Should I redo that?

The regular meeting of the Annapolis City Council on Monday, February 9th, will be called to order at 7 p.m.

At this time, we will have a moment of silence to prepare ourselves for the work ahead.

At this time, would everyone willing and able please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance?

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands.

Under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you.

Madam City Clerk, will you please call the role?

Mayor Littman.

Present.

Alder Woman O'Neill.

Present Alman Smith Brown.

Present.

All the woman also.

Present.

Sorry.

Present.

Present.

Honorable McConti.

Present.

Aldama Savage.

Present.

Let me lay.

Alderman Thor.

Present.

Thank you.

Okay.

The city attorney, will you please present the next item on the agenda?

Next item on the agenda is the approval of the agenda.

At this time, I'd entertain a motion to approve the agenda.

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed?

Motion carries.

Miss City Attorney, please present the next item on the agenda.

Next item on the agenda is a ceremonial item, the proclamation honoring Ellen O.

Moyer, the former mayor of Annapolis.

Thank you.

Miss Mayor Moyer will please come to the stand.

Okay.

This is your moment.

Miss Mayor Moyer.

It is a great pleasure to be able to celebrate you and just in anticipation of a big milestone birthday coming up.

I won't say the number.

If uh you know, I suppose it's 29.

Yeah.

And so it's uh I'm very grateful for you to be here.

Would you like to have your family up here with you for this?

Come on up.

Excellent.

Excellent to see them both again.

So it is our pleasure.

I'm going to read this plot proclamation and then invite you to say a few words, if you will, to share with us.

This is a proclamation as opposed to a city citation, because we're not just giving you a citation, but we're proclaiming February 12th, your upcoming birthday as Ellen Moyer Day.

Wonderful.

I don't always read this entire thing, but you've done so much that I think it's worthy of reading the entire proclamation.

So bear with me while I do this, and I'll try to speak up so you can hear it.

Whereas Ellen Moyer made history as the first woman elected mayor of Annapolis in 2001, breaking barriers and inspiring generations of leaders in our city.

And whereas Mayor Moyer's tenure was marked by her commitment to environmental stewardship, including the creation of the Annapolis Conservancy Board and the Greenscape Program, which we've enjoyed together, leaving a lasting legacy on the city's parks, waterfront, and public spaces.

And whereas prior to serving as mayor, Ellen Moyer served with distinction on the Annapolis City Council.

Sixteen years.

Okay.

The Maryland Racing Commission and the as executive director of the Maryland Commission for Women, advocating tirelessly for education, equity, and civic engagement.

And whereas her dedication to public service is matched by her unflinching attention to detail, often expressed through spirited phone calls and emails to city staff, a testament to her passionate commitment to the betterment of Annapolis, and whereas beyond her professional achievements, Ellen Moyer has been a devoted mother and grandmother, instilling values of leadership, civic responsibility, and resilience in her children and grandchildren.

And whereas beyond her professional achievements, Ellen Moyer has been a devoted mother and grandmother, instilling values of leadership, civic responsibility, and resilience in her children and grandchildren.

And whereas in recognition of her historic leadership, unwavering service, and the colorful yet always devoted spirit she has brought to the city of Annapolis.

It is fitting to honor Ellen Moyer with a day dedicated in her name.

Now therefore, I, Jared Littman, mayor of the city of Annapolis, do hereby do hereby proclaim February twelfth, 2026 as Ellen O.

Moyer Day in the City of Annapolis.

We would love to hear some remarks if you have any anything you'd like to share with us.

And I'm going to give her the proclamation to hold.

Oh, wonderful.

Thank you very much.

I am dear indeed humbled and honored.

You know, of me.

You are in an admirable position.

You have one of the best jobs in the country.

You really do to be mayor of this city where civil government was born.

You know, what could be better than that?

And for all the representatives here, you know, but they disappeared.

Oh, real close.

There we go.

Okay.

All right.

I don't know where I was.

Can you can you still do that?

Well, it is.

It is.

Um, I I would like to just say a couple of couple of things because when I was mayor, which was back in 201 to 209, so that was some time ago.

You know, my office was immediately as you come in the door downstairs.

It was immediately to the to the right, and that door was always open.

It wasn't, it isn't open now, but it was open always open then, so that anybody could come in, and they did.

Um, I was accessible to talk with anybody that wanted to come in and speak with me.

And I know, even though you've moved to the second floor, you guys are still accessible and still tuned in to the citizens that you serve around you, and I know that you listen and talk with them.

But it was uh, you know, it was just a really good time.

Um the office that I was in, the mayor before me, had had the windows bulletproof glass put in it.

I can't imagine.

But anyway, oh they did.

You know, there were two offices in that space and a conference room, where actually then we had a city newspaper, and then we had a staff person from the Washington Post that served this area.

So we had regular meetings with the in that conference room, regular discussions with the press with questions back and forth.

And I don't know, I don't guess you can if you have that now.

Not quite the same.

We do have the press coming in.

Well, the press for the press, where's the pressure?

Okay, all right.

Well, very good.

We don't have a hometown newspaper anymore.

But um, you know, alas, alas, we must be the only capital city in the country that doesn't have its own newspaper.

Well, not really.

Thank you for doing what you do, but it's not still not the oldest newspaper in the country, the capital was, and whatever's ever left of it, I guess is still the old oldest newspaper in the country.

Anyway, I want to thank you very much for recognizing me and sharing my birthday with me.

Um and having a special day on my birthday, meaning Abraham Lincoln.

Thank you.

On behalf of the city council members that are there to your right, my my right, my left as well, we all wish you know, I know you.

We always we all wish you a happy birthday, and thank you for your service to Annapolis.

Would you mind if we pose for a picture of having us together?

Thank you.

Okay, Miss City Attorney, would you please present the next item on the agenda?

Next item on the agenda is petitions, reports, and communications, beginning with the update from the mayor.

Thank you.

This won't be as long as last week.

Good evening, and welcome to the Annapolis City Council.

It's a it's currently the second week of Black History Month when we take time to honor and recognize African American history and the contributions of Black Annapolitans, not only to the fabric of Annapolis, but also to the nation.

In preparation for the 250th anniversary of the United States, we are presenting a month-long history and cultural culture series rooted in revolution, 250 years of black history in Annapolis, in conjunction with the Anorondo County Public Library.

The second session will be held tomorrow, February 10th at 5 30 p.m.

at the Michael E.

Bush Library on West Street.

Tomorrow's theme will be building community, faith, education, and black institutions, highlighting black churches, schools, mutual aid societies, and leadership through the emancipation and Jim Crow eras.

Next, on February 17th, resistance and reform, a look at civil rights and social justice will highlight local organizing, desegregation efforts, and connections to the national movement.

The last one on February 24th will examine Black Annapolis today and tomorrow with a focus on contemporary leadership, the arts and culture, and youth voices.

These events are free and open to the public with free food and refreshments provided.

We hope to see you there.

While these events start at 5 30, the food will be available starting at 5 p.m.

Last Thursday, we kicked off our 2026 Town Hall series at Eastport Neck Library.

Alderman Savage and I were grateful to the Ward 7 residents who braved the cold to join us.

We had a productive conversation about the current state of Annapolis, giving us in city government the opportunity to learn more about the everyday concerns of Annapolis residents and what city directors need to address.

I hope that the residents who attended left feeling more familiar with their city leaders and more confident that we are working to improve their lives.

To any residents, Ward 7 or otherwise who weren't able to join us last Thursday, you can watch the recording of this town hall on the YouTube channel.

Go to the City of Annapolis page and search for the video titled Mayor Town Hall Ward 7, February 5th, 2026.

And as of the time of this meeting, it is the most recent video uploaded.

This was the first of two town halls that we are aspiring to do in each ward this year, 16th total.

So those there's going to be many more to participate.

The next one will be this Thursday in Ward 2.

You can join Alder Woman Karma O'Neal and I at 6 30 p.m.

at Mary Moss Academy, located at 245 Clay Street.

Thursday, February 19th, at the uh East.

I'm sorry.

At uh sorry, located at 245 Clay Street.

Next week, we'll be in Ward 8 with Alderman Thorpe at the Eastport Fire Station.

Join Alderman Thorpe and I at 6 30 p.m.

during the Eastport Civic Association meeting.

As a reminder, this is not your only chance to meet your elected officials, but you'll also, it's not only a chance to meet your elected officials, but also the directors and chiefs who run city operations and programs.

If you want to know when we'll be in your ward, head to Annapolis.gov, search engagement opportunities.

That'll take you to a page with a list of the town halls we currently have scheduled.

As a reminder, another opportunity on the engagement opportunities page is a forum to sign up for office hours.

I will hold office hours one Wednesday each month, giving you the opportunity to share your concerns and ideas directly with me.

On the engagement opportunities page, there's a calendar to schedule in 15 minute intervals, one on one conversations with me.

Click the button that says jump to the next bookable date, and I'll take you to the next spot.

These town halls and office hours are part of my broader strategy for listening and engaging with residents and businesses.

To help Annapolis work for everyone, city government must listen carefully and develop solutions with the community.

These engagement opportunities are your opportunity to help shape our city's future.

Okay.

The city is recruiting for two open positions.

If you are or if you know of an experienced public sector leader who wants to get involved in local government in Annapolis, you can check out the application to be Annapolis's next city manager by going to the city managers page on Annapolis.gov.

We are using a recruiting firm for this national search.

We've also posted the open city attorney position.

If you or someone you know is interested in learning more or applying, go to Annapolis.gov and search for jobs with the city, and you'll see among the other posted jobs.

As of today, we're officially 70 days into the administration.

I'd like to share with you the progress that we've made on the 100 day plan.

Here's where we are.

Firstly, I promise to build a strong accountable leadership team from day one.

I've met with every director in chief of the departments to clarify expectations and identify gaps.

Second, I promise to listen to city staff with assistance from due east partners.

We've currently just recent sorry, we've just recently concluded 19 round tables to be where we invited the entire city staff to come to one of those 19 conversations.

This was open to all city employees across all departments, helping us to determine what's working, what's not, and what we can improve.

I'm very much looking forward to getting that report and shut and following up with next steps.

Third, I promised regular communication and transparency with residents.

In addition to the town halls and office hours I mentioned, we're emailing weekly newsletters, beginning planning regular neighborhood walkthroughs with city leadership to see issues firsthands.

Next, I promise to act quickly on major high impact challenges such as City Doc.

We've enhanced our communications and outreach to inform stakeholders about this project while also exploring options to reduce expenses.

Regarding permits, I can report that residents and businesses navigating the permitting process are already finding it faster and easier.

It remains a top priority of mine to continue that progress.

As for parking, we're actively working to make things easier for residents and visitors alike, including creating new signage and pamphlets to help visitors and navigate downtown and find parking.

We have a couple exciting uh opportunities with parking that are I'm really excited about, but they're not final, so I'm not ready to share them, but coming very soon, I hope.

I've also begun tackling the shortage of affordable housing by co-sponsoring legislation with alderman woman O'Neil for 12-month moratorium, a new short time-term license rental licenses while we work to improve enforcement and address concerns.

Finally, I promise to link spending to outcomes that matter to residents.

As my administration prepares our first budget, we're working to identify the top priorities of city directors, alder persons, and residents.

Our goal is to focus on only the most pressing needs while being deliberate with tax money.

At 70 days in, we're doing what I said we would do, putting leadership in place, listening closely, and taking early action on the issues that matter most, although there's always more work to be done.

And on that note, let's get on with the meeting.

Uh attorney, would you please present the next item on the agenda?

The next item on the agenda is reports by committees.

Okay.

Would any council member like to present a report from their committee?

Alder Woman O'Neill.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

The public safety committee met two weeks ago, and we had um reports from each of our public safety um units, um, starting with fire department, office emergency management, and that was police department.

Our committee had asked them to provide um three to five goals that they had uh for the coming year and um ways that we could as a committee help them.

Um so we had a really robust discussion on that.

Our next meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, February 18th at 445 here in council chambers.

Um we did not have any legislation to discuss at that meeting, um, but I believe that there is some coming up.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions for all the women O'Neill?

Okay.

Uh Alder Woman.

Uh also Johnson.

I didn't have any questions.

I'm sorry, Mr.

Mayor.

I'm sorry.

I didn't have any questions.

Do you have a report you'd like to present?

I do have a report.

Go ahead.

Um, just want to thank you.

Um, Mr.

Mayor.

Um we had um updates on the SP cameras.

Um, the Naples Police Department came to attend the meeting and gave some updates on the speed cameras.

We also had um updates from the Transportation Department and also from the Transportation Board.

And we will be meeting um this Wednesday at four o'clock, if anyone is interested to come to our transportation committee meeting.

That's all I have at this time.

Thank you.

Any questions for Alderwoman, also Johnson?

Okay.

Any other committee reports?

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh yes, environmental matters is meeting this Thursday at 3 p.m.

And we will be discussing one piece of legislation, which is uh the performance measurements.

And um I'm gonna be bringing some amendments to the committee for discussion.

And then we'll also be getting a report from Plan Zoning on the tree canopy program, public works on the uh water restoration fund.

Um I believe that's it.

Okay, thank you.

Any questions for Alderman Savage?

Okay.

Any other committee reports?

Okay.

Yeah, I'll share reports.

Although Alderman Smith Brown.

So at our last meeting, we did vote favorably for O 4125, which was the changes in exempt service jobs classification for the deputy chief of staff position.

Um we also voted uh to speak further at our next meeting uh in regards to the property tax child care centers, family uh child care homes and large family child care homes.

We're gonna have some presenters come forward to just give us some um additional information.

Uh we also had a general discussion, appreciate our um acting city manager Buck Linnon, our chief of comprehensive planning, um, Lysinski, who came and they answered questions in regards to just development and the vision that we have in enforcing this 2040 comprehensive plan.

Um, our next meeting is going to be scheduled Thursday, March 5th, 2026.

Um, and we will be requesting uh that the Anorona County Board of Supervised Elections as well as the State Board of Supervisor Advisors of Elections um come and present to us for some changes for our election code.

Thank you.

Have they responded to your invitation yet?

Um we actually are in the process of of sending that invitation.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any questions for Alderman Smith Brown?

Okay.

Any other committee reports?

Okay, seeing on.

We'll move on.

Ms.

City Attorney, please present the next item on the agenda.

Next item on the agenda is comments by the general public.

Okay.

Uh I am going to invite the one speaker in a moment uh listed on the sign-up sheets.

Come forward.

And that first person is Alth Arthur Roberts on Duke of Gloucester.

Please uh come to the podium.

State your name and address for the record, please, and you'll have three minutes.

Oh, sorry.

Hello, my name is Arthur Roberts.

Um I live at 108 Duke of Gloucester, where my family has resided for about a hundred years.

And uh it's on the corner of Newman and Duke, and Newman's named after my grandfather.

Um it's a plateau, it's the highest point on land in the city of Annapolis, surrounded by water and trees, and we've kind of had a bird's eye view of Annapolis for a long time.

My grandchildren are ninth generation Anapolitan.

And um, I have a couple issues um to discuss, but the one I'm gonna discuss tonight is um the idea of making Duke of Gloucester Street a two-way street.

Um, it would make both the parking problem and the traffic flow problem much worse and create much danger for the residents, the churches, the kindergarten, and the schools and businesses, as well as cause more congestion than what we already have to deal with.

I'm sorry, I have to read this.

It it it might go uh it I it well it was three minutes exactly, now it's gonna be three and a half.

I just need to concentrate on this.

Sorry, I'm a little nervous.

Um it would also be very expensive and damage the structure of our beautiful city.

During the rush hour in the AM, St.

Mary students are getting dropped off and walking to school.

The danger and traffic jams it would cause are unspeakable.

It would lead to more narrow sidewalks, even the steps of City Hall would come right out to the street where a girl was once struck and killed already without the sidewalks being narrowed.

The infrastructure would have to be altered, eliminating and removing fire hydrants where they are placed strategically for the safety of our school, church, and residences.

Ambulances, fire trucks, and police vehicles would be stuck in traffic with their lights and sirens being useless unless it remains two lanes going one direction as it is now.

The St.

Mary's drop-offs during the AM rush hour and pickups in the afternoons would be pure chaos while traffic is at a standstill in two directions instead of one.

The toxic fumes, which are already a huge danger during these traffic jams, would be twice as hazardous, as well as two times a runoff into the bay.

We don't need or want this change.

Annapolis was built the way it is for a reason.

A safe, even flow of traffic rotating off the two very important circles, church and state.

