Board of Health: February 3, 2025

Transcript captured from MHTV’s Vimeo auto-captioning. No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:04 Uh, welcome to the meeting, uh, February 3rd. Um, tomorrow’s my grandchild’s fourth, uh, on the fourth is his eighth birthday. I better remember tomorrow. Um, anyhow, uh, could we devi from the agenda while we wait for, um, yeah. Wait for the atomic man who’s traveling, uh, from work. So do you wanna, um, ask about What you wanna do? Oh, you wanna do board of that? Maybe I, maybe my motion that I sent right before the meeting? No, let’s do, let’s do the other first. Okay. Uh, you, you’ve rewritten some of the, um, the town meeting report And board of health, the, uh, board of Health Report. Town report. Town Report, not town meeting. Yeah.

0:51 So, um, and I have taken a look at your first draft, but I haven’t seen the second draft. So, um, can you forward that to me? Yep.

1:03 I thought I forwarded them all to, or have I sent you? I Need the first draft. I, Go ahead. Okay. I, okay. That was my mistake. You have a third, you had a third draft last night that I, yep. I think I Had. It must be the third. What should I lost count, but I, I didn’t have the most recent Transfer station. I don’t know enough to add. I organized, I think. Okay. I think the most interesting thing I was telling Andrew that I did this to try to help out because of this crisis that we’re dealing with compactor. Um, but I found it much more interesting than I thought it was going to be. The, uh, infectious disease issues, particularly the jump in pertussis was scary.

1:49 Well, the only thing that we know is that those are the only ones that are reported by docs. And there may be more and may be more being reported since Covid. Um, but if there is a jump, then we can keep, we keep, keep watching it. And that’s why we have, that’s why we have statistics. Well, but we haven’t in the past, in the report, the Tom report, we haven’t given the town running tabs. And I think that the table that I made was interesting to me at least. Well, if there’s a, to show it over three days, three years, three. Well, if there’s a jump, then I think it’s important to not thank you for doing that.

2:30 Good. Excellent. Did you, you didn’t see that? No, It didn’t, no. Well, okay. And those are only those diseases. There could be others too, but, um, Well, I don’t know where we got that list that you have that in one of your, so this is The communicable diseases that, you know, we get through Maven. Uh, this is the communicable list that’s required to follow up with. Okay. So those are the ones that Yeah. Maven uses. And the list is everything. ‘cause we always, we don’t have every one every year. What do you mean by everyone? That’s correct. So you’re not gonna have a disease for everyone every year, But, but all of these are the only ones we have and we don’t have anything for RSV. So RSV does not get reported through the Maven system. There’s a whole other separate reporting that it is open

3:19 to the public and doctors for RSV, but it’s not, the state does not deem it a communicable disease to be fall through Maven and, um, reported on Is there any way we can put RSV in those three years and put an asterisk that they’re a different source? ‘cause I think RSV is up. It RSV is definitely up and so is pneumonia. Um, Influenza pneumonia, I would’ve to take a look at it, I’d have to, I’ve never looked at the RSV report. Um, ‘cause again, it’s not a required communicable disease reporting one. Um, but I can take a look at that and see what information is there. So I’m surprised it’s not re you know, as a pediatrician. Yeah, it’s cro I mean, it kills babies every so often. Yeah.

4:06 In the old days, I mean, we had big group was rooms, it was Always a croup, uh, problems. But yeah. For whatever reason, it’s not one of the ones that is required to be on Maven. Well, if we have the data, if you can send me how I can get it or something. Yep. I think put it in there at a different place, maybe with an asterisk that it’s of a different source. But at least for me, I mean, I read things differently, uh, but I like to know why I am reading something and if I read that the town is following diseases for me and I, I want the town to know if the diseases are rising and falling. Yep. The, the covid was I think very interesting.

