This webinar is being transcribed and summarized.

To the flag of the United States of America.

And to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.

All right.

Welcome everyone again to our community meeting that we meet every three months for input from our community.

And if I can now have the council clerk read the call of the meeting.

The chief of police of the city of Middletown's greetings.

And remotely via WebEx at Join a Meeting, event 2347-148-3597 on Thursday, July 9th, 2026 at 6 o'clock PM.

Hereof fail not, but make due service and 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 Pino Sarah Mayor.

City of Middletown July 2nd, 2026.

Online we have Councilman Tony Gennaro, Councilwoman Chine Fulton, and Councilman Darnell Ford.

Okay.

Thank you.

Whoops.

So we are ready to open.

Oh, and Councilwoman Linda Salafi is listed as an attendee.

I'll move her up.

Linda Salafi.

Four members, okay.

Uh so we are ready to open the meeting to uh public comment.

And if you would allow me just to go briefly go over the council uh rules and procedures for community meetings, uh we have uh uh uh ten minutes um to speak to us about any concerns you have.

Uh I'll give you uh a minute warning if you get that long with with your your comments.

Uh and please state your name and address for the record.

So and I'll go back and forth um chambered and online.

So we'll start with the chamber, and though anyone that would like to speak to us, please come up with the first.

I'm not shy.

Edmickow and 76 Pearl Street.

And uh you'd be surprised to know that I'm here to talk about Route 9 tonight.

Um I know we've had a lot of discussions, heard a lot of discussions in the chamber, and I appreciate the information that's come our way.

I still have concerns, obviously, and you will continue to hear about them.

Uh you know, at some point I would like to understand exactly where we are at what point where we are, and you know, if we could understand completely what phase one and phase two and phase three is and and what it means and where we are, that would be great.

Uh as you know, I don't trust the DOT.

And I I think you know the fact that they're coming in August to talk about the railroad bridge, uh gives me pause because I I think, well, why do they have to do anything with a railroad bridge if it doesn't somehow affect what might eventually happen on Route 9?

And uh what I uh have observed is that um they move little by little to the point where they say, well, it's almost done, we may as well just finish it.

And that's that's a concern.

Um, recently, and I know I've heard it's not connected, but when I heard um Court Street here might be turned into a one-way street, I thought, aha, maybe there's some influence that the the DOT is saying, well, if we fill the Coven with 7,000 cars a day, maybe we need another feeder road to get the cars up to Main Street or Broad Street or Pearl Street on days when it's crowded and your GPS is telling you to go somewhere some other way.

Uh and I I've been assured that that's not the reason we're doing it, but when I heard that the reason was safety, I looked at the crash data, which if you ever want an interesting nice reading, I would recommend going to the Connecticut State crash uh repository where you can look up any street, any intersection, and find out just how many uh accidents there there have been there.

I happen to know there are many at the corner of Pearl and Washington Street.

I know Ava knows personally that that they have them there.

Um in the past three years there hasn't been an accident at the COVID and um Court Street.

So you know, I think it's if safety is being is one of the reasons it's it's uh it's being considered.

You might want to take a look at that data to find out.

Um which leads me to my the point where I'm here and I don't have 10 minutes in me, so uh you'll you'll be relieved.

But uh there are so many this is such an important decision what we do and what the state decides to do to this highway and to our streets.

And it used to be that in the city of Middletown we had uh someone on the police department who was a traffic or officer, but who was certified and trained, uh uh went to classes to to understand the impact of traffic.

We don't have that we have a traffic officer now, but that that certification apparently does not exist.

Uh I think my suggestion is that the common council that the city hire a traffic engineer to help look at the plans and understand the impact because none of it I'm not an expert.

I've looked at it a lot, I thought about a lot, but I'm not an expert.

But I would love to talk to someone who is neutral who can look at it and say, yeah, this is a good idea, or that it's not a good idea.

So that's my suggestion for consideration that before we make a decision that will impact us for a hundred years, that we get a neutral expert, like we get a neutral expert on legal matters and on building matters and on buying property matters, because this is as important as any of those decisions.

So have a nice night.

I uh didn't hit 10 minutes and I'll I'll leave you alone.

Good night.

Thank you, Ed.

Thank you, Ed.

Uh with the council's permission, since we have such a small group, I could I could provide some information that they're just received so that it could be made public.

I got a call yesterday on the date for our public form for the Route 9, which essentially is um a plan that's about 60 to 70 percent.

It's not the final design.

60 percent 70 percent.