:47out of this particular fund. And I'm assuming it's with the hopes that the revenues coming

07:51in would cover the salary. I can't -- it's not under my preview to determine where this

07:59employee would be charged or where else he's to be allocated. That would come from the

08:06administration. The follow-up question. So we don't know which other funds being used

08:17to pay this one's salary? So we don't have -- currently, he's only being paid out of

08:23this particular account. He's currently being paid out of the oversight account. He's not

08:28being paid out of any other account. But this oversight account is already in deficit.

08:34That's correct. If I could just -- because this isn't one

08:43of our general fund accounts, might I monitor? Can they go into the red until they get their

08:52quarterly payments? Technically any personal service line can go into the red because

08:59we are obligated to pay an employee no matter where they're charged. Right. So if they

09:04were not to get that money, they would get paid in full. They would be -- they will

09:08be paid in full each week, even if the -- if an account is in the red. This account revenue

09:15comes in on a quarterly basis. So I'm assuming that once this quarter, which we'll post,

09:23the money will come in by the end of September. And I'm assuming the treasurer's office will

09:28have it posted to the account within the first few weeks of October. Obviously the

09:33deficit will lessen, however, it will then grow again until we get enough revenue in

09:39the account to cover it. If I could, I think these are -- and I'm

09:44just going to check for -- is that out of the Public Works Enhancement Fund or is that

09:49under the -- I believe Councilor Yvonne is talking about the 10% that goes to the oversight

09:54fund. But it all came under the same act. Okay.

09:59So my question for that then would be for a follow-up, I believe in 2017 this person

10:04was being paid as the -- I could be wrong, but I believe this person was the head of

10:08the parks and -- right? Parks, right? Then Dave Murphy became the commissioner and he

10:16moved over to something else. But I think before he moved over to this fund, he was

10:19getting paid someplace else. So I think we just want an audit of where that came from.

10:23And then also any time we're in the red, whether -- personally, this is just a personal thing,

10:28we should -- we should be notified of that any time any account goes into the red. Now

10:33I understand that Granite Links is a -- it's not part of your purview, but it is part of

10:37our purview. So we should be notified when that goes into the red and we should know

10:41that. And that's part of the reason why this -- the audit of Corey Hills is so important

10:47because we don't have insight into what that money is being used for, good, bad or indifferent,

10:53not saying it's bad, just saying we don't have insight into that. And I think it's

10:57really important that we do because when we brought the audit forward, we thought we could

11:03take it out of oversight and that's in the negative as well. So these are the things

11:06that we have to kind of get our arms around so we can understand it. And another reason

11:10why we shouldn't really be spending money out of -- out of accounts for other projects

11:15when we don't know -- when we haven't had that audit.

11:21And this -- the first order that we're talking about is more for the DPW fund. But if we

11:25-- so obviously there's a little further down the agenda, we have a more global Corey Hills.

11:30We'll focus on this first. Councilor Yuan.

11:37Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. So I have a follow-up question. So this oversight fund

11:45suppose is for oversight. So this money should be used for higher independent auditor to

11:53audit in this -- the Corey Hills. So has this fund been used for hiring independent auditor?

12:04And what's the job description of this project manager?

12:08Okay. So I think maybe what we could do is defer that question until we're talking about

12:12the agenda item about the Corey Hills. More in general.

12:22So I guess the question is what can we -- what can we do to become more engaged in what's

12:26going on with this fund, this -- the DPW line, and to be -- ensure that it's being

12:31used in compliance. I don't know if you want to weigh in on that, Mr. Walker.

12:36No, one second. Because of 10% of gold.

12:41Through you, Madam Chairwoman, as the spreadsheet shows, this fund has been used for a good

12:48number of major and minor projects over the course of time. The special legislation that

12:56you referred to was passed prior to the co-administration taking office. You know, we're happy to take

13:04another look at that. Our view on this account from a practical perspective has been expansive

13:12in terms of its allowed uses, in terms of public works that you'll see through the

13:19spreadsheet there are different kinds of public works. It's not strictly related to streets

13:23and sidewalks, as is outlined in the home rule. But going through this, especially the

13:28last couple years, you'll see that the major project that's been used out of this revenue

13:35fund has been the improvements to the Reshooty Drive intersection. T-PAL and the state working

13:41together to after a number of years get that project moving and get a signal at that intersection.

13:50It's the major piece of what we've had the last couple years on that piece. The other

13:56major project that has been conducted with this funding source was the major improvements

14:03to Pageant Field. Pageant Field included the major restoration, included the restoration

14:08of the ball fields up there, some reconfiguration, a much improved picnic area, a new walking

14:14path and a good deal of new plantings in that area. And that is, you'll see from the items

14:21listed in the spreadsheet provided by Madame Auditor, that those two items are really

14:27the bulk of what has been spent out of that money over the last several years. When we

14:37talk about the technical differences between the state statute and the leases and the

14:44guidance, I know Mr. Timmons has some thoughts on that as well. But again, our motivation

14:52and our view of this fund is that it's expansive beyond or has been expansive beyond the language

15:01details in the 2003-2004 special legislation. And we've been able to utilize this fund

15:08to a great extent. Well, if I could just read that into the record.

15:13The Commissioner of Public Works under the direction of the mayor, she'll use the funds

15:16for the sole purpose of designing, repairing, maintaining and constructing the streets and

15:20sidewalks of the City of Quincy and for the acquisition of any capital equipment necessary

15:25to accomplish that purpose. So as you know, Mr. Walker, this started because of the Nicos

15:29and Post parking lot paving project. That is not an allowed use of this. So I would

15:35hope that we're going to take another look at this and adhere to the law. This is a

15:40law on the books. Through you, Madam Chairwoman, I appreciate

15:44the sentiment. And as we've discussed, based on the request of this council, not necessarily

15:52because we felt it was inappropriate in any way, shape or form. But this body asked some

15:58questions about the fund, about the use of the fund. And we determined that we would

16:04in the mayor the next day said, okay, we will find other sources to complete the Squaw

16:10Rock project based on the request of this council. Not any sort of order, not any sort

16:16of requirement based upon our view of the expansive nature of what's allowed, what's

16:23not allowed and how we pursue Public Works projects. But going forward, now that this

16:31issue has come up, we're happy to talk about some changes to how we expend money out of

16:39this fund. That's totally fine. Keeping in mind that we've done a lot of what's in that

16:48special act has come about regardless of that language. That language back then was

16:55at a time when there wasn't a lot of road work getting done in the city. The city,

17:01my recollection having been a young cub reporter at the time of the newspaper was that this

17:07body at that time must have in some ways, shape or form, determined that the strictly

17:14road improvements were a priority for that fund. But as the timeline progressed and as

17:25we progressed as a city, we have spent upwards of $200 million on our streets and sidewalks

17:34over the last ten years since 2019. I don't know the exact number of furniture I can

17:37provide that to you. We've made major improvements to streets and sidewalks and our underground

17:43utilities over the years where as this evolves, now at that time this was just getting off

17:50the ground. There were different conditions on the street at that time. There were different

17:56conditions at that council and the state legislature and the private partners had to

18:02abide by. That was a construction project at that time. It has long since not been

18:06a construction project. It is producing revenue. And yes, we have used that revenue in an expansive

18:13way and a way that we feel is entirely appropriate. Thank you, Mr. Walker. President Mahoney,

18:20did you have something to add to that? Somebody just texted me and said the QA TV's not working.

18:24Yeah, we're working on that. Okay, just checking. Is it live streaming? Just not? Sorry, folks.

18:33So I was just asked to check on that. As we all know, it's made for TV, I guess that's

18:40what they're saying. So I do have something to say about that. So I appreciate that.

18:46And the fact is that it wasn't brought, it was not brought to this council's attention,

18:52nor was it brought to a prior council's attention while I was on council before. It was material

18:55that was dug up by people who got elected because they really wanted to see success,

19:03but also understand how things are happening. So when we talk about, you know, Nickerson

19:07Post and how we're going to use this money for Nickerson Post, but because the will

19:10of this body wasn't to use that and we went out and found other money, I think the issue

19:14is that we should also know where that other money's coming from. Because I think it was

19:18on QA TV, the mayor said it was Chapter 90 money, and that's questionable, too, as to

19:23how they're applying for Chapter 90 money for a parking lot that doesn't have any major

19:27roadway infrastructure happening on that area. Now, sidewalks could be considered that,

19:32but it's not a major, they're not, it's not a major reconstruction. So that's one question.

19:36I know you don't have to use Chapter 90 money for everything. You can buy it for equipment,

19:39you can put it to use for other things, but specifically you can't use it for a parking

19:43lot. I'm going to diverse a little bit just because it's the history of this. We use

19:48CPA monies to buy two properties for a presidential library. We put a parking lot on that property

19:53as well. Now we're not going to have a presidential library there because we're going to have

19:56it at the Monroe Building. That's the new rumor. But my point is that we seem to shape

20:03shift whatever we need to do whenever we feel like it, but the problem is that we

20:08should have an understanding of what projects are happening, where they're happening and

20:12how they're being funded. Whether they're being funded from the general fund or they're

20:16being funded from bond obligations or they're being funded from any other revenues that

20:21we get in. Because those revenues, and I've heard it used before, it's free money. It's

20:25not free money. It is the taxpayers' money. And it's going into an account that's supposed

20:30to be audited or at least reviewed here at the City Council, and it hasn't been at all.

20:34And then in 2004, that's when that went through. And then also, I think I can't remember what

20:39the year was, was it 2017 when the Councillors had the noteworthy meeting? Was it 2017?

20:47Which one? When then and let's see, November, it was 2003 when this piece went through.

20:57And then it talked about the auditor shall report to the council with 90 days for the

21:02fiscal year end for these things. While I was on the council, let's just go back one

21:05more time. While I was on the council, we did ask for an audit of Granite Links. And

21:08we wanted that audit because Granite Links wanted to have an extension on their lease.

21:13And we had never audited the lease. It was an opportunity for the administration to bring

21:17forward a great story, but instead they brought forward a red-lined lease document without

21:22any discussion of what the great story was. So one other thing that happened was Ruth

21:27Gordon Amphitheater. Ruth Gordon Amphitheater would have been, you know, I'm not sure what

21:32it was supposed to be, maybe it was a basketball court. I'm not sure. But that was going to

21:35be filled in from that very project that was used with the Granite Links money. And again,

21:40had not an active group of people found out about that. And it was, I wouldn't say it

21:43was completely restored, but I think it was brought back to life by some passionate people.

21:48And I would beg to differ that those concerts are pretty packed and very exciting for people

21:53to go to and a great place to cool off in the summer. And, you know, we were, one might

21:58say we would compete. You compete against what's going on in downtown Quincy versus

22:01what's going on there. We shouldn't be competing. We have offerings that we can do everywhere.

22:05But again, this was money that was spent and not shared with the council and projects

22:12that were kind of behind the scenes and unveiled. But that's not how government's supposed

22:16to work. You know, if we're proud of the projects we have and the things that we're

22:21doing and the way we're spending our money, we should include the public for transparency

22:27to make sure that this is what our community wants. And I don't, that does not happen.

22:33The only time it has happened is when we have had some charrettes, but usually the decisions

22:37are made. But I just want to make those things pointed and clear. We had an RFP for Nickerson

22:41Post. Then you had a public hearing. You had identified the money that you didn't tell

22:46anybody. When the money was identified and you were told you couldn't use it, you had

22:48to go use it someplace else, but we still don't know where that money's coming from.

22:51That is not how government, this isn't a private, not for profit business or a private

22:57business, this is government. And government should be transparent. And I know you don't

23:00like that word, but transparent is how are we doing it? Where are we getting the funds

23:04from and when is it going to be executed? Because if we do those timelines together,

23:07we can be successful with those things. But if we don't know where you're doing it, then

23:10we can't. Thank you, Councillor Honi. Well, we don't have audio, live audio right now,

23:20but it's being recorded. So for the replay, people will be able to see it. Councillor

23:24McKee. Thanks. So when I looked through this list of expenses, I kind of highlighted the

23:35ones in yellow that I thought didn't sound like they were streets or sidewalks. And some

23:43of them I'm not too sure about, but there were a lot other, I think I was pretty conservative

23:46and about one out of five of the number did not seem to be used for streets or sidewalks.

23:55And some of it was used for Christmas lights. Some of it was used for a bronze plaque, granite

24:07markers, more plaques. Some of it was used for cleaner greener t-shirts, land appraisals,

24:27gardening equipment. There's all the pageant field work that was mentioned. So I think

24:36just I think we need to tighten the ship a little bit. And I think we need to follow

24:43where the money is supposed to be going to. I think that's just good government. And

24:50I think that it also fosters trust in the system. I also know that as a ward Councillor,

24:59a lot of the complaints I get are about streets and sidewalks. And so had that money been

25:06available, we could have done even more work on our streets and sidewalks. And I think

25:12we've done a lot over the years. And I'm very grateful for that. But, you know, I've

25:21learned from the previous commissioner that there's this grading system and we have to

25:25tackle the worst streets first. Some streets that are pretty bad are not the worst. So

25:32in my ward, I've had to tell people, sorry, you're not on the worst list. So you got

25:37to hold on a little bit. I think if we want to do these other things, we should find

25:44other sources of money for those other things and use this money for what it's intended

25:49for. Thank you. Anyone else? Anyone on this side? I'm going to go to Councillor Ryan.

25:58Councillor Ryan. Thank you, Madam Chair. And this question will go to Mr. Walker. With

26:03regards to item B under the session -- chapter 92 act, it states that on or before March

26:131st of each year, the mayor shall submit to the City Council for its review a report

26:19of any kind in all capital equipment expenditures from the Public Works Enhancement Fund for

26:26the preceding calendar year and shall submit a report of anticipated expenditures for the

26:33present calendar year. Notwithstanding the preceding sentence, any and all expenditures

26:39for the purchase of capital equipment in accordance with this act shall be subject

26:44to appropriation by the mayor and a vote of the City Council. So could we possibly

26:52submit -- could we submit a formal request to have this report created and delivered

26:58to us? Through you, Madam Chairwoman, sure. The larger piece of that, Councillor, is the

27:06pavement management plan, which does exist, which every member of this body I believe

27:11has had individual meetings with the commissioner over the course of the last spring. We've

27:19talked to Commissioner Grennan about how we do that going forward. And within this fund,

27:26the equipment piece of it, again, this is something that was passed in '03, '04, not

27:32something that anyone would have thought was operative at 23 years later, for whatever

27:41reason. But, like, there are certainly things that we're happy to provide this body, and

27:46if that's one of them, I don't think that's a huge issue.

27:49Okay. Thank you. And do you have any -- could you give a timeline over the next couple of

27:54weeks when that would be delivered? Through you, I can certainly try. I think if we're

28:02going to try to make an effort to meet some of the technical guidelines that are in this

28:08home rule, that that would be a March 1st type of scenario. And we would work with

28:14our folks to get some equipment needs and see what may be available and provide this

28:19body with a list of some of the -- with the equipment that we may purchase out of this.

28:24And more specifically, the bigger item, obviously, when it comes to this account is going to

28:29be the streets and sidewalks. And I know Commissioner Grant and I will be in touch

28:34to talk about what we have available going forward, updating the pavement management

28:39plan, which has been through the ringer, so to speak, because so much has gotten done.

28:46I would note that when we say that, you know, we could be doing more road work, I do remember

28:53the former commissioner saying we almost could not do more road work with the amount of

29:00contracts that we have on the street, with the amount of contractors we have on the

29:03street, that we have pushed the threshold. And my memory serves correct. He's actually

29:09drawn back a little bit in terms of spring, summer, fall on some of these things because

29:15of available resources in terms of the private contractors. The money's there, the city's

29:20willing to get it out the door. We're going as fast as we can. But there has been some

29:24discussion about, you know what, we actually can't do much more road work with the basis

29:30of the money. Now, that's going to change because we're getting toward the end of the

29:35funding life of these five-year plans that we've put in place. And I think we're ahead

29:40of schedule on that, again, getting back to the money getting out the door as quickly

29:44as possible. I think we're going to be a little bit ahead of schedule getting all that road

29:47money that was approved a number of years ago out the door. So that is going to change.

29:53And the administration is certainly willing to have a conversation about the pavement

29:57management plan and how we go forward and how this fund may supplement that.

30:01Okay. So just to clarify, what's the expected date? Because I'd like to see some --

30:09I feel that that would be a spring item. We can talk about that. I mean, I'm open

30:17to -- we would certainly be open to talking with our team, figuring out when the appropriate

30:23time is to deliver an updated pavement management plan and what we may have for equipment.

