Sustainability, Energy, & Resiliency Committee

Meeting Minutes - Final August 28, 2019 – 6:30PM City Hall – 98 Washington Street In Attendance: John Hayes, Jeff Cohen, Chris Cantone, Phil Koch, Brittany Dolan (staff), Jenna Ide (staff) Not in Attendance: Lisa Peterson (councilor), Rick Nye, Gail Kubik Public: Esmeralda Bisono (Community Solar Coach), Stan Franzeen (SAFE), Pat Gozemba (SAFE), Ann Sterling (Historic Salem, Inc.), Tim Jenkins, Nathan Dill (H.E.L.P.), Joe Rossi (H.E.L.P.), & Brian Baer (H.E.L.P.) 1. Introductions 2. Public Comment o Pat Gozemba – The event Making Salem Thrive, Bright Future for Salem will be taking place on October 1, 2019 from 6-8:30pm at the CLC at 401 Bridge Street in Salem. The Benson Bill (H.2810) will allow money from a carbon tax to be given back to the City. The session will be the first that will be a visioning session about what can be done with that money to make Salem more sustainable and resilient. SERC voted at the last meeting to co-sponsor this meeting with SAFE as well as other groups. It will involve a presentation, a round-table discussion, and then a reconvening of the ideas that were discussed. Sonia Hamel is going to be running this visioning session and after this, more programs like this will be run in communities across the state. o Ann Sterling – Historic Salem, Inc.- Historic Preservation is a huge problem along the eastern seaboard, and historic neighborhoods in Salem are going to be affected by climate change so we would like to start partnering with groups like you to start figuring out what we are going to do to preserve the history here in Salem. o Pat Gozemba – Gas leaks are also a major problem in Salem. There will be a presentation on gas leaks in Salem September 19, 2019 from 6-8:30pm at SATV (285 Derby St). o Stan Franzeen – We don’t know if the Benson Bill will pass but the visioning session is the first step for Salem in figuring out how we would spend that money if Salem were to receive it. Salem would qualify for a larger sum of money than most municipalities in MA because it is a gateway community and an environmental justice community. The seagrass at Collins Cove will get the first chance to prove itself and, in the future, more projects like this may be done. Hubie Halloween is supposed to be filming on Derby Wharf this weekend and  they are concerned with the tropical storm off the coast that their set will be destroyed if there is any storm surge at all. 3. Review & Approve Meeting Minutes o Jeff Cohen motioned to approve the minutes with any revisions to Brittany by Friday at 8am. Chris Cantone seconded. o Vote passes unanimously. 4. Massachusetts Coastal Coalition (MCC) – Joe Rossi, Executive Director of MCC o Hazard Elimination and Loss Prevention (H.E.L.P.) Program o Jenna Ide – The presentation will be posted on our website. o The mission of the MCC is to educate, advocate, and inform professionals and stakeholders regionally and nationally, on flood hazards. o The Elevated Studio – Brian Baer - Strengthen individuals by building back better from a disaster. Promote social equity by expanding access to socially-responsible design that helps communities achieve economic and physical resilience and sustainability. They like to use the word “sustainaffordability”. If it’s not sustainable then it’s not affordable and vice versa. 85% of the buildings in the Northeast are not sustainable or resilient. We try to reimagine these buildings so that communities can recover quicker in the future. o Jeff Cohen – Is your program income based? o Brian Baer – We help the 90-95% of people that don’t have the ability to afford to rebuild by themselves. We also have disaster case managers and they work with the architects to come up with holistic survivor centric recovery. o Jenna Ide – Do you ever say it’s not worth it to a homeowner? o Brian Baer – Yes, we do constantly. o Joe Rossi – The disaster cycle shown in the diagram is linear but, it is much more circular in real life. H.E.L.P. is a program designed to be a full life cycle hazard mitigation service. There is no cost for a City or Town to implement the H.E.L.P program. It is paid through application development and project administration costs of awarded grants. There are two individual grant programs (Flood Mitigation Assistance (FMA) and Hazard Mitigation Grant Program (HMPG)). The grants are for individual property owners. FMA is a national competitive program. HMPG is based off a calculation that takes place post event. o Chris Cantone – What is the City’s role in all of this? o Joe Rossi – The City issues an RFP for us to come in. The City is going to be handling the funds and H.E.L.P. would be the one using the funds and implementing the program. This would all be outlined in the RFP. o Jenna Ide – We should have another meeting with more people from the City to go through all of this. o Jeff Cohen – Motioned to move forward to have more discussions with relevant staff members including the Mayor. Chris Cantone seconded. o Vote passes unanimously. 5. Solarize Mass Plus Next Steps o Community Solar Coach – Esmeralda Bisono o Installer proposals due September 5, 2019 by 4:59pm o Volunteer event sign-up: ▪ Party on the Bridge - September 7, 2019, 4-9pm  ● Remond Park, 1 Bridge St. ▪ Book Swap – September 14, 2019, 10-1pm ● Community Life Center, 401 Bridge St. ▪ Salem Farmer’s Market – September 19, 2019, 3-7pm ● Derby Square off Front St. o Contact Esmeralda Bisono at ebisono@salem.com to volunteer for future events. 6. Salem PowerChoice Update o We have a new 30-month electricity supply contract with Dynegy. o Jenna Ide- This should save you money over the life of the contract. o Chris Cantone – This is part of a national government aggregation program. These prices are standardized, and they protect you vs. a third-party supply contract. o Jenna Ide – The City of Salem was approved to buy this on behalf of the residents. This is different than the companies that call you and come to your house. Salem PowerChoice will never call you or come to your door. o Chris Cantone – Once you opt out of this program, you are out until this contract ends. 7. Project Updates o Will give project updates at next meeting. 8. New Business/Upcoming Events o John Hayes – Can SERC members check out the website and resiliency FAQ for next time and give any final comments for next meeting. o Jenna Ide – Two new people have applied to be part of the committee. We need to fill the 7th spot on the committee. 9. Next Meeting – Wednesday September 25, 2019 at 6:30pm 10. Adjournment o Jeff Cohen motioned to adjourn. Chris Cantone seconded. ▪ Vote passes unanimously. Meeting is adjourned at 8:36pm. Minutes respectfully submitted by Brittany Dolan.