It would be hazardous and foolish as well as very costly to change it.

Trash pickup would also be impeded as and it's already a huge problem.

And the driveways on both sides of the street would be almost impossible to get in and out of.

And the handicapped accesses would also be taken away or narrowed.

Duke of Gloucester must not be two-way traffic.

As our new mayor, we the people of Annapolis asking you to do the right thing.

You and your children are also part of the city.

I don't even know if you have children, I just put that.

Okay.

Thank you for your testimony.

Is there anyone else in the uh chambers who would please come up?

And if there's uh other people, feel free to line up on the side so we can help you move along.

Please start with your name and address.

Good evening, City Council.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak before you this evening.

My name is Matthew Wallace.

I live at 701 Chesapeake Avenue.

First time being here, a little nervous.

Um it was great to see all of you running um in the recent election, and when I create congratulations.

Um I lead a small nonprofit based in Eastport.

We collaborate with residents of the city's public housing neighborhoods to create community gardens and opportunities for youth enrichment.

Uh we've had an incredible kind of pilot growing season in 2025, which I've had the opportunity to connect with many of you about.

Um tens of thousands of vegetables produced in collaboration with incredible community members and support from wonderful local businesses.

I'm here excited to announce uh ESport Community Farm project happening this year.

I had a wonderful meeting with uh Director Maddox Evans of the Housing Authority this afternoon, and we are excited to have a half-acre community farm growing site uh at the end of Frederick Douglass Street in between Eastport Terraces and the Housing Authority HQ.

You may be aware that this land is um slated for redevelopment.

However, this is the perfect opportunity for us to pilot this community farming initiative and really iron things out before it's introduced along with the redevelopment.

We hope to produce a hundred thousand servings of fresh uh fresh vegetables within the community over the next two growing seasons and transformational opportunities for youth engagement.

The the most wonderful part of this has been growing leaders, the way that the kids have stepped up to take ownership of these projects, take ownership of the gardens to build things.

Um Daisha's son is a wonderful part of these programs.

And I look forward to continue collaborating through our organization with Annapolis's uh wonderful public housing residence and and wider uh city residents.

So Eastport Community Farm, the ribbon cutting is May 2nd.

I look forward to seeing you all there.

Thank you for your testimony.

Mayor Littman.

Mayor Little.

Yes, questions, please.

Um, hey, how are you doing today?

All right, thanks, sir.

Um I was wondering, I'm sure you're connected with Heaven White as well, who's she's here with me this evening.

No, I gotta shut up my own case.

That's okay.

That's all I wanted to make sure.

Her eighth year gardening in Eastport Terraces, she will be in charge.

Any other questions?

Okay, I think thank you for your testimony.

Thank you, sir.

And a couple of requests, um, just as we're fundraising, would be grateful to any introductions to your networks.

We're gathering resources to bring into the community, of course, and looking forward to seeing you on May 2nd.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Okay.

Is there anyone else who wishes to provide general comments?

Okay.

Seeing no motion in the chambers, I declare the comments by the general public closed.

Ms.

City Attorney, will you please present the next item on the agenda?

The next item on the agenda is ID 3626, the city council discussion on houseboats and house barges.

Thank you.

Harbormaster Bellis, will you please come to the front table?

And looks like you might have some people to bring with you.

And again, for context for those putting things trying to uh put things into a categories, this is a topic that is we would normally think of as a work session topic, but because we have so many items on the work session list and not so much legislation yet.

We're trying to include some of these work sessions during our city council meetings.

Good evening.

Thank you very much.

My name is Beth Pellis.

I'm the harbor master.

My entire team is here tonight, and we're very excited to have some time to speak with the council and the mayor.

Um solicit your opinions about the direction that we should go with our waterways.

Um we have three topics tonight.

One is um I shouldn't commercial vessels in city waterways.

Um also moorings.

Get close close to your microphone, please.

And um also anchored boats in city waters during the winter.

Um so we have a we have a um presentation that we distributed ahead of time, and we're gonna go through that now.

We would love it if you would wait your questions to the end.

So if you could just jot them down for time's sake.

Thank you.

And keep in mind, since you were kind enough to share your presentation in advance, we've all had a chance to review the presentation.

Um good evening, um, Mayor Littman, Jackie Gall, Deputy City Manager for Resilience and Sustainability.

We also have with us John Manasseh for the Department of Planning and Zoning for Code Enforcement because this issue of enforcement and permitting house barges overlaps into planning and zoning.

So he's here to clarify that portion of the code um how Title 17 fits in with Title 15.

Thank you.

Good evening.

My name is Tim Jacobs.

I work at the Harbor Master's Office.

Uh, like you said, you all had a chance to review it.

I had a couple shots of espresso, so I'll go as fast as I know how.

Uh so uh as mentioned, we're looking for direction uh in terms of short-term rentals.

When we're talking about houseboats, floating homes, and other uh vessels that are being used as short-term rentals.

That's really what we're talking about.

We're also looking at determining permissible uses of houseboats and floating homes or house barges when it comes to offices, constructions, or full-time residences, if that's uh something we choose to do.

Uh as mentioned, the current challenge with Title 15 is there's not an effective uh it's not effective in permitting or prohibiting houseboats or house barges as short-term rentals.

Uh so before we work at changing this code, we'd we'd like to know what the direction we should go.

So I know you had a chance to see us, so I'll just go really quickly over these images.

Uh I just want to point out that top left image.

I know it's hard to see, but if you can see the middle piling, the one that's in the middle of the boat, that's the size of the slip.

Um, just for reference.

So that's twice the size uh that vessel is twice the size of what should be in that slip, um, which is one of the things we're seeking direction on.

Uh, if we choose to allow these, what dimensions are we looking at?

Um the reason this is not uh legal right now in city waters is that this is a platform that can't press propel itself.

Um this is the same houseboat, and uh renters who don't know code uh would of course want to tie their boat up to it, which creates an even larger navigational hazard.

Uh this is another example of a platform or houseboat being used as a short-term rental in Back Creek.

Um currently, neither the Harbor Master nor planning zoning are able to address these issues through code.

Um then we also have these what looks like a normal vessel, right?

This is uh a hatteress by any means if you're looking at it, you might not know, but this is a short-term rental.

The bold lettering is from the advertisement is for accommodations only, and it may not be driven.

Um these are what is allowed now.

Okay, we do have dimensions set forth.

And if uh a marina wanted to uh put a houseboat or house barge, they would be required to provide two designated spaces.

Um it does depend on the size of the marina, how many of these platforms they'd be able to place.

However, as we've already pointed out, the permit required uh which would go through planning and zoning and our office is for a um sorry, what's the name of the yeah, it's basically designed for occupancy for a structure.

Um more of single family home structure, not a floating structure.

So there is no way forward in that permitting process.

Uh as I mentioned, there are some exceptions to the code, uh, and those are platforms that have existed before 1984, uh construction related barges, uh something that's in the town for repair at a marina, um, and something that's for sale as long as it meets those size dimensions.

Zoning in our office is for a um sorry what's the name of the yeah it's basically designed for occupancy for a structure um a more of single family home structure not a floating structure so there is no way forward in that permitting process uh as I mentioned there are some exceptions to the code uh and those are platforms that have existed before 1984 construction related barges uh something that's in the town for repair at a marina um and something that's for sale as long as it meets those size dimensions and anything being used as an office or storage or fueling and we do have those in the city as you know we had a a task force that was uh implemented in April 2025 um with very specific tasking for that task force and that was to determine the effect on the city's maritime industry and the benefits and drawbacks of the community and the consequences for city operations uh that task force was made up of 15 members appointed by previous mayor and council and uh it was very diverse and full of uh professional mariners as well as uh the community the overwhelming uh recommendation from the task force was to enact an ordinance prohibiting the use of house barges for rental purposes that includes making it unlawful to obtain a city business or rental license for such use um we did include I'm sure you saw these but these are uh examples of different municipalities and uh some of whom have decided to out and out ban the use of short-term rentals and houseboats and house barges and then the community of Wilmington if you get a chance to look at it's actually a pretty cool they've designated one area one marina uh outside the city that's all short term rental houseboats um so the questions we we pose are do we want to allow house barges and boats in city waters as an office like we currently do uh we want to allow them for an individual owner or family to live on as their primary residence and do we want to allow them as short term rentals the same example below and if we do is there are dimensions uh different than what we already have outlined uh that would be recommended so task force and our office agree there are some positive outcomes for allowing short term rentals on vessels um the visiting public gets to see exactly what we get to see at work every day you know a peaceful serene creek and get to uh enjoy the communities in a in a different way than you might at a hotel or an Airbnb however the negative outcomes uh are are pretty heavy uh it would require as we pointed out someone who specialize in and certifying these as safe um it would also require us to find a way forward for initiating taxes uh right now if you're operating a short term rental there's there's no fees associated with it's a pure profit margin at anywhere from five to seven hundred dollars a night and it would also have an impact on the marina industry locally and uh the boating community as at large slips would become more scarce and they might go up in uh in price as I mentioned the staff impact we would have to have someone come in uh and figure this out from a uh survey uh a vessel surveying standpoint to figure out what it what we deem safe and what would be included in the permitting process and of course there's a financial and staffing burden associated with that task force recommendation I already covered but uh I just want to point out that that task force did a fantastic job I know you all received a 50 page report um they made our work incredibly easy um and on based on their report uh they did uh recommend prohibiting the use of house barges for rental purposes uh house barge our harbor master's recommendation supports the task force's recommendation uh to prohibit short term rentals on houseboats and other vessels one thing we did want to address there was some questions that when we initially implemented the task force and that was whether we're concerned with live aboards um we did want to include a definition of liverboard um for those of you don't know there's plenty of people that live full time on their boats at marinas and in city waters that is not what we're talking about neither the task force nor the harbor master's office believe the uh liver boards or legitimate charters should be further regulated uh we did have some other uh as hard master mentioned we have some other Title 15 considerations uh we're recommending that the city prohibit anchored boats in city waters during winter months this winter is a perfect example of why it could be uh dangerous and is dangerous to have folks living on the hook uh throughout the winter months um we do have folks that try to do it typically if you're trying to live on the hook and and this is a generalization um you're going to need assistance uh you're gonna run out of supplies and we mean the harbor master's office andor rescue services are going to have to go out and facilitate that assistance in less than ideal conditions and I'll just um I'll just jump in for a quick minute that's actually a picture of um our hydrographics unit for the state of Maryland going to offer services to an anchored boat um they didn't have

Typically, if you're trying to live on the hook and this is a generalization, um you're going to need assistance.

Uh you're going to run out of supplies, and we, meaning the harbor master's office and/or rescue services are going to have to go out and facilitate that assistance in less than ideal conditions.

And I'll just um I'll just jump in for a quick minute.

That's actually a picture of our hydrographics unit for the state of Maryland going to offer services to an anchored boat.

Um they didn't have water, they didn't have a way to charge their cell phone.

There's often a check on the welfare.

And while we know that uh lots of people want to anchor their boats, uh in Maryland, it's often not a safe situation between mid to late December to mid to late March given most of these folks don't have generators, they don't have any way to keep warm.

And so we do spend a great deal of time offering social services.

Um we do have we do have a plan for these folks if the council and the mayor are um are supportive of the idea of limiting those anchored um boats during those months.

Uh we have a way to get them to um winter storage docks.

Um and um we're not gonna leave them out in the cold, but right now we are kind of leaving them out in the cold by allowing them to anchor there.

So well, we'd love for the council and the mayor to entertain some ideas about how to um improve upon this.

Do you want to say that more in there?

Sure.

Yeah, and on your plate today, later on this evening, you will see that we have some mooring legislation.

Um I would um I would tell you that this is more of a correction than a change.

Um at the moment, the way that the code reads is that it's uh not lawful to have a vessel moored within 75 feet of any structure shore or private mooring.

Um if we were to enforce that, every single mooring in city waters once we put a vessel on that mooring would be in violation.

So it's clearly not the intent of that section.

So really this is just a cleanup measure.

Um what that section really should say is that a mooring should not be any closer to another mooring or a shoreline or a structure, um, not the vessel itself.

And so as we went about the um as we went about the task of planning some new moorings, we sort of realized, oh, this is a mess.

This doesn't work.

This is not how this is supposed to be written.

And so when you look at that legislation later this evening, um if you have questions, we'll still be here.

But we're just presenting this slide to you to help you understand the purpose of this change, which I would present to you as a correction as opposed to a change.

And so our transient moorings are typically a hundred feet apart, and those will allow a vessel uh up to 55 feet in length, and our annual moorings are 75 to 100 feet apart, and they can accommodate up to 42-foot vessels.

And in my 10 years of being here, um, there's never been any trouble with those.

And so moving forward, we we hope that you'll support this legislation to understand that we're just making sure that it makes sense to keep it as it is.

And then in summary, we're just looking for your guidance because we don't want to go and try to make some changes to Title 15 if everybody's not sort of on the same page as to how we would move forward.

Okay, is that the presentation?

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Just want to make sure it wasn't interrupting.

Thank you, first of all, for the presentation and all that information.

Um, before we open it up to uh questions or discussions, I just want to clarify if I can what your various recommendations are.

Uh it sounds like it's to prohibit short-term rentals in marinas.

Is that accurate?

Short-term rentals on boats.

Short-term, okay.

So number one is yes.

So Alderman Thor.

Just for clarification purposes, last year the city council addressed um short-term rentals on boats in marinas.

I think the focus here is short-term rentals on private piers and other boats.

I would say it's short-term rentals on any boat.

There you go.

It would broaden, it broadens the discussion beyond just commercial arenas.

Okay.

Yes.

So number one is no short-term rentals on any boat.

Correct.

Okay.

Within Annapolis waters.

Yes, sir.

Okay.

Second um recommendations.

I heard it is uh prohibit anchoring of boats during winter months.

Correct.

If on those dates December 1st through March uh 20th.

And so wintering.

And then the third was the code change for 75 feet between mooring balls as opposed to between vessels.

Correct.

And then we're also just sort of seeking guidance about house barges or houseboats as they're defined in the handout.

Okay.

Okay, thanks for that clarity.

All right.

Uh what questions and discussion?

Alderman Thorpe.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

And and I would like to applaud uh the office of the Harbor Master.

This is a example for me where in the 71 days of this council, it's it's given me the opportunity to gain a better appreciation for what you all do.

I think the body of work that you have presented.

Um specifically also to the opportunity to read it before the brief, and then your presentation should be applauded.

Um in addition, by you providing this brief in advance, we were able to tell our residents that it was out there.

And I received a tremendous amount of feedback on the on the brief.

Um very supportive of what your recommendation is.

And and Mr.

Mayors, you pointed out there's several topics.

I'd like to address the house barges first, maybe as a group and then come back to the other ones.

Because the house barges or or whatever we call them, boats as short-term rentals, um, is a significant issue for the future of Annapolis, both based on uh who we are as a city as well as the infrastructure costs.

And I think it was addressed about city taxes from uh uh boats, but but also I've done two ride-alongs overnight with the police.

They don't go down to the piers routinely.

Both officers I was with, impressive officers had never stepped foot on a pier.

And to your point about it's this is not about live aboards, live aboards police themselves very well.

Uh the marinas police them.

Uh as a community, they're policed.

But what when we talk about short-term rentals and we talk about people who have no experience being on a boat um and being down on a pier on a day like today, or even uh a July evening when there's wet, the piers are wet or whatever.

Our police force don't wear boat uh shoes that are compatible to be on piers.

Our firemen do not go down on piers.

It's a significantly different operation.

As a matter of fact, both officers that I did a ride along with had never stepped foot on a pier in their work capacity.

Um so first and foremost, from an infrastructure standpoint, if we were to open this up, as some would would like to pursue us doing, which is why I think the timeliness of your presentation is perfect.

If we were to open this up, not only would it would it cause an infrastructure increase, it would also cause a cultural difference for for the city.

And whether it's good or bad is in the eyes of the beholder, but it's different than what we are as a city today.

People love Saltita, where there's house barges and it's it's cool, it's funky just like Eastports funky, but it's different funky.

And so we've got a decision to make as a city council.

Do we want to continue to pursue being the sailing capital of the world, or do we want to be a resident residential on the water capability?

So uh in conclusion, I will tell you I applaud the brief.

I fully agree with your recommendation.

I think it's very well presented, and I would uh ask the city council uh to look favorably upon this recommendation.

Thank you.

Alder Woman O'Neill.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Ray.