30:30So I wouldn't --

30:31Just one other question.

30:32Yes.

30:33Could we get a list of the projects that have been completed under this?

30:37Absolutely.

30:38Okay. We'll start with that. Thank you.

30:45Anyone else?

30:48Absolutely.

30:49Councilor DiWano?

30:53Commissioner Crennan came forward. I don't have anything to say. Do you have anything

30:58to say?

31:01Sure. Yeah.

31:03I'd like to give some context on the pavement management plan. We have been working off

31:09the original 2018 plan, which has been updated a few -- updated a few times over the course

31:13of the capital improvement program that we've had. We are in the process of updating that

31:19pavement management plan. This spring and summer, we had a company civil into survey

31:25all of our roadways. There was basically like Google Maps, like the car drove around

31:30and took video of every roadway and then AI actually goes through it, identifies the

31:35pavement condition for each roadway segment within the city. That data has been coming

31:41back to the city. It's being combed through. It's like a computer gave it back to us.

31:47So we're trying to make it human. After that, we'll go through the list of roads, come

31:51up with a list of priorities and be able to provide a plan. That after will be taking

31:58place over the course of the early fall, and we'll certainly be able to -- we'll certainly

32:04be able to provide that as soon as we can. Yeah, I'm Ed Gretton. I'm the Commissioner

32:10of Public Works.

32:14I'm going to ask you to stay in order, please. Thank you. Councillor DiBona.

32:20Thank you, Madam Chair. Just -- we're talking a lot about roads and sidewalks, this enhancement

32:27fund. We're also talking a lot about the most important streets need to be paved,

32:32the worst streets need to be paved first. However, in the past I've worked very closely

32:37with Commissioner Gracioso over the last some odd years that he was in office. And I know

32:44Commissioner Grennan over at the T-PAL department has worked on streets as well, especially

32:51with the C Street project. We not only -- I mean, let's get kind of this backtracking

32:57a little bit on the streets is sometimes they'll go out and they'll do an asphalt overlay,

33:02which basically will not be the top priority of the worst street, but they'll shave off

33:08the -- and I'm not an expert in this. I just talk to them quite a bit about it. It's going

33:15to cost 30 to 60% less than a true reconstruction of a road, but it could get you 10 to 15

33:24years of life. It's not going to be a full reconstruction, but I've seen it happen throughout

33:29the city where we've gone into like a mid grade group of roads and said, you know, that's

33:35a long road. Why don't we just overlay it and we'll get some durability out of that

33:40particular street. They might not be going up and ripping up gas lines. National grid

33:45doesn't look like they're going to be touching this particular street. So there is reconfigure

33:49and there is an algorithm that the Commissioner will have discretion over certain streets

33:55in the city based on water mains, sewer repairs, whether national grid is going to go in there

34:01and really -- because they have top priority. If we do a street tomorrow and they have

34:07a leak, they're going in to rip that thing up. We have no jurisdiction over that. So

34:13what the Commissioner probably will do and what the previous Commissioner did is really

34:17have a great algorithm of underneath repairs and where we're going to really attack particularly

34:24in the city. I just think that that's something the public should know, that we just don't

34:31do the worst streets first. There is an overlay that we can do. I know ward Councillors have

34:39basically in the past have requested to do that. They said, listen, we kind of have

34:45to get this road taken care of. It's kind of a longer road. Can we do an overlay? And

34:50if you talk to the Commissioner in your particular ward, if you think it's a top priority that

34:55you really need to get done before the winter or right in the spring, you can particularly

35:02talk to the Commissioner about getting certain roads, maybe even smaller ones that you think

35:07that are cut through streets or whatever the case may be. But I think a general understanding

35:13of how we attack the city, Commissioner Garcia also did a fantastic job over the years.

35:20I know Councillor Mahoney was part of it to the $100 million bond for the roads and sidewalks

35:26that we did some years ago in our capital improvement plan. And we've done a great job

35:31with adding the Chapter 90 funding. But, you know, the roads, everything gets a lot

35:38more expensive in the materials. So for the future, I know I always -- I'm going to be

35:43talking to Commissioner Grennan a lot with the overlay because it's something that we

35:48could do. It's not really just a band-aid. It's not a band-aid. It's going to give us

35:53at least 10 to 15 years. But it's not a full reconstruction. It will cost a little bit

35:57less to do. And that may be strategically areas of the city that we could do that could

36:04maintain what we have. Obviously, I would always talk to Commissioner. I'm going to

36:08be talking to him in the next few weeks about, okay, what's the goal? What can we get to?

36:13Weather's already changing. You see the weather pattern. I know Thursday and Friday will be

36:17warm 80s in the next couple days, but we're going back to cold weather. And once that

36:22weather gets to a frost or gets to a point where we can't pave anymore, we're going to

36:27be ceasing that particular item. So we're looking at maybe two months, maybe two and

36:32a half if it doesn't get really, really cold in December to try to attack the roads and

36:37sidewalks out there. So just what we've had over the past few years in our capital improvement

36:45plans, I would hope that I would ask the administration to maybe come forward and if they need more

36:51funding for roads and sidewalks is to come forward to us and ask this particular council

36:57if they need particular another one, two, three year capital improvement plan. Because

37:02I think it's she talks about top priority. One of the main concerns of the city is roads

37:09and sidewalks and maintaining them throughout the city. So just just to let the folks in

37:16the audience, folks listening, and our fellow councilors that hey, listen, there is a plan

37:24in place. So thank you.

37:29Thank you, Councillor Davana. So I think we've gotten a little bit off track a little bit.

37:33This is really just about using this fund which was restricted for DPW work relative

37:39to streets and sidewalks for something other than that purpose. So it's a restricted account.

37:44I think we got way too far down the rabbit hole of how we prioritize things and stuff

37:48like that. So I would like to move on because on the next one, but if people would like

37:53to have one more, Councillor Mahoney. So if I could, Madam Auditor, could you just

37:57tell me how much money I don't have the spreadsheet with me. Could you just tell me how much

38:01money is in the account or was in the account before money was expended on any of these

38:05projects? Just a rough number. Just a rough number of how much money has been collected

38:11in this account. Forget about how much has been spent out of it. How much money has

38:14been collected into this account for use of the city. Yep. So one moment. So basically

38:25since fiscal 2006, we have collected in this particular account $5,363,695.78. So I guess

38:37what I'm trying to, I listened to what Councillor Davana said and I've listened to what the

38:41Chief of Staff have said. And we do have money that we take out for bonds for capital

38:45improvement. And we did take out $100 million. But this would be $5 million that we could

38:50have put towards capital, just towards that capital that would have lowered our debt

38:54by $5 million. That's how I look at this, not these are great projects that we're doing

38:58and we wouldn't be able to do it if we didn't have this money. Well, again, it's not money

39:01that's meant for all these other things. It's meant for sidewalks and streets for

39:05DPW or equipment. And we didn't use it for that. We used it for plaques and we used

39:09it for, we used it for cleaner greener t-shirts. That should probably come from a campaign

39:15account because I think that's a campaign thing. But I just, I just think honestly,

39:19at the end of the day, when we're looking at these things, we really need to be more

39:23honest about how we're using it and transparent about where it's going to. And then if we're

39:28going to talk about capital improvements, if we're doing all this pavement, it's not

39:32about the pavement that we're doing. It's about where we're getting the funds. And

39:35if we have $5 million in account that we could have used, that's $5 million less that

39:39we would have had to bond. And that's all I'm trying to say. At the end of the day,

39:43we have $200 billion worth of debt. And that would have been $5 million that we would

39:49be able to not have taken out had we used it for the purposes it was used for. And

39:53that's it for me tonight. Thank you, Councillor Mahoney. Councillor

39:55Ash and Councillor Jacobs have not spoken. Do either one of you have anything to add?

40:01Councillor Ash? Thank you, Madam Chair. I guess just to, just,

40:05I agree. I think we were conflating a few of the issues and going down a road and whether

40:10it was paved or not. But however, my question, just to wrap up, I want to make sure that

40:17these are independent kind of either lists or presentations of what's going to happen.

40:27So on or before March 1st of next year, we should expect a foresight of what's going

40:34to be paid out of this account. Is that correct? The way that the order is written, yes.

40:41The way that Chapter 92 is drafted, yes. But that is independent from, say, Commissioner

40:47Grennan's list of priority roads and this audit and what was the the company, Commissioner

40:55Grennan, Sybil? Sorry. Yes, Sybil. Great. Thank you.

41:02You're welcome. Councillor Jacobs?

41:06Yes, thank you. Just kind of, you're going off with Councillor Mahoney said, you know,

41:14when you look at these projects, it's basically like we're paying interest now on appraisal

41:22of DPW signal trucks. And because we're basically not using the money to do roads, we're using

41:31the money to buy these other things. And because we're then borrowing money to do the roads,

41:39we could have used, like Councillor Mahoney said, we could have used this money to pay

41:41down the debt. And inadvertently, we're kind of like paying, you know, interest on a granite

41:47bench, which is nice. I have seen it. It's a nice bench. But, you know, the money should

41:52be used for the appropriate purpose. And I think that this is all comes from, you know,

41:57we say, oh, it's from 2003. It was, you know, 23 years ago. And, you know, basically get

42:02the sense, it's like, how can we be expected to know that? It was before we were in office

42:06and, you know, I guess I hear that argument. But now is the time to clean up the books,

42:14make sure we're doing it right, right the ship and make sure the money is being used

42:18in the appropriate manner. So hopefully we'll be doing that. And that's all I wanted to

42:23say about that. Thank you, Councillor Jacobs. And in the interest of time, I would like

42:27to move on unless people have something. Okay. Because we're moving on to the granite

42:33links, the next order. Is it specific to this one? Okay. Councillor, you're on.

42:41Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. So just a follow-up, Councillor Asch's suggestion, like before

42:51March 1st of each year, the mayor shall submit to the City Council for its review, a report

42:57of any kind or capital equipment expenditure from the Public Work Enhancement Fund for

43:03the preceding calendar year. So how about from now to next year, March 1st? We also

43:10want to know what project is going on and is planning during this time. So I want to

43:17reinforce Councillor Ryan's request, ask the administration to provide a list of projects

43:27that is going on and is planning to do during this time using this fund, Public Working

43:34Enhancement Fund. So Councillors and the public will not be called surprised again.

43:41Thank you, Councillor Ioannon. I think if we've agreed that there's a freeze on spending

43:45from this line, then we can wait until March. If there's any spending that comes out of

43:48this account, then, yeah, I would agree that we need some reporting on that. I don't know

43:55if you want to add anything to that, Mr. Walker, but if the account's frozen until March when

43:59you come before us, then we'll be in compliance. Through you, Madam Chairwoman, I would be

44:09reluctant to use the word frozen again. The Council asked that we not use this funding

44:15for a specific purpose which the administration felt was appropriate. The Council asked us

44:19not to, feeling it was not appropriate based upon some of this language. We said okay.

44:23We tried to know the source for the specific project that exists. We're also happy to provide

44:28the pavement management plan as per the guidelines outlined in the state law. We're happy to

44:33provide another, anything else that's included in this, if that's the Council's wish. But

44:41I do sort of want to get to a point where, like, we're not free, nothing is frozen.

44:48This is an appropriation process. This is a project request process that is dictated

44:54by the administration, controlled by the administration. And if something comes up now, information

45:00sharing, fine. If something comes up between now and March 1st that we want to spend the

45:04money out of, we'll make a commitment that we'll certainly let this body know that we've

45:08got $100,000 in emergency sidewalk repair, $100,000 in an emergency drainage project.

45:14Something along those lines will certainly inform the body, but I'm certainly not going

45:19to commit to freezing the account until March.

45:24That's fair enough, Mr. Walker. Appreciate that. I think at the end of the day, and

45:28I would like to, oh, Councilor Ryan. Go ahead, Councilor Ryan.

45:32This would be to Mr. Walker. Again, I just want to point out that in this law, it does

45:36state that the City Council would also vote on the appropriation.

45:41Where is that?

45:46That's item B in the second page of the law. Notwithstanding the proceeding sentence, any

45:57and all expenditures for the purchase of capital equipment in accordance with this

46:02act shall be subject to appropriation by the Mayor in a vote of the City Council. So I

46:07do stand corrected. It is just for capital equipment, but if that is going to be something

46:12that would need to be purchased, we would also have to vote on it.

46:19Thank you. So if I could just wrap this up. I think what we are looking for is compliance.

46:26Being unaware of the law isn't really a reason not to have been in compliance with it. And

46:31at the end of the day, it is for streets and sidewalks. I agree with my fellow Councillors

46:36who have noted that we have bonded and taken on a lot of debt for some of these projects.

46:40This fund was intended to be exactly for that, not for parks, not for t-shirts, not for

46:44fences. So I think if we can, you know, just monitor this going forward and have cooperation

46:52from the Administration that we will be informed of what is going to happen with that. I think

46:57with that we could probably move on to the next agenda item. Thank you.

47:02Okay. So next item on the agenda is 2026-081, a resolve seeking a formal audit of lease

47:09deductions, expenses and payments by Corey Hills Associates LP. This order was introduced

47:14by Ward 4 Council of Virginia Ryan on May 4th to request a formal audit of the Corey

47:19Hills lease payments and the City's use of the oversight account funds. I don't want

47:23to spend any time here tonight on the long 25-plus year history of the transformation

47:29of the site from a dump to a world class 27-hole golf course and function facility.

47:34What I would like to address is the City's oversight of the contractual relationship

47:38between the parties under the still current 2002 amended and restated lease. There are

47:44five amendments that have been negotiated and added to that lease. But simply the City

47:48receives 10% of gross revenue from the golf course, operations and driving rage, and 10%

47:54of net revenue from the functions, taverns, members lounge and the crossing nines, hospitality

48:00side of the business. No formal complete audit has ever been performed to the best

48:05of my knowledge, but it has been requested over time and especially since the operators

48:09requested a new lease and extension of the term for an additional 50 years. That requiring

48:15a home rule petition was approved by the City Council in late 2024, but it has not

48:20received the necessary approval at the State House. So the parties are still operating

48:24under the 2002 lease. So with that, I would be happy to open it up to my fellow Councillors

48:32with any comments. Councillor Mahoney.

48:37Just quick. On May 4, 2026 of the budget meeting, Mayor Koch stated that there would

48:42be a separate audit for Corey Hills. So I guess what I'm looking for, and that was just

48:46a public meeting for the budget, but he did state for the record that this was going

48:50to be happening. So I just wanted to know where we stand on that.

48:53Mr. Walker.

48:55Madam Chairwoman, we're still looking at potential contractors for that. We have been

49:00in discussion unrelated but parallel to that with the City's independent auditors relative

49:10to some major changes, the need to go on relative to our annual independent audit.

49:16It was determined through a number of meetings and conversations with Municipal Finance that

49:20we would get the City audit squared away in a place where it needed to be. This body

49:27is familiar. Council, you are relative to your time at Holbrook, relative to some of

49:33the issues that cities and towns are having with this consolidated corporation that is

49:39doing a lot of the independent audits across the Commonwealth. We've had a number of issues

49:43with that. We've had a number of issues getting things done, reported back to us timely.

49:48We are working through those issues now and we'll have some changes. But before we solicit

49:56another outside auditing firm to do this work, we want to get that house in order first

50:02because there could be people that would be involved in one of the other things. That

50:06being said, the Mayor, as you mentioned, agreed to do that in May of this year and we'll

50:12get it done.

50:15Through you, Madam Chairwoman, that is in flux at the moment and I should have some

50:23information to share in the relative near term.

50:25Are you working on 25 or 26?

50:2926.

50:30Don't just ask me what year they're up to on their audit.

50:3526.

50:36So CBiz is an auditing firm that was bought out. Sullivan and Powers was bought out by

50:40Mark M. Mark M. was bought out by CBiz and a lot of communities are having a hard time

50:45getting their audits done. And it affects their bond rating if they don't have their

50:48audits done in a timely fashion. So does that -- did you hear me? Okay. And yes, I'm familiar

50:55with it because I do do it in home work, but we changed auditing firms because it's

50:59impossible to get your stuff done. So most places are moving. So that's just because

51:03it was brought up. I'm just sharing it because I know my audience likes me from both sides.

51:08So this isn't something that we just asked this year, though. That's the thing that

51:12I'm frustrated about. It might have been brought up at the Mayor on May 4th of 2026, but when

51:16I was in the Council, that was brought up by Councillor Failin at the time on the Council

51:21that we would have an audit and we didn't have an audit. And for two years after that,

51:25nobody on the Council asked for it. So I find it interesting. This is going back four years

51:29now looking for an audit. So CBiz was not the problem four years ago. So I guess I'm

51:33just looking -- is there any audit? Because we were told there was an audit.

