SPRINGFIELD—Eons ago on Monday, before the meltdown with the outgoing school superintendent, the City Council held a relatively uneventful meeting. What occupied the most attention was the Community Choice Power Supply Aggregation (CCPSA) Plan. The city entered the program on the initiative of former Councilor Jesse Lederman and is now lumbering toward realizing its goals.
SPRINGFIELD—Despite a lengthy debate and reasonable fears about how the city’s principal revenue stream affects residents, the City Council approved the fiscal year 2025 budget. It passed last week with no modifications and no dissent. This was also the first annual spending document presented under the new Chief Administrative & Financial Officer, Cathy Buono.
SPRINGFIELD—The City Council sped through a thin agenda Monday that included a final realization of the new tree ordinance. Earlier this year, the Council approved a revamped arboreal code including fines and fees for removing public trees. However, the creation of the fund to use
SPRINGFIELD—On Monday, the City Council received a briefing on plans for Springfield’s share of the opioid settlement. Health & Human Services Commissioner Helen Caulton-Harris explained how her department will build out a response to opiate addiction within the city. Her presentation came with a startling
The Springfield City Council digested a simple agenda quickly on Monday. The only scent of discord arose from a split vote to transfer funds over a lawsuit. However, that conversation took place in executive session. The public highlights involved revised handicap parking and revival of
SPRINGFIELD—A relatively tame agenda before the City Council Monday quickly unraveled into much longer discourses. The body spent a considerable amount of time mediating on technical changes to legal documents. However, the body also had a pair of resolutions backing legislation in the legislature.
Former city councilor and now-Senator Adam Gomez appeared with Westfield Senator John Velis to discuss the firearm legislation.
SPRINGFIELD—A quiet agenda reached the City Council after a rollicking couple of weeks in February. If anything, what defined the March 11 meeting was what did not happen. The Council did not take action on a new version of a tree ordinance, opioid funding or two street discontinuances.
The recent row over the nature and powers of the Springfield Police Commission and the superintendent of the Police Department has reached a conclusion for now. On Tuesday, the City Council made the final changes in ordinance, as part of a compromise with Mayor Domenic
SPRINGFIELD—Mayor Domenic Sarno and the City Council averted a political crisis Monday by agreeing to sunset what now amounts to suspensions of key parts of the Police Commission ordinance. The change ostensibly arose to ensure Deputy Police Chief Lawrence Akers, who would be the city’s first Black police leader, will have the same powers his four predecessors had.
However, the pair of ordinances, which reallocate most of the Police Commission’s power other than to mete out discipline, prompted sharp pushback.
Ahead of the ascendence of Deputy Chief Lawrence Akers to Police Superintendent, the Springfield City Council considered a batch of legislation in an odd Tuesday meeting to smooth things over. Substantial changes to police leadership ordinances yielded a fractious, heated and, at times, bizarre debate.