I had a couple of questions.

Um I did want to say that when we put together the task force in 2025, and we had a bunch of public comments about that.

So I appreciate that you've taken all those comments too, I think in your report um from both sides for the issue.

Um you talked about there are few boats that were our grandfathered in for prior to 1984.

Do we have a number on that?

Zero.

Oh zero.

So we don't have any.

We don't have any.

Okay, thank you very much.

That was my question.

Um I do appreciate all of the work that you guys put into this.

And my other question is moving forward with the moorings.

You talked about the moorings being a part, not the vessels.

So it's a matter of us changing the wording in that title.

Is that correct?

Correct.

We're just looking to uh make the code fit with what's been in existence for more than 15 years.

I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Because otherwise we'd have to yank up all our moorings and move everything.

And I just don't think that was the intent of Title 15 Section 1010.

So what you're suggesting is actually the safer, more effective mode than what's actually written.

It's just a fix.

It doesn't actually change the safety.

It's just correcting the wording.

Okay.

Thank you very much for that clarification.

Appreciate it.

Yeah, I'll just highlight the change that you were just discussing is what we have before us on first reader 0226.

So just to I know you know that.

Just want to clarify that for others.

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

And uh first of all, congratulations, thank you for your 10 years of service to the city.

Uh and also kind of echo my colleagues' comments on the presentation is very helpful to get ahead of time.

Um so yeah, so I have oh the maritime industrial district in my ward.

Um so some of my thoughts uh would be so as far as house barges, houseboats.

I think generally I I do some concerns about them, and I think it seems like the they would require a lot of quite a bit of permitting, right?

And and inspections.

And that does give me a pause.

But I do think that they could I see a couple potential uses.

The qualifier has on that is that the only way I would potentially support them is if they have a specific maritime use.

So you know, we're very I'm very sensitive about um diluting the maritime districts, right?

We when we overhauled the maritime districts, uh what was it like six, five, six years ago, something like that.

Um, when Eileen Fogerty helped us out with that effort, that was quite an effort, and we did try to strike a very good balance.

And so I don't want to do anything that's gonna upset the mixture that we have there and the focus on maritime.

But some of the uses I could potentially see would be for houseboats or house barges would be to provide housing for seasonal workers or or seasonal students.

Um because uh we don't have housing in the city to provide that.

Um so obviously again, that would also require certain regulatory regime, but if that helps, because that I think would help strengthen the maritime uses on the property.

Um so that is one area I'd like to take a closer look at.

Um I'm also as far as short-term rentals.

I mean, that's to the same point.

I I don't really support them in maritime districts, but I hadn't thought about just generally private boats, and based on your presentation, I think I I can see the concern is safety and having people who would rent them and not really know anything about how to operate the boat.

I know sometimes they say people can spend time on it but can't even take them out, but still then you have to bring us up the environmental concerns as far as waste.

Uh so I'm not too keen on that, but that's something I think I would want to learn more about.

Um then maximum dimensions you asked about.

I would uh I would think uh no larger than your typical boat.

I know there's been some concern.

I heard from um the former Alderman from Ward 6 about some of the catamarans.

You know, the marinas are allowing much larger boats, which ends up reducing the number of slips, and I I don't think I would want the same thing to happen due to super large houseboats, and again, unless it's directly related to the maritime use.

Um let's see.

Oh, and I I also share the recommendation I think from the task force.

I have no desire to regulate liverboards.

I think we haven't had any problem with them that I'm aware of, so I don't think um we need to open up that can of worms.

And I also support your efforts for prohibiting anchored boats during certain times of year.

And I I think we do seems like we do a really good job with removing derelict boats.

You know, I was in um Bermuda this past summer, and there were kind of boats all over the place that were like just leaning to stuck against the shore, and I kept thinking to myself, I'm so glad we don't allow that to happen.

So I know you probably put in a lot of work to make sure, so thank you for that as well.

Um that's really all I have, Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you for taking the time to present to us.

Thank you, Alderman.

Alderman and uh Shandelmeyer.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh again, kudos, great job.

Uh going up joining my colleagues on the detailed presentation.

Um the main concern that it had when we first started this task force is getting the liveaboard community caught up in the net if we catch this too wide.

Um keeping it very narrowly focused on no short-term rentals on boats, that really avoids the problem.

But in the event that we get more detailed on do we want to start regulating longer-term rentals or full-time uh residents on these boats, do we have the legal and technical ability to separate those two things out or like a houseboat house barge versus traditional liveaboard?

So I think what you're asking me is how are we going to define a short-term rental?

And I think a lot of jurisdictions have already done that.

Well, short-term rental it's really easy to define.

We already have it in our code.

Uh but if we want to talk about a longer-term rental, that's also easy.

A lot of jurisdictions have done that.

And so if you look at the handout that I distributed that has all the definitions, the definitions are really long.

That's not what we would like to see in code, but there's a lot of bullet points there for your thoughts.

And so at the end of the day, what we would do is hopefully work with our office of law to narrow down those definitions to such a point that it would be enforceable.

And it and it would be to the vision of what the city administration would like to see.

So if you're worried about um, can someone rent a boat for a year if you're having a different vision, then we can address that all in the definitions, I think.

Okay, thank you.

For the sake of brevity, I would just say that I adopt the um the expressions of Alderman Thorpe as for my my views on what you're trying to do as far as regulating short-term rentals on boats and in the marinas.

Alderman Thorpe, you had something.

Yeah, I would I would uh like to talk about the restriction of boats anchoring during the winter and winter months and put an exclamation to your point about uh what you're addressing in fact is it's just hard to uh to get our arms around if you're not out there on the water like you are.

These are boats who are anchoring in our waterways, who for the most part, if not all of them, require, as you mentioned, significant amount of social services.

Um and they're dangerous.

I mean, it's uh and and I applaud the officer of the harbor master for the way you do handle that.

The question I would would ask you to take away is what months we should do that that banning, right?

So I in the brief uh December 1st to March 20th, I think is what you mentioned.

The the challenge that we have as we move forward, and probably not to be answered tonight, but just to to focus on sometimes we have beautiful December's and sometimes we have beautiful marches.

As we live as we see today, there's rarely good voting January's and Februaries, but um, but I would ask you to look at what the right dates are, and you would know that best because you're out there.

I'm just not sure, because we've all been out there on a beautiful day in December or a beautiful day in March, and I would ask you to consider that as you go forward, what are the right dates?

Sure, that's a great point.

I just those folks need a little bit of time to plan.

And so if we wait till December 20th or 31st, and then it's icing in, it's too late for me to help them get the social services that they need.

Yeah, and so but yeah, your point is it's very good one.

Thank you.

Any other comments?

Any I'm sorry.

Yes, all the women called.

Um the first one would be what is the increase um excellent, what um would it increase the pollution in a bay?

And the second one would be what would be the equity in this.

So if you're speaking about um folks that are short-term rentals about house barges, um, one of our major concerns is gray water.

So gray water is what comes from a washing machine or a shower.

Um and I might let Tim speak.

I think you might know about that more than I do.

Yeah, the the short answer is yes.

So if you have a liveaboard, they're very uh attuned to the amount of water they're using.

There's something called a sea shower.

You get wet, you shut the water off, you soap up, because they don't want to use their own resources.

It's it's a hassle to fill your boat up with water.

If you're a short-term rental coming in the party for the weekend, you let it run.

All that gray water goes into Spa Creek, it goes into Bat Creek.

And there's it's a difference in lifestyle between a liveaboard and a short-term rental, and that's one of our major concerns.

There's also concerns about the non-gray water, it's called black water, the actual sewage.

Those systems are complicated.

And again, a liveaboard or someone who owns a boat knows how to use those systems, it's very easy to let that go as well.

It's just knowing the systems, and a short-term renter could easily say, Oh, it must be this valve, and it all that goes again directly into the creek.

So and that's that is a major concern.

I'm sorry, I didn't catch the second question.

That can be um so yeah, I I guess when we we were speaking about equity, we were talking about we have short-term rentals who are not paying what uh legal short-term rentals are paying, what paying, you know, uh luxury, what is it, entertainment taxes, hotel taxes, um, all the associated fees.

Um, so the legal businesses right now are paying into all that, and these short-term rentals are on the water aren't paying into any of that.

They're also not paying, they're also not paying property taxes.

So it's just it's sort of a wild west, as it were, because we just don't have our arms around it, if that makes sense.

But did you have another question that we're not addressing?

Okay.

I will um add to the environmental concerns with the gray water.

So also with a short-term rental, you're going to be running the the um washing machine with sheets and towels after every rental.

So every weekend you will be running that, whereas a short uh live aboard usually isn't running a washer uh or dryer on board, they're usually taking that ashore anyway to do their laundry.

Um very few um live aboards do have laundry facilities on board, but as you can imagine, like a hotel after every user, you're going to wash a sheets and towels.

So that's a lot of gray water discharge.

Alder Woman O'Neill.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Do we have an idea of how many illegal boat STRs we have?

I'm gonna check with my colleague, but I'm gonna say 15 to 30.

Yeah, I think it's on the lower end right now.

Uh and I think the reason we're pushing this forward is to discourage that behavior.

Um, but I think there's probably ones we don't know about.

So the trick is the only way we know about them is through looking at every single short-term rental website.

Um, and again, when we talk about charters and legal charters, they don't operate on Airbnb, VRBO, all the those the sites, they have specific sites for charters.

So when we look at those, I think the last time we did a count, uh, which was in the fall, I think there was maybe seven active ones, but springtime, you know, everyone has that same idea, and there'll certainly be more.

And I I think too, it's really hard to get our heads around because the numbers are growing.

It's not just Airbnb now, there's boats that are.

I mean, the number of platforms is multiplying so much so that it's really hard for us to keep count.

And you're talking about charters, so I have a boat.

I rent it out to somebody coming, they stay a couple evenings in the marina or at the dock, and then I'm taking the boat out and coming back in.

Is that what you're referring to as far as charters and those?

No, so I don't think that we don't believe that the task force, nor does our office want to legislate against legitimate charters.

And what we think is really important is to define what a legitimate charter is.

So we think that a charter is a charter if and only if the leasee has the absolute right and ability to take that boat and go away from the dock.

Um, and in the code of federal regulations, it specifies that a bare boat charter, a bare boat charter is where I lease my boat to you and you own it for that time, you have that absolute right and ability.

Um so if we don't close that loophole, then every time I try to say you're running a short-term term rental, sir or ma'am, you're gonna say no, no, it's a charter.

So I think in our definitions and our code, we really need to address that and close that loophole if that's what this administration wants to do.

Yes, thank you for that clarification.

Okay, yeah.

If I could just add to that, it it is very difficult because now there's also websites where you can list your boat for somebody to come and take out your 21-foot Boston whaler, um, which is not a short-term rental, but it's an opportunity just to go bare boat and and do it.

So I applaud the amount of work and the effort you're recognizing we have to do to go forward to uh encourage the use of the water for the water's sake and discourage uh the idea of people using uh the water as a short-term rental with all the problems that you've addressed.

And it's a very good thing that you've noticed that the United States Coast Guard is super concerned about this.

So it's a growing trend that I want to give my 28-foot Boston whaler for folks that want to run a bachelorette party, and I'm gonna give it to you for four hours for 700.

Very lucrative.

And these folks may or may not have proper voting safety knowledge or training, and so they are actually bringing uh teams.

The Coast Guard is bringing teams to different cities to work on this problem as it pertains to voting safety.

So that's good that you notice that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Enjoyed the conversation and discussion.

Appreciate uh being able to have a work session topic in a council meeting.

Uh thank you all very much for the presentation.

I don't see any other further hands to continue.

So we'll wrap this up and move on to the next item.

Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you.

All right, Ms.

City Attorney, will you please present the next item on the agenda?

Next item on the agenda is ID 3726 is city council discussion on short-term rental enforcement.

Thank you.

Planning and zoning director Chris Jacobiak, please come forward.

You get double duty today.

Please uh identify yourselves and then uh feel free to jump in.

Good evening, Chris Jacobiac, Director of Planning and Zoning.

John Manasse, Chief of Code Enforcement, Department of Planning Zoning.

Thank you.

Well, we were asked to come speak to the topic of short-term rental enforcement.

Uh that's a big topic, actually, and um we will uh actually we were asked to be here for a discussion of that topic.

So we'll perhaps throw some things out for discussion and uh we'll listen and uh take some things back uh to the office, of course.

Um last budget, the city council authorized the hiring of a short-term rental coordinator.

Our office uh retained the services of a person, and uh we did stepped up enforcement beginning late in the summer.

Uh the number of short-term rentals that are licensed uh has increased uh by 55 over the period of time from the end of July through tonight.

Um so uh in June of 2025, we had 283 short-term licenses.

And our main source of information about the short-term rentals out there is host compliance, and it recorded 560 short-term rental listings on the various platforms that it manages.

And that's our source of information, for better or for worse.

And we say that with some caveats because we've identified ourselves that there's still uh it's not absolutely accurate, but it's the best information we have.

We have to deal with the complexities and having incomplete information.

But there were 560.

That's what we included in our statement of an annual report last uh in August.

Uh so we had roughly we we we determined we had a 50 percent compliance.

In other words, 50 percent of the short-term rentals listed on the platforms were actually licensed by the city.

Uh today we have 343 short-term licenses, and um 532 short-term licenses listed on the platforms.

You it's interesting because through our enforcement, we've seen an increase in the number and also a reduction in the re increase in the number of license and also a reduction in the total number.

And that's what you kind of expect by with uh enforcement.

So um now we're at 65 percent of the short-term rentals on the listing platforms being licensed.

So there's still a third, roughly 35 percent out there.

What was that percent?

Six sixty-five percent.

Uh 343 uh of 532 total.

So uh we've increased our licensing uh by 55.

Um, and there are 28 fewer total fewer short-term rental listings currently uh in the city.

John's gonna talk about enforcement and how we go about enforcement and where our resources are devoted to enforcement and the the process.

Uh but I just want to touch on a couple of items besides the the data that I mentioned.

Umce July uh first, we've handled 194 short-term rental code cases.

Uh that's 194 enforcement matters.

Given that we're pretty busy with a lot of things.

And we've closed 154 of those.

So 154 of those, roughly 200 cases have been closed.

And they're principally closed because the owner has followed through and applied.

So we close that case.

Or the owner has delisted.

And in some cases, folks have said we not it's not our intention to continue a short-term rental.

Or we're surprised that our house is on the market.

We bought our house and didn't realize that the previous owner had an account with one of the platforms.

And there are other reasons too.

And we would anticipate those would be resolved or they be transferred to the law office for adjudication.

And that brings me up to, and that's a sort of a big summary of the summary of the where we are in terms of data.

But I wanted John to take us through the process of code enforcement to give you that context.

John?

Hey, Mr.

Mayor.

May I ask a question?

Sure.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Thank you.

If you don't mind also sending if you can this summary to us just as a breakdown, if you have if you do you mind uh will you send this breakdown to us via email?

Yes, we can have.

Okay, thank you.

The enforcement part of short-term rental license kind of comes in two pieces.

The first is looking at uh new applications that are coming in and renewal applications for existing rentals.

Um we're checking for the application completeness.

The code now has a block face limit for how many rental licenses can be on that block.

So that becomes a part of our check.

Um making sure that the property has a local property manager.

Uh, if the owner is out of town, uh, ensuring that the tax account has been established and that they have a state tax account number.

So these are the things that we're looking for when applications are coming in.

The second part of our enforcement deals with seeking out the unlicensed properties.

So that involves using the host compliance tool, uh looking at their findings.

What we do is we pull the unlicensed properties that they're they're showing us.

We send them a letter that indicates they have to get a rental license and that it's not legal to rent their property without one.

Um we give them a brief window, usually 30 days to come into compliance.

Um next tool for enforcement is posting a placard on the property, which states that the property is not a licensed rental unit.

It's taped to the door.

Um the purpose of that is to make sure that anybody coming onto the property is aware that they're entering a property that's not licensed, and the city's got no idea whether or not it's in compliance with the safety codes.

So it's primarily a notification to the potential tenant, but it also generates a very quick response from the property owner or the property manager because they get this notice on the door and it immediately causes questions from the tenants and they contact us pretty much right away at that point.

Um there's no ignoring that placard.

Uh, but there are cases where that fails, and we have to issue um a citation.

So that usually occurs.

Um, if we send the letter out and give them 30 days and they haven't responded, we post the placard and then we write the citation.