51:38Through you, Madam Chairwoman. It's our perspective that we're getting into a semantic discussion

51:45in terms of what "is an audit" as part of the lease negotiations. We did enlist Mr.

51:53Powers to do a full financial review of the lease terms, of the accounting mechanisms

51:58done by grant links. That report is available to this body. It was at that direction of

52:05the Council that they wanted a report of this sort. It didn't have the word "audit"

52:12on it, but it achieved a lot of the same goals. It lifted the hood under Grant Link's

52:19financial operations. It looked at how they did their accounting with their auditors.

52:24So now we have their auditors. We have another auditor. Everyone's looking at the books.

52:30Everyone's our independent auditor, looked at that work, worked together with the private

52:35partners, accountants and auditors, and determined that the House was in order. Subsequent

52:41to that, with the request of Senator Keenan, we have provided the State Senate with a

52:48further report relative to the hospitality components of the revenue provided to the

52:54City. I'm not sure if members of this body have that. I'm happy to provide it. There

52:58was some question at that time relative to what's included in the net revenue and the

53:03gross and what's taken out of the gross to make the net. Independent financial advisor

53:10was enlisted to, again, go in underneath the hood of Grant Link's, find out what they

53:16were doing, going line by line, showing that they're taking out deductions for column A,

53:24column B, column C, and it's all standard industry procedure. And I'm happy to provide

53:29that report to you. So it's not like there has been no work on this issue, I think. And

53:35I'm not an expert in the world of what would be considered an audit or what we're actually

53:43looking for. And I do think it would be instructive if this body provided some questions. It can

53:48be offline or it can be here, relative to the answers that you want relative to that

53:53fund and how Grant Link's reports to the City, because they do report every quarter.

53:59It's all itemized, I believe, that was delivered to this body. The private partner has said

54:08that they're an open book. They're willing to have anyone in to look at anything that

54:11they want. And we've taken that at their word and done reviews over the course of

54:18a number of years. And every year, the revenue is subject to our independent audit. The

54:24numbers that are coming in are checked, they're reviewed. It's looked at on a consistent

54:31basis going back to 2013, 2014. I know we did do an audit, an outside source going

54:37back to, I don't know if it was 2014, 2013, that we did hire an outside company to do

54:43an audit. And it came back and said basically the same thing. And at that point, the municipal

54:48finance department was maturing, we had more talent, we had more resources within the municipal

54:53finance department. So it was opposed to outsourcing a regular audit of this revenue

55:00that was coming in on a consistent, normal basis with no major fluctuations, except

55:05that we were going up every year, that we felt we could handle it internally. Now we've

55:10been asked to have a fourth or a fifth party after multiple outside independent analysts

55:19have looked at this and said everything is in order, everything is the way it should

55:22be. And we will do that. But that's going to take a little bit of time.

55:26Thank you, Mr. Walker. If I could, I'd like to just take a look at the -- I made sure

55:30that everyone had the most recent calculation from the last quarter that was received.

55:38So the one dated July 15, 2026, which is actually addressed to Deborah Coughlin, who's no longer

55:43our treasurer collector, which is kind of interesting. In close, please find the second

55:48quarter 2026 rent calculation along with a check in the amount of $314,820.40 due to

55:55the city. Please note that the second quarter income statement attached for golf is for

55:59the period April 1, 2026 to June 30, 2026, and clubhouse fee rent calculation is from

56:05January 1 to January 30. So it's already a little confusing because the golf calculation

56:10is done on a quarterly basis and the clubhouse and hospitality part is done cumulative.

56:16So it's already a little crazy. But does everyone have those documents with them?

56:21So under number one, golf course fees this period. So this is the gross -- this is on

56:26the gross part of things. The first thing I notice is that letter A is number of rounds.

56:32And for whatever reason, that's not provided. It certainly would be beneficial to know how

56:37many rounds of golf are played that calculates the green fees. But for whatever reason, that's

56:45not provided. And then the next thing is the membership fees, membership dues, driving

56:53range, other receipts for tournament fees. So they add all of that up together for $2.5

56:59million. But if you go to the next page, you'll be able to see the income. The bolded ones

57:07are the ones that are included in the rent calculation. And the ones that are not bolded

57:11are not included in the income calculation. So the driving range is included, the tournament

57:23fees, the golf simulator, the greens fees, the monthly dues are all included in the

57:27income. But if you get on to the operating expenses, one of the first things that I

57:32notice is the third one down is the discounts and comps. $21,833 is deducted for discounts

57:38and comps. That's comp and drinks, food, golf. I guess this would just be for the

57:44golf. This must just be comping for the golf itself. So $21,000 is taken out of there.

57:50The other thing that's taken out of there is the golf carts. So the golf cart lease

57:57supplies and repairs total $71,000. And they took in -- where is it? The golf carts. The

58:07member carts and the public carts total $364,000. So Amendment 5 of this lease removed the

58:16golf cart income from the calculation. I actually can read that into why it was. They

58:22basically said that it was not making enough money and so they had to remove it. It was

58:29too much of a financial burden. And at the end of the day, on this particular quarter,

58:36they made $293,000. Now, the golf is supposed to be on the gross. So if their gross income

58:42of $364,000 and their expense is to maintain and run those golf carts at $71,000, perhaps

58:50they should have just negotiated to make that a net deduction. But there's $293,000 for

58:55one quarter that we would be getting 10% of that. 10% of the gross would be of the

59:01$364,000. So that's an example of something that was removed. It was presented as being

59:08financially burdensome. And the city is losing out on that. The next thing we have is administrative

59:15expenses. And that's $80,000, $138,000. So after deducting payroll, cost of goods sold,

59:22computer equipment, dues and subscription, office supplies, golf supplies, travel entertainment

59:27and promotion, handicap system, utility, security, postage, telephone, the golf cart

59:32leasing supplies, tournament expenses, rent for Milton, rent for Quincy, GPS, website

59:41expense, rental clubs and $2,000 for miscellaneous, whatever that is. There's $80,000 of administrative

59:47expenses tacked on top of that. We have no idea what that's for. So that's an area where

59:55we're looking for better clarification and better control on that. So I don't know if

59:59anyone has any questions on the golf operations. So this would be the 10% of gross, Councillor

1:00:05McKee. >> Thank you. So yes, I took a look at the

1:00:15documents from the Treasurer's Office that had come from Granite Links. And you mentioned

1:00:22some of them. But I just wanted to highlight again. So a few things that I noticed that

1:00:28I didn't know is it seems like the functions and the food are bringing in considerably

1:00:32more than the golf, at least in the ones that I looked at. And then I guess the questions

1:00:42that I would have that I would be very interested in having an auditor look at is what some

1:00:47of these deductions are. So as you noted, Chair Riley, the administrative expenses out

1:00:56of all these different kind of divisions and each one of these things in four quarters

1:01:03in the fiscal year 2026, administrative expenses amounted to $5.8 million. And then something

1:01:14called depreciation amounted to $3.7 million. And discounts and comps amounted to $879,000.

1:01:30That's just for kind of general discounts and comps. There's another line that sometimes

1:01:35appears that's discounts dash manager, which is $122,000. So I guess my concern is, and

1:01:45this is actually something that was raised by the man that came in to speak on who raised

1:01:51the hood of the finances, he said yes, things seem to be lining up. But it would be helpful

1:01:57to have an audit to look at the specifics of what's being deducted. And I think that

1:02:04I don't know what administrative expenses are. They're separate from payroll, which

1:02:08is a different line. And rent is being deducted as well. Some of these expenses are higher

1:02:16than I would expect, but I don't run a golf course so I don't know. So I would just want

1:02:22an audit to kind of look at that and also I guess an outside real estate attorney who's

1:02:33very familiar with all of this to make sure that any lease that potentially the city would

1:02:42enter into in any future time really makes sense for the city, for the citizens. Because

1:02:50I can imagine that if you're deducting all of the meals that you give to your workers

1:02:56and you're saying that each meal costs $50 or something like that, that's a lot of money

1:03:02coming out of the pockets potentially of citizens. So this one that we were talking about, the

1:03:09golf is only on the gross income. So all of these deductions do not affect the amount

1:03:13that the city receives. But if we want to move on and take a look at the next one,

1:03:17the next one is the functions. So that would be the weddings and events that happen in

1:03:21the function room. Just to clarify, all those numbers that I got were from all of the different

1:03:29so there's a golf line, there's a functions line, there's a food line, there's a maintenance

1:03:33line, there's a membership line, and there's income for sort of general administrative.

1:03:38So those are the totals for everything. Right. Some of these expenses are spread across

1:03:44all of the buckets. Some of them affect what the city is going to receive for a payment.

1:03:50But in the case of the golf, they do not. It's based on gross. The only thing that

1:03:52we've given up on the on the golf is the golf cart rental, which used to be a source

1:03:57of income. It used to be included in there and it is no longer and it is, at least in

1:04:02the last quarter, quite profitable. So that's something that the city gave up. My understanding

1:04:07is according to the amendment five to the lease, what we received in return for that

1:04:14was the use of the clubhouse for the mayor's golf tournament, which really doesn't seem

1:04:19to equal certainly $293,000 for this quarter. But when you negotiate and give something

1:04:26up, you have to get something in return and that's my understanding of what we received

1:04:29in return for that. I will check on that. And I remember this question coming up during

1:04:35the lease negotiations with this body. I remember there was a rational explanation

1:04:39to why the golf cart fees were deducted. I'm not sure that that was the answer, though.

1:04:43I will double check on that. I believe I had something on that. I do have it in there.

1:05:07Councillor McKee. As you're looking for something, maybe I'll just mention the other thing that

1:05:12I had on my list. So in the list of expenditures from the city from the fund that comes into

1:05:20the oversight fund, there are again some things that don't appear to be for oversight. One

1:05:27of them is for Crown Colony work. And I don't really know what that is, but it doesn't seem

1:05:38to be for oversight. It says roadway opening new electric line asphalt, curb reset per

1:05:45mutual agreement on file between Crown Colony and Flatley company. And then there are again

1:05:55string lights being so I think we need to kind of tighten up on all of these funds

1:06:02to make sure that we're using them for their intent purpose. And I guess I'm wondering

1:06:11where in the city who's okaying that these would come out of certain funds and how can

1:06:19we ensure that they're only using them for their intended purpose? So you're speaking

1:06:25of the oversight account. I'm just speaking of the oversight account. Yeah. I don't know.

1:06:32Mr. Walker, certainly. So I think what you may be seeing is some

1:06:39bookkeeping issues. Essentially I think again going back to the expansive view of how we

1:06:47view these funds and what they can be used for is that there might be some intermingling

1:06:50between the DPW, what we would consider the DPW fund and the oversight fund, again going

1:06:55back to the evolution of what the city's needs are, what we believe the city's needs

1:06:59are and what the money can be used for. So there could be something in the oversight

1:07:04account that is more public works related and there could be something in public works

1:07:11related that may be more oversight. I think we've generally looked at them as sort of

1:07:17interchangeable based upon the funding codes and the sources and that could be a basis

1:07:22of it but happy to take a look at it and make any corrections in terms of the process.

1:07:29It is the same process that we go through under any expenditure. It goes through the

1:07:34mayor's office. It goes through the municipal finance. It goes through all the appropriate

1:07:36channels, legal. There are belts and suspenders along the way for every major expense that

1:07:43comes out of this and we're happy to provide any more detail.

1:07:49Thank you, Mr. Walker. If I could just keep going through the statement here. So the

1:07:53next page is the function income. And so this is a net deduction. So they reported a little

1:08:02under $4.3 million in function revenue for the quarter ending June 30, 2026. But this

1:08:10one is based on net. So when you look at the deductions, payroll, food, beverage,

1:08:16accounting, education, training, electric, gas, water, telephone, advertising, and then

1:08:20we get down to function expenses, $165,000. So I don't know what function expenses are

1:08:27if some of these items are already included. But that is being deducted from the amount

1:08:33that will be calculated for the City's revenue. Then we go down to computer equipment, kitchen

1:08:39supplies, repairs and maintenance, credit card fees, cleaning supplies, leased rental

1:08:43equipment uniforms, laundry linens, security, miscellaneous, $11,000 for miscellaneous.

1:08:50Again, with all of these categories already outlined, I'm not quite sure what would fall

1:08:54into miscellaneous. But then back to Councilman McKee's point, this one we have taken the

1:09:01administrative expense $542,000 and deducted that from the gross revenue here. So after

1:09:10having administrative expenses against the golf line of $80,000, we have $542,000 a little

1:09:15more than that that's being deducted and another $165,000 in depreciation. So yes, if we're

1:09:22looking for areas that we think are worthy of an audit, those three lines on there are

1:09:27definitely or four, including the function expenses, are worthy of a little further scrutiny.

1:09:35Combined it's 1, 5, 6, 7, 8, almost $900,000 that's being deducted. So it's a substantial

1:09:44amount of money that really should be further, you know, further reviewed. Because when

1:09:51all is said and done, the net profit for functions is $364,000. So we start out, we start out

1:09:59with $4.3 million in revenue in income and we're down to $364,000 once we take all of

1:10:07these deductions. And this is the part of the business that the newly seeks to expand

1:10:12upon. We're not going to expand upon the golf business. The golf business is fully realized

1:10:16pretty much with the driving range and the greens and the seasons that we have to deal

1:10:22with in New England. We're not going to see much more revenue from the golf course. So

1:10:27did anyone have any comments specifically on the function part of things? Anyone? Okay.

1:10:32So then we move on to the food and beverage. And that would be the tavern, the members

1:10:36lounge and the crossing nines outdoor bar area. The gross income on that is just over

1:10:46$5 million, 5091. And again, when we start to look at the expenses that are being deducted

1:10:52from here, cost of goods sold for food, cost of goods sold for beverage, bar snacks. And

1:10:58then we move on to discounts and comps, discounts and comps for employees. I guess that's maybe

1:11:06not just employees. Discounts dash comps/employees. $171,000 in one quarter has been deducted

1:11:13from these numbers. Member discounts, I assume that members just receive a 10% off their

1:11:18beverage, so that's understandable. Discounts manager. So I would imagine this is at the

1:11:23manager's discretion to comp food and beverage, $31,000. And then we move on to payroll.

1:11:29Payroll is almost $2 million for the quarter, so that's clearly a sizable expense that

1:11:34they have. Advertising and marketing, insurance for liquor liability, kitchen supplies, function

1:11:40expenses, electric gas water, equipment maintenance and repairs, cleaning and supplies, entertainment,

1:11:45accounting, security, linen service, computer equipment, pest control, credit card fees,

1:11:50license fees, printing menus, telephone cable and internet, dues and subscriptions. The

1:11:56next item is miscellaneous, $16,761. I don't know what constitutes miscellaneous when there

1:12:03are so many categories here already captured. Uniforms, waste removal. And then again,

1:12:10we get down to administrative expense. So if you notice, the administrative expense

1:12:14seems to be equally balanced on both sides of this. The $80,000 was put to the golf

1:12:21side, but then exactly $542,456.90 is appearing equally on both the function side and the

1:12:30food and beverage side. So that's well over $1 million being deducted from the city's

1:12:41debt proceeds. And then we have the depreciation. So again, I think that's a line that could

1:12:46use further scrutiny as to what's being depreciated. In fact, it's very clear on what's allowed

1:12:56to be depreciated. And if you bear with me for a minute. Depreciation calculation. According

1:13:08to Exhibit B of the lease document item 13, depreciation of the clubhouse restricted

1:13:14to areas devoted exclusively to the food and beverage operations. Most recent depreciation

1:13:19calculations. So in this current one, the total depreciation is over $700,000. So the

1:13:27question is, how is it calculated? And then how is the formula for distributing across

1:13:31these three areas of their statement of income and expenses?

1:13:39And finally on the last page is maintenance. Now these are not deducted. Presumably these

1:13:44are expenses that Granite Links is absorbing in their side of the house. And interestingly

1:13:53enough they have environmental work listed here. There's fertilizer, chemicals, license

1:13:58and permits. They do have payroll to here. So these are not coming out of the calculation.

1:14:06Interestingly enough the ball field expense is $3,753. So out of all the money that has

1:14:13come into here, only $3,753 was expended in the spring of 2026 for the ball fields. So

1:14:22that's a pretty sad distribution of funds for that. And then you can see how they again

1:14:33all the information is on here with the checks and how it was calculated. Does anyone have

1:14:38any further comment on these calculations and how they're done?