4:53 In 2022, we had 3000 covid or something like that. 2023 we were down to 300 and so three 50. And in 2024 we’re down to 300. So it’s not, it’s tapering, it’s not ending. Correct. So people need to see that it’s covid is still here. Right. So co covid is no longer a pandemic. It’s now an endemic. So it’s never gonna go away. It’s always gonna be a background disease. Well, again, that should be a word. Maybe we use, that should be something we sure we can teach in the town report other than just give information. Yep. So now, and, and it’s the same with pertussis. So obviously Marblehead is not unique in the pertussis

5:38 outbreak across the state, across the country. Um, and obviously, you know, there’s potentially several factors that are going into that. Um, yes. Vaccine hesitancy and the latency of the vaccine itself, or the effect, the effectiveness of the, the vaccine itself.

5:57 But No re like no, there’s been no major report to say, um, Tdap should be given on a seven year cycle rather than a 10 year cycle. They’re still sticking with the 10 years. Yeah. Well, Well, they’re afraid to do anything. No. Well, I hope they won’t be. I hope something in the next, But, but I think even if, even if Robert Kennedy isn’t even appointed, there is a hesitancy. The article in the Globe on Sunday was pediatricians are changing the way they talk about vaccines to people, to their patients. Oh, I read that. The, uh, that the New England Journal said that they’re questioning, I can’t even say it on tv, that they, they’re questioning fluoride,

6:43 which is disgraceful. Well, no, they had that, but Dr. Krueger gave us that article by, by, uh, the, in the Globe by Lynn. Yeah. Well, it’s, it’s, they have no right saying that. It’s, it’s proven. If you’ve seen rampant caries, you know what it looks like. And you have seen it. Well, Well, but what they, what the people who are arguing are saying, is it with fluoride, tooth pot taste and fluoride mouthwash? We get the fluoride we need. That’s could be true. But the people that get the rampant caries probably don’t even have a toothbrush, may not have a toothbrush, I should say They need in the public health way,

7:29 then maybe we gotta give toothbrushes rather than fluoride. And I think if you go the dentist, they do you have toothbrushes. Yeah. And when I went, when I went to Cuba, I brought a thousand toothbrushes. Hey, no, we’re on the same side. But I think this, but I, but I, I Didn’t, this is my view of what the Board of Health is supposed to Do. I didn’t bring fluoride toothpaste. I bought the toothbrushes. ‘cause I knew they didn’t have Does C but but Cuba has fluoride water. No, no. I don’t even know if they, I don’t even know if their water is clean.

8:05 Um, anyhow, uh, let’s, let’s, um, talk about this since I was on the committee that wrote the, um, wrote the mission and I feel comfortable with where we’re a, a majority right now. And the Tom did not write the mission. I don’t mind you making a motion about the all. Oh, I would move that on the mission that’s existed on the Tom report. We replaced the word th to by all, all residents of, of Margaret, all Citizens of hood. All citizens. Yeah. Yeah. Instead of the, I’ll, I’ll second that motion and all in favor. So I, I like the all too. But now the other thing is, does that have to come up three times?

8:51 That’s not something, a mission statement is not three times for a vote. No. Okay. Alright. So that’s done. That’s done. Okay. Um, we got, uh, several minutes today. Yes. And, um, I, I didn’t, I was, I was, you had some time today to read them. I didn’t read them. I glanced at, I only read the one, Oh, I glance at them at, uh, five o’clock or four 30. And I think that they’re, they’re too detailed and they should be more concise. They’re, they’re not, um, more generalized. I mean, like you’ve written with your, you know, 1, 2, 3, and four, maybe we need it formatted like that. But the, there was too much, uh, dialogue in the, in this, uh,

9:37 I can only speak through November. Yep. Which I didn’t think was well written. It. Well, no, it’s, it’s way too much dialogue. It’s, it’s not concise enough. It’s too detailed. So do you mind if I take a look at them? Of Course not. Okay. We’re gonna talk about ‘em next time. Formally though, right? Yes. We have to vote on them formally. So we need to do the work between now and, okay. I submitted my draft of the November ones to you all about four o’clock today. I saw it. Okay. But you were basing it on, on his Yeah. His, I think that we can make it more concise. Is is that right now I thought that Dr. Kruger was here for the League of Women Voters to take minutes for the league.

