Board of Health

CITY OF SALEM BOARD OF HEALTH MEETING MINUTES February 11, 2019 MEMBERS PRESENT: Paul Kirby, Chair, Kerry Murphy, Geraldine Yuhas, Datanis Elias ABSENT: Dr. Jeremy Schiller OTHERS PRESENT: David Greenbaum, Health Agent, Maureen Davis, Clerk of the Board, Beth Gerard, City Council Liaison, Sandra Power, Loring Avenue resident Lydia, a student from the Health Care Studies program at Salem State University, and Alena, a student from the UMass Boston Nursing program, were also present to observe the meeting TOPIC DISCUSSION/ACTION 1. Call to Order 7:00pm G. Yuhas motioned to take the agenda out of order. K. Murphy 2nd. All in favor. Motion passed. 2. Resident, Sandra Power, discussion Sandra Power talked about the issues at the property at 36 Loring Avenue. of issues at 36 Loring Avenue The porches are filled with junk and look as though they will collapse at any moment. The owner of the property runs a pipe-fitting business out of the home and keeps junk everywhere. He also uses the space on Charles Street behind his house as if he owns it. The City owns that land. He has been taken to court several times over the last eight years or so. He cleans up a little, but then goes right back to doing what he wants. D. Greenbaum said Jeffrey Barosy from the Health Department has been in contact with the owner and has had to resort to ticketing. To date, the owner has not paid any of the fines. We may have to take him back to court. D. Greenbaum said he will check to see if there may be a zoning violation if he is running a business. He will also add the property to the list of problem properties. P. Kirby thanked Mrs. Power for her patience in dealing with the situation. 3. Welcome David Greenbaum P. Kirby welcomed David Greenbaum and said the Board is very happy to have him. D. Greenbaum thanked the Board for the opportunity and said he is happy to be here. 4. Organization of the Board K. Murphy motioned to appoint M. Davis as Clerk of the Board. G. Yuhas 2nd. All in favor. Motion passed. J. Schiller spoke at times to both K. Murphy and P. Kirby about taking on the role of Chair. He suggested he would be willing to serve as Chair but has concerns because he can be called away for emergencies at any time. D. Greenbaum thinks continuity would be best at this time considering all that is happening with discussions about the possibility of an ISD. P. Kirby said he is ready to relinquish his title as Chair, but he would like to talk with J. Schiller before any decision is made.  D. Elias motioned to continue discussion of the Chair position until next month’s meeting. K. Murphy 2nd. All in favor. Motion passed. 5. Approval of Minutes G. Yuhas motioned to approve the minutes. K. Murphy 2nd. All in (January 15, 2019) favor. Motion passed. 6. Chairperson Communications Representatives from the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC) recently attended the Task Force meeting with the Mayor regarding ISD. The MAPC will be reaching out to Health and Building department staff to get their input and discuss any concerns. D. Greenbaum met with Mark Fine from MAPC today. Mark plans to meet with staff as a group at some point as well. All of the staff involved are union members, so he recommended there be a union representative at the group meeting. These changes may have to be collectively bargained. G. Yuhas suggested we add another nurse to the staff who will have the time to explore new programs and apply for grants. D. Greenbaum said the Board would relinquish the hiring and firing of Health Department staff because an ISD would change the Board’s authority. If, for example, there were an issue with a restaurant and we felt it necessary to shut a restaurant down, political influences could prevent any action the Board of Health wished to take. G. Yuhas pointed out that the Board of Health was set up to be non- political. With an ISD model, politics could get in the way of the Board’s decisions/actions. D. Greenbaum cautioned about the Home Rule Petition, which is a legislative change. Once it takes place, if the model doesn’t work, there is no guarantee that a new Mayor would be willing to change it back with another Home Rule Petition. He suggested we wait a year and see how things progress. He would like to ask the Lynn Health Director to speak about how they are actually looking into changing back because their model is not working. B. Gerard does not believe the City Council will vote an ISD through. D. Greenbaum said funding and staffing could accomplish the things the Mayor is looking for. K. Murphy got a sense that people would like to see whether or not staffing could accomplish things without having to make a major change. B. Gerard feels the Department has not been fully funded and that is a big problem. D. Greenbaum believes we could fund a position through fees. He feels the Certificate of Fitness fee can certainly go up. The fee hadn’t been increased in almost 30 years prior to the last change in 2006. B. Gerard feels that is possible since a lot of Planning Department salaries are funded by many sources. G. Yuhas said Kimberly Waller would be great for grant-writing position. 7. Monthly Reports-Updates a. Public Health No report this month. Suzanne Darmody is due to return from maternity Nurse’s Report leave on March 11th. b. Health Agent’s Report No report this month. c. Administrative Report Copy available at the BOH office.  d. City Council Liaison Updates B. Gerard reported that the City Council will discuss the Municipal and Religious Adaptive Reuse Overlay District plans for the reuse of buildings not currently being used. The archdiocese wants to sell unused properties to be used for affordable housing. Zoning sometimes becomes an issue. Recently at joint public hearings the Planning Board took back some of the zoning requirements and has made recommendations and the Council will review that. Salem is at or below 10% of affordable housing options. The waiting list for housing is years long. D. Greenbaum said getting a 40B program, which allows developers to override local zoning bylaws, is easier to put in a community if the percentage of affordable housing is less than 10%. He feels people have a huge misunderstanding of the difference between low-income housing and affordable housing. B. Gerard reported that the Governor said we are in a housing crisis. She feels inadequate affordable housing is a public health crisis. K. Murphy motioned to approve the reports. G. Yuhas 2nd. All in favor. Motion passed. 7. New Business/Scheduling of Future agenda items: Future Agenda Items - Discussion of Municipal and Religious Adaptive Reuse Overlay District - Discussion of updating regulations D. Greenbaum and E. Gagakis met in Peabody today to discuss regional body art regulations. They would like to assess regulations and come up with a model regulation for at least the 15 surrounding communities. District Incentive grant monies will be used to fund it. MEETING ADJOURNED: G. Yuhas motioned to adjourn. D. Elias 2nd. All in favor. Motion passed. 8:07pm Respectfully submitted, Maureen Davis Clerk of the Board Next regularly scheduled meeting is Tuesday, March 12, 2019 at 7:00pm At City Hall Annex, 98 Washington Street, 1st Floor, Salem, MA