1:14:48Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. So my question is, so currently there is nobody doing this

1:14:52oversight of this lease deduction expense and the payment by Crow Hill. So no one is

1:15:01doing so. What's this oversight fund? 10% of this income going into this oversight

1:15:10fund. So what's this fund doing? If this oversight fund is not doing oversight, then

1:15:18I'm wondering where those money goes. So can anyone tell me what's the role of this

1:15:26project manager who is paid $120,000 from this oversight fund? Mr. Walker.

1:15:38Through you, Madam Chairwoman. As I've mentioned before, the administration's perspective

1:15:42on this is that these two areas of the revenue have been used interchangeably. The project

1:15:51manager's role is actually a public buildings role. That person has been instrumental.

1:15:57The role has been instrumental in a number of our major school projects, administering

1:16:02and monitoring the logistics, specifically on the movement that has to happen when we

1:16:08do these major school projects, the moving of stuff, the moving of the students. That

1:16:14is a huge undertaking, as we've seen most recently in Squanam. We've seen it at the

1:16:22De Cristofaro Center. Before that, we've seen it at Southwest Middle School. That has been

1:16:29a piece of that person's job, a large piece of that person's job. And then there are

1:16:33other projects that that person has overseen. Again, with the underlying motivation that

1:16:43these are flexible and that the administration and the team has the ability to use these

1:16:49in ways that it sees appropriate. Thank you, Mr. Walker. Hang on a second.

1:16:59So the follow-up question. If the city is going to hire an independent auditor to audit

1:17:06this count, which fund will be used to pay for this auditing? Is it from this oversight

1:17:15fund or from which fund? Either one. Either one? Which oversight fund and which fund?

1:17:23Either one. It's largely a bookkeeping mechanism as to which percentage is where, what is

1:17:38used from where, and how things balance out. Councillor McKee mentioned a couple items

1:17:45that were probably appropriately placed in the DPW enhancement fund that were paid out

1:17:51of that. The oversight funds can then get money from the DPW enhancement fund. We can

1:17:56just move it over. And there'll be money in the oversight account to pay for the audit.

1:18:02Or we can keep the money where it is and pay for the audit. It is a ledger issue.

1:18:09And it's easily resolved. Councillor Mahoney, just jumping in here.

1:18:18So is this what you call financial flexibility? Just asking. Because it's a term that you

1:18:23guys used during the bond situation. And the reason why I asked that is because you asked

1:18:28a question or I asked a question about the audit. So we didn't define what an audit

1:18:32is. And it's funny because when the council or anybody asks for anything, we're not asking

1:18:37it in the appropriate way. But I think it's nailed here tonight where we're saying an

1:18:42audit is talking about the separate financial audit, specifically examining granite links,

1:18:46quarry hills, revenues, expenditures, and simply for the city's regular -- or not the

1:18:52regular audit of the city. So we want to know, like -- and you're saying when we get the

1:18:55money in, we're checking it, and then you're saying it's interchangeable. And it's just

1:18:58a ledger change. But it's much bigger than that. And when you make it seem as though

1:19:03it's not a big deal, it is a big deal because you're using the oversight and you're paying

1:19:06somebody $125,000 out of that to be a -- I'm sorry, what is it, project manager to do things

1:19:13all over the city when you're having buildings done. That's just -- that's not a -- that's

1:19:18not from -- that should be being paid from out of oversight. Oversight should be something

1:19:21where we're working as a team collaboratively with granite links to make sure that the

1:19:25city is getting what they're expecting to get from granite links. That's what the oversight

1:19:28account should be used for. If you said to me, we hired somebody for $125,000 to kind

1:19:33of be the -- and I think it was two people that were getting paid out of it. When I was

1:19:37in the council, it was this gentleman. It was also Helen Murphy was getting a piece

1:19:40of that money, too. So it's -- like you said, it's interchangeable. Wherever we want to

1:19:44get the money from, we can give it to whoever we want. It's nice. It's nice that we can

1:19:48do that. But we're asking for that audit because, you see, the City of Quincy cut

1:19:52a deal with the land. And we did end up with a beautiful golf course. And we had a lease

1:19:56that came before us. And I believe that that homeroom petition is dead. But, you know,

1:20:02we could come back in another council. But we need to understand this stuff. And I'm

1:20:06not by any means sitting here saying I don't like granite links and I don't want them to

1:20:09be successful. But I also want the people of the City of Quincy to feel comfortable

1:20:13that we're all doing our job. And when you say it's interchangeable and you're not being

1:20:17specific, what do you really want to audit? Well, we want to audit those numbers. And

1:20:21we want to understand them. And anybody who would be looking at this would be saying,

1:20:25yeah, it needs to be looked at. And it's not just good enough for me to go to the -- to

1:20:30Madam Auditor and say did we get a check in? Sure. We get a check every quarter. But how

1:20:34do we know it's actually matching up to what it should match up to? And, you know, when

1:20:38you're looking at some of these numbers, it is kind of curious that $546,000 is the

1:20:46same amount on both places. And it's just like it's curious that in the DBW piece there

1:20:53was a -- I think it was the signage that we did for $9,999 just underneath 10. So

1:20:59we don't have to actually go out for quotes. We only need three quotes, so it's not -- they

1:21:02don't actually even have to send them back. My point, though, is the money that the City

1:21:07of Quincy is receiving and the decision for those golf carts, I guess I'd go back to

1:21:11those golf carts, was that decision made here in the Council or was that a unilateral

1:21:14decision made at the City -- in the Mayor's Office? So -- because that's revenue that

1:21:19was decided upon to be taken out of a lease. And I don't believe it was voted on at the

1:21:22Council level. I'm not positive, though. I'd like to know that, though.

1:21:26It was not through you, Madam Chairwoman, the lease is negotiated by the Mayor. The

1:21:31Mayor has the ability to negotiate specific items in the lease, not under the purview

1:21:39of the City Council. So, again, when I'm talking about under the

1:21:44purview of the City Council, when we're asking for audits and being told, well, we're -- you

1:21:48know, we're having a difficult time because, you know, we have to get our annual audit

1:21:51done and everybody in the States having that problem, when this has been asked multiple

1:21:55years over year over year. And you have audits, but you haven't shared them with us. We have

1:21:58to ask for them. It would be nice if you -- let me just finish, Mr. Walker. It would

1:22:02be nice if those things would just be given to us. And then finally, when we're asking

1:22:06these questions and you're saying it's just a general ledger thing, all we have to do

1:22:10is move the money because we just took it out of the wrong account and it's up to our

1:22:14discretion how we spend that money. That's very -- it's great that it's just a -- it's

1:22:20just a counting mechanism. But Madam Auditor, can I ask you a question when we just do those

1:22:25types of transactions? Don't we want to have, like, a backup to understand why things get

1:22:29moved from one place to another in case anybody was to do an audit to be able to follow the

1:22:33trail of where the money came from? Yes, we should have one. Thank you very much.

1:22:37Just on the specific items that the body has mentioned that you mentioned relative

1:22:45to an audit, I would contend -- and, again, we will have someone to do some of the nuts

1:22:52and bolts work here, but I would contend that that work done by Powers and Sullivan,

1:22:56that that work done by two or three other firms, has confirmed that what you're looking

1:23:01at in front of you is the appropriate deduction. Is the appropriate number? Is the appropriate

1:23:07revenue being provided to the city? We believe that that work has been done verified by

1:23:13multiple outside vendors. Now, can we take it a step further? Yes, of course. But we

1:23:22have been on this for quite some time, and our understanding and the facts before us,

1:23:28I say -- suggest that this has been verified multiple times over the course of the last

1:23:34number of years, and you raise fair questions. We can dig into those, but that is not to

1:23:39say that we're just taking a check and walking away and calling it a day. There has been

1:23:45work done here by a lot of people, a lot of people that have tremendous amount of

1:23:50overreputational and historic records of doing this kind of work in the Commonwealth. Jim

1:23:56Powers is probably the most respected municipal finance and revenue and financial person when

1:24:04it comes to municipal law or municipal finance that has been in the state in the last generation.

1:24:10He's not going to put his name on something that is somehow suspect or isn't valid, and

1:24:22there's been two or three other firms that have been involved in the same kind of exercises

1:24:27that have shown. I'm just going to follow up with this, and it's very simple. You keep

1:24:34saying that these audits were done and they're reputable people. Nobody is saying people

1:24:37aren't reputable. I don't think I've heard one person up here be disrespectful or say

1:24:41people aren't reputable, or that it's in the purview of the mayor, but it's also in

1:24:44the purview of the council to ask those questions, to have the stuff brought to us so that we

1:24:49can see it ourselves, and we can show it to the public when the public asks. The fact

1:24:54that you have those audits, and they've been asked to be shared in the past, and they haven't

1:24:59been, but now we have to ask again. I guess we're all going to ask publicly, can you send

1:25:02all of your audits, whatever they were done, with all the cliff notes so we can take a

1:25:06look at them? Why don't we just post them on the website because I think a lot of people

1:25:09are interested in them. I think we want you to realize them because I'm not saying the

1:25:14audit wasn't real, but I think there's different levels of audit. Madam Auditor, could you

1:25:18back me up on this? There's different levels of audits that we do. We might be only specifically

1:25:22looking to see that we're getting the quality number that actually meets the number that

1:25:25actually is on this little report, and we can say, "Yes." The net profit was $139,382,

1:25:31and we got a check for that. The audit passes. They're not going into the individual levels

1:25:38of those things. So when we're looking for an audit, we're looking to make sure that

1:25:41we're looking at everything in an independent and clear way. And I'd like to know, Powers

1:25:46and Sullivan, and you said there was two other ones, one that was done for Senator

1:25:49Keenan. I'd like to know the names of those auditors, and I'd like to have those.

1:25:52I can give you a little summary of that, Council Mahoney. So there were four recent documents

1:25:57and one older one, an 84-page document. It's a compilation of a review from the Powers

1:26:02and Sullivan dated November 20th to the City of Quincy and presented on December 9th to

1:26:07the Council. The document is called Reviewed Financial Statements Prepared by G.T. Riley

1:26:13and Company, and that was commissioned by Corey Hill's associates. There's a 57-page

1:26:19document dated August 1st, 2025, Comparable Market Rents Report to Support the Market

1:26:25Lease of Comparable Properties to the Granite Lease Golf Club. For the purpose of providing

1:26:31data in support of your lease fairness analysis of the Corey Hill's lease extension approved

1:26:37by the City Council on January 21st, 2025, that document is addressed to a Dr. Zitt

1:26:43of the Innovation Group in New Orleans and prepared by Jeffrey R. Dugas. He is Massachusetts

1:26:49licensed for leisure appraisals. There's another 16-page document dated September

1:26:552025, the Lease Fairness Analysis that was prepared by the Innovation Group. So some

1:27:00of these were reviews of documents that had been provided, and then they were reviewed

1:27:04by another auditing firm. And then there's a 14-page document dated May 22nd, 2026,

1:27:12by LGA, LLP, CPAs, and Business Advisors, Re-Granite Links, Rent Payment Analysis for

1:27:19the City of Quincy, commissioned by the City of Quincy. So I have all of these documents.

1:27:23I'm happy to share them with anyone. But there's a total of 171 pages of non-audit

1:27:28financial reviews. Every one of these documents make it very clear in their -- either in

1:27:34their cover letter or somewhere in their disclaimers at the bottom that it is not

1:27:37an audit. They make it very clear of that. They all call them reviews or analysis, but

1:27:43they definitely avoid the word audit. Additionally -- and this was something that -- thank you,

1:27:49Ms. Manning, for digging some of this up for me the other day. Additionally, there's

1:27:53a reference to a past scrutiny of an analysis from DePeezer and Company in 2009 and 2010

1:28:01that highlighted several concerns and inconsistencies, according to the Patriot Ledger articles from

1:28:05the time. The criticism is around the deductions from the hospitality side of the payments,

1:28:10which are based on net revenue. That is from a 2009 resolve introduced by Ward 6 City Councilor

1:28:18Brian McNamee. And I have a copy of that, and I will read some of that. Whereas during

1:28:29the past fiscal year, homeowners in the City of Quincy were hit with some of the biggest

1:28:33tax increases in the history of the City. This is dated September 8th, 2009. Whereas

1:28:38tax increases adversely affect all of our taxpayers, but especially seniors on a fixed

1:28:43income, and many young families are being hit the hardest. And whereas the City of Quincy

1:28:48has experienced dramatic reductions in local aid from the Commonwealth of Massachusetts,

1:28:53and whereas the combined effects of these overwhelming economic trends has made it

1:28:56increasingly critical that the City of Quincy maximize and protect revenue sources to reduce

1:29:01the tremendous real estate taxes being endured by the taxpayers of Quincy. Now, therefore,

1:29:06it will be resolved that the City Council Oversight Committee convene a meeting to inquire

1:29:12of the Mayor's Office, City Solicitor, and Chief Financial Officer as to what the City

1:29:17of Quincy has received and is currently receiving in revenue from agreements with Corey Hill's

1:29:21Associates and Furnace Brook Golf Course. Obviously, that doesn't apply anymore.

1:29:26In addition, also extend invitations to the management of these facilities to describe

1:29:31compliance with agreements and answers to recently raised questions appearing in the

1:29:35newspaper regarding revenue related to the energy agreements, we haven't talked about

1:29:39that, and the sale of methane. And this was approved and sent to the Oversight Committee.

1:29:47And according to the notes here, it looked like there was to be an oversight committee

1:29:50on October 28th, 2009, but it does not seem that there's a record that that ever took

1:29:57place. So this is in 2009. As a result of reporting from the Patriot Ledger, City Councilor

1:30:05introduced a resolve, and that resolve died in committee. It feels like deja vu, doesn't

1:30:12it? So what we are asking for after 18 years is a real audit and to not use money that's

1:30:20intended for that purpose for something else. It really is that simple. We can't move money

1:30:26around from this bucket to that bucket, you know, shuffle things around. I see plenty

1:30:31of reference in all of these financial spreadsheets that the auditor has provided per memo, per

1:30:40memo from one person to another, sometimes not even -- sometimes it's just a number.

1:30:45We need to do a better job of providing some oversight and some transparency on where this

1:30:53money is coming from and where it's going to. So I just -- when I saw this and thought

1:31:00it was kind of interesting, that it was my pre-predecessor, Brian McNamee, God rest his

1:31:05soul, that had introduced this and had fought for it to happen. And I don't know -- nobody

1:31:13seems to be able to put their hands on that de Pisa audit, but it would seem that perhaps

1:31:18there were some things in there that were not necessarily flattering. So with that,

1:31:26I'm happy to take any more comments or questions from anybody.

1:31:31Thank you. >> Thank you, Madam Chair. Since we don't

1:31:41have a person doing oversight of this account, so I don't know who will answer this question.

1:31:48So there are two questions submitted by residents. The first one is, so go to the page, Cory

1:31:56Hills, the total revenue received through April 28, 2026.

1:32:06>> So you're looking at the April quarterly statement?

1:32:10>> The Cory Hills total revenue received, like a city received from the Cory Hills.

1:32:15>> I don't know. >> That's in the --

1:32:19>> Oh, okay. I know what you're looking at. Okay.

1:32:25>> So you can see physical year 2007, city already received $352,607. Physical year 2008,

1:32:40city received $346,379. And then from that time forward until year 2017, the city received

1:32:55less than $300,000 each year. So what happened after year 2008 through the following eight

1:33:03years, that our receipts were less than the 2008 revenue. The functions and the dining

1:33:11did not decrease in value or standards during that time. So I don't know if you don't have

1:33:19people oversight of this. I don't know who can answer this question. Why city start to

1:33:25receive less money since 2008, keep for eight years receive much less money than 2008 and

1:33:352007? Let's show exactly we need to have people doing oversight of this lease deductions,

1:33:43expense and payments. Otherwise, this question, who will answer it? And the second question,

1:33:54the city began to see substantial increase in revenue from year 2022 to the present.

1:34:02Coinstantly about that time, a group of concerned residents began to question the lease revenues

1:34:10received in the deductions taken by Cory Hills. Did the functions and the dining suddenly

1:34:18become so much more profitable in these years? Or Cory Hills became aware that the numbers

1:34:28were being exempt closely and then have to be a change if they had any hope of lease

1:34:34extension.

1:34:36Thank you, Councilor Yuan. I would like to just state that I think this is speaking to

1:34:41why we need an audit.

1:34:43Through you, Madam Chairwoman, and I appreciate that. I would just say on question two, I

1:34:51feel the insinuation is categorically unfair toward the private partner. There's no suggestion

1:34:59that somehow they started redoing their books. What happened was we could provide more detail.