10:22 That’s not the same. They’re not our minutes. No, they’re not our minutes. They, They’re not having No. Oh, why do, why do we have two sets Of minutes? Because the league, because that’s the league chooses to do, but we’re required by law to do minutes Of our own. Yeah. And the league has decided they wanna do this as a public service, and they put it in the paper as a public service. Oh. They, they have a representative for many different, um, different organization, different, uh, committees.

10:52 They have a representative that goes to each meeting. Gee, where what, what paper did they put it In? The current. The current, Yeah.

11:05 So we can go back to that November meeting and see what the, If he were, if if he were here, there’s some of the meetings he had wasn’t attending at some point. Okay. I mean, he comes, he comes most as a volunteer. Yeah, I know. Yeah. I actually like his presence because he’s knowledgeable. Yeah. Um, his wife was on, on the, on the, uh, board health. Oh yeah. She’s an engineer. And, uh, she was served, I took her place actually. Um, smart woman. So, um, it’s now 15 minutes after the call time. So can we go to the, the meeting that, uh, the reason we’re here for the meeting? Sure.

11:52 So, um, we reached out to SL Chase Steel. Um, you know, we, we’ve been working with a structural engineer, um, for replacing the tipping floor, uh, that needs to be replaced. Uh, we, you know, we tried to solicit three bids. Um, or we have solicit tried to solicit three bids. Um, we’ve been talking with SL Chase Steel. We have an estimate from SL Chase Steel. And so, just so everybody understands the process with this, so we have a draft design from Chris Milano, who is our structural engineer. When the company that we award the work to goes into do the demolition, they will verify all correct beam sizes. Once they verify all that and all the work that needs to be done,

12:37 Chris will finalize his plan. Chop drawings will be created, the details will be created, and SL Chase will continue to do the work. So again, this is an estimate. So they’re estimating it, it’s $60,000 in steel and, um, materials. Um, and then it’s $60,000 with labor. Now we had to make sure that they had paying prevailing wage rates. So we reached out to the state to make sure we had the most updated, um, prevailing wage rates. And we provided that to SL Chase Steel for that work. And that’s why the estimate went up approximately, you know, a little bit. Yeah. It went up 60%, 59%. Yeah. So I, I, I can’t believe

13:27 I would like to understand, number one, we got an s we got a response to our proposal on January 30th. Yep. They said it was good for seven days. Yep. And four days later they bumped. So We need to make sure we are required by law that they pay per prevailing wage rates. Wait a minute, I have to ask you a question. $20,000 is 60% of a, of A hundred of 58. 50 20, 20,000 is 50% of 38. I thought we got it. Got a 90,000, Well, 90 nothing, Nothing changed. Nothing changed for the steel. What changed is the labor rate. But overall it wasn’t 59%, but it was Just No, it was the labor.

14:12 But, but, but the labor rate is easy Okay. To look at. And it, it, it seems to me that even if they don’t, if they didn’t have the pay prevailing rates to jump up a labor estimate in four days by 59%, I, I believe we’re responsible to be prudent purchasers and we have to ask about that. Yes. So what did you submit to them and ask them how it compares to what they had already? So I speak to them. So I have to reach out to the Department of Labor Standards and get the most recent prevailing wage rates. And you go through the prevailing wage rates and it comes up with, so for that category

15:04 is iron worker welder is the category that they have to use. I provide the current prevailing wage rates to the subcontractor or to, uh, SL Chase Steel, and he has to plug these numbers into his estimate. Right. And that’s why you see the increase, But it increased by 60%. Right. But we are required to pay per prevailing rate. But, But they made a bid. They can say they didn’t have the most up to date one. He Was just using his current rates that he would charge, you know, regularly. So if we were Okay. An average, you know, if we was doing the work, we, This is another example of why when we follow

