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Date: 6/8/2018
CHICOPEE – The city started the final approval process for its retail marijuana legislation at the City Council meeting on June 5.
In a lengthy agenda, three groups of municipal employees received approval by the City Council for their new contracts, but the city’s schoolteachers have yet to reach an accord.
Members of the Chicopee Education Association had an informational picket prior to the June 5 council meeting. Several teachers spoke during the council’s speak-out section pointed out how much money the city spends on education and urged the council to fund the schools.
The municipal laborers and administrative personnel, represented by UFCW Local 1459 had their new contracts approved. The three-year agreements provide a two percent increase in wages, Mayor Richard Kos explained during his briefing
The department heads also received a contract as well, but only for one-year.
According to Kos’s office, certain department heads will now receive additional compensation as their contracted hours have increased from 35 to 40 hours a week (Planning Director, Building Commissioner, City Engineer, Council on Aging Director, Library Director, and DPW Financial Administrator). The Department Heads have also received an additional amount of $650 added to their base rate for a reduction of three sick days per year.
The council approved the following mayoral orders for allocation of funding:
• One and half million dollars was approved for repairs to the pumping station at Jones Ferry. Department of Public Works Superintendent Jeffrey Neece explained the station handles the movement of nearly 50 percent of the city’s sewage and was built in the mid-1975. The work will be completed in two phases, which include the replacement of the original power distribution and control system. The repairs would also address code and safety violations.
• The council agreed to allocate $128,000 to establish a recycling program that would replace the services offered by the operators of the private landfill. In a letter to the mayor, Neece explained the funds would be used to build a small building for the recycling attendant at the Baskin drive facility. The center would allow residents to drop off mattresses and box springs at a charge and textiles, cardboard, books, rigid plastics, batteries, light bulbs, used paint, propane tanks, scrap metal and yard waste and brush for free. Kos assured the council this expenditure would be one-time funding.
• The city will repair the Parks & Recreation administration building thanks to the approval of $75,844.76. Neece explained in his letter to mayor the building needs a new roof, new main door, new drop ceiling tiles and floor covering as well as updates to the reception area and entry way, storage areas and conference.
• The council approved $51,000 to pay for a new automatic bar screen to remove rags and debris from the waste stream.
The council also voted to send the proposed ordinance regulating the sale of recreational marijuana to the zoning and ordinance committees for review as well as to the Planning Board.
Kos said the recreational ordinance “mirrors” the ordinance concerning medical marijuana. There will be three types of marijuana businesses covered by the ordinance – business to business for wholesale sales; retailers; and businesses such a testing laboratories and research facilities.
The recreational ordinance would limit the number of retail stores to four outlets.
The ordinance reads that no retail store would be allowed within 500 feet of an school, any city parks, churches, libraries, playgrounds, youth centers or “other establishment at which youth under the age if 18 usually congregate.”
The ordinance also notes that such a store has to be at least 1,000 feet if any drug rehabilitation or detoxification facility.
The ordnance would require all adult use establishment to install a “densely-planted vegetated screen spanning the entire width of an parcel boundary abutting any residentially-zoned ot residentially-used parcel and extending inwards on the establishment’s parcel for a depth of not less than 50 feet.”
All of the facilities must be located in a “permanent building” and cannot have a drive-through service. The earliest a retail store can open will be 9 a.m. during the week and must close by 9 p.m. The store cannot open before 10 a.m. on Sunday.
The four licenses created for Chicopee will each have to meet the requirements of a special permit.
Councilor James Tillotson said he believes the City Council will be able to make its final approval on the ordinances, after the succession of meetings, at its July 3 meeting.
I don’t see how we can do it any quicker,” he said.
Tillotson also said there would be a joint meeting between members of the council and the Planning Board on June 26 as part of the approval proves for the ordinance.