That usually gives them another two weeks at least to um reply to the citation to determine whether or not they want to fight the citation in court, or go ahead and pay the citation.

And they have two options.

They can either apply for a rental license or stop doing that activity and say they're not gonna be a rental license at that point.

Um, and they're not gonna seek a rental license, and they'll they'll cease the activity.

Uh, usually what we end up doing is monitoring the host compliance site to make sure that it's come down and that it's no longer being listed.

So just as a final note on that, um we do have weekly, I would say weekly is about the frequency of confrontations with an owner that is either arguing with us about the fact that they didn't realize their license was expiring, or that uh they weren't aware that there was a block face problem and their block is overcrowded with short-term rentals already.

So that's a roughly 50-50 split between the two problems.

One of them being that they didn't reapply in time, or that they are facing a block face limit.

So those you know, if you think of it that way, that we're getting a couple a month that are solely for the block face limit, and it's it's having an impact on the number of licenses.

There have probably been half a dozen to a dozen licenses that have been denied since November over that factor.

And that's all I had.

Alderman O'Neil.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

I do have a few questions.

When you find in your enforcement that somebody is not in compliance, is there a way to immediately contact the platforms?

Um Airbnb, VRBO, rent your house.

I'm not I'm not familiar with that.

I don't think we've attempted that.

I asked because I had a personal meeting with representatives from Airbnb, and they suggested that they haven't heard of any issues.

Um, and I think that we should start telling them those issues so that they do realize that we do have a problem, I think, in the city with unlicensed um units.

Um, my other question is our code is pretty specific about the number of people that are allowed in a unit, and I have forwarded to you at least two that are promoting the fact that 16 people can sleep in them.

Um are we actively watching those on the online platforms as well?

I can't say that we look at that through the platform.

Uh I think the the volume is a little too high for us to actually dive that deep into the listings.

Um they have to show us on the application how many rooms they're going to be using.

And that's our check on.

So if they're lying to us in the application and using more rooms or trying to host uh say they can host more people than the limit, then uh there's a penalty for that.

That's grounds to revoke the license, but um that's usually our check on saying that there is a limit to the the amount of people that you can have overnight.

It's really a sleeping limitation, like you could have a short-term rental that can hold 10 people, and there could be 20 people there for an event during the day, but they can't be there overnight.

So that's sort of how the rule works about um the sleeping rooms.

Uh, but I I your um your note about going and providing feedback to the platform.

That's something we will definitely look into.

Because I mean the the hosting the host compliance software does provide us with the companies that are being uh used as the host platform, so it's as easy as is going through that and uh it's an extra step, but it's something that's reasonable we can do.

I think it would be important in our continued enforcement, um, especially in identifying those that are not in compliance.

So I appreciate that.

Thank you.

Any other questions or comments?

Alderman Sepch.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh, and thank you for joining us for to give us this presentation today.

Um, first of all, do you think there are any more do you need any increased enforcement tools or additional resources to complete the enforcement mission goal?

That's a yes.

Um the we should be clear that the position that the council authorized um was not provided for in city government as a as a position.

So it took us well over a year or so to fill it, and we could only fill it with a contract employee uh administrative assistant.

That's because of the the difficulty of sometimes translating city council directives into actual positions.

You're familiar with that with respect to trees.

Um so we've been working with uh that level of uh of um staffing resource, uh whereas the position itself really demands uh far more uh competencies, far more outgoing uh engagement with the property owners, uh coordination with enforcement.

Uh so it's a part it's a staffing issue that we still need to, and we're trying to accommodate ourselves and work work out the best solution with the resources we have available.

Um we have 62 short-term rentals pending inspections, because as you know, we do inspections for over 6,000 rental units, not including short-term rentals, but regular rental units throughout the city, in addition to hotels and motels.

And uh this is an extensive uh listing of you know um rental inspections that we have to do.

So uh our staff aren't able to process the um inspections that we have waiting.

So these numbers that I've mentioned would likely be higher, uh certainly the number of licensed short-term rentals if we were staffed more.

Um so it's a it's a slow process to get uh through this um without a doubt.

And as John indicated, we don't have the staff to sit and engage with host compliance on a in a on an as-needed or real-time basis to understand how to respond.

And while we have shifted as a city to proactive enforcement to go after units that we know are not licensed and bring them into licenses, we're still on a response basis uh when it comes to um the effects of short-term rentals, like noise complaints or the trash or lack of snep snow removal in front of sidewalks and uh at the short-term rentals.

Um we don't have the resources to go out and be proactive about enforcing those issues.

So uh when we get calls in, we we send resources out to do that.

But um that's that's uh a limitation in our ability to enforce the entire set of standards and code for short-term rentals.

So I'm hearing that you you might need some additional resources then, staff.

Yes, we certainly do, and um it and we would anticipate that as part of this budget cycle coming up.

So and and pardon me for not remembering exactly what we approved, but so it was a contractual position.

No, the city council simply approved a position of a short-term rental coordinator.

Um, but just because of the personnel rules in city government and how positions formed and authorized and allocated uh uh we had to live with a uh going out to find a contract position for administrative assistant.

And so maybe we can get into this more with the budget, I assume, but um would this position potentially be would it just be focusing on short-term rentals or would it do broader other types of enforcement?

Because I know you have multiple enforcement needs in the department.

Um I think we've been working through those issues with the mayor's budget and the city administrator.

Okay.

Well, look forward to hearing more on the budget uh on this.

Uh but well, I guess the other question related to that.

So have you I know our laws may change here, especially if moratorium passes and after that.

But operating what off of what we do know, which is the 10% and the um uh the lottery again, lots of assumptions there as far as if it holds up with any kind of potential court challenges, but if it were to move forward, um one question is do you have an estimate of the total number of short-term rentals if it would take effect as far as the total reduction?

And the second part of that would be would you do you think you would need as much enforcement staff at that point in time than you do now?

Is some point like you think you'll have a steady need for it seeming even if we pass regulations limiting non-owner occupied, which sounds like some want to do, is the enforcement knee going to go down.

I I don't think the enforcement knee will go down, actually.

I think it's gonna stay consistent.

And again, most of the enforcement is ensuring compliance with the licensing requirements.

And um we have um we're approving roughly eight, eight and a half short-term rentals every month uh since July.

Uh and I would anticipate further dispersal of short-term renters into the more solidly single-family neighborhoods around the tourist centers as the uh 10% cap is locked into place, uh, which will likely really drive more complaint-driven enforcement uh and calls to our office.

Okay.

Um another question.

I just I know we talked about this in the committee, but just my colleagues' sake.

Um you did mention that there will likely be an increase in the fee, license fee to help cover some of the staff calls.

Yeah, um I think there ought to be uh if the level of if fees should be commensurate with the service provided.

Um there are quite a few staff members that have a hand in short-term rental regulation, not just in our department, but thank God for IT and Stephanie Connor and her ability to craft a platform for us to manage this, but that's a continual maintenance IT maintenance issue that uh extends beyond our department and the finance department is involved as well in processing payments, the law office and um prosecuting violations.

So it's a really multi-department approach to this enforcement.

And something else, I think I can't remember if I mentioned or not in the committee, but my conversations with Airbnb is that they do have the capability to require license information before a posting is approved.

They don't do it here, they do it, I think, in New York City and um I forget some city out west.

So I'm just wondering have we or can we have a conversation with the platforms to maybe maybe we need to that's one thing we need to update in our code is to require that, but that would I think help save the city some time as far as reducing some of the enforcement burden if these platforms just require the license up front before you'd even submit a um a listing.

Yeah, I uh I would look into it.

I don't I don't like I again I haven't interacted with the hosting platforms to know what they can do in that regard.

Uh it sounds like it would definitely excuse me, it would definitely relieve some of the the burden on our staff.

Um and speaking of the moratorium, uh I did mention the the process that we use to um check for application completeness, block face limits, and the property tax requirements.

If we did institute a moratorium, that would take that workload off of our staff member that's doing that work, and they would be able to focus strictly on the unlicensed properties and um forcing compliance out of those property owners.

So there's a benefit in the moratorium in that regard for the enforcement aspect of the unlicensed rentals.

Okay.

Uh last question is have you received any documented complaints regarding short-term rentals?

Because we include that provision, I think from older woman O'Neil, uh, so people can call in and actually again document some issues, be it public safety, noise, uh, I don't remember what else we had in there, any kind of I think type of nuisance.

So I'm just you know, we had we heard a lot of testimony.

Oh, they're causing problems, and again, parking safety.

But I'm wondering if people actually called to take advantage of the provision.

Well, the overall um the number of complaints about noise has dropped pretty significantly.

We're not really getting complaints about noise right now.

Um I can't remember the last time I had a noise complaint for short-term rentals.

Our primary complaints are trash that is uh either set out well before the pickup day or the cans are left out well after the pickup.

Um it seems like it's an isolated incident.

When we've addressed it with those property owners, they've corrected it.

Um so it's sort of like an intermittent problem there.

Since the snowstorm, we've heard a lot of feedback that the short-term rental operators are not cleaning their sidewalks because they're just not even aware there's a problem if they're not in town.

And it's just being left sort of to the mercy of the neighbors or enforcement action, which is probably for those type of properties just starting to come into play.

Okay.

Good to know.

Thank you.

That's all I have to do.

Thank you, Alderman Savage.

Next is Alderman Thorpe.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Building on Alderman Savage's point, can you drill down a little bit farther on the process that you follow for complaints?

It seems to me we have two issues.

One is people who are complaining about short-term rentals, and the other people who are applying for them.

But so on the complaints, who actually is managing the complaint process.

How do you give me give us some more details, please?

And then how do you wrap up the complaint process getting back to the both the owner and the complainer?

Okay, the main avenue for complaints is the CSS Annapolis.gov website.

And for short-term rentals that are either the trash is an issue or some other problem with the rental unit or unlicensed, that would come to me.

I would then send it to the senior property maintenance inspector who either handles it herself or she'll delegate it to one of the other inspectors to follow up.

And from there, the citizen that put in that complaint, it's generating the file right from their complaint.

So the file then exists when we receive it, we're assigning it, and usually we're scheduling a site inspection or contacting the owner if that's the case.

So the you know, the the person that's putting in the complaint does have that ability to see it.

Um if I think what they were listing themselves as a contact, I think they were thinking that was how they would get feedback, but you don't list yourself as a contact to the to the property, um, and when you enter your information, that information stays on a private side of the complaint file.

Um, and it gives the person that's doing the complaining a little bit of anonymity.

Um the um the complaints can also be filed anonymously, we get plenty of those.

Uh so the process um from the handing it off to an inspector to follow up, they're gonna go out and look.

Um they create like a violation type that has a correction date and it lists the actual violation and the corrective action, so it's meeting all the requirements to send proper notification.

If the person has an identity, that property owner has an identity in the system, like they are already in the system as a renter, uh, a landlord or a property owner, um, it will go directly to them in an email at that point.

Um, for people that aren't in the system, say it's an unlicensed rental, there's no owner information in our system, then we have to just mail it hard copy.

Um so we get the typical two weeks to come into compliance uh when we send that notice out, and uh by and large, it's successful.

There are you know, like a percentage of cases that end up going to a citation level afterwards, like another two weeks after that, then we issue a citation, and that number it further gets reduced down to a very small number that we have to take to court actually.

Did I answer all your questions?

Yes, thank you very much.

Thank you.

My my next question has to do with the map, the the public awareness of what houses are licensed as STRs.

What is the city's official position on providing a list publicly of all of the licensed STRs?

Well, we ran we get a lot of uh FOIA requests for that, especially since uh the moratorium or not the moratorium, I'm sorry, the the lottery came into play because people wanted to know where they could buy that were not going to be subject to a limit, and that's something that we can't predict.

We can't provide that information.

We wouldn't provide somebody financial like that.

We get calls frequently, uh we're getting ready to buy.

Is this place gonna be able to obtain a short-term rental license?

And we cannot provide that information, and it's our policy not to provide that kind of information.

Um but the you know, the um I guess the I don't know, Chris.

If I were asked, I'd say why not?

Uh it's official license.

It's uh the map just reflects a point of time when licenses are are applied for.

Uh we have the data uh and uh and uh we can map those.

We have it internally, we use the maps quite a bit.

Uh we we've shared it with city council members who've asked for um this map.

Um no one's asked me that question before or asked the as far as I know the city manager to for an official determination, but I I would support such a determination.

Sure.

Okay, thank you.

Um I think my last question is the code is very clear about uh not needing a license to have a uh to rent your house out for short-term rental for commissioning week uh or the sailboat shows.

Um it is that I that I'm aware of silent on what those people need to do.

And I understand, or let me ask a question.

Is are we requiring registrations for those uh commissioning week and sailboat, and what what's the difference between a registration application and a license application?

Um, and are you ready to answer that or are you working through that as we speak?

Yeah, no, absolutely.

That that's pretty regular, it's been this way for quite some time.

Um the the tax requirement came into play with the state and the county taxes.

Um at the same time we were rolling out the intergov software and making an online portal a reality where people could pay for things online.

So the tax payment requirement got rolled into the short-term rental license requirements.

People that are only renting for graduation in the boat shows are still obligated to pay that tax on their revenues for those rentals.

So there's a twofold problem.

One of them is they need an avenue to pay their tax, and they need to like somehow register with us so they don't continuously get caught in that dragnet of host compliance.

So the registration is the way to do that.

They're registering their property as a rental unit for just those specific events.

They're getting the opportunity to pay the taxes easily online.

So that's one of the differences.

And there's no inspection requirement.

So we're not providing them an inspection or a license for their rental unit.

They're going through our system so that they have two things.

They're not going to be popping up as an unlicensed rental on the software.

And they have an avenue to pay their tax.

Okay.

Thank you.

I guess the last thing I would say, and Mr.

Kubiak, you you mentioned the budget process going through it.

I think the residents are speaking very loudly that they would like better enforcement of short-term rentals and to get that the delta down from 190 to some number that is manageable.

And I would encourage you through the budget process to come to the city council with real numbers, what it would cost to do that.

Because I I think you alluded to it, and that it is expensive to hire the capacity you need.

So I would not want to see us the city have to pay the balance because we our fees and penalties were too low, or us not doing what the residents want and reducing our enforcement or licensing process because we don't have the funds.

So I'll be looking forward to getting real data that this is what it really costs for you to do the job that you want to do that meets the needs of the residents.

Alderman O'Neill.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

Um I have a couple other questions that have come to me through text from somebody that's watching.

Um question is how you go about verifying that properties actually have uh in-town property manager.

And it kind of goes along with that.

The other question is um, how are we verifying that owners do in fact only own one property versus creating a loophole where they are creating different LLCs to run properties when it's one person?

Oh yeah.

Okay, so the application the owner lists their address, and if they're not in Annapolis, Annapolis proper, like the Annapolis City, then they have to have a property manager that's located in the city.

So that's all part of the application process, and it's verified by our staff that's doing the application completeness check, and it's fairly straightforward.

Um there are times when people don't understand that requirement, or they think that because they live in an Annapolis zip code, they think they're okay.

Uh, we get a lot of calls from just outside the city limits that didn't realize that they don't qualify for that.

Um so that that's something that we work through uh pretty routinely.

As far as the um enforcement component goes for only one property, that's that's difficult sometimes.

Um but every license that comes in is being cross-referenced for that that owner's identification.

Um it's just savvy on the part of the staff member doing that check to to try to catch similar addresses.

Um if it's an LLC and it's created specifically to obscure the owners, then it's difficult.

Um, there the people using a property and calling it their principal residents is another one.

We look at the tax record for that.

So the tax records are really a primary tool.

Um what they're listing on their application.

Okay, thank you.

Um, and one last thing I wanted to clarify in 2024 early, we did pass legislation that talked about a three-strike share out, and it just has to be documented.

Have we utilized that piece of legislation to document and shut down any of our short-term rentals?

That's for disruptive neighbors.

Uh or disruptive rental.

Yeah, we we have not had any that met that requirement.

Um I can't think of even one that we've had two real complaints on that are based on the way the property is being used.

Okay.

I can think of at least two properties where I've gotten at least a half a dozen complaints on.

So I think that we need to kind of take a look at how those are being logged and yeah, please please follow up with me and tell me the properties because I'm they're not coming to mind on my my part.

I'm sorry.

I will.

Thank you very much.

I appreciate your time tonight.

Okay.

Thank you, Alderwoman.

Um Alderman Smith Brown.

Thank you, Mayor Littman.

Uh the question that I have, if not more than one.