15:51 the rules Yep. We’re paying through the notes. He’s also probably not used to working municipalities. That’s what I mean. Yeah, sure. He not a government agency. Yeah. But yeah, we’re, we’re required to make sure that the, you know, that these res are paid to the, to those employees that are doing the work. And Could you just double check and make sure that that’s why he there was An increase? Yeah. I sent him the email this morning that says say, Hey, you must use these rates. Please put this into your estimate. So then that’s what, yeah, Picked it up. Oh, okay. You triggered that. I triggered that. Yeah. Okay. I, I sent in motion out to you all. I pulled back my motion. So, you know, obviously, you know, we’re looking to go into contracts, uh, with s sl Chase Steel for the work

16:37 for the tipping floor, and that’s for demolition and construction of the tipping floor, as well as the steel ladder that is in place. That, that is also getting replaced to meet OSHA standards.

16:52 So, um, are you ready for us to make a motion? Yeah. So, you know, the motion should essentially say, look at the, you know, make a motion to enter into contract with SL Chase Steel based on the estimate and authorize the direct to, you know, sign on your PA behalf and create this contract. So would you like to make a motion on behalf of SL uh, chase, please?

17:17 Well, I, I guess I’ll make the motion to open the floor for discussion. Well, usually you make, yeah, you make the motion for, for discussion. Yeah.

17:28 What’s, what would be the extra delay? Oh, you, but wait a minute. Did you make the motion? I, I make the motion to do, to, To enter into contract. I, I thought you said I will make it so I I didn’t know if you made, I, I, I move that we enter into contract with SL Chase Steel. I, I seconded. Okay. I’m not ready to vote. Oh, You’re not ready to vote. You’re got to Discussion. Right? I want discussion. And there’s a couple of cards just came in. So Tommy may be arriving. Um, how much delay, uh, are there alternatives to s SL Chase? I, I, regardless, it does seem to me

18:13 that the business person five days ago should have known that dealing with the town government that they had to pay these rates. You don’t think they, that was part of their business? They don’t do, I guess they are a new, New Hampshire firm, and they may not deal with Massachusetts municipalities. It’s also possible that he was just trying to get work. And so he wanted to make sure that he was giving us a number that we would take. But I have to make sure that they’re paying prevailing wage rates, Even if they’re not a Massachusetts firm. Yep.

18:54 Well, I I, I, I guess,

18:59 have we done enough due diligence on 101,000? Well, a hundred thousand. $120,000 that you, you feel ba based on where we are in the state of Massachusetts and the town of Marblehead, if for example, we, what would it, what would be like to business people? If we had to wait two more weeks to get another bid?

19:31 It would be more than two weeks. It’s been almost a month. It’s only, so it’s only been two weeks? It has, yeah. Okay. It hasn’t even been two weeks. Do you, Are there, did the structural engineers say that these were the only people that could do it? The Structural engineer did not have any recommendations. Um, so we do have some other numbers. So in a, in a perfect world, you would be putting this out to bid. If, if time was not an issue, you would be putting this out to bid and receiving, hopefully, potentially several bids that you can make sure that you had the best price. Now, obviously this is time and materials. So they would be bidding to say, all right, you know, this is, you know, this is the known quantity, steel, we can count all the beams. I can see all that stuff.

20:17 And then they’re trying to make a guesstimate of how long it’s gonna take them to put it all together. Again, we’re all dealing with galvanized material. It’s, you know, structural steel, all that stuff. So essentially then you’re really trying to figure out how quickly can I get this done? Um, and do I think I’m gonna be right on that? So am I gonna win or am I gonna lose, or am I gonna be right on the money?