1:35:06And I'm not the auditor, but I know having lived in the city and haven't seen that facility

1:35:11that in that time period, Granite Lakes dramatically increased its driving range and bar facility

1:35:18at what is called the crossing nines. So those timelines absolutely do match the capital

1:35:25improvements that went on at the site. And again, I find the insinuation that somehow

1:35:31they changed the dynamic a little bit questionable. And I appreciate that.

1:35:35Question one, I tried to answer after you started question two, Councilor. So what was

1:35:41question one again? Oh, the increase, I mean, I'm looking at this a little bit differently

1:35:46and we could certainly provide an answer to that. But I'm looking at a couple years

1:35:50where the numbers went up early on and this is probably this is prior to this is 2008-2009.

1:35:58They sunk a couple years. But from 2012 until today, that is 13 years, there has been market

1:36:09substantial increases every single year. But we can certainly provide an answer why

1:36:13those couple years after the course opened and things were producing revenue while there

1:36:20was some why why there was some fluctuation. Again, we are going back almost 20 years to

1:36:24look at this. But I would again point to from whatever point on 2012-2013, that you

1:36:35start at 232, 272, 268, a little bit down, 299, 321, 467, 478, 522, 537, 541, 683, 828,

1:36:48879, 856, and 905,000 under three quarters. So we're going to we're going to meet that

1:36:54and exceed it this year. >> Councillor Mahoney?

1:37:03>> So again, we can go back and forth and we can get our feelings hurt or we're insulting

1:37:08somebody but there's no reason for the City of Quincy to actually feel that way because

1:37:12the responsibility just like the responsibility the mayor can spend it we don't have to come

1:37:16to the council and ask but the responsibility is when the council asks for these things

1:37:20is that we get it and if you're not doing oversight on it year after year and you can't

1:37:24show it and you're saying we move the money here and then we move money there and it's

1:37:28not a big deal and we had audits done but they weren't really audits you got to define

1:37:32audits. There seems to be an awful lot of just, you know, the stuff coming up here

1:37:39just like you're just filling it in and to me it doesn't matter. What I'm asking for

1:37:43and what this council is asking for and what the residents of Quincy are asking for is

1:37:48an audit so that we can understand how this is done and what decisions were made and

1:37:53when they were made. It was this administration that brought forward a lease that created

1:37:58the questions that were asking and I would think this administration would want to have

1:38:02that audit and bring it back here so that you can show it to us. Not say Powers and

1:38:07Sullivan because they didn't do an audit because the words as you said before we were

1:38:11getting caught up that it didn't say audit. Then it's not an audit. It's very simple.

1:38:15We want to have an audit and we want to have it looked at and we don't want it looked

1:38:19at from the perspective of is it a good lease or is it a good investment. We want it from

1:38:23the perspective of does this lease is this lease and the revenues the city of Quincy

1:38:28getting. Does it make sense at the time period that we're in now and there are opportunities

1:38:33for maybe renegotiation because if we want them to have what they want then we have

1:38:37to come to the table with what would be best for Quincy and I didn't see any of that happen

1:38:42the last time. All I heard was we have a great partner. It's the best thing in the

1:38:46world. We should look at it. We didn't have them. We wouldn't have this. That's not

1:38:49the case. The case is they were a great partner. We don't have a dump anymore. They want to

1:38:53extend it. We need to make sure that we understand what we are going to gain for the residents

1:38:58of the City of Quincy to best preserve what we have in the City of Quincy and that's

1:39:02a lot of open space. When you say you don't have to come back until March because you

1:39:07didn't know about the 2004 thing, I don't care when you found out about the 2004 thing.

1:39:11That's what we have to come back with. It's not my concern when you find out when you're

1:39:17supposed to be reporting something to the Councillors. It's now there. You know it.

1:39:21So come in March but come before March too. Come tomorrow, Chris. I don't think anybody

1:39:26is saying we don't want to work with you. We're just saying we'd like to have this

1:39:28information and we shouldn't ‑‑ if you have this stuff, then share it. Just share

1:39:35it with the public. Let the public come up and ask some questions too. Thank you.

1:39:38>> Through you, Madam Chair, just a quick clarification on Councillor Yuen's question

1:39:42relative to the increase and the decrease in revenue. It occurred to me those years

1:39:47and I can confirm that those were financial crisis years, 2008, 2009, into 2010, those

1:39:55areas where I'm going to make an economic assumption, not being an economist myself,

1:40:01that there was less money for people to golf. And that's why revenues were down those years.

1:40:06>> Councillor Yuen. >> So you mean, Chris Walker, you are doing

1:40:15oversight of this account? >> The administration, as we ‑‑ as we've

1:40:21discussed earlier, we have many avenues of oversight, many ways to check numbers, many

1:40:28ways to look at these, and we do. If there was something egregious, if there was something

1:40:34out of line, there certainly would have been questions asked and work done. The bottom

1:40:40line is that number that ‑‑ those numbers you're looking for that you ‑‑ that

1:40:45I read off and that you pointed to all make practical, normal, rational sense. The years

1:40:52that were down, there's a reason. The years they went up, there's a reason. And that

1:40:57was my point on that. >> Follow‑up. So we don't ‑‑ we need

1:41:05detailed the check oversight, not just say, okay, this year have a finance crisis going

1:41:13down. That's too general. And when ‑‑ because it's people eight years, they received

1:41:19city guard and decreased below the 2008. And also, since we have a group of concerned

1:41:29citizens, residents who are paying close attention about this career, why not we form a resident

1:41:38oversight committee of this account? And they can ‑‑ they volunteer. They're doing

1:41:46for free. They don't need ‑‑ you pay their $120,000 to do this oversight. And if

1:41:53you call oversight fund, you call oversight. It's mean oversight. So we do need oversight

1:42:00committee to monitor an oversight discount. >> Thank you. The current lease that's in

1:42:08force in effect does have an oversight committee. It just has been disbanded.

1:42:12>> Expended? >> It just hasn't met. >> Who are the members of that oversight?

1:42:19>> I don't think there are any anymore. But the lease does call for it. Again, it's not

1:42:23being enforced. It's kind of like the, you know, the home rule petition that created

1:42:28these funds. It just isn't getting enforced. So ‑‑ hang on a second, please. Mr. Walker,

1:42:36please. I have a couple of more points that I'd like to make here. Because this is something

1:42:42that's been very ‑‑ I've been very involved in. So we've already talked a little bit

1:42:49about between 2006 and 2027, the city deposited a little over a million dollars into the

1:42:55oversight line and spent $1.367 million. So we are in the red on that. And we are not

1:43:01using it for oversight. We're using it to pay a building's person. That is not proper

1:43:08use. Just $136,861 has been spent on oversight out of this line since it was created. Including

1:43:15$43,569,000 to DePieser & Co. for audit services, nobody can produce the audit. And it obviously

1:43:24prompted council action that never took action. We've already talked about the personnel.

1:43:35Charges for tree service, roadway paving and hanging string lights is not oversight.

1:43:40Where the heck is our audit? Another area that has been questioned is water abatements.

1:43:49The city has granted the operators water abatements. There was one in particular that was sent

1:43:54to me in 2022. The city waived $42,297 in water use charges on one quarter. I'm not

1:44:02sure if they waived the interest as well. But those charges are then spread across

1:44:07the rest of the rate payers. All of the people in the City of Quincy who pay water bills,

1:44:12you're paying for that credit that they're giving them. One of the things I find interesting

1:44:20is that this body has to approve receiving, you know, $500 from DARE to the police department.

1:44:26And we don't have to approve receiving these funds in the hundreds of thousands of dollars

1:44:31every quarter. It makes no sense to me. So in summary, the taxpayers deserve to receive

1:44:37as much -- oh, I have one more thing though before I go into that. Mr. Walker isn't here.

1:44:44One of the other things is Section 24.1 of the lease agreement allows for free use of

1:44:49the golf course for a one day City of Quincy sponsored charity golf tournament. Up until

1:44:542017, Madame Auditor, I believe you've confirmed this for me, those funds were received into

1:45:00and dispersed by municipal finance. What has happened since 2018? Where is that money

1:45:06going? Why isn't there any oversight? Who authorized the change in accounting for that

1:45:11money? And Mr. Walker, if you'd like to speak to that, I'll allow you to do that.

1:45:17>> Thank you. In that time period, the Mayor determined that that money would be directed

1:45:23to the Christmas Fund Christmas Festival Committee, also known as the Quincy Foundation.

1:45:29That's the nonprofit that helps run the Christmas parade, helps run Flag Day, and provides charitable

1:45:39work for other organizations within the community. So there was no need for the money to come

1:45:44to directly through the city. >> So that charity -- that nonprofit is not

1:45:51a charity. So we are directing city money into a non-charity entity and providing no

1:45:58oversight. >> I would disagree. It is not a 501(c)(3),

1:46:02but it is a nonprofit. It is a 501(c)(4), which is a charity.

1:46:07>> It is a nonprofit. >> It is what?

1:46:10>> It's a nonprofit, but it's not a charity. >> It provides charitable resources, and it

1:46:14provides funding for community events. >> With no oversight. So in summary, the taxpayers

1:46:26deserve to receive as much financial benefit as possible from the lease agreement with

1:46:30Corey Hills to offset ballooning property taxes. A comprehensive audit is long overdue,

1:46:36as is evidenced by Councillor McNamee's 2009 resolve. The oversight committee needs to

1:46:41be reinstated under the current lease terms, and we cannot allow the operators to self-manage,

1:46:47and we cannot trust the current structure at City Hall to hold them accountable to the

1:46:50taxpayers. With that, I'm ready to move on. Any other comments? Thank you.

1:47:01Okay. Moving on to item -- agenda item 2026-042, the American Rescue Plan spending transparency.

1:47:12This order was reintroduced to the council on March 2, 2026. It had been introduced in

1:47:17February 2022 by Councillor Andronico and referred to the finance committee -- finance

1:47:23and oversight committees but never brought forward for discussion. As I think we can

1:47:27all recall, the COVID-19 pandemic was a global public health crisis that brought mounting

1:47:32uncertainty, economic disruption, and widespread anxiety to citizens all over the world. The

1:47:38purpose of the COVID relief funds was to assist communities in providing the necessary

1:47:42health response and economic stabilization needed through local government agencies.

1:47:48Per the U.S. Treasury, monies needed to be expended between March 2021 and December 2026,

1:47:54and fall into one of the following categories. To support public health responses to the

1:48:00pandemic, address negative economic impacts from the pandemic, improve water and sewer

1:48:06infrastructure, provide premium pay for essential workers, invest in broadband infrastructure,

1:48:13and replace public sector revenue losses. And while many municipalities have made their

1:48:20spending of these monies public, the City of Quincy has not provided the taxpayers with

1:48:24an accounting of how the funds were used. I do want to thank our auditor, Madam Auditor

1:48:30Susan O'Connor for painstakingly pulling together the materials that we have been provided.

1:48:35There was a lot of information and I know it took you a lot of time to compile it.

1:48:39I really do appreciate it. We did not receive any of this information from the administration

1:48:44for this meeting. All of this information was either through the auditor or other sources.

1:48:51So with that, I'm happy to turn it over for questions first. Anyone?

1:49:02Councillor McKee. Questions or observations, I guess? We're really not in a question and

1:49:06answer format here. Yeah. This is more an observation. So I haven't

1:49:12gone through all of the funding. There was just a lot on the agenda tonight. But I had

1:49:22looked into one of the items, which I think is maybe illustrative of some of the things

1:49:33that we're talking about here in other parts of the meeting and maybe later as well.

1:49:40So $52,150 in COVID money went to a company with a -- its name was a website. And that

1:49:56work was for debt and bond transparency, among other things. And after that, the city continued

1:50:06to pay that company for this work, financial analysis services. And they received a contract.

1:50:17I asked for the invoices and the work produced. And the city said it -- it sent the invoices,

1:50:27but it did not -- it said that was everything. So there was no work produced that they could

1:50:33provide. So this amounts to at least $132,866. And there are just a few things that I want

1:50:49to point out. So it's a bit ironic that this money was for work on debt and bond transparency

1:50:54and there's nothing to show for it. The other thing is the website name. If you looked up

1:51:03the website name, it doesn't work. It doesn't exist. If you look up that company name on

1:51:10the Secretary of State's corporations database, it says that it had been involuntarily dissolved

1:51:20in 2012. So I guess I'm concerned about how this company was chosen to receive this money.

1:51:32And I mean, it seems like just even a basic looking up of their name and their website

1:51:40would show that it's not really functional. So I guess it kind of goes to the point that

1:51:47we may be discussing later about purchase orders and oversight and who is approving

1:51:53these payments. But some of this payment, some of this money was paid through COVID

1:52:02money that came in. Through you, Madam Chairwoman, I certainly

1:52:17provide -- I have not as I'm not sure that everyone else has yet. I have not weeded

1:52:25through the spreadsheets on this. I am familiar, I believe, with what Councillor McKee is

1:52:31referencing and we're certainly happy to provide some more backup material relative to that

1:52:37work that was done by that person over the course of a period of time. I'll follow up

1:52:44with municipal finance. This dates back a number of years, but we'll certainly track

1:52:48that down. And I think if there's any discrepancy relative to the company name or the person,

1:52:53I think it was more from our perspective, the RFP went out. There was an RFP for this

1:52:58work. The person was hired off of that RFP or the company. But we, I think the group

1:53:04that selected him certainly knew that it was a person. We created this work, was highly

1:53:16instructive to us, was a help. And we provided a little bit of opportunity for someone in

1:53:22the community to get their feet wet in the business, in the industry and do some work

1:53:27for the city at the same time. But I'm happy to provide the backup information. I know

1:53:32there is some. Thank you. Councillor McKee, did you name who the vendor was? I'm choosing

1:53:39not to. But I do want to just say that, you know, I was told I was following up with the

1:53:45city for quite some time to see the work provided. And ultimately, I mean, I had to

1:53:52appeal this and ultimately found out that I was told that there wasn't any work provided.

1:53:59So that's what I was actually told by the city.

1:54:04The other point is that there was an RFP. I believe that the city awarded contracts

1:54:14to all of the companies that applied for that RFP. But in looking at the RFP, there's

1:54:22a very strong qualitative difference between this RFP and some of the other ones. It's

1:54:29sort of handwritten in parts. So I guess I'm just, again, like concerned that how these

1:54:41decisions are being made and who's overseeing them. Are you talking about the RFP responses?

1:54:46You received copies of the responses to the RFP? Is that what you said? So there's a

1:54:51couple. So this particular company got some COVID money. And then this individual who

1:54:56runs this company applied to an RFP for financial services work, got it, along with the other

1:55:03companies that applied. And then no work was produced for $133,000, at least, that I was

1:55:16told by the city. So, yeah.

1:55:20And that was under a public records request?

1:55:22Yes.

1:55:23One thing I did forget to mention, because I was a little bit disorganized here, and

1:55:28you can chime in, Madam Auditor, if you want to add anything. But just so that we're clear,

1:55:32the total amount of funds received under what we call our COVID funds was $45,362 in

1:55:41federal funds and $18,799,199 in county grant funds. So it's a total of just over $64 million

1:55:52that was received and dispersed in a matter of a few years, right? And in pouring through

1:55:59all this data, it's clear that many organizations were providing frontline support and services

1:56:04during this time. Interface Social Services, the YMCA, the Salvation Army, Germantown

1:56:10Neighborhood Council, Gavin Foundation, Dove, and most if not all of our religious organizations

1:56:15are just some of the organizations that received funding to help respond to the overwhelming

1:56:20needs at that time. In addition, there was money spent to purchase COVID tests, personal

1:56:24protection equipment, computers for remote access, and HVAC upgrades to public buildings.

1:56:30Premium pay bonuses were paid to well-deserved frontline city employees, and there was no

1:56:34better time to tackle infrastructure projects than when everyone was home and the roads

1:56:38were virtually empty. So the money did go to a lot of good purposes. There's no doubt

1:56:43about that. But there are certainly many line items that do not fall into what was

1:56:50the intended use of that. And I believe a full accounting of how this money is spent

1:56:56is overdue. Did anyone else have any comments they wanted to make, Councillor Jacobs? I'll

1:57:04go to you next. I actually had a comment about the Germantown Neighborhood Council.

1:57:12I was recently at a meeting at the YMCA Germantown Neighborhood Center. And in that meeting

1:57:22was myself, Senator Keenan, State Rep. Chan, along with people from the Y. Nobody seemed

1:57:30to know who the Germantown Neighborhood Inc. is and who actually makes up that board.