Uh I heard you say that you bring them into compliance.

Is that to imply that we are assisting the short-term rental persons in meeting the necessary requirements to have a short-term rental?

I mean, is that our responsibility as a city to do that?

If you know, if they're interested in that, if they don't meet that, and how does that impact then our fing of them?

Is it is a fine associated with not being in compliance?

And if so, why are we helping them to get in compliance if the fine is to also lead them away from having short-term rentals the long term?

Well when we initiated the that's a good question, actually.

And and it's really speaks to the the theory and practice of code enforcement generally in a city.

Um when we initiated the heightened enforcement in the summer, uh, we began with uh a love letter to every short-term rental.

Uh and uh and I'm glad it was stated as a friendly uh citizen to citizen type of outreach because uh there were quite a few that uh were uh genuinely surprised that they were getting the letter because they thought they were operating appropriately and we thought in fact some of our enforcement was unfounded.

Um and some city council members actually got notes from people saying, you know, I I I'm following the rules because the nature of this the data set we have uh it requires years of refinement before we're gonna get to the precise numbers.

In any case, uh the initial effort on our behalf was to bring people into compliance to let them know that uh the law, what the law is and that they have an opportunity to work with us to get into compliance, and we would encourage them to take the opportunity.

Should they fail to though, they subject themselves to code enforcement, we let them know what that code enforcement uh was.

Uh by and large, most people took took that as an effort to get into compliance quickly.

Um some stragglers didn't and are going through more significant code enforcement and fines.

I would like to see what those numbers would have been if they did not fall into the clients just because that would be a good information to know.

Um and they should appreciate that we help save them that money.

Um we should go even a link further to support our residents in that same front.

Um the other question that I had I heard you mention this um coordinator position uh that you all have been, I believe was passing a previous council.

Um the moratorium upon us passing this moratorium, would that position be ne I kind of heard you say, but would that be necessary for this upcoming year if we pass the moratorium for up to that year?

Um, I think so.

Um in because we would anticipate if there were in fact a moratorium that a lot of resources be devoted to understanding these issues and working with the council to understand the impacts of short-term rentals generally and uh making any improvements that uh were deemed necessary.

Um yeah, I I I I think that either with or without the moratorium, we're gonna need staff resources to implement the um short-term rental.

So we should take that into account, but it's an additional cost to this moratorium, possibly, if not even if we don't have the moratorium, it'll be additional costs because we do want to support our departments.

Right.

Okay.

Thank you.

Minister Alderman Smith Brown?

Okay, thank you.

Any other questions?

Comments?

Any questions other questions for us since we're in discussion?

No.

I actually do have one more question.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Um I know we were talking about this whole idea of hosting platforms.

I mean, do we reach out to them and invite them to talk with it?

What is the relationship, the partnership that we can have?

These are major corporate people, and I think they have people on staff when you make a phone call, uh, set up a meeting and say we're the city of Annapolis with the capital of the state.

I don't see how we can't facilitate some type of um you know round table with these hosting platforms because this is a serious topic, and I think if we're trying to address it long term, we're gonna need their input.

So uh what does that look like?

Is that even I I think that's possible.

Um and I think certainly within certainly in the interest of these hosting platforms to to work with us, certainly.

I I will uh jump in and add though that there are some limits to what those companies typically would share with us.

Um we've had uh a lot of interactions with uh a few of them about trying to get very granular data they collect um collect those those taxes, for example, and remit them to us and us trying to get detailed information about how much we got from which person is some of that kind of data is actually very difficult to get out of them.

That's not just our experience.

We've we've pulled a lot of different jurisdictions to see if anyone else figured out what the magic words were to get that information out of them.

Um so I I think that you know that question of engagement with those companies is a good one and one that we should pursue.

I'll just say that for some parts of that information that's been um that's been a more difficult relationship than it would be nice to have Alderman Thorpe.

Um at least one of these companies that have been named have a very aggressive government relations operation who has reached out to several members of the city council very proudly stating they want to work with municipalities.

I will pass you their information, and if you desire to reach out to them, I would be very surprised if they would turn down the invitation to to create that dialogue with you.

And if they do turn it down, I think many members of city council would be interested in knowing that they turned it down.

Okay.

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Um, thank you both, uh Mr.

Kubiak, Mr.

Manasseh for joining us today.

I think that concludes our uh presentation.

Okay, Miss City Attorney, will you please present the next item on the agenda?

The next item on the agenda is approval of the consent calendar.

Items on the consent calendar include the approval of journal of proceedings, which is CCM 1126, the regular meeting minutes.

That is the end of the consent calendar.

Okay.

Uh is there any objection to the consent calendar?

Okay, seeing none on entertain a motion to approve the consent calendar.

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

All those in favor, say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Madam City Clerk, will you please take the roll instead of saying aye?

Mayor Mayor Littman.

Aye.

Alderman Chandelmeyer.

Aye.

Alderwoman Conte.

Aye.

Albany Savage.

Aye.

Alderman Thorpe.

Aye.

Alderwoman O'Neill.

Aye.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Aye.

And Alderwoman Alphabet Johnson.

Aye.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Ms.

City Attorney, please present the next item on the agenda.

Next item on the agenda is legislative action on first reader beginning with ordinance two twenty-six, morning requirements in city waters.

Thank you.

Is there a motion to adopt O twenty O two twenty-six on first reader?

So moved.

Thank you.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

And all those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed say nay?

Motion carries.

I refer O226 to Environmental Matters Committee and the Port Wardens.

Ms.

City Attorney, please present the next item on the agenda.

Excuse me, Mr.

Mayor.

Yes.

Could that I also ask that that be referred to the Maritime Advisory Board?

Okay.

And to the Maritime Advisory Board.

Thank you.

Ms.

City Attorney, please present the next item on the agenda.

Next item on the agenda is resolution 426 extending the public paddle craft rack pilot project.

Okay, thank you.

Is there a motion to adopt R 426 on first reader?

So moved.

Thank you, Alderman Chandelmeyer.

Is there a second?

Second.

Thank you.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed say nay?

Motion carries.

I refer R 426 to the finance committee.

Ms.

City.

Yes.

So moved.

All right.

So uh so referred.

Excuse me.

Ms.

City Attorney, please, Miss City Attorney, please present the next time on the agenda.

Next item on the agenda is legislative action on second readers beginning with ordinance 4125 fiscal year 2026 changes in the exempt service job classification.

Okay.

Is there a motion to adopt 04125 on second reader?

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Is there a second?

Second second.

Thank you.

And we'll begin discussion.

Um I'd like to begin the discussion uh with a few comments.

I want to begin begin with the simple reality.

The mayor's office is functioning well, but it is operating at the outer limits of its capacity.

When the office responsible for leadership, policy coordination, crisis response, and community trust it's is stretched too thin for too long.

The risk is not just staff burnout, it is slower responsiveness, missed opportunities, reduce effectiveness for the residents we serve.

I am active at the local, regional, and political levels.

The mayor's office leads on communications, resident response, cross-department initiatives and issues, and community outreach.

This is not symbolic work, it's daily operational leadership.

However, the structure supporting this work has not evolved to match its scope.

If you remove the outreach team, which plays a vital but specialized role, there are only six staff members directly supporting the mayor's daily operations.

Supporting that role are two communications professionals managing crisis and emergency messaging, media relations, speech writing, press releases, digital communications, and long-term communications strategy for major initiatives.

This communication work has been long under supported and really should have more support.

There is one community engagement strategist coordinating boards and commissions, nonprofit and stakeholder relationships, and community-wide initiatives such as town halls.

There is one position for constituent services and the ombudsman role, addressing complaints, ADA compliance, departmental coordination, and public meetings.

And there is one administrative assistant managing calendars, payroll, correspondence, records, and daily operations for both the mayor and the city manager.

That is a very highly skilled team, but it is also very thin.

At the center of this structure is the chief of staff.

This role serves as my strategic advisor and manages daily operations, coordinates with me to set daily priorities and long-term goals, oversees staff, coordinates with the county, state, and federal partners, leads crisis and issue management, and manages the mayor's office budget.

At the same time, the chief of staff is routinely pulled into day-to-day operational problem solving and the resolution of urgent issues.

That combination, strategic leadership, and constant tactical management is not sustainable in a single position.

And that is why the mayor's office needs a deputy chief of staff.

A deputy chief of staff would provide essential operational leadership and capacity.

This role would help manage internal workflows, coordinate cross-departmental initiatives, track follow-through on priority projects, and ensure continuity during high demand periods or emergencies.

In simple terms, this position helps turn strategy into execution.

Good ideas and action require coordination, timelines, accountability, and consistent attention.

Right now, much of that responsibility falls to the chief of staff by necessity, which limits how quickly and effectively initiatives can move forward.

A deputy chief of staff also strengthens resilience and continuity.

The mayor's office cannot rely on a single point of leadership at all times.

When the mayor or chief of staff is engaged externally, responding to a crisis or unavailable, there must be a trusted senior leader who can maintain momentum, manage operations, and make informed decisions.

This is not redundancy, it's responsible government governments.

Importantly, this role is not about adding bureaucracy.

It's about improving efficiency.

With the deputy chief of staff handling operational coordination and internal management, the chief of staff can focus more fully on strategic planning, intergovernmental relationships, and advising the mayor.

The entire office becomes more responsive and better aligned, and therefore all departments as well.

As expectations for the mayor's office continue to grow from increased constituent engagement to complex regional challenges and complex projects like City Doc, the current staffing model is no longer sufficient.

The work has expanded, the expectations and demands have increased, the structure has not kept pace.

Establishing a deputy chief of staff position is an investment in effectiveness, accountability, and sustainability.

It ensures the mayor's office can continue to lead, respond, and serve the people of Annapolis with professionalism and responsiveness they expect and deserve.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Anyone have a comment?

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

So I do some remarks, but first I guess the question for city attorney would be procedurally.

Um I'll make a motion to postpone, but there's already a motion on the floor for second reader.

Looking over at the city clerk over there.

Yeah, you can postpone if there's a motion on the floor because that kind of trumps your first motion.

So you don't have to vote down the motion, you can just do a motion to postpone it.

You can do a motion to postpone.

Okay, and then if that fails, it'd go back automatically to second reader.

Second reader whoop the I mean whip the second.

Okay.

Well, if that's the case, um move to postpone for 30 days.

I'm sorry, I don't have the exact date.

Could I suggest if you're going to make that motion that you do it to a specific council meeting, like the 23rd, February 23rd meeting?

Um, that'd be fine.

Okay.

So the motion is to postpone to February 23rd.

February 23rd.

Okay.

Is there a second?

Second.

Okay.

Any discussion.

Um Alderman Channel Meyer, I should beat you to it.

I'll let the alderman who made the first motion go first.

I'll yield to the very good.

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um, yeah, so I want to speak in support of postponement.

Um, because there's still some fundamental questions that haven't been answered, and I don't see a compelling reason to rush permanent structural change tonight.

You know, um, we only received the presentation from the chief of staff last week, and uh had it unfortunately wasn't able to make the committee meeting because we had a town hall.

Um but I have actual draft amendments I'm working on.

It's not an effort to sabotage or anything like that.

This I have concrete amendments I'm working to address my concerns.

I'm just asking for courtesy to try to get them resolved and for the sake of unity.

So before I get to some of my list of concerns, I think the first big question is establishing need.

You know, why must this be done?

And based on what I'm hearing, it's primarily a workload issue.

And if that's the case, I think we need to dig into a few things.

One, I think we need to determine first of all if the position is doing things that it really shouldn't be doing.

Um based on the list of duties provided.

This is objectively the case.

Uh the chief of staff is proposing and listing tasks that are required by our charter to be done by the administrative branch, the city manager.

If we free up those duties from the chief of staff, perhaps they'll have more time to address you know some of their uh more essential duties, uh, priority duties from the mayor.

Next thing is to look at the position if the position can delegate tasks.

There are 14 other staff persons in the mayor's office, uh, not even counting the city manager's office.

So let's determine exactly what tasks the chief of staff needs help with and see if that could be handled by other staff.

Those are two things that we can certainly get some more data on before pushing through this vote.

And I really think it's just a basic analysis that we should be doing before we justify 150,000 dollars or uh whatever it is.

Um once we establish that need and determine the position is warranted.

My concern boils down to four things.

It'd be potential charter violations is the first one.

Second is it weakens the connection between the mayor and the council, third is financial, and the fourth is just fairness.

So dig into those a little bit.

First one's charter violations.

In my view, these positions potentially violate the charter again by assigning duties to the executive branch that are specifically assigned to the city manager's administrative branch.

We're obligated when we took an oath of office to uphold the charter.

And again, I have amendments specifically to address this concern.

Um, but more time is needed so I can collaborate and share them with everybody.

Two, this weakens the connection between the mayor and the council.

Having someone designated as the council liaison threatens to weaken the mayor's charter role as chair of the council at a time when I would argue that role has been given a back seat because I think the mayor understandably has other priorities with the transition.

But this is addressable again by amendment if we have time.

Third thing is financial issues.

Fourth is fairness.

But frankly, join the club.

Easily approach 60 hours, sometimes 80 hours a week.

And so what makes the council unique is that we don't have our own direct staff.

Many of us have been expressing this need for years, and the council did express this to you, Mr.

Mayor, a couple months ago at our initial retreat.

And so but where's the urgency to address our staffing needs and reduce our workloads?

And there's been no proposal to address these needs, no dialogue about balance, only executive branch expansion.

Each branch should be given fair assessment, and that can't happen until the budget process.

We have we have not answered yet to consider alternatives we haven't considered and make a decision that aligns with the charter and long-term balance of our government.

That's why I support postponement, and I'm asking my colleagues for that.

Simple courtesy of just uh what would be three week three-week delay.

Thank you.

Alderman Schenemeyer.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um so I'm very supportive of this position.

I think the administration has made the case for why it is necessary, how it can greatly improve the efficiency of local government, and how it can help better coordinate making annapolis work.

My colleague has also come up with an amendment that I do think is decent, but it's kind of at the last minute.

I'm wondering if you had the opportunity to take a look at it.

I have not I've not seen it.

All right.

So this is kind of some new process because we've changed up how we do amendments now.

Uh since we were a little notorious for doing things on the floor during our last term.

What is the new process for doing things on the floor or procedure for doing things on the floor?

Because I do think it's worth discussing.

And I understand timing is important.

Um I understand we don't want to delay this for another meeting, but what is our process for this?

That's to the law.

I mean, you have a motion to postpone on the floor.

I don't think you're gonna you gotta vote on that, and then if you want to consider amendments on the floor, I I guess you can do that at that point, but I think you have to address the motion to postpone first and foremost.

Okay.

So does throwing this off for another meeting throw off the timeline of the position to consider the amendment, or does this you're starting to back away with the microphone?

Sorry.

Does throwing this off until our next meeting on the 23rd um throw off for allow time to consider this one amendment that's been put forward, set throw off timing.

Do you mind if we kick this back one meeting?

Does that throw things off greatly?

Gotcha.

Sorry.

You were starting to back away, so I was starting to lose you at the end of it by I think I got your uh question.

I am simultaneously either too loud or too quiet.

There's never perfect volume in the uh ear of the beholder, I suppose.

Uh so there's just an immense amount of work.

So the longer something like this gets delayed, the longer everything in the uh future success or more success gets delayed.

And so while we're uh navigating through city doc challenges and navigating through budget development, and we're every uh every department wants a piece of me, basically, of uh talking about their priorities, all that just gets slowed down further.

Um there's just a million and one priorities I can go through my a calendar.

I wish I uh you know it it would be uh that simple typical week.

I wish I uh you know it it would be uh that simple typical week um starting at between eight 8 30 every day, going till nine o'clock at every night, and someone when you go from meeting to meeting for 12 hours, you need somebody there to uh support and prepare and schedule the next weeks and and continue.

And so it's it's um I don't know that I could have a more proficient, skilled professional chief of staff to help coordinate all those things, but 80 hours a week um is just unreasonable, and frankly, and um my recommendation to her is to not kill herself is to reduce the hours, and so you're looking at reduced efficiency and reduced work product.

So a delay does have significant impact on operations.

Um the position is posted.

Can we have significant say in the overall description?

Because I do think in the amendment posted, there are some very reasonable requests put forward, but again, I do think that we need to move on getting this position pushed.

Yeah.

Thank you.

So this is a uh at Will person, so it's like the process for hiring somebody in the mayor's office, it's not an open position uh that will be solicited.