20:41 And what’s your best guess? I think this guy is analyze it. So one of the factors, when you go, go take a look at this job, the tipping floor is pretty straightforward. The, the amount of work that has to go into that ladder is considerable. Um, to build a ship’s ladder, you know? Yes. You’re, you’re not quite, it’s not a quite one-to-one replacement with the ladder that’s there. Um, we were hoping that he could just put on an OSHA compliant handrail, but he made a remark to the architect to say, Hey, you really need, don’t, don’t be messing around. You need to replace that ladder as well. And so that’s the extra piece that’s coming into this. And these things do take time.

21:24 But again, you know, so if time, if time was no money or, you know, we, we would put, I been thinking, I was thinking about this.

21:34 We, we would pro, we’ll probably hear from the construction people that there’s our being without a co a compactor is costing them money. Yeah. $4,500 a day. Yeah, That’s what they’re saying. No, that’s what, what, that’s what the numbers show us. That, that’s just straight. I just texted one of my buddies, I was like, gimme your average a month. And he said eight grand. Yeah. They spend here. Yeah. Yeah. But what if they had to then drive? I, the way I understand it now, I may be wrong. Yeah. That they would have to drive an extra hour or two to go to somebody else’s. Not that far, but, well, but, but that’s the, the logic that I wanna make is if you had X contractors and they were each paying somebody two extra hours,

22:21 one hour back and forth, if we covered that, would we be up to, I I think this 20, for me, $20,000 jump is your best. Well, but again, this is, I’m, I’m, I know public health, I’ll, I’ll say if you all who know the town, believe we’re being prudent buyers in this, then I made the motion and I’ll vote for it. Well, but you Also know biding, which you’ve worked on, and you’re also an engineer. So you have Yeah, I, I I mean things That you are, are, uh, If I were, if I were thinking about SL chase, the fact that they put a bid in

23:09 that didn’t come close to the labor costs, You just have to remember. So it’s an ES the first one. It’s, they’re all estimates. These are not bids, these are estimates. Oh. So we’re entering into a time of material. Yeah. Well then why isn’t he giving, so your, Your, your materials are 60,000, your time is 60, But had to do my remodeling time of material. They didn’t gimme estimates. They told me it was $80 an hour for a, for a car, for a carpenter, and $125 for a plumber. Right. He, he’s just broken it up. ‘cause he knows the job and stuff like that.

23:49 So if they go over the time and materials, we pay More. That’s correct. So that’s not the bottom line.

23:57 So again, this, this is all based off of a draft. Like I said, he’s gonna go get in here, do the demo, verify that the, the steel is the size that the structural engineer is telling us and make sure the price. So he’s, he’s priced it out based on what’s drawn, drawn here. But when he gets into the projects and it changes, there might be some additional costs.

24:24 Would it ever be less? And there’s A possibility there could be less, Would never be less. It It happens very rare. Yeah. But when we talk about, so when we look at the revenue that comes in, I don’t calculate the loss that, that the guys are spending going somewhere else. The, the, that facility is losing 400 $4,500 a day, they Can actually, the contractor losing No, We’re losing 40. I mean, like, I’m, I’m with you that you normally want to go for a bidding process, but when it’s time sensitive and you know, so then I just have to go with Andrew’s best judgment on this as, as okay. Yeah. Well I’ve made the motion, it’s been seconded. Then I, I have nothing further to Say. $4,500 a day is, is just five days.

25:10 Not even five four something. But, so if he goes out for four more days, he’s lost the 20,000.