1:57:37I mean, again, I know this was a couple of years ago, but we don't actually know. No

1:57:43one in that room knew who that was. So if I know, we can get an answer to that just

1:57:50because I did look at the ledger and I saw that. And this is something that just had

1:57:56this meeting a couple, maybe a month or two ago. And it did come up that we're not even

1:58:00really sure who's on that board. And it definitely existed at one time. But whether or not it

1:58:06exists today is unclear. Thank you. Councillor, you had your hand up?

1:58:18Thank you, Madam Chair. So the administration used the $15 million of the city's allocated

1:58:29ARPA funds to purchase the Monroe Building on Hancock Street. Is this a eligible use

1:58:37for the American Rescue Plan spending? If it's not, does the city have to return this

1:58:45money to the state? Mr. Walker?

1:58:50Thank you, Madam Chairwoman. It is an appropriate use as are all the other uses that you'll

1:58:58see throughout these spreadsheets and the report that the administration will file.

1:59:03This is all conducted through a federal portal. All these items are reviewed on an individual

1:59:09basis for the most part. And they've made a past screening. There is a wrap up function

1:59:16at the end of all this. And that will be performed. And our team is working on that.

1:59:23But it is absolutely. And we've said it before. We would certainly stand by. The mayor would

1:59:28stand by the purchase of the Monroe Building. The benefit that we believe that that's provided

1:59:32in the city now and in the future is absolutely worth that money. Now, I think there needs

1:59:37to be a distinction between relief funds and economic stimulus funds. ARPA was economic

1:59:43stimulus. And we use that in a number of different ways. And again, I'm looking forward to this

1:59:50body reviewing all the expenditures and providing us with some questions. And I know that we

1:59:56owe you a report on it. But the amount of work we were able to do for small businesses,

2:00:02nonprofits, the city, the Christopher Early Learning Center is one example. The money

2:00:10we provided a small business relief. And I know, Madam Chairwoman, you mentioned some

2:00:13of these. So I don't know that I need to go into all the detail right now. But there

2:00:17isn't going to be anything that this body presents to us that says we don't believe

2:00:24that was an appropriate use of the money, which is fine. That's your role. That's your

2:00:30authority to say you don't believe that that was an appropriate use. But in almost every

2:00:36case, it is going to be the administration's belief that it was an appropriate use. And

2:00:42this goes through the federal portal. And it will work with our federal partners and

2:00:47doing everything as efficiently and as correctly as possible.

2:00:50Thank you, Mr. Walker. Hang on a second. Council, you on?

2:00:59So here it's clearly stated four categories of eligible use of this ARPA funds. And I

2:01:07would like the administration to explain, purchase and monopoly belong to which category.

2:01:15So first category is responding to the public health emergency. Second is providing premium

2:01:22pay to employees conducting essential work. The third one is providing government services

2:01:28to the extent of a government reduction in revenue due to COVID-19. The fourth is investing

2:01:36in water, sewer and broadband infrastructure. So purchasing the property, the monopoly belong

2:01:45to which category? I'm not sure if you're quoting directly

2:01:52from the law or the resolution. My understanding is that the law has itself had a number of

2:01:58multiple pages of categories and allowances. So I'm not sure if you're reading from the

2:02:08is this the resolution or is this from the actual federal law?

2:02:11It's from the resolution. I think that there are broad categories within

2:02:22the law that gave the city the authority to purchase that building.

2:02:30Thank you, Mr. Walker. Is it like a wish law item?

2:02:37I don't know. It's something we're going to get.

2:02:40So we'll keep with these causing these. Councillor Mahoney.

2:02:46So I think what can be asked rather than just a resolve or the law, there were properties

2:02:52purchased and economic stimulus was what you just said, Mr. Walker. But I think maybe

2:02:57if you could just come back and tell us for the pieces of property that were purchased,

2:03:02what the definition of the law that you passed in the federal portal.

2:03:06And then maybe we could have another discussion because I think we could go back and forth

2:03:09all night long and say it wasn't the right use or it was the right use.

2:03:12I think I heard somebody in one of the meetings came up and said that it was for they purchased

2:03:18it because we didn't have a place for tourism. Yeah, I was going to say Quincy 2000, but

2:03:26we didn't have going back a long time there for tourism. So we bought the building for

2:03:30tourism, but the building itself wasn't, it was like a piece of it was used for tourism.

2:03:34But in any case, if you could come back and give us the definition of the law that you

2:03:37put into the federal portal for those things, that would be, if he could put, if we could

2:03:41ask the administration to come back and explain the purposes, the federal purposes that they

2:03:47used the ARPA monies to purchase specific properties like the Monroe building, it was

2:03:53a Center Street purchase. There's a home 37 Center Street that was purchased for $385,548.

2:04:01And they actually also paid off the mortgage for that home, which was $98,885. So that

2:04:09was a house that then they knocked it down. And I don't know what the plan was for that.

2:04:13But if we could, if that's economic development, if you can tell me how that's economic development,

2:04:16I would greatly appreciate that. And then we also bought the 662 and 664 Southern

2:04:21artery purchase, which I think is the Marina, correct. And as far as I know, when we talk

2:04:27about economic development in communities, I mean, there should have been a long list

2:04:30of why these things would be necessary. I know the Monroe building was brought to the

2:04:36City Council for the purposes of building a new City Hall and Quincy College. But when

2:04:44that didn't happen, we bought it for a different purpose. But yet I think we had the superintendent

2:04:49there when we were unrolling this, saying that we were going to use the opera money.

2:04:54But then later it was called tourism. So we're just looking for, I think, for the

2:04:57general public to put this to rest. Let's just find out what you put in the portal

2:05:00for and we can move on from that. The other questionable question, the things

2:05:04that I saw was, you know, when we talk about the use of this, and we're going to be specific

2:05:09about it, but tourism is one of the ones that get thrown out there. We used $1.2 million

2:05:15for the John Quincy Adams Park and Monument. We used $5 million for the Mount Walliston

2:05:22Cemetery. For those of you who don't know, that's the lobster gates. That $5 million

2:05:26was for that. The Adams Presidential Library, which isn't supposed to cost anybody anything,

2:05:32we invested $305,000 for that. Then the Lone Sailor Park statue, that's in Marina Bay.

2:05:38That was $1.5 million. And then we can get into vendor-specific things where the Dormison

2:05:44Consulting and the West Virginia University Research Consulting, I believe those were

2:05:51for salary studies, economic development, salary studies. Allure Spar, I'm kind of

2:05:56interested in that one. Do you know what that one's for? Allure Spar. I don't know where

2:06:02Allure Spar is, but $25,000 for Allure Spar. And Babson College, I think we were paying

2:06:07tuitions at Babson College. So curious about that. And then we do have a lot of nonprofits

2:06:13that we went through too. And I'm not here to knock nonprofits, but I do get concerned

2:06:19with some of the things that I do see. And I'm just going to ask a question. $150,000

2:06:24went out to the chamber, the Quincy Chamber. That could be economic development for the

2:06:29small businesses that were having trouble at that time. But again, validation is really

2:06:34looking for why we used it, what was the benefit for it, and how did it positively

2:06:39impact the city of Quincy? At the time that this money was being sent from the federal

2:06:44government, it was meant to help those who needed help, right? Businesses that were

2:06:50having struggling. And now we're seeing years later, a lot of people getting into trouble

2:06:54for the inappropriate use of the monies that they used before, because they are going

2:06:59back and they are looking at these things. I am by no means saying that it was used inappropriately,

2:07:03but there are communities that people are getting in trouble with. And I hope that's

2:07:08not the case here. And I don't think it is. I really don't. I want to make sure I'm saying

2:07:12that I do not think it is. But I think the way we can kind of conclude this conversation

2:07:17is with those kind of questions bringing it back, because it sounds like you have the

2:07:20information to share it with the general public. Does that work?

2:07:25>> Just real quickly, it's the saying it without saying it, Councillor, that now we've

2:07:33sort of thrown it out there, that I hope we didn't do anything wrong here. And those

2:07:38particular cases where there's been waste, fraud and abuse, those were people that were

2:07:42taking personal advantage of the money. I understand. Thank you. And that in no way,

2:07:48shape or form, the items that you list off, you may not have agreed with them. The members

2:07:54of this body may not agree with them. But they were entirely appropriate for the benefit

2:07:57of the city. And we can certainly provide the right category and what subsection of

2:08:02what category that was denoted to pay for that. But you mentioned the John Quincy Adams

2:08:07park. Should we have spent that money? Yes. The loan sales park. Should we have spent

2:08:12that money? Yes. The money to the Quincy Chamber of Commerce, whether it was for events

2:08:16that they do to promote the city and promote quality of life? Yes. And I believe that

2:08:24almost every if not every single one of these items that we go over through this spreadsheet,

2:08:30when we submit the report back to you, every single one of them, I'm going to stand up

2:08:34and say, yes, we believe that was an appropriate use of this money. And respectfully, I disagree

2:08:40with your assessments of the parks in particular. But again, I see where you're coming from

2:08:46and we could provide a little bit more backup on that. I get it. Thank you, Mr. Walker.

2:08:51I have a follow-up. Councillor Yuan. So Councillor Moconey just mentioned the Wollaston Cemetery

2:09:03that gate cost $5 million, that golden gate. $5 million can help how many residents? I

2:09:14really question you spent $5 million just on a golden gate at the cemetery. I'm wondering

2:09:20if that's really a proper use. Just thinking about during COVID, how many residents need

2:09:27help? $5 million really can help a lot of residents. So I just give this one example

2:09:35that we can look up more to see if this rescue plan fund been really properly used to help

2:09:44residents. That's it. Three minutes ago, the renovations to the cemetery were much more

2:09:49than just the entry gate. But by the way, that entry gate and the renovations are absolutely

2:09:54outstanding. And this was an opportunity that we may not have had otherwise to use traditional

2:09:59infrastructure funding sources, traditional local funding. This opportunity was presented

2:10:04to us to get something done that coupled with the public safety headquarters across the

2:10:09street coupled with the improvements to Faxel Field on the other corner and coupled with

2:10:13hopefully the federal funding that's going to come through with the major intersection

2:10:16project in that corner. That's a major gateway to the city. And that we believe, again, I

2:10:21understand you disagree with it, but we 100% believe that that project was an appropriate

2:10:27use of money. 100%. Not only was it the gate, it was the refurbishment of the veterans

2:10:32area. It was the new war memorial dedicated to our veterans and those who were lost from

2:10:41the most recent conflicts that we fought in. There was a lot more to that project.

2:10:44You can see the flag poles now all in a row. That entryway to the city is absolutely beautiful.

2:10:50And that is important to the quality of life in the city.

2:10:54Thank you, Mr. Walker. Did anyone over here have anything? Anyone who hasn't spoken? Council

2:11:02Lee won. But don't forget, the city is in the $2 billion debt. Because this debt, the

2:11:11property tax keep increase forcing people out, make people couldn't afford it. And this

2:11:18situation compare people couldn't afford it compared to make a beautiful office cemetery.

2:11:25Which one is more important? That's why that's how I consider how you spend money. You spend

2:11:32money to help residents for their everyday real problems. They couldn't afford this property

2:11:39tax. And you spend money to beautify the city. I think that should be secondary. That's

2:11:45my point. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Ioann. Councillor Jacobs. Councillor, I just

2:11:58want to touch on the cemetery in regards to the ARPA funds. The gates were presented

2:12:09in a meeting at the parks and rec board, I'm pretty sure. And that meeting was, people

2:12:16who attended that meeting weren't able to see what the gate was going to look like.

2:12:21I know because I tried to observe that and was unable to do that. Another thing that

2:12:26I find, although I agree with a lot of things that happen at the cemetery, the new war

2:12:33memorial, the extension of the veterans graves, one thing that I do have a little concern

2:12:41about this, again, this is a historic city. There was a historic, I know it looks like

2:12:46a water fountain but was actually a horse trough. We don't really know where that is.

2:12:51We don't know where that's going to be repurposed. There was a gate already there that had been

2:12:59broken up. There were broken pieces. The archways were broken. You know, I don't know

2:13:04what the, there was not really an open process to what was going on with the new cemetery

2:13:10gate. We don't know it was looked into, how much it would have cost to restore the gate

2:13:15that was there. You know, we didn't ask the folks who lived in that neighborhood along

2:13:23the back there, what's that, is that Marymount Road, about the gate, you know, that's honestly

2:13:29not really that nice. I mean, the front does look nice but the backs, you know, kind of

2:13:33got the, you know, not a great deal. I feel like we could have, you know, tried to repurpose

2:13:39the old entry gate and use that as a way to, you know, kind of beautify the backside

2:13:45of it as a pedestrian walkway because I think that's how it kind of was initially built

2:13:49on the front side. But the community wasn't really asked about what they wanted. They

2:13:57were, again, just kind of told, hey, this is what we're going to do, isn't it great?

2:14:01And there really wasn't a lot of room for community input, which again goes back to

2:14:05the no surprise government resolution that was passed here last week, you know, and also

2:14:12I know is that a lot of other municipalities across the state used ARPA money for, I don't

2:14:20want to say school renovations, but to update HVAC systems, air conditioning systems. I

2:14:28mean, I was at Athorn Howe open house two weeks ago. It was like 85 degrees in there.

2:14:37The heat was on. I know that the boiler system there is kind of wonky. It's an old building.

2:14:43It dates back to 1911. So, you know, but again, we could have used some of those ARPA

2:14:48monies for that. We could have had air conditioning put in, you know, some of the older buildings.

2:14:53We could have air conditioning added to the newer buildings that we've constructed that

2:14:57we decided not to put air conditioning into like Quincy High School, Sterling, I mean

2:15:01Southwest and, you know, I think maybe the Christopher album might have air conditioning,

2:15:08but some of the newer schools, Central Middle School, we could have used some of that money

2:15:12to buy air handlers and all that stuff to kind of bring those buildings more up to conditions

2:15:20that are beneficial, not only for the people that work there, like, you know, the teachers

2:15:24and the staff, but also as students, our kids are going to school in temperatures

2:15:28that are way warmer than it was when we were kids. It's hot in there. And, you know, our

2:15:33teachers shouldn't have to work in those conditions. And our students, our kids shouldn't

2:15:38have to learn under those conditions. And Shaka, they're not going to be learning if

2:15:41it's 95 degrees in the classroom in September. Thank you.

2:15:46Thank you, Councillor Jacobs. Anyone else? Councillor Ryan, to you, Madam Chair. Just

2:15:54to provide a clarification on the vendor-specific list, Alora Spa is actually a business located

2:16:01in Quincy. It's on Quincy Avenue. And I do believe during an event at Quincy College,

2:16:12the owner of the spa was there. And she did thank the mayor at the time for a little

2:16:19bit of a helping hand during COVID. So I just wanted to clarify that. And I just want

2:16:26to also confirm that the funds have all been spent through APA, correct?

2:16:33I believe so. I'll let Madam Auditor speak to that. The time has passed. So anything

2:16:40that hasn't been spent is no longer available. Is that correct?

2:16:44That's correct, yes. And I think we're still waiting for a million dollars or so from

2:16:49one of the county. Norfolk County, there's a million dollars that we're still waiting

2:16:54to receive that we should be receiving at the end of this quarter.

2:16:57But we've already spent it. It's in the process, I believe, of being spent.

2:17:05Yes. Okay. Okay. I think we've had a lot of good

2:17:12discussion here. And I think that we can maybe agree to disagree on the priorities

2:17:17and the proportion of money that was spent on some of these gates and parks and that

2:17:23sort of thing. Certainly, it would be nice to get a final presentation of the monies

2:17:31and be able to see proportionally how much went to giving teachers bonuses, which is

2:17:36absolutely a worthy use of that money versus how much went to parks and monuments.

2:17:43But I will just say that personally, I believe if you drive by interfaith social services

2:17:48and see the line of cars waiting to get into that food pantry, sometimes I think we can

2:17:54do better by our people. And I'll just leave that at that.

2:17:58No one else has any further comments on that. Okay. Thank you.

2:18:03So the last thing, finally, the last thing on our agenda tonight is Council Order 2026-056,

2:18:08the Council on Aging Department had theft and federal charges. Given how our discussion

2:18:14of this ended before we broke for the summer, I wanted to give Councilor Jacobs the opportunity

2:18:22to bring that conversation to a little bit more civil closure and to present a few questions

2:18:28I know I have. But I would like to give Councilor Jacobs the floor for that.

