The Everett City Council confirmed Monica Lamboy as chief development officer and Omar Boukili as chief administrative and financial officer, each 11-0, on Monday, April 13, after a public hearing on the administrative code changes that create their departments drew no speakers. Councilor Stephanie Martins said Boukili “has been doing a great job getting our budget ready to go.” Council President Stephanie Smith said the changes rename the chief financial officer post, which is vacant, and add the development job, and that no positions were cut in the current budget.
Data centers: Davis digs in
The first meeting under the council’s new three-minute comment rule drew 10 speakers, seven of them on data centers. A representative of the Davis Companies, identified as Ben, read a statement calling the planning board’s proposed limits “an existential threat to the shared pursuit of the highest and best uses in the district,” saying the limits on computer room size and power “will inhibit leasing to even standard research offices, financial firms, R and D, or life science users,” and asking the council to send the ordinance to committee. The company, he said, “reluctantly filed a subdivision plan that freezes the current zoning for the district,” which it would withdraw after “a collaborative process with the city.”
Residents answered. Ally Ressing of Locust Street, who works in a university computer science college, said the planning board’s April 6 amendment follows industry practice and that Davis “has been nothing but disingenuous.” John Burns, also of Locust Street, said Davis “would build a data center tomorrow if they could” and told the council to ask Lowell how its data center is going. Stephanie McCullough said the company’s letter proposed a 100-megawatt cap, “which would be classified as a hyperscale data center,” and defended diesel backup generators. Victoria Thistle and Selena Hernandez made similar points. Peggy Serino took the other side: data centers “are here and now the future of commerce and jobs. Instead of trying to stop them, you should be making sure they are built appropriately.”
When the Davis letter was placed on file, Councilor Katy Rogers said the planning board ordinance “is the compromise. It should not be compromised any further.” If it fails, she said, “I’m putting on a full ban again.” Martins said she asked Davis on March 4 to help write the compromise and “never got any collaboration in return.”
National Grid
Seven National Grid and Verizon petitions for nine new poles on Second, Boston, Spring, Third and Vine streets passed 10-1. The company’s designer, Sebastian Chen, said they bring a new feeder to serve a 134-unit building at 376 Second Street and add switching flexibility for the area. Councilor Peter Pietrantonio was skeptical: “We put over 5,000 units, 6,000 units down there. We’re putting a 134, and you’re adding nine poles.” Councilor Wayne Matewsky asked for streetlights on them. An eighth petition, for 3,500 feet of conduit and 10 manholes under Broadway from Beacham Street to Second Street, went to committee after Pietrantonio learned the company planned single-lane repaving on a street the city repaved last year. “Not doing a single lane. You go from curb to curb,” he said. Rogers again voted no on every National Grid item over the company’s Chapter 91 waterfront access dispute: “The time is up. I’m tired of it.”
A liquor commissioner’s story
Samuel Fern of Avon Street, confirmed to the licensing commission 10-0 along with Antonio Canelo to the public works commission, told the council his 20-year-old son was nearly killed years ago riding home from a Boston bar with a friend who had been overserved. “I take this position extremely seriously,” he said. He described two bars near his home with blacked-out windows and summer nights of “public urination, fights, traffic jams,” and said he would like to see live acoustic music in Everett restaurants. Rogers asked his help on nip bottle litter and a statewide deposit; Pietrantonio, whose family has run a liquor store for 40 years, said businesses should not be punished “because people are pigs.”
Also April 13
- The final vote on the wage theft ordinance was postponed to April 27 because the amended version had not been properly advertised. Jeff Cohen, a retired Salem councilor who wrote that city’s ordinance, said Lynn’s has been in place since 2018 with no lawsuits.
- Martins and Holly Garcia presented a citation to Sam Amato on the fifth anniversary of Way Better You fitness studio at 153B Main Street. The council held a moment of silence for Dean Gibbs, the city’s longtime superintendent of wires.
- The $40,000 advertising appropriation passed after Smith said the prior administration spent more than $180,000 a year on advertising and the council cut it to zero last budget. $150,000 for water and sewer emergency repairs, the audit appropriation as amended, the $43,000 Bluebikes grant and a state fire services grant passed. The fire prevention regulations were ordained 10-0.
- Six new nominations, including Michael Piazza to the housing authority board, Farah Costa to the licensing commission and Laura Evans to the disability commission, went to committee. The Chelsea Street Park loan went to Ways and Means with the parks master plan.
- The council asked the administration to place a memorial bench for Edward “Ed” Lucas Jr. outside the barbershop at 225 Elm Street, to reinstall the Ali memorial bench at 696 Broadway with a tribute to Najah Ali, and, on Matewsky’s resolution, to have Encore explain what happened to the Las Vegas-style entertainment promised when the casino opened. An Earth Day cleanup is Saturday, April 25 at 9:30 a.m. from the Target lot.
Previous council meeting (April 10): Everett Council Picks Its Own Legislative Aide, Mike Mangan, as Assistant City Clerk 7-3 Over Elections Veteran Caryn Antonelli
