Welcome every rise, please.

Thank you.

Under God with liberty and justice for all.

All right, welcome everyone again.

Thank you for being uh at our meeting for questions of directors, and if I can have the council clerk re please read the call of the meeting.

Thank you.

Kelly Sweeney, Anthony Mangiofico, Linda Salafia, Anthony Es Gennaro Sr., Jonathan Polino, Leslie Spatola, Shine Fulton, Ava M.

Hart, members of the Common Council of the City of Middletown, to attend a special meeting of said common council for the purpose of holding the questions to director's workshop on department agenda items for the regular common council meeting.

Said meeting shall be a hybrid meeting to be held in the council chamber of the municipal building in said city and remotely via WebEx at Join a Meeting, event 2344344-6249, Monday, July 6, 2026 at 6 o'clock PM.

Hereof fail not, but make due service in return to the clerk of said city three hours prior to the time of fixed meeting.

City of Middletown June 9th, 2026, attested by Honorable Eugene Pinocchera Mayor.

City of Middletown July 2nd, 2026.

I hereby certify that I have delivered an attested copy of the foregoing order and attached agenda of the common council meeting to each and every council member named above via electronic mail, attested by Eric M.

Costa, Chief of Police.

All right, thank you.

And now I'll open up the uh questions to our directors.

And uh just before I do that, who is online, please?

Um Councilman Darnell Ford is online, and then there are various directors online as well.

Okay.

All right.

Who would like to start the meeting with questions?

Questions online.

We're trying to wait.

I gotta get myself.

Questions online?

Good evening.

Thank you, Your Honor.

Um Director of Health.

Good evening, uh Kevin E.

Lack, Director of Health.

Thank you, Kevin, for being here this evening.

Um, we have a resolution dealing with the relationship between the city and the city of Cromwell regarding um the fact that uh as I read this agreement that you would potentially be the acting director from time to time to the office of uh for Cromwell.

Um I read through the agreement.

I didn't see anything in here regarding uh well, I did see yes, as of the resolution says there's no fiscal impact.

So potentially, I just wonder how this is gonna, I mean, you're taking from time to time, you're gonna be fulfilling your full-time job as the director of health, and then from time to time, in addition to that, you're gonna be the actor of acting director in Cromwell.

Um, in terms of taking on that level of responsibility as well.

Are you are you a member of a collective bargaining agreement?

Do you remember to the supervisors of in the city of Middletown?

Do you I'm not I'm executive, not your executive.

You're a non-bargaining.

Yeah.

Okay, so we can decide what we want to pay you or not pay you, uh, type of thing.

So why was why there's why is there no compensation?

I guess it's just the reality.

Why why are you?

Well, first let me go back and just explain why we're doing this.

So we're by statute, directors of health are required to when we're considered um uh on a planned absence, so if we're on vacation or on a medical leave or or whatever it may be, um we're required to a notify the Department of Public Health that we're going to be out of office, and then B have someone act in our in our absence.

So for us here in Middletown uh and of course there's certain criteria that that acting person or or education that that person has to have to fill in uh we have somebody in house we have Teneal Davis who's our public health manager so now when I go on vacation or go to a conference out of state or something like that I can name her as my acting um in some cases uh it's always good to have somebody else in line like we are we already have an MOU with the uh city of Meriden as well um again where it's mostly where if the director of health in Meriden goes on vacation they'll name me as uh filling in and and their absence and honestly so far it's been nothing more than having my phone on and if their staff needs to need something that only a director of health can do I can I can fill that and so far I've had to haven't had to do anything.

It could be signing a signing an order, a legal order or something like that.

So it's not definitely not going into the office in another town um or or doing anything like that.

It's more just phone support.

So that's what I see with our relationship with the town of Cromwell as well um where they have a actually a new full time director of health there now and uh they have somebody actually that would in house that would fill in for an acting director but if that person wasn't available they would need somebody next in line it only makes sense to have the jurisdiction next next door to you to to help out with that.

So that's why and talking with the director there now that we have laptops and phones like even if we're away that we can still we still you know I've gone to conferences across the country and still talk to my staff or I can do sign things digitally on my laptop and things like that.

So really there's I don't want to jinx it but like there's not many instances where we would actually need to do something that would require now to go there or expend a lot of time on something.

So just for the record this is well I'll speak for myself have we had this an agreement in effect that that you're it's before us that I that was adopted years ago and you're just updating this did we ever have to this this is a brand new one with Cromwell and this is of course after the new uh multi-year contract requirements came in place so that's why that's before you even though there's no fiscal impact um it is uh re automatically renewed every year once it's goes into effect so as I read that we have an amendment before us that actually says uh this agreement shall be binding upon the parties in subsequent years and shall re renew automatically from year to year unless terminated so it's not coming back to us this will be the first time potentially we will we as a city council at this date in time will actually see this agreement.

Correct and so uh in when when you are engaging if I I'm just trying to get clear on the um role that so there's going to be a share you know something in writing as I understand it is actually going to be transmitted uh on a right on what on a dad need basic explaining and so forth you're gonna be one of the parties to that discussion transferring writing the whatever's written and put into effect uh your honor do you play a role in signing off on on that as well or you do okay so the mayor yeah the MOU or the mayor and myself okay so I mean I'm talking about in terms of so from time to time you receive some a request from Meriden that's documented you receive that the you and the mayor sign off on it.

Same thing for in Cromwell so there's a record of that.

The follow-up question I have is in terms of the so you have someone that can in the chain of responsibility in our health department you have someone that can take over and operate while you're out of town or away and can it has the full licensure and ability to uh take care of whatever needs to be taken care of in fulfilling that role uh is that member that individual a member a non bargaining member as well uh no they're a member of uh up sue okay so the union has not indicated that they're gonna declare or at any point indicated impact bargaining when when that well and it's actually in their job description that they that it says they they fill in for my during my absence.

So the union has not indicated that they're gonna decline or at any point indicated impact bargaining when when that well, and it's actually in their job description that they that it says they they fill in for my uh during my absence.

Okay, so that's already documented and so forth.