2:18:50All right. So back in April, on April 6, 2026, Ward

2:18:576C Councilor Debra Riley introduced Order Number 2026-056, Council on Aging Department

2:19:06had in theft and federal charges. Just to give you a summary of what this was all about,

2:19:10okay, there was an incident with the COA director who was embezzling money from the taxpayers

2:19:19and also directly from the seniors who were utilizing the services at the Elder Services

2:19:29Building down in Office of Quantum Street. And so this order was basically just a way

2:19:36for the City Council to kind of bring back responsible stewardship of taxpayer dollars

2:19:43to look at the safeguards to prevent any additional breaches such as this in the future. Also

2:19:50to bring some accountability and transparency to this event. We all know there was a federal

2:19:56investigation. Obviously the individual pled guilty in court. So because of that, I think

2:20:06a lot of things if it was more like an open trial probably would have had more public

2:20:13information. But things where he was basically pled out. So this is what they agreed happened

2:20:19versus what could have actually occurred. But we also wanted to make sure that we were

2:20:24providing internal controls and approval processes and also financial oversight mechanisms.

2:20:30We wanted to look at exactly what was going on. We did have Director Michelle Hanley here

2:20:39who kind of told us the things that they had changed in regards to collecting funds.

2:20:45They have a new online system when you go in there. And it's almost like self-service,

2:20:50like you're basically self-identifying yourself. You're saying I'm paying for this. They count

2:20:54the money in the back room. There's always more than one person there. I happened to

2:20:59go there that day that we had this meeting. And there were actually three people in their

2:21:04counting the money and they kind of walked me through the process of what was going on.

2:21:09Having worked in fees and revocation, things like that for the National Park Service many

2:21:13years ago, it seemed like a pretty good system that they had done. It seemed very similar

2:21:20to the one the federal government uses, at least in the National Park Service. And we

2:21:26really just wanted to make sure that we were reaffirming our commitment to safeguarding

2:21:31public resources, the building, and also the people that we serve. And so that's what

2:21:36this resolution was really all about. It was just a way for us to say, we know this happened.

2:21:43This is what we found out in court. This is the information that we have here. And

2:21:46it was a way for people to kind of get that information. So since it wasn't kind of readily

2:21:53broadcast available because the individual ended up pleading guilty. And with that,

2:21:57I'll open it up to any questions that the Councillors may have. Councillor Ryan, who

2:22:05has been along since they've done this.

2:22:08Okay, there we go. To you, Madam Chairperson. Not Madam, sorry. I would just like to know

2:22:18during the meeting, the Treasurer came up, Molly Smith, and presented a very comprehensive

2:22:25review of the changes that she made after the investigation. I'd like to know if we

2:22:32can learn if internal controls, more comprehensive internal controls was enacted by the Purchasing

2:22:43Department. No, we didn't get a chance to go into that. So maybe we could address that

2:22:48question with Chief of Staff, Mr. Walker. Thank you.

2:22:54Anyone else? Councillor McKee. So ahead of this presentation, we were provided

2:23:08a little bit more information than we had before, including some police reports and

2:23:16some invoices that came in, some purchase orders for some of these fraudulent purchases.

2:23:24I think tonight might be more for discussion since we don't have anyone from the Purchasing

2:23:34Department here as far as I know. But what I learned from this police report, I noted

2:23:44a few things. So I'll just go through them. So some of the purchase orders were for cleaning

2:23:51a private home. This was of what was reported by the federal prosecutor. It was a girlfriend

2:24:03or a friend. A towing of this friend's car. A CD workshop for all these hours in a music

2:24:14studio. Some of this we've heard. Some of it was new to me. One was for a lawnmower.

2:24:23And then there were purchase orders from a company for $38,134 in this police report

2:24:37that was from Celtic Safety, which I guess was Mr. Closby's friend in the Bronx, New

2:24:48York for classes at the center. Some interesting things from this report were that Mr. Closby

2:25:01told an employee there when he was first submitting this fraudulent purchase order that the first

2:25:14paycheck was for a friend's company to kind of get it off the ground and he would pay

2:25:19it back. Sorry, that the individual pay it back or that Closby? That Closby would pay

2:25:27it back as I understood it from this report. And so when I looked at the purchase orders

2:25:35for this, one thing I noted was that they're in the Bronx. So hiring a company from the

2:25:43Bronx to teach classes in Squanum should raise a red flag, I think. Maybe it's just

2:25:49headquartered there. But anyway, it might have raised some red flags. In the invoices,

2:25:57there were no dates for any of these classes. It was kind of always the same, just sort

2:26:01of general classes on various things. And there was another one that was mentioned

2:26:10of a reupholstery of a couch. And I guess some of these things, I think since he was

2:26:19the head of elder services, maybe he was just I don't know exactly what the process was,

2:26:25but he was possibly, you know, the one there that was approving these things to go forward.

2:26:31But I don't know why like cleaning a private home wouldn't have raised some red flags

2:26:37as a cost that would maybe you could argue if a senior, I guess, had a serious issue.

2:26:44But these are things that kind of popped into my head. The other thing that I was thinking

2:26:52about is when it was mentioned that Mr. Clasby had told an employee, oh, this is just to

2:27:01help a friend's company get off the ground and I'll pay it back. The fact that, you

2:27:08know, he said that, and the fact that it wasn't then reported by the employee at that

2:27:13time indicates to me that he felt and everyone else understood that maybe he would not get

2:27:23in trouble for this and that this was allowed. But I can't imagine that all employees in

2:27:28the city would be given the opportunity to help a friend get a company off the ground

2:27:33and they would pay it back. So I do think that I'm not saying that the mayor knew about

2:27:44any of this, but I do think that this highlights for me the importance of our hiring processes

2:27:52and making sure that we're really trying to be fair about the people that we choose and

2:27:58we're not choosing friends or family members or relatives because then those people might

2:28:09be seen by their colleagues and also themselves as having no, you know, being able to sort

2:28:17of get away with things that other people wouldn't get away with. So I think these

2:28:23are questions for me that come up that I think the city should really address in terms of,

2:28:29you know, some of the things they're doing. I raised at the HR budget hearing. But to,

2:28:37you know, perhaps just like black out people's names on a CV so that people are just looking

2:28:44at the qualifications and not looking at the name or whatever and, you know, hiring

2:28:50people with a committee and having very fair scoring mechanisms, asking the same set of

2:29:00questions just to try to make sure that we are hiring very people who are qualified and

2:29:13will not be sort of seen to be above the law, I guess.

2:29:16I have to agree. I think that's a good proof. On that last that there were you talking

2:29:26about black, you know, redacting people's names, I think that's a great idea. When

2:29:30I grade papers, I do the same thing. I can't look at the kid's name because I know the

2:29:34kid and I know what they're trying to say to me. I want to give them an A, you know,

2:29:38so when I try to grade, especially final papers, I always make sure I blank, you know, black

2:29:42out the kid's names that way I can't see it because you'd be biased that way.

2:29:47And I just I want to say, too, that I know this is really awkward. I feel awkward bringing

2:29:52it up. Our last meeting about this got very tense. But I'm bringing it up because I you

2:30:00know, this happened. And I think we should learn as much as we can for it can from it.

2:30:05And, you know, we can always get better. So counsel, you want just hold on one second.

2:30:30Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm wondering does the city have the whistleblower policy? If

2:30:38if we do have maybe this will will be discovered much earlier because of this last decade.

2:30:49And already to the extent class B just to take those cash and and the people walking

2:31:00there already know it. They're they're hiding those cash is the indifference of yours when

2:31:04he comes to the office. That's too dramatic. If already to that extent, how come you still

2:31:12take a so long time to fund to to catch him? So I'm wondering if first if we have the

2:31:22policy to protect the whistleblowers. So people will be will be more willing and there to

2:31:30report suspicious behaviors. Do you want to ask do you want to have the

2:31:41source the solicitor answer that question? So let's do damage.

2:31:48Thank you very much, counselor. It's been very difficult to sit here and listen to this.

2:31:55And I just ask if you plan on turning off my microphone, Mr. Chair, please first advise

2:32:01me you find what I'm saying to be out of order so I can get the support of a counselor

2:32:07who might get a point of order and I can find out what I've done wrong and speaking.

2:32:12But I'd like the opportunity to speak first to the points that counselor McKee made and

2:32:18the inference you made or the implication rather very clear implication that an employee

2:32:27who first heard from Mr. Claspio it's something he was doing didn't report it because she

2:32:35thought he was able to get away with things because of his relationship with the mayor.

2:32:41Totally untrue, totally wrong, totally false, a wrong implication, but it's consistent

2:32:48with the the entire presentation tonight. What happened was particular employees were

2:32:57intimidated both by Claspio's relationship with the mayor and by the fact Claspio was

2:33:06their direct supervisor. And you know I know you folks understand this, know this happened.

2:33:14The FBI came in and conducted a multi-month investigation. I still have five volumes

2:33:22of material, five bankers boxes of material. They talked to everybody including the employees

2:33:30who made perfectly clear that they were concerned primarily about their job and there was nothing

2:33:37about the relationship with the mayor and Claspio that was direct. Claspio implied things

2:33:44as you did tonight. Claspio would say I'm going up to see the mayor and things like

2:33:48that but it was found that that was part of his fraud. The second thing is we're talking

2:33:55about fraud here. Someone did things fraudulently. That company in New York that was an individual

2:34:06the purchasing department took an initiative because the individual's name was all that

2:34:12came up from Mr. Claspio and the purchasing department got a address, tax ID number and

2:34:26independently checked with the Secretary of State in New York to find out about the company.

2:34:32So they are the ones who identified that this guy was from New York but it was the

2:34:37nature of the work he was doing that Claspio fraudulently represented just like he paid

2:34:44a painter for painting services but did not specify that he was painting a private home.

2:34:51Of course he didn't. Of course he didn't. So you're shaking your head in agreement

2:34:58with me now but I don't understand the implication. Why would we let someone paint a private

2:35:05home and the city pay for it? That's not what happened here. The way the system works

2:35:10the department heads run their department. The city has a system in place. The purchasing

2:35:17department can't check everything going on in every department in the city. They'd be

2:35:23swamped. So they manage purchase orders and they manage contracts and they manage requests

2:35:30for payment that come in from department heads. So when department heads fraudulently

2:35:37do things, which has happened once, this gentleman here. We have 2700 employees. Clasbee is the

2:35:50one guy who went to federal prison for what he did. There was a prior incident involving

2:35:59a police officer who also went to federal prison. In that particular instance he was

2:36:06kind of gaming the detail system and that's what happened with him. In this case it was

2:36:12a pattern of fraud and it was discovered and it's very important for everyone to understand

2:36:19that someone came forward to the mayor and made an allegation. He spoke with her. He

2:36:27fleshed it out and then that evening the chief, myself and Mr. Walker were called into

2:36:34a meeting at like 8 30 in the mayor's office and we sat down. That night and the next

2:36:41day the police department was down waiting for Clasbee, took his car keys, took his office

2:36:49keys, locked them out of the building, locked everything up and they began an investigation.

2:36:55So there was immediate action and that's the best corrective measure. There aren't

2:37:02proactive measures that can be taken against fraud. It can't happen especially in municipal

2:37:10government where pretty much every department is understaffed and so the mayor acted immediately.

2:37:19We brought the police department, brought the FBI in and today Clasbee is in prison.

2:37:28Now I don't understand the purpose of this. I've heard some express purposes but frankly

2:37:37after what went on earlier I don't know that I accept them but there's not much of a reason

2:37:44for this council which could be moving forward with the administration to be looking in

2:37:50the rear view mirror at Tom Clasbee. He's in federal prison and the day the mayor learned

2:37:56about it that night he told us what to do. It was done. The whistleblower didn't need

2:38:04any protection at all because that's not how things operate in this city. People know

2:38:11they can come forward and it happened then. I don't think it's going to happen in the

2:38:16future but I know that employees learned from what happened here that that employee

2:38:24was protected, told her story, was believed and it was investigated. So I thank you,

2:38:32Councillor Rache, for allowing me to explain. My intention was not to take Councillor Yew

2:38:40on, take over the questions. I know that she asked a question about the city's whistleblower

2:38:46policy so I was just pointing to you to maybe, since you're here and you know I have some

2:38:52knowledge of the statute but I certainly don't want to speak on behalf of the city

2:38:55so I believe her question was just with respect to the whistleblower statute and well I trust

2:39:03I answered it hopefully. And I'm happy to answer any other questions about this. If

2:39:09anyone wants to know what's going on I'd be very happy. I think he answered my question.

2:39:18Does the city have the whistleblower policy to protect the whistleblower? I don't know

2:39:26about that. I'm sure we do because there's regulations but that's an HR question. You'd

2:39:35have to ask, did you just ask is there a policy to protect whistleblowers? Did I hear

2:39:40you correctly? Yes. All right. So that's for the HR department to answer. I mean I'm

2:39:52certain there's a policy, I don't know, because at the state level and at the federal level

2:39:58you have to have policies. But I don't know that. That wasn't, this is about Tom Clasby,

2:40:06it's not about whistleblower policies that I can speak to. By any common sense, if one

2:40:23still cash and being known by the employees for so long, and how come he's still not

2:40:32being caught? I just don't understand. If he is not the best man at Mayor's wedding,

2:40:40if he is not so close to me, just see any any officers, if has no such special connections,

2:40:50how come he still cash from the jar and then that's people donated to the senior department.

2:41:01Many many times the employee already know it. Every time he come to the office, employee

2:41:05have to hide this jar in different drawers in case he took it. That's a movie scene.

2:41:11By common sense, this can happen in Quincy. If just any normal one, this should be immediately

2:41:19caught, this person. I don't understand how this still can last until someone we so blow

2:41:27or go to blow or this should be immediately blow to whole city. By gossip here, everyone

2:41:32should already know it. I just don't understand by any common sense how that can happen.

2:41:39If this one doesn't have special connections to the to the mayor.

2:41:43All right. So are you saying that because he was the best man at the mayor's wedding,

2:41:50he felt that he could steal cash and he got away with stealing cash. Just to be clear,

2:41:56what are you saying precisely about the mayor and about class because I'll tell you right

2:42:03now, I have here the sentencing memorandum from the United States Attorney following

2:42:10an FBI investigation. It's got everything in it. It addresses one of the false assumptions

2:42:18that you're making now and I'll answer that next. But first I want to hear from you directly.

2:42:25Why are you talking about someone at the mayor's wedding and then saying, how could

2:42:30he steal cash? Just clarify for me. Is there a relationship?

2:42:35I just want to point it out. Let people thinking for themselves just by anyone's common sense.

2:42:43And this is a fact. I don't make any connection. I just want to people thinking for themselves.

2:42:50Well, if you're going to talk about facts, you need to talk about all the facts and you're

2:42:55not doing that. Okay. The fact is that the people put money into boxes, a donation box.

2:43:06But then at the end of the day, it was collected by Mr. Classby as a department head and he

2:43:12took care of reporting it to the city treasurer's office. He did that alone, but he took control

2:43:21of the cash and the checks and all that was getting reported for a period of time was

2:43:26the checks. But to imply that any employees were somehow complicit or that they didn't

2:43:35take appropriate action, they did what their job was and then at the end of the day it

2:43:40was collected by Classby. And what he did was he didn't report all the money.

2:43:46Thank you, Mr. Simmons. I'm all set.

2:43:56You're all set?

2:43:57Yeah, thank you. I think you answered everything.

2:43:58So what are you saying? I should sit down?

2:44:00I don't have anything to ask you. I was just going to go into another thing. I'm all set.

2:44:06So according to the February 10, 2025 article, then Director of Municipal Finance Eric Mason

2:44:12told the Patriot Ledger that the city was crafting a new speak-up policy that would

2:44:17include an independent hotline a city employee could call to voice their concerns. There's

2:44:22been a large gap of insulation between the individual making the call and someone like

2:44:27me who would be in charge of the investigation so the worker feels protected, Mason said.

2:44:32City officials have already met with a qualified firm according to Mason. He said he couldn't

2:44:37discuss the details because the policy is still in draft. But he described the company

2:44:42as a national, reputable firm. Now, maybe that was HR, but I have to say that HR typically

2:44:50goes to their legal counsel. Now, I'm not asking you, Mr. Simmons, typically goes to

2:44:53the legal counsel to make sure we're doing that, but it was Mr. Mason who was the finance

2:44:57director, the finance director that spoke in the paper about this, and I think that's

2:45:01all we're asking is, is this policy that was created, that was being created by the

2:45:06national reputable firm, has that actually gone anywhere? And it's not a question to

2:45:11you. It's a question really for the city because you said you don't have anything

2:45:14to do with HR. Right. So instead we spew inferences onto

2:45:18the floor, say, I'm not asking you a question. Usually everyone goes to the solicitor or

2:45:25the law department about policies. You said that, not me. I heard that the public heard

2:45:32that this is another example of what's going on all night here. And the public, please,

2:45:38I'm responding and I wish to not be interrupted as you frequently do. And I know when I sit

2:45:44down, you'll then mischaracterize what I say, but I want the public to hear what I have

2:45:49to say, which is that if there's a policy, and if you, first of all, if you're reading

2:45:55from the ledger, that's not always accurate. No, it's not, but it's the only place I can

2:46:00get the information. Well, I know that. I know. Quoting from the ledger is part of the

2:46:07game plan up here. All right. And the ledger's not always accurate. They put something out

2:46:12last week about the mayor and a statement he allegedly made to his staff. Totally false

2:46:19headline. And when you read the article, they talked to someone else. But in this instance

2:46:24here in response to what you raised, the question you raised, well, I want to respond

2:46:32to this. We're done. We're done. No, we're not done because you folks do not, the city

2:46:37councilors do not have a right to infer things and say, I don't know. And then step back

2:46:43from it if there's a policy that's been worked on, we'll get it. Excuse me. Please sit down.