I'd be more than happy to engage each council member with the person before making an offer to gauge um acceptance of that individual.

All right.

So I understand that may not quell all of my colleagues' concerns fully, but I do hope that at least calms some of them.

Thank you.

Thank you, Alderman Shandemeyer.

Any other uh Alderwoman O'Neill.

Thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

Um, I first and foremost want to say that I understand um working long hours as a person who regularly has more than one job and works those long hours.

I get that, and it has nothing.

My hesitation for supporting this ordinance has nothing to do with the person who's currently doing the job and the job that they're doing.

Um my biggest hesitation are twofold.

Um, one, we haven't received a job description.

Um, it concerns me that HR was able to assign a classification level to it without a job description.

Um you and I have talked offline about the lack of job description and what was written.

Um really concerns me that it does put a layer between the mayor and the council where we're supposed to be a team.

Um, so that does concern me, and that is one of the reasons why I would ask for a postponement, even if it's until the 23rd, so that we can get a job description to in order to say yes, in fact, we want this position, it makes sense for this position.

Um, because otherwise we are okaying a job and we have no idea what that person is going to be doing.

Um we have no guarantees that the six or seven items that you rattled off at the beginning of your speech um are actually going to be what they're going to be doing.

And as I also talked with you, I'm worried about the job classification uh level and how it'll affect other people in that department.

Um who could and should be at that level.

Um, and we haven't had an opportunity to talk about that, and we'll do that so in the budget.

Um, doing a position of this magnitude outside of the budget is my biggest concern.

Um, I had seven or eight constituents um who reached out to me since I put out my newsletter, um, who also voice that concern of so many unknowns, so many unknowns, and outside of a budget, adding uh position of this significance.

Um that's why I would push for postponement, just so that we can get those answers solidified.

Um, I would happily vote on it.

Um if we had a job description that was significant to enough to tell us exactly what this position is going to be doing, and basically showing us why that position is at that classification.

Okay.

Any other comments?

Alderman Thorpe.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um, as you all know, I watched the city council for about a year from out there, and and one of the things that I observed was uh the residents need, desire, demand, call in on while while we all ran uh for accountability, efficiency, and more production uh from the city staff.

We're 71 days into this.

And I've I've uh been on the staff of major front offices, working for senior flag officers.

I've been one myself, and I know personally that the output of the leader is exponentially related to the amount of support staff they have.

And it is clear to me that the mayor's office does not currently have the staff uh the capacity they have.

I also will say I have the benefit of observing closely enough that it's not their performance, it's their capacity.

Um I also want to say that I am very conscious of the number of people on city staff.

I get it.

Um like all the woman O'Neill, I've had that discussion with residents.

Um, and I am uh beyond confident that the addition of this staff member um is well worth the added capacity at this point, and I I think the sense of urgency is tremendous.

Again, we're already 71 days into this.

We're already, as you said, starting to you're starting to dive into some of these bigger issues that take strategic insight, strategic work.

Um so I look at this as we have a choice.

Um we can uh continue to discuss this and limit the output of the mayor's office, or we can move forward with the trust and confidence of the CEO's uh recommendation uh that um you need this added capacity.

I am heartened by the brief that your chief of staff gave of the focus on the support of the city council.

I don't see that as a lair in between us.

That's not your leadership style.

Um and I I personally don't fear fear that.

I do tremendously respect um Alderman Savage and and Alderwoman O'Neill's concern.

Um but I I personally think and I would encourage the council to act on this tonight in that the mayor has spoken that he needs this added capacity.

Um this isn't about power and politics, it's not about uh my worry that the city council of which you are a member is going to have diminished power.

Um and if that does happen, I think there are ways that the city that the aldermen and all the women on the council can address that.

Um I have a tremendous sense of urgency, as I think you do, as I think this the council does on getting this done.

Um I would say I'd like to quote Colin Powell on leadership.

And he often said that a true leader is one who knows when you have enough information to write to make the decision.

And you make it a day late or a day too soon, um, and it causes problems.

Um I don't see what a delay is gonna get us.

Um I think it will get us more discussion.

Um I'm not saying it wouldn't improve the process.

I just don't see the benefit of the improvement of the process that would be worth another two weeks and be even perhaps longer delay.

Um I am not a fan of the city council and telling you how to write this job description.

Um I trust the city council will evaluate you on your on how you do that, and we will continue to work closely.

And I would I would conclude by saying I applaud what you've done in the 71 days and what your front office has demonstrated in working with the city council.

So I would say let's be practical.

Um let's get to yes.

Um, let's move forward and hire this person.

Um, and and really ensure that we have a mayor's office and a city council that continues to improve the responsiveness that our residents have asked for, demanded, and we're starting to hear that they're getting.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Alderman Thorpe.

Any other comments?

Janice, is that you asking?

I agree with Alsa Johnson.

With Ms.

all the men.

The Lord.

On accepting this position.

No, that more hands are better than just one.

And that way again always be person, someone always available when one person is off.

If it's just one person there, that's a lot.

Because she can never be off for any emergency or out sick or anything away from the office.

So I agree with Mr.

Thorpe that we should try to conclude this tonight.

Thank you, Alderwoman.

Any other comments?

Alderwoman O'Neill.

Yes, thank you very much, Mr.

Mayor.

Two things.

One, the mayor is not the CEO.

Just saying that.

It's different.

There's a difference.

But second of all, it's not needing the position.

It's the level of the position.

You said yourself support staff.

This is not a support staff.

This is a executive that we're hiring.

I think that there's a difference there, and that's where my hesitation has come in.

And I'm sorry that I'm looking at you directly, Alderman Thorpe.

But my questions as far as the job description and the level that we're bringing this person in has everything to do with the levels in the city mayor's office and the executive functioning of each and every person.

We haven't had a city manager.

We've had an acting city manager who's doing a great job of her own job and as an acting city manager, but we haven't had a city manager since May.

And there's been a lot of things that have fallen through the cracks because of that.

No shade to you at all, Vicky.

You're doing amazing in two jobs that are both very demanding.

We brought on an assistant city manager because of the work of the city manager, and now you're doing both jobs.

So no shade at all that I'm throwing you.

I'm just saying that in our city government, we are missing key personnel and have been since May.

That is a long time.

70 days of being mayor, you've done a fantastic job of getting stakeholders and getting employees to the table and listening to them.

My hesitation on this is bringing in another executive level person.

Support staff, fantastic.

Somebody that can just do one or more of the parts while we work through what exactly is needed.

And I just wanted to say that because I felt like what I had to say about it and my hesitations were overlooked by the fact that yes, we need some more people in there, but do we need an executive level or do we need support staff?

Thank you.

Alderman Thorpe.

Yeah, if I can just address it and and thank you.

I mean I had no problem with you looking at me.

I mean, this is good, right?

This is we're all in this together.

Um my point about the mayor being the CEO, that that's kind of how I look at it in our former government.

Um the entire city staff works for the mayor.

Um, and and I look at uh the mayor, and this is not me thinking this, is this has been a lot of discussions as I learned what the role of a city council member is is the mayor is truly the person who is the chief executive of the organization.

Whether that stands the scrutiny of the the city attorney, I don't want to go there.

The mayor is the chief executive officer of the city of Annapolis, so he is the CEO.

That's in the charter.

Yeah.

So but but even I I wasn't gonna go there because I think the charter can be used to argue for this position or against this position, as Alderman Savage is has talked a lot about.

But so just just as a point of clarification, that's how that's where I uh came from.

Um the deputy chief of staff as a support staff.

My point there, just to clarify, is I don't think we're hiring a deputy mayor.

I don't think the chief of staff is the deputy mayor.

Um, again, having worked in front offices where the chief of staff can only use the authority of the mayor for so long until he or she uh is irresponsible in their use, and and then we we go to the mayor and say, hey, what the heck?

Same thing with the deputy chief of staff.

That's what I'm saying is support staff for the mayor.

Totally agree that the person is of a seniority that if they call one of us and say, hey, the mayor's asked for whatever, we're gonna take that a little bit more than uh just a routine phone call.

But uh but I my point there being I have a lot of trust and confidence that as we move forward, I would like to get that phone call so that the mayor doesn't have to make that phone call and have relationships.

I'm confident in the relationships.

If it doesn't work out, I think we have ways to remedy that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Alderman Smith Brown.

All right.

So to address maybe maybe some of the concerns, excuse me.

Address some of the concerns that I know.

Having asked about fiscal responsibility.

Do you mind just sharing with other people exactly uh maybe if they haven't looked at the fiscal impact in order to report uh what this will look like, why we are in a good position to find someone to fill this position and how even long-term uh it wouldn't necessarily set us back, just to if you can give that context for some who may be wondering.

Sure.

So the uh human resources department assigns the category based on the job responsibilities.

The the range, as you uh as you know, is quite broad, and that's not my doing that's from HR, and frankly, that's from the class and comp provisions that this the previous council approved.

And so they approved a uh these wide bands, so this could get range from anywhere from 86,000, don't quote me exactly, but directionally I'm accurate, 86,000 to 160,000.

The uh the reality is somewhere in the middle tends to be the most likely of the positions.

The city manager uh will tell you over and over again, she never likes to hire on the high end because she likes to leave room for improvement.

I think for the uh executive type level functions and capabilities that the uh low end is way too low.

I think you're probably looking at a uh on a low end between 100 and 120, a high end probably 130, um, extreme high end 140.

So I don't think we're gonna touch the the high end of this, uh, but that's how it conceptually I feel um that this plays out.

Um it depends on who takes the job and you and in looking for executives in similar roles, that range I gave you is probably uh where we're gonna play out.

As far as uh funding this position uh for this current fiscal year, as you know, there's a uh a number of acting positions or number of vacancies, so there is uh there is payroll money that's not being used that would fund this position.

Obviously, it would be uh in the mayor's budget funded for the next fiscal year, and obviously that comes back before this uh council.

Uh all positions come back, and so you have line by line.

You say you don't like 120 officers, you can you know, and you're right if you have five votes to reduce uh payroll.

So that's you have that ability each year.

And frankly, I view it as I take on the responsibility, accountability to uh when this person's in place, assuming this person is uh uh in place, to show you accountability of why uh that that demonstrate that this person is earning the the keep and confidence of the city council and why they that position, just like all other positions in the mayor's office and elsewhere throughout the uh city council throughout the city administration, meaning like the entire city budget is earning their uh their way.

That answer your question.

Absolutely.

Um do you also mind touching on just the idea that um our workload or our burden as is I mean, we we're I'm called to do this, we're in this for a reason, you know, for the people.

Um but can you address your um commitment to us as a council as well?

Uh that this is not just giving you all um a little alleviation or easing off some of the uh work that you all have to do, but that it's just one step in that direction to also provide that same support to us as a council.

Can you share that a little bit?

Sure.

I can certainly um relate to the frustrations that a as a council member feeling like you don't have your own uh staff and and that is a uh frustration.

And when the council members are uh feeling not successful, it's whether not keeping up with legislation or uh I'm assuming, and so it's an assumption that most of the uh extra burden is the number of correspondents, so the requests to appear at different places, emails to respond to text messages, calls, and so on.

Um so I can certainly relate, and I want you to be successful.

When the mayor is not successful, whether it's me or just generically, the mayor is not successful, things like um city doc things collapse, lawsuits get mismanaged.

Um money that you all are looking for, or the city departments are looking for, say take the uh fire department uh example, because that's top of mind.

The mayor's office is driving trying to uh fundraise that money from other government entities, county, state.

So the the mayor being unsuccessful and not productive has frankly much more dire uh consequences.

And so that's why I think amplifying the support to use uh uh Frank's term is a huge lift.

That said, the city council prior administration approved a position to support the city council as a legislative assistant, and the uh uh city man city manager buckliness has recently gotten that position out, and so finally uh you'll have that support very shortly to help in uh with legislation.

I I can relate to the need for administrative support, I think, of this council, the eight of you got together and discussed how an administrative type person, something with uh constituent relations was supportive and be absolutely open to how we can work together to address the needs of council and try to help you all be successful.

Thank you, Mayor.

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um just a few things to follow up on.

Just a quick clarification, because that I don't believe the class and comp study.

Well, I know the cost comp study did not set the pay on this particular position because it did not exist at the time.

Um I guess presumably HR chose one of the positions on that level, but again, I to our colleagues point from word two.

I don't know how we can determine what's appropriate if we don't have a job description before us.

Um another quick observation is just very little mention of the city manager in all these conversations, and again, that is they are the chief administrative office for the city.

Uh and I think a lot of these concerns we're hearing have to deal with the operations.

Um not the mayor's office.

It's that's a lot of I think you're shouldering too much of the burden for sorting out the operational deficiencies.

That is largely shouldered by city manager, but also the council too, as we as far as we and you have are in charge of the delivery of municipal services, right?

And that is specifically written in the city manager's job duty, right?

So we we have to be mindful of that.

It's not all the burden that has to be on your shoulders or your chief of staff shoulders.

But I feel like the impression I have is that you're taking it all on personally.

Um to Frank's point, again, I don't doubt the need.

Um but again, I think we need to coordinate these things with the city manager's office.

Um let's see, we talked about the pay.

So, yeah, as far as the pay, I do think that needs more evaluation too.

It's rather high.

I mean, this position would get paid more than a number of engineers in the county looking at what they get paid over there.

Uh, and they have all kinds of requirements for licensing and education, but again, we don't have all the information to even make that assessment here because we don't have a job description.

Um, I can also demonstrably point to conflicts between the list of job duties and the city manager's office.

This has been confirmed by former city managers who look at the job description, look at the job listings that we that was presented to us and express concern.

And I'm just surprised we would just ignore that and think everything's gonna be okay.

So to wrap it up, I just have to say I think if this doesn't get postponed, it's it's gonna be sloppy um here today because I have an amendment for the floor.

Admit it's not 100% ready because I would love to get feedback.

Um it's really not ideal to make floor amendments, but you know, so if this so again, like asking us to be postponed two weeks really is not a steep ask.

Again, it's a courtesy that is often granted when it's made in good faith, when it's requested in good faith.

And I think we both have said, since Alderman O'Neill and I are primary ones uh champion this.

We've both said we're willing to work if we get some additional information to work on this, to work to get to the yes.

And so if that faith request in good faith is ignored, it sends a very clear message that the desire for unity of this body and making decisions collaboratively takes a back seat simply for what two weeks?

Two weeks.

How is that unreasonable?

I've always been passionate about trying to maintain the health of this body.

And this sends a very bad message for a very new administration.

And to be frank, it'd be unprecedented.

You can think back to how many postponements we granted in the last administration.

Because we value the health of the body, relationships with each other, because we have to function as a team.

We're gonna get in political fights, but we have to still function as a team and give each other that courtesy when we ask for such things in good faith.

And so again, I ask you please respect our requests for a delay so we can get on board and get comfortable with this proposal.

Any other comments?

Okay, I've got a few to respond to uh what I heard.

Um, number one, much discussion about separation of powers and the responsibilities of the city manager versus the responsibilities of the mayor, let alone a chief of staff or deputy chief staff.

All those powers are very well delineated in the city code and charter.

This edition of the position wouldn't have the ability to change those powers.

There's no intrusion of separation of powers.

That's perfectly clear from where the current city code and charter state, what the city manager does, what the mayor's office does.

I believe that I have a very good working relationship with the city manager and respect the role and don't intrude.

And so the suggestion that, oh, if we just stop doing city manager stuff, life would be easier, or we hire a city manager, doesn't change a thing.

City manager has her responsibilities, her staff, her department heads, chiefs, and she manages them.

When we we have bad outcomes, it's this it's the mayor and the mayor's office that gets the pointed finger and held responsible and held to uh blame.

Very no offense to uh city manager buckling.

No one's saying on Facebook, City Buckland City Manager Buckland really dropped the ball on the ice and snow removal.

It's the mayor's office, rightfully so, and that's fine.

I don't I don't shirk from that.

But let's be clear that there's no violation of separation of powers here.

Uh the idea that this is a uh a temporary workload, uh that this is just short-term, there are certainly acting positions.

But again, mayor's office, city management uh chief of staff aren't doing the job with city manager, they're not doing the job of the finance head or HR head, city attorney head for that matter.

Those those hirings will help the city function all better, and we all look forward to having all those vacant roles fit filled.

It's not going to change my workload though, nor of the city, uh the deputy uh nor of the uh chief of staff, excuse me.

Uh size of the staff.

Um I've read somewhere that someone was suggesting this is the biggest uh staff ever.