2:46:50You've been asked to sit down. Why have I been asked? I'm answering a question. No,

2:46:55no one asked you a question. You're, you're, you're coming forward and providing information,

2:46:59unsolicited information that nobody asked for. Well, please sit down. I'm clarifying

2:47:03in the statement. Am I out of order or is the department head, the city attorney allowed

2:47:10to respond when something completely incorrect? You're allowed to respond. You're allowed

2:47:16to respond. That's all I'm doing. When someone asks you for a response to a question, which

2:47:20you were never asked. Can I just, thank you. Do you have anything else to say? I do. So

2:47:28I'd like to go back to where I think actually the key of this is. And it is, it is something

2:47:35that has been decided in the courts that much I can agree on. It is a tremendous blow

2:47:40to the city of Quincy. I think if anybody knew Tom Clasby, it was shocking to anybody

2:47:45to know that this was the person who did this. And, but I would go back to the consultant

2:47:49that I know that I just looked at my email. I say I got it at 1.30 this afternoon. Thank

2:47:53you, Jen, for sending out the, the warrants with the backup. I just haven't had a chance

2:47:56to look at it. But the Celtic Safety Consultants, what I think we need to do is spend more

2:48:01time looking at that. Identify the five, I think we did that, the five totaling 38,134.

2:48:08And really because the things that's jumped out to me, you can check things and they can

2:48:11be businesses, but this is a business that's out of the Bronx and it was going to somebody's

2:48:16apartment. They were doing nutrition, exercise, stress management, hoarding and home safety.

2:48:23Employees were told investigative, investigators that the classes never occurred. QPD's report

2:48:28said federal prosecutors later stated that the company provided no goods or services

2:48:32to the city department. So really what we need to know is did Celtic Safety Consultants

2:48:37originally establish, how was it approved? How did it become a city vendor? And I think

2:48:41Mr. Timmons already explained that, that the procurement officer went the extra mile to

2:48:45check that. What documentations were received? I know that from the first night there was

2:48:49a W-9, a tax, was there a tax ID business address, insurance contract, who provided,

2:48:54who approved the Celtic vendor, who approved each of the five payments? What documentation

2:49:00demonstrated that these classes had actually taken place before the invoices were paid?

2:49:04Now that's changing because we're going from procurement to finance if we're going to be

2:49:08accounts payable. So I just know when we do a procurement piece and then it goes to

2:49:12the finance, they'll question things. That's what you should do. Like a good accountant,

2:49:16a good system will question things that come across the desk because they'll say the appropriate

2:49:20backup isn't here. Can I check on this? This seems like an inappropriate use and it will

2:49:24get pushed back to the departments. I'm sure many departments have had questions from the

2:49:27finance team. The Celtics payment address was an apartment in the Bronx. An out-of-state

2:49:33vendor certainly isn't something that's going to be improper by itself. But did the financial

2:49:38system flag that new vendor, the residential address, is unusual for a vendor to have for

2:49:44an additional review? These are questions that are fair to ask. These are the types

2:49:48of things you should ask in oversight and you should be able to ask and not be told

2:49:53that we're doing it the wrong way and that we're being aggressive. Those are questions

2:49:58just like asking if we have a whistleblower policy. And what the question was was do we

2:50:04have it? And what the solicitor said was HR does that. And what I read was Eric Mason

2:50:09was talking about it. So it was talked about. I'm just looking to find out if it ever happened.

2:50:14And that's a fair question to ask in oversight. Not a diatribe of all the things that are

2:50:19unfair about how we ask questions. It's a fair question. So when we look at those things

2:50:24in each stage, who's the responsible person confirming that the city actually received

2:50:29those services? Was there anyone outside the elder services required to verify any of these

2:50:33performances for these things? Could each department had essentially certified their

2:50:38own expenditures and caused it to move through the warrant process without being checked?

2:50:43Those are the kinds of questions that need to be answered. And I'm sure that we have

2:50:47safeguards on those things but I think those are the types of things that we're asking

2:50:50for here. And then when we look at those payments when they're being viewed individually or

2:50:55cumulatively, you know, did the city's financial system identify cumulative payments from the

2:51:02same vendor because it was over a certain amount? So we hired somebody for one thing

2:51:06and then we're starting to go over a certain amount. Did it meet the procurement rules?

2:51:10Was anyone reviewing how much a department had paid a particular vendor over the course

2:51:15of a fiscal year? Would five payments totaling over $38,000 triggered any procurement audit

2:51:20or review? Should it have? Again, this is not saying that anybody did anything wrong

2:51:27but those are the safeguards that I think we would like to hear. Those are the safeguards

2:51:32that we would like to hear. And then as far as the cash in the Kennedy Center where we

2:51:35talked about that too, they were saying over $1,000 a week should have been, it was being

2:51:39delivered by the man himself. And then who was reconciling those amounts when they were

2:51:44ultimately deposited against the slips of what they had when they collected that money?

2:51:50So, you know, maybe the auditor can answer me this. Maybe this is a question I can ask

2:51:54you, Susan. What testing and performance during the city's annual audit of elder service

2:52:01expenditures and cash receipts during 2019 to 2024? You may not know that but I'm just

2:52:05going to ask that anyway. Is there any performance, auditing performances that are done to check

2:52:09for cash? >> I'm not sure about that time frame, to

2:52:15be honest with you, Councillor. >> But you wouldn't be the one that would

2:52:17do that. That would be our annual? >> No, that would be through the annual audit.

2:52:22And I'm assuming if it was with state grants, I'm assuming that the state would audit some

2:52:28of the grants. >> So those annual audit outside audits normally

2:52:32examine transaction at this level. They would be detecting something like this would require

2:52:36an internal department audit. Were the elder services cash receipts ever reconciled independently?

2:52:42If that happened or it should happen, it should be something that because this happened maybe

2:52:46we should think about it. I don't have the treasurer here tonight but I think she might

2:52:51have mentioned something to that effect. Were files ever stamped, sampled and confirmed

2:52:56that the services bill to the city had actually been provided? Obviously we had really a

2:53:00horrible thing happen. It was fraud and it was unexpected. And nobody, no municipality

2:53:09wants to go through that. But we are asking these questions because this was brought

2:53:14at the last City Council and it was never brought forward and it was never discussed

2:53:18and it was said because the court case was pending and all these other reasons why you

2:53:22couldn't talk about it. But now it's he's in jail. So now is the right time to be asking

2:53:27those questions. So I really do want to say that this is not something I think it's something

2:53:34that many people were upset about and felt personally violated by because there are

2:53:40many people who went and used the elder services and they felt hurt by the people that they

2:53:44trusted and that's really what happened in this particular case that people really trusted

2:53:49this individual and they were fooled. And I guess the only other question that I have

2:53:55is has the city received $136,000 in restitution? Do we know that Susan?

2:54:04I'm not sure about that as of yet. I know that that was going to be done through the

2:54:12pension. I believe when the pension payout came through I thought that part of it would

2:54:17go through the city, go back to the city. Are we on? I can answer that. That $136,000

2:54:31is working its way through. It was part of the negotiation and one of the reasons that

2:54:37Mr. Class B's sentencing was continued on multiple occasions because they were trying

2:54:43to agree on a number that represented the balance in Class B's retirement account that

2:54:53would have otherwise been returned to him. And I can also answer, I don't understand

2:54:59why you were saying earlier that the checks were being sent to a P.O. box and that should

2:55:06have been a trigger for somebody. I said as an out of state vendor that's one thing

2:55:10that's doing services for the elder services and that it was a vendor that had an apartment

2:55:17number as their address. Right. You said the checks were being sent

2:55:20to a P.O. box which should have been. Well, there was material I know given to you at

2:55:26your request and I presume was distributed to all the Councillors and it answers a lot

2:55:32of the questions you just kind of threw out on the table but one of them is that the

2:55:38check that was sent on each of the five occasions, it's in here and it's sent to a street address

2:55:465,700 Arlington Ave, 12th and Bronx, New York. It was not sent to a P.O. box so that would

2:55:55not have been a trigger for anything. And most of the material you want to look at

2:56:00it's all here. I didn't say it was a P.O. box.

2:56:04Well that's what I heard you say. I said it was an apartment number.

2:56:08Well I heard P.O. box. Well you heard everything up until that part

2:56:12correctly but it was not a P.O. box. So my point is just in highlighting these

2:56:27issues is to see how can we do things better. So as I understand it and I am not a purchasing

2:56:35person, but I did with Councillor Riley take a class through the Inspector General's office.

2:56:45There are things that people can do to reduce the chances of fraud. You cannot eliminate

2:56:50it but you can reduce it. And there are certain red flags and they said to us in that classroom

2:56:58you can't do all of these things at once but you can implement them one at a time or

2:57:04as you learn about them. So there are different things you can do.

2:57:09It seems in this case that I'm a little bit unclear as to who might be checking whether

2:57:20a certain item purchased or a certain service purchased has been provided and if it's all

2:57:28sort of one person I think it's ideal to sort of separate that out into multiple people

2:57:34so it's harder to have something like this happen again. It did happen here so I think

2:57:42it's fair to ask these questions. I also just want to make a statement to say

2:57:47that I really object to attacks on anyone in the audience from anyone in the Council

2:57:55Chamber or on the Council, especially the free press. We are in an environment where

2:58:03we don't have, you know, people just aren't buying subscriptions so press is struggling

2:58:08and so I think we really are lucky to have local reporters here and we do have a number

2:58:15of local outlets that are covering things very closely and I don't think this has happened

2:58:22a number of times recently where folks have criticized the Patriot Ledger which has been

2:58:29reporting on some of these touchier subjects and I appreciate that reporting and I don't

2:58:35appreciate disparaging that reporting. Any other questions from Councillors? Councillor

2:58:53Riley. Thank you. And I think that what we're trying

2:59:02to do is to just, you know, understand better what changes the City has made or intends

2:59:10to make so that we can all learn something from this experience. The Treasurer-Collector

2:59:15got up and gave a very detailed presentation on how she handles cash and how she feels

2:59:19she's improved. Any loopholes or weaknesses that may have been in that process? The current

2:59:25Head of Elder Services has done the same. She, you know, even when she came up before

2:59:30for her budget, she was very cautious and very clear that, you know, she wants to do

2:59:37better and what we haven't heard is of any purchasing changes and that's really the

2:59:42part that is really discouraging. We have not heard anything other than we couldn't

2:59:48have possibly done anything differently and that is very discouraging, very discouraging.

2:59:54So if we don't look to ourselves, if we don't look for mistakes and figure out how we can

2:59:59do things better, then we're destined to repeat the same mistakes. And I think at

3:00:04the end of the day, you know, the department heads do have a lot of authority and in this

3:00:10case that was the weak link. The department head had supreme authority over his budget

3:00:17and his people and, you know, I'm sure a certain amount of trust. He had been around

3:00:21for a long time. And so that is something that we need to learn lessons from. We can't

3:00:27just say, oh, well, we couldn't have done it any better and say that we're victim shaming

3:00:32and playing Monday morning quarterback because as Councillor Mahoney said, this was something

3:00:38that was not talked about until the sentencing was over. We were told that we couldn't hear

3:00:44anything more. It was all hush-hush until the feds took care of it. And so now is the

3:00:49time to do that. And I would just like to know what changes in purchasing have been

3:00:55implemented and who's running purchasing right now. There's a lot of unknowns that is still

3:01:02to be answered. And the other thing I'll mention is that the Patriot Ledger did have

3:01:11to defend their reporting by getting a copy of the federal sentencing guideline and follow

3:01:15up with an article that said that there was evidence that this went back 10 years to 2014,

3:01:21although the case only covered from 2019 to 2024. It seems that this had behavior had

3:01:27been going on for quite some time. And again, all we can do is learn something from it.

3:01:33Thank you. Councillor Mahoney. The one thing I forgot to ask, and I think

3:01:40it might have been told last time, where is the restitution, the 136,061-71? Where is

3:01:46that going to go to? Does Madame Auditor know? I think it should go back to the COA.

3:01:52Honestly, these people were giving $5 to do yoga, $10 for a nutrition class, whatever

3:01:59was happening. And it may not seem like a violation, but that's a huge violation. You're

3:02:04a tax paying citizen of the City of Quincy. You're going to the senior. These are the

3:02:07places we should feel the safest. And I don't think this is one of those things that should

3:02:12go to free cash. I think it should go back and the restitution could go to the COA and

3:02:16to build something better than the memory that's going to be left there. So that was

3:02:22a hard thing for the new director to go in and take care of. If you want to talk about

3:02:27morale being down, I know Councillor Devone likes to talk about morale, but people at

3:02:33the COA were devastated. And that was a wave that went through the whole city with this.

3:02:41And we do expect more from the people who work in our public. And we expect when something

3:02:47bad happens in our public that we're going to put safeguards into it so it will not

3:02:52happen again. And by no means should anybody be so defensive when people are asking questions

3:02:56because whether it's one person or it's 100 people, it happened. It happened underneath

3:03:02the watch of the people who work here in the city. So I want to know where that money

3:03:06is going to go. Thank you. Any other questions? All right. I'm just going to close with a

3:03:17brief statement. So before we close tonight's Oversight Committee, Joint Oversight Finance

3:03:22Committee hearing regarding this portion of the CLASB incident, I want to thank everyone

3:03:29who came forward and answered questions and helped the committee to examine what happened

3:03:34at the Council on Aging. Above all, I want to thank the whistleblower who stood up for

3:03:46Quincy seniors and the staff at the Council on Aging and the taxpayers of the city. Coming

3:03:52forward takes extreme courage, especially when the person whose conduct you are reporting

3:03:56holds authority over you. It can be hard to do the right thing when you're superior is

3:04:02doing the wrong thing. Fear of retaliation, concern about your livelihood and pressure

3:04:08to remain silent can weigh heavily on you. Your willingness to speak up deserves our

3:04:13respect and our gratitude to any employee who does that. I also want to recognize the

3:04:17Council on Aging staff who serve our seniors with care and dedication working through these

3:04:22circumstances like that just happened where it could be difficult both professionally

3:04:27and personally. Their work matters and the seniors who depend on them deserve a department

3:04:32where employees can feel supported and safe in raising concerns. The money that's entrusted

3:04:39to the Council on Aging and to any city department is intended to support our seniors. When

3:04:44the resources are stolen, the harm reaches beyond the budget, it can damage public trust

3:04:51and takes away resources meant for people who rely on these services. Holding this

3:04:56oversight committee hearing gives the public insight into what happened, as I'd started

3:05:00off saying. What we have learned and what we have changed in response. Residents deserve

3:05:06to understand where failures occurred, what safeguards have been strengthened and what

3:05:11work remains and we still have work to do there. Restoring public trust requires openness

3:05:17about what went wrong and clear evidence and that we're taking action to prevent it

3:05:22from happening again. This is why this hearing matters. Our responsibility is to seek accountability,

3:05:31strengthen oversight and follow through on issues raised here tonight. Employees must

3:05:37know that concerns will be taken seriously and that speaking up will be supported. To

3:05:42the whistleblower, thank you for refusing to look the other way. The Council on Aging

3:05:48staff, thank you for continuing to serve our seniors and to the Quincy seniors and

3:05:52taxpayers. You deserve honesty, accountability and responsible stewardship of every public

3:05:58dollar. I also just want to add that I will be putting forward a resolution to request

3:06:08that the $136,000 from the restitution does go directly to the Council on Aging and not

3:06:17into the journal fund. So that way the good folks over there can figure out best how

3:06:21they can, you know, support our seniors with that money instead of, you know, the administration

3:06:28but just over at the Council on Aging. Look for a motion to adjourn this meeting. Very

3:06:34good. Second. Second by Councillor DiBona. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you.