It's not accurate.

The same size with this position as the Buckley administration.

You'll notice that three people departed.

Uh the sit the uh chief of staff, which I've replaced, uh, two other individuals, uh, one of which was repl was moved out of the mayor's office a few months before the end of the term, but for most of the eight-year term he was in that office, and this is uh maintains that size this of the office.

Again, this would get us from six to seven people for all the responsibilities that we have.

I reviewed all of them.

They are all working to not only max, but working well beyond their uh budgeted hours.

Um the reason for this position, as as clear as I can state it, is to improve capacity.

If there is doubt on job responsibilities, look to the job responsibilities of the chief of staff.

This is the deputy chief of staff, and it is to add capacity to those functions.

That is important.

I think it will all benefit you.

Along those lines, I think to the concerns that there would be this would be create an extra barrier.

I've I've got personal relationships with each of you.

You all call me, that's not gonna stop.

We're all gonna call each other.

I think we have appropriate level of when something rises to a phone call, in person meeting, email.

But I also know that many of you, many of you have sent lots of emails about looking for more support, meeting on certain your legislative priorities, looking for more support, engagement that you have not been responding to.

And there's not one of you who I've ignored intentionally.

Their workload is simply too great to keep up to the level of expectations that you all have, that are 41,000 residents have, that are state, federal, county elected officials have when they try to reach out to the office and demand and expect responses.

They send uh concerns and frankly, people beyond the city, people who aren't residents who come to town hall meetings, come to city council meetings, are on boards and commissions and expect more responsiveness.

Business owners, business crises.

This is a priority because this position ultimately becomes a bottleneck when the work doesn't get through.

It's a long list of people, and it's we are working our darnest to meet every single request and the correct priority, and it's unreasonable to expect that a chief staff can help the one mayor be prepared for all meetings, 10 hours of meetings and events and scripts, and be prepared for the next day and the next week, and keep an eye on the vision for the big picture with the big picture goals.

It's just unrealistic.

I don't think the voters who voted us in, asked for the same level of service that they've been receiving.

We heard two years of this is how I want it to be better.

If you want things to be better, and yet you're giving the same resources and expecting a different result, we all know the same.

It's the definition of insanity.

And right now, this feels like a lot of insanity with the way that so many people in city government are stretched over capacity, and yet we expect more, and we expect responses at 7 a.m.

and 11 p.m.

and on Saturday and on Sunday and on holidays and on and on.

You sometimes need to recognize that there's a demand for capacity and be responsible.

I heard 14 members of the mayor's office, it's not accurate.

Again, there's six members who are part of the mayor's team, and there's six people as part of that's part of outreach.

That's very much a separate role.

And a lot of those members, by the way, of those six people who do outreach are grant funded and they are part-time.

As far as the the uh concern or the statements about, well, it's you know, we all expect hard work.

I don't know that.

I mean, this is not gonna sound very humble.

I'm an extremely efficient person.

I produce a lot of work in the hours I give to the city.

Two years ago, I had 10 different jobs between volunteer jobs, paid jobs, gave them all up to do this one job, and I'm giving it my all.

Chief of staff, very similarly.

You will not recruit and keep and retain qualified people, expecting them to perform at high levels 80 hours a week and and stay human, stay sane.

I don't think it's a fair expectation.

And again, I'm I've been I'm the boss who says work less, because I don't want to burn out my chief of staff or anyone else who works around me.

These are dedicated people and they deserve that respect.

As far as the executive level pay, this is executive level work.

You heard the work I described by the uh chief of staff.

If you want that right now, the person's working 80 hours a week.

I'm trying to get it back down to something reasonable.

It's still gonna be well more than 40.

You want that same level of consistency and output, whether it's the chief of staff or the deputy chief of staff.

That's why I think the pay is justified.

It's a lot of money, but that's what if you if you want the people who can perform the work at the level you all expect and that our residents expect, that's what's gonna take.

As far as process and amendments, if there was this is the normal process.

We have first reader, we have committee assignments, we have public hearing.

No one, no one has sent me an amendment to review, period, on this legislation.

Not prior today, not today, not two weeks ago, not a month ago, never.

And so to me, what good faith discussion of postponement looks like is an engagement of the issues that's not about name calling and mischaracterizations and exaggerations.

It's about let's work through this complicated issue and address it.

This legislation is essentially one edit of a line where it's a list of exempted people, it adds another person.

It's not complicated.

No one has approached me with the amendment to discuss.

And so the suggestion that we have ideas of an amendment that I haven't shared with you yet, and that's my good faith effort to meet lands flat.

I've been in part of many complicated pieces of legislation discussion when I've been sitting in your seats, and there was ample time, ample justification for times where we should have postponements when there was good justification and dialogue that was left in complete, we needed more information.

This is not that case.

Um motion to postpone.

Alderman Savage.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um no one, I didn't hear anybody name calling today or any of the written materials.

As far as amendments, yeah, this is something I've been started working on, I think after we got this the presentation from rules in government.

Uh again, I would have been there if it wasn't for our town hall.

That's not a lot of time to work on amendments and to get the word out there.

Um I was hoping again that folks would just postpone uh to give more time.

But you know, I'll just leave the one thing.

I mean, again, I've mentioned this to you before in different contexts, but your whole slogan is listen you night do.

Um but if you can't even grant the two-week delay to help build that unity, then you might as well just strike unity from your entire slogan.

It's a very, very easy, reasonable request for two weeks.

If you feel like I'm not in good faith with the amendment, so be it.

Uh, you'll still get the vote in um two weeks.

Um but I just think it's completely against what the entire theme of the campaign.

The person in the candidate I supported to be completely ignoring a reasonable request like this.

Okay.

Any other comments?

Alderman Smith Brown.

Oh my gosh.

Okay, this is this is some serious business right here, y'all.

Um I do just want to emphasize that let's not overlook that employment in our city.

Um there's been a lot of issues brought forth, and we and I think that they also need to be addressed.

Um I just want to make a mention, you know, with all that we've heard from the uh cases brought forth, the public testimony.

I just want to acknowledge those people who said that uh there's some issues that need to be resolved in just employment in general in our city, uh, particularly with the um the implied racial discrimination, etc.

So I just want to make that comment, and then I want to call the vote if we can.

I move to call that vote.

Thank you.

Okay.

Uh all those in favor of the motion to postpone to February 23rd, say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

All those again say nay.

Nay.

Nay.

Okay.

I don't think we need a roll call or motion fails.

Roll call on that.

Nay.

Alderman Shandemeyer.

Nay.

Um, I'm sorry, Alderman McConty.

Oh, we rule on anything.

Voting uh whether you want to postpone or not, a yes vote would postpone a no vote uh does uh does not postpone.

What was the answer?

Yes, you said yes.

Um Alderman Savage.

Aye.

Alderman Thorpe.

Nay.

Alderman O'Neill.

Aye.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Uh no.

Yes.

He makes a full decision, but I'll give it his time.

I'm abstaining.

Um Alderman and also down to Nay.

Um, the motion is defeated.

Yes, um, three yeses, four no's, and one abstention.

Thank you.

So now we have the underlying motion that has already been seconded.

Is there any further discussion?

Alderman Savage.

Well, let's have fun then.

I move a floor amendment.

As I you will see.

Amendment number one.

Savage amendment number one.

Second.

Thanks, sir.

Oh yes.

We'll share.

That's right.

That's right.

So just to give a description on this.

Basically, if you look at the this would add text to the end of at the end of the legislation.

And if you look at the section of code, it would be located in the same section as the rest of the legislation.

And so it would be in.

Sorry, just looking this up.

Let's see.

So it's located in title three.

And okay, sorry, here we go.

So chapter three dot oh a exempt service.

It'd be at the very end of that section of code.

Create a new section, and it would be a section establishing the duties and limitations for chief of staff and deputy chief of staff.

And so starts off on the first page with a purpose, which I don't think is too divisive.

And B talks about non-supervision of departments.

Again, those have also heard over the years from city managers.

And this would set some clear restrictions, uh, clarify clarifying uh restrictions that chief of staff shall not have no authority hire, fire, discipline, promote, et cetera, et cetera, because again, that's reserved for the operational city manager's office.

C is coordination with departments, basically saying the court limits the type of coordination.

Um states that operational control departments remains vested in the city manager's office.

G is council access.

Um let's see, should be construed to require council members to communicate with the mayor only through the chief of staff or deputy chief of staff.

Again, the intent with that is to preserve the mayor's role as chair of the council in E.

We have intergovernmental representation, and that just establishes clarity on that to state that the mayor is the principal representative of the city in intergovernmental affairs, and uh I just want to make sure that's emphasized in F prohibited duties, lists things like prohibiting procurement authority, which my understanding uh has been a problem in other jurisdictions, so I thought it would be good to put in here.

Um prohibits some of the personnel conflict that's outside the mayor's office, prohibits direct day-to-day departmental uh directing day to department operations.

Uh you'll see in G job description approval, or final job description should be submitted to the city council for approval by resolution prior to hiring or appointment, and then it has a reporting requirement where we can get quarterly reports from those positions so we are aware of the activities since the way it's being sold to us is that it's gonna help serve the council as well.

Well, I think it's justified to get some reporting from them.

So that's it in a nutshell.

That's my attempt of addressing some of my concerns, and I was hoping to have time to work with everybody, including the mayor on this, but not given that option.

So here it is.

Any discussion.

Alderman Shannon.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um so in a service level reading, I think a lot of this sounds reasonable, but I do think we should be hearing from our chief of staff.

Uh if there is anything I am missing.

Is it possible for Ms.

Garrety to join us at the table?

Uh yes.

Um I didn't hear the first part.

I'm sorry.

So what's the request for Ms.

Garrety?

A surface level reading makes this sound reasonable, but I am not the one who's hiring this position and trying to navigate this process.

So I'd like to hear some input from Ms.

Garrety, who is Alderman.

I suggest before we get into your questions of Ms.

Garrity that we ask our city attorney for review of legal sufficiency.

Fair enough.

So there's a couple things in here that are already covered by the code that don't need to be included in here.

So starting with B, the non-supervision of departments.

The authority that's set up in the code now is that the city manager is the supervisor of the department.

So B is not necessarily needed because it already has that sort of tiered system set up in the code where what is considered the appointing authority for the mayor's office is the mayor.

Um, and then for the departments is the city manager for the office of law, is myself for the departments, it's the department directors, and so on.

So B is not necessary because that structure is already set out in the code, whereas a deputy chief of staff would not have that authority to hire fire um discipline because that is retained with the appointing authority themselves, and that's in earlier in um in chapter in title three.

Um it's in 3.16 in various locations.

Um this is just a very quick glance, so there's probably other things that I could pick up when it under G for the dot job description approval.

I just lost my spot too.

Um that conflicts with already existing code provisions of 3.08.070A, which has all exempt job descriptions, with the exception of city manager and the department directors are approved by HR and the city manager.

So the city that code provision would have to change if the city council wants to approve a job description for chief of staff and deputy chief of staff because those are already approved by HR and city manager only, as already um passed by the city council.

Those are just my first two initial glances at some of this.

Oh, I'm sorry, in the big one.

Um, just so that it is very clear.

There is no such administrative authority in a separation of powers.

It is the executive branch, the legislative branch, and the judicial branch.

We do not have judges.

Um you could say some of our boards are quasi-judicial, but administrative authority kind of falls under the executive.

Again, the mayor is the chief executive officer.

The city manager is the chief administrative officer of the city.

The city manager directly reports to the mayor as the chief executive.

So administrative is not a separate branch, it falls under the executive.

Thank you.

Did you say something she could change in here on that?

The administrative or was that just a comment?

Well, I'm sorry, what were you commenting on language that you're doing?

Yes, so it says these positions shall operate in a manner consistent with the charters allocation.

I'm sorry, and under A.

Charter's allocation of executive, legislative, and administrative authority.

Administrative authority falls under the executive, it's not a separate branch of government.

Okay.

Yeah, it's it's not saying that it's separate here, it's just saying the policy should operate in a manner consistent with the charter's allocation of those duties.

But the allocation of those duties or the city manager is a direct report to the mayor as the chief executive.

So the city manager is subordinate to the mayor in that regard.

The city manager's administrative authority is technically enveloped by the mayor's executive authority.

It's almost one and the same.

Or part and parcel, I guess, is a better way to phrase it.

Well, I don't see a harm in mentioning that though.

The different types of authorities because it does specifically say in the code the chief administration is handled by but it also specifically says that the city manager has the mayor has direct supervision over the city manager.

Right.

Yeah.

I mean, I don't mind um I don't mind making the removing B or changing approval in G to from approval to review by the council.

But it clearly there's been expressed a desire from the council to be able to see a job description.

And so I think just putting in here um that the description should be submitted to the city council for we can just put comment for comment prior to hiring or appointment that way we don't step on HR's toes.

Okay, Alderman Thorpe.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Um I guess before I make my comments, I really want to address Alderman Savage directly and ask that none of this be taken personal.

Um I think we can have a remember we don't address council purposes directly, we do address the mayor.

I'm sorry, we don't address council persons directly in meetings.

We really just make sure that we're addressing it as directly toward the mayor, just so that there isn't any type of tension or anything like that.

Okay, that's fair.

I mean, I'm my my point is is that is I think we can have a good discussion about this legislation without questioning each other's um intent or whatever.

Um and that that's that's uh my overarching thing because I think we've got a great body here that we want to continue to work together in a very cordial and and uh professional way, and we should be able to agree to disagree.

Um so with that said, before we go line by line through this document, um I'm trying to figure out what how these amendments improve the job description of the deputy chief of staff.

Um and I'm I'm struck with I think it goes back to, and I think the mayor alluded to it, the uh challenge between the older persons and the role of the mayor.

Um that there's a lot of it that I think could be misconstrued by some in the future to delay efforts from moving forward because there's legislation, and I'll just pick one at random.

Um the chief staff at deputy chief staff shall not condition limit or filter council access to the information to information or staff.

And I would I would not want somebody to in a meeting to go point of order, legislation says you can't do that or whatever.

I mean it and then finally I would say um to me, organizationally, it's unheard of to require for the city council to require quarterly written reports by the mayor's chief of staff.

So I I guess I before we go line by line, I'd like to take a step back and I'm not sure on Robert's rules of orders how to do this, but but we could spend hours debating this, but I and then still disapprove it.

I mean, so if but if that's the intent, I guess that's what we have to do from a legislative body standpoint is go through amendments and then vote at the end.

But I just I'm under my review of this.

Um I'm trying to figure out what problem we're trying to solve with it.

Mr.

Mayor.

Thank you.

I uh uh again as the uh as the efforts to try to get towards legislation, the proper way to uh share amendments is not on the fly in the council meeting when you're trying to vote.

It's in advance to have discussion and debate, and uh and so unfortunately we didn't have uh no one's taken the opportunity to do that in advance.

I'm also not clear um what the problem that this solves, due to your point.

Um at first glance, the uh besides an A having the administrative authority in there to me, that's a no-brainer to take out.

Uh B, the non-supervision of departments should also be removed.

That is all uh dictated in the uh the code and and uh already.

So that's super superfluous.

The uh part D about council members retaining direct access.

That is the um I I get the point, and frankly, I don't disagree with the point, but as far as when you're trying to dictate code and you need to be specific, that is completely non-specific, and is so um so uh vague as to not be uh effective in what the intent is, and I can't imagine that it would pass uh legal sufficiency, frankly.

Um the next paragraph after that.

This is also just poorly formatted legislation, and that as you have like say in this paragraph D we're looking at, you should have it A, B, and C.

You should have line numbers so that we could have a debate.

So this is just poorly crafted and presented uh uh amendment.

Um the that last sentence in D, the chief of staff and deputy chief of staff shall not condition limit or filter access again, so vague as to be overarching and just setting up for future disputes and rational disputes and uh litigation.

Uh G, job job description approval.

Um again, there's this is uh an overreach of trying to solve an issue of job description.

Um so that is that it strikes me as a significant overreach.

And then as an overarching, I'm not sure why any of this mentions the chief of staff at all when this is an amendment uh regarding the new position of deputy chief of staff.

And so if there was um any serious consideration of this amendment, I would strike all instances of chief of staff and have this be specific about the deputy chief of staff since that is the underlying legislation.

Amendments are supposed to be tied to the underlying legislation.

The chief of staff position is not part of the underlying legislation.

So all instances of the chief of staff are or misplaced here.

So that is my reaction um off the top of my head.

Um Alderman Shandemeyer, or were you looking to say something?

Yeah, I was gonna say attorney and another quick legal review, but I can wait.

Go ahead.

Are you sure?

Yeah, we need legal review on this.

Um so under F for the prohibited duties, there I've already marked every area in the code where those duties would be prohibitive anyway, so it would be redundant to include it in this legislation.

The procurement authority is already under 6.08.040, and that is giving that a procurement authority to the procurement officer.

The only exception to this is when there is an emergency declaration, then the city manager is allowed to um uh give the procurement officer the ability to exercise procurement authority absent the normal means.

And so there would be no need to have this prohibition language in there.

Conducting or directing personnel investigation or disciplinary actions, the appointing authority is given that authority in 3.16.120, so the deputy chief of staff would not be able to do that.

Binding the city contractually or financially, that is under Article 5, section two of the charter that is given specifically to the mayor.

There may be some instances where the city council is given that authority contractually, like if you're passing legislation for a lease or something along those lines, directing the day-to-day departmental operations, Article 6, Section 2B of the Charter, which is giving that authority specifically to the city manager, and then performing any function assigned by charter to the city manager, it's unnecessary because that is already uh duties that are delegated to the city manager under Article 6, Section 2B.

So the entirety of section F is is unnecessary.

Alderman Shendermeyer.

You had some questions well, my question was on initial reading.

This seems like this wouldn't tie hands too much, but I wanted to hear from the person who was going to be hands and knee deep in this and this process.

I think we've heard directly from you uh, Mr.

Mayor, that this does seem like it would be pretty restrictive in trying to hire this position.

But uh Ms.

Garerty, is that a correct assessment on my part?

You're just referring to the amendment.

Yes, ma'am.

Yes.

All right.

So I appreciate wanting to try to narrow this down and increase supervision, but we're hearing from our team that this amendment would just make it too difficult to hire on to the position that they are looking for and the position that they need to be an effective executive branch.

I think that we can give this administration the trust that they will still be responsive to our needs.

A week if I needed something within 24 or 48 hours, and I think with this position, that response time can continue.

So I appreciate the goals of this, I appreciate the targets of this, but I do think this will tie the hands to much of what we want to accomplish with the legislation itself.

Thank you, Alderman.

Um City Manager Bucklin.

I wanted to address just a couple of things.

Um the first is is sort of just on the technical level.

Um the just descriptions of duties are typically in the code, having are typically in the charter, having this in the code, like none of the other positions are described this way in code.

They're in the they're in the charter.

Um from a practical day-to-day standpoint, I think that one of the things that I I'm hearing in the discussion here is some concern about how the relationship between the city manager and the chief of staff plays out.

Um and having gone through a couple, you know, previous administration and this administration.

Um there's I think that there's a um I think it's I think there's a little bit of a misunderstanding about the role of coordination and helping to translate the mayor's vision versus direction.

And they are different things.

And I think it's also important to understand that if everything has to run through the city manager, the city is gonna come to a standstill.

There have to be other paths of communication between the mayor's office and departments, because if everything has to go through my inbox, that is a recipe for disaster.

And part of what the chief of staff has always done, whether that was the previous administration or the current administration, has been to help provide some additional conduits for the translation of that vision and those priorities.

Obviously, the role of the city manager is to make sure that I stay informed about what that is, how that's playing out, are there difficulties?

Do we need to make adjustments?

You know, has everyone been brought in.

But that coordination element is not the same thing as providing direction.

And you know, part of I think the strength of any administration ends up being how well those relationships work, and that requires people being willing to own their own authority and speak up if that that threshold is being crossed.

And I I've that's not something I've had to do.

And I and I appreciate the concern, but I'm not sure that's what we're looking at here.

Thank you.

Any questions or concerns or comments?

Okay.

Alderman Savage.

Oh, thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Just a few things.

Um yeah, I sounds like some of the proposed code is certainly duplicative, but I don't think that's really harmful to have in the code.

Um the reason I'm including chief of staff in this is because I think both positions, again, just in my experience, need some you know, uh descriptions added in the code to help govern and speak to their job duties and expectations.

Um I do take some offense to the serious amendment.

I mean, I think any amendment on the floor is a serious amendment, especially the amount of work that I did put into this.

Um got information late, but also I thought we had more than enough votes to postpone.

Um, and so I made the mistake of waiting too long.

Um didn't think I needed to send them out and under that scenario.

Um and I think if Alderman Hotley was here, we may very well have gotten to postpone it.

Um any case.

Yeah, that's that's it.

So I mean that's kind of my that was my intention.

I wish I would have had more time to work on this.

Um I still might bring it back if this fails.

But um yeah, appreciate the dialogue.

Okay.

My suggestion is this that we uh do not proceed with this amendment one, so we'd vote it down and proceed with the underlying legislation that we have before us.

And then we work collaboratively to with the human resource department to develop a uh job description.

Since that seems to be a concern.

Um, and I think if since we have other job descriptions, um it's reasonable to uh have one here, and we could work, I would think, collaboratively on what that job description looks like.

So it could be uh something that we work on together collaboratively.

Again, I it's important to have HR as the uh experts in those uh in that process.

So I think we should have that discussion.

Um the underlying legislation does not have all the job descriptions.

It's a different piece of legislation, just different piece of code.

That's why I don't think this uh effort um taking out face value as being well intentioned to um improve the job descriptions and and duties is misplaced on on this point.

There is uh certainly this council and the way the code is set up provides the council numerous opportunities for oversight and account and accountability.

Um you expect rightly so all positions to be performing, high performing, and when they're not, you should call it out and you and you do, which is is right inappropriate.

So that's my suggestion is to uh work on legislation that adds it adds uh job description to that position, uh, but doing it concurrently with the next steps of hiring this position and not letting that uh slow up the process, Alderman Smith Brown.

Thank you.

Um what does that timeline look like?

Uh sorry, can you speak up?

What is that?

Yes, what does that timeline look like for us um if we uh are to not support this amendment?

Um just realistically speaking, though supporting the legislation to add this additional position.

Um it goes into effect.

We're gonna start looking for our chief of uh deputy chief of staff.

Um what will that look like then for our involvement?

Are we gonna have a meeting in a week to discuss what that looks like?

Like how how will that look uh for us to have that input?

Sure.

So what I would envision is if a deputy chief of staff is is hired before we get to uh for me up again.

You have a chief of staff with very clear responsibilities.

The deputy would be um delegated, have the ability the chief of staff would be able to delegate those responsibilities that the chief of staff has to a deputy.

That's the whole definition of what a deputy does.

Um I would not think it would take more than a meeting at most two to develop a um, I would look to legal whether it's a resolution ordinance.

I suppose I'm saying it out loud, it's an ordinance because it's a change, it's not a policy change, it's a uh statement, it's not a statement of policy, it's a change to the code.

And so it's you know, not looking um immediately to my left to see what the burdens are of the office.

I don't think this legislation is very complicated to add job descriptions.

It would just depend on the um time frame uh capacity of the HR department or law department um and us having a chance to work together on that collaboratively.

It's not complicated.

Sorry, all the woman o'Neill.

Thank you.

Um the uh hopes of not beating a dead horse because my phone is blowing up.

The one thing that I've heard over and over in the past 20 minutes is the fact that the title of this legislation is changes in exempt service job classification when really it's adding a position.

So people are feeling duped.

I just wanted to say that.

Yeah, I don't think it's a it was a great title either.

It wasn't uh it does it says nothing to the fact that we're adding on a position, um, an executive position in the mayor's office, unless you dig down deep and shame on me for not telling my constituents to dig down deep on every piece of legislation that goes a pass, as opposed to yeah.

I think uh we point taken, we can certainly work to improve the titles of legislation to make sure that it's uh more transparent about what it does.

Sure.

Okay.

I think we're ready for a vote on um amendment one with the and whether just asking for a vote on amendment one.

You can yeah, okay.

All right.

All those in favor of amendment one say aye.

Aye.

All those against say no.

Nay.

No.

Roll call.

I said nay.

How are we voting on this?

Madam City Clerk, can we have a roll call, please?

Sure.

Hold on, let's I have a question.

Yes, Alderman uh Smith Brown.

I know we're voting on this, but there's so many changes that still needed to be added to it.

So why wasn't there a motion to make those edits per our our attorney and the suggestions that were made before we came to a vote on this?

I mean, there's sections that shouldn't be included, and there's uh missing space.

I mean, there's things that we could add to it.

I know we might be can't go back now, but I just thought that that's what we should have done.

And Alderin Spith Brown, I agree that there's this does not meet uh legal sufficiency in a number of ways, and that's why I wouldn't tend to vote it down.

Um the issues can all be addressed in standalone legislation, and frankly, it's the right place to do it, not as an amendment.

So that's why I would encourage colleagues to vote against this, and then we can work get to work on subsequent separate standalone legislation to address the job descriptions and other issues that are not beyond the bounds that the city attorney described.

Okay, thank you very much.

Um may I um does that meet I'm not gonna ask the older persons, but can you speak up, please?

To those who to those who are have reservations still, does that meet uh the need for for you to uh be comfortable with the mayor's commitment that we are gonna bring forth additional legislation to bring a job description?

Is that meet the um ask?

It's fair question.

So roll call right now.

So uh madam city attorney pointed out that we already asked for discussion, discussion closed, and we're in the middle of a roll call.

May I let me?

All right, no.

Albany Shandemeyer?

Nay.

Alban Conti, nay.

Nay Aldama Savage.

Aye.

Alderman Thorpe?

Nay.

All woman O'Neill.

Aye.

Alamus McBride.

Nay.

Alderman, Alderman off of Johnson.

Nay.

Motion is defeated.

Okay.

Is there any further discussion on the underlying motion?

No, could we ask?

Can we ask that question now?

Does it meet the need?

Yes.

Okay, does it meet the need?

Is there any uh anyone wish to respond to that?

Sorry, excuse me.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

Uh that helps for sure.

Um I think it's something I mean, we can certainly have been pointing fingers at each other as far as getting information to each other on time.

And I think this is something that we should have gotten a long time ago with the introduction.

But it does help.

Thank you.

Very good.

Okay.

All right.

Any other discussion before we woman?

I don't know if it's appropriate.

Just speak up into microphone, please.

I don't know if it's appropriate to be asking this now, but I just want to know.

Um you gave y'all the reasons for why y'all wanted to push forward with this, but is this more significant than some of the alleged um discrimination issues that we've had that we haven't gave this much attention to?

Was it termination issues?

Is that discrimination issues that we've been having that we didn't give this much attention to?

I'm trying to process uh your question.

So my question is we're like it's a lot of pressure and a lot of chaos over this legislation.

So how come we're not giving the same attention to the discrimination issues that we've had?

Got it.

So I think I would just describe it this way.

The claims of discrimination have been staff that are below the director level.

So they are certainly the mayor does not have direct oversight of people who are directors, let alone below the director's level.

I think your concerns and questions about discrimination are well founded in that we've heard a lot of claims, and we should all be concerned that we have these claims of discrimination.

But I think the person to answer where we stand on that is the city manager of where that is.

Now I don't think she'll be able to give you specifics on any one individual case because those are individual personnel issues, but perhaps she can uh describe it in in a broader context of what has been a reaction without any specific instance.

But that's that I think that's the reason why you haven't had a discussion about those claims here because it's not a council matter, those are operations, and as you've heard me say, I try to stay clear uh of intruding where I don't wear at all with authority.

City manager Buckland, would you like to address sure?

Um as you indicated, um, some of that is individual personnel uh matters that cannot we cannot comment on on individual personnel matters.

That said, um I certainly take those concerns extremely seriously.

Um as you guys know, I I spent a lot of years in the health and human services world.

Um that has as part of its core mission, um taking care of everyone in the community, particularly those that are most vulnerable.

Um and I take I take those charges very seriously.

Um that's that's something that obviously we continue to follow up on.

Um of those um some of those issues um exist outside of the uh some of some of the particular um there are definitely processes for addressing some of those, and it is important that we follow those processes.

They exist both for they they exist for the protection of staff as well as protection for um for uh organizations.

Um is a real non-answer.

That was probably really unsatisfying.

May I prompt you for another part of the answer?

Can you uh um discuss the uh position of EEOC and what the human resources department role about?

Yeah, that is a function that has um historically um occurred within um within human resources.

Uh there's um part of what you heard during that testimony um was a request to kind of revisit how the city has organized some of those functions, and that is something that we're uh we had been um discussing anyway, um, and are taking seriously that that request um to take a look at how the city organizes that function.

Any any further um that you could share about what your requests to our acting human resources director about revisiting personnel regs or anything like that you'd care to share?

Um, yeah, as you know, our personnel regs are extremely are are old.

Um there were there are a number of things that had been in code, they got removed from code, but the underlying personnel regs weren't updated at the same time, so we're sort of falling back on this really old personnel regs.

Um that was an effort that human resources had been starting anyway, and the acting HR manager um is is aware and is actively engaged in um some updating of that.

Uh and that's obviously a charge that we will want a new permanent HR director to to look at.

Um is there there are number of pieces in there that really need updating?

So I can't stress enough how complicated that work will be and time consuming, but it's concerns taken very seriously.

So I can't stress enough how complicated that work will be and time consuming, but it's concerns taken very seriously.

Okay.

If no further discussion, I would ask uh for a vote on the underlying uh legislation 04125.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed say no.

No.

Okay.

Any requests for a roll call?

Um roll call.

Walked into that one.

Sorry, yeah, there it's gonna be one on third reader anyway.

We're finishing the vote on second reader.

Yeah, yeah.

So that was um carried.

Motion carries.

Yes.

Um, do we want the roll call?

Um, you're gonna do a roll call on third reader.

Got it.

Thank you.

Is there a motion to adopt 04125 on third reader?

So moved.

Thank you.

Uh Alderman Chandelmeyer, is your second?

Okay.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

All those against say no.

Nay.

Um, Madam City Clerk, would you please take call the roll?

Yes, sir.

Mayor Mayor Littman.

Yes.

Alderman Chandelmeyer?

Aye.

Alderman McConti.

Aye.

Alderman Savage?

No.

Alderman Thorpe.

Aye.

Alderwoman O'Neill.

Alderman Smith Brown.

Good.

Aye.

Alderman Alsib Downson.

Aye.

Um that pass.

Okay.

The motion passes.

Matt, Ms.

City Attorney, would you please present the next item on the agenda?

The agenda is completed.

Is there anything else for the good of the order?

Alderman Shandemai.

Thanks, Mayor.

Um I apologize if we're already working on this, but I do think it would be helpful to have as a work session uh in the near future, a post-snowstorm debrief with our public works transportation and emergency services just to go over uh what we learned, what went well, what could potentially be improved upon.

Um, I think that should just start becoming SOP after every major snowstorm where we have to declare a stage two or higher emergency.

Very good.

Um, it is being worked on as you would imagine.

And so yeah, happy to we can add certainly add that to the list of um work session items.

Thank you.

Sure.

Any other points for the good of the order?

Alderman Thorpe.

Um Mr.

Mayor, uh here in Annapolis, we have a thing called frostbite races, which are sailboating.

I'm sorry.

Here in Annapolis, we have a thing called frostbite races, which are sailboat races when people sail and it's 30 degrees outside.

I wanted to commend public works for Saturday night, and I think you witnessed it as well.

There was a water main leak in Eastport.

And it was clearly in the teens.

Uh the temperature was in the teens.

And uh not only would was the team out there working it, but when I stopped and talked to them, their attitude about fixing it could not have been more positive.

I mean, it was kind of of the tone, hey, we got to get this done.

Um and the system work.

The residents were notified uh that the water main was out because of a water main break, and then they were notified again when it was fixed.

And I and this comes on the heels of reacting to a major storm.

And uh I just wanted to make sure that we're recognizing that um it continues to be tough out there for our public works team uh as we're battling this goal.

Thank you.

I appreciate you raising that.

They are certainly working hard, and as you know, when they were spending so much time on clearing ice and snow meant putting aside uh other responsibilities, and I know they continue to see uh I the plows continue to be out.

I saw some out on the roads today as they're continuing to try to address uh areas of concern.

It just continues to be very hard work mixed in with their regular responsibilities and very impressive and and difficult work, and especially when it's 19 degrees, as I think it was when I saw them working on that water main break.

Any other points for the good of the order?

Okay, there being no other items on the agenda.

I would entertain a motion to adjourn.

Thank you.

Alderman Chandelmeyer, is there a second?

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Thank you.

Listen, motion passed.