25:20 We’ve got a motion that’s been seconded by the majority. It’s for, and it was open for discussion and that’s who we are. So yeah, the Bush should enter into a contract with us. So Chase Steel? Yeah, I mean, yeah. The, are we recording? Yeah. Oh, was I late? I thought it was seven. No, it was six 30. Oh, okay. That’s my mistake. Sorry about that. That’s alright. Um, yeah, I mean, like normally you, no, I’d say you’d have to go for the best price and you’d have, you should go out and bid, but because of the time sensitive nature of this and the money you lo you lose and the amount of time it would take to go out and bid, I, you know, you, you’re going to be on the losing end if, if you wait. And so I, I’d have to go with Andrew’s judgment on this where, you know, he’s talked to people, you know, same thing I do when I talk to contractors, I ask them

26:05 who, who their guys are. As long as I trust those guys and they tell me who their guys are, you know, you have to put some faith in there. And so that’s, that’s what I’d say that you, that you go forward with. One Question, what I have, did they say there was the, what the timeframe was for their job? Yeah. Estimated four weeks, you know, start the end. No, but how long will it take them to get on site to start? So to get on site pretty quickly? Um, again, we have to, you know, have a contract. They have to sign the contract, um, insurance, you know, bonds, all that stuff has to be, you know, so probably four weeks start to finish, um, to get these guys in, no, in and then out. And obviously they’re, they understand the, the timeframe for us.

26:52 They understand, you know, that it needs to be done as quickly as possible. Um, and so obviously he, he thinks he can shrink that down. But this, this is, you know, he, he doesn’t wanna promise that. Is That compact compactor included? That’s not compact. Compact included. Not compact compactor. Yeah. So we’re looking at another week and a half after that. Yeah. Okay. So also, um, uh, does this include the insurance and, and, uh, yeah, this would, Yes, This number. Yep. So if anything changes, again, it’s time and material. So if there’s gonna be additional cost for the, the insurance and stuff like that. Do you guys want me to come back to you?

27:28 N no, I think we should be comfortable giving your agency to do the, uh, I would like to change the motion to give you agency. I, I move. Well you wanna withdraw the other motion? Yeah, We have to vote. Okay. I’ll withdraw the other motion and I’ll, uh, so I second that we just, I second that. Okay. I move that, that the direct we It. Are you in favor of your motion? Yes. Okay, Thank you. I’d also question where the steal comes from right now. Sorry, Sue. The steal comes from That. So the, the point was made to me today it is like, if we do not move on this, we could see a 25% increase. Exactly. That’s, that’s what we’re tariffs right now. Oh yeah. He, he said, we talked to the steel company and they’re like, you better move quickly. This is, yeah, this is coming. That’s five, that’s what we’re doing. 20, 30 days at, at five o’clock tonight. Yeah.

28:16 Yeah. I think we, you know, we still need to keep that in the back of our mind, but, Uh, I’m, I’m therefore moved that we give the director of public health, uh, agency to negotiate the best possible price based around this, uh, previous estimate that we’ve seen from S sl Chase. Is there a second? Yeah, I second. All those in favor? It’s you Unanim. So I’ll talk him first thing in the morning, um, and get him moving on this. Um, he’ll, you know, he, he’s ready to jump. Okay. Yeah. So, Um, so anything else before you go to public comment? Anything for the, Sorry for being late. I know I said I could be here at six 30 and I could have,

29:02 and then I thought it got put to seven. I was like, oh, great cushion. So, Well, we, uh, and we waited 15 minutes. We, we have. Okay. And that quarter of, we said we’re gonna keep started. You’re here. Fast. Important parts. So There you go. Yeah, I think we all three should vote. Yeah. Yeah. Well we did. Yeah. Um, a any questions from the audience? Just a public Comment. You should mention the new shed we have up there, the new shack. Um, so yeah, we, we have received one our transaction hut up at the transfer station. So, um, when the residents enter from Green Street, um, they’ll come up that hill and that transaction hu is sitting right there. It’s the pretty blue thing. The pretty blue thing. So I, I want it green, but if the green was a couple extra hundred dollars,

29:48 So It stake the blue. Um, the second one should be arriving next week. Blue Is sky and water. And that’s pretty, meanwhile when you put that on, uh, could you have the board on instead of the doorway? If Oh yeah. Is there a way to do it? Yeah, sorry. And I think it’s important to mention what we talked about, the estimates we originally had for those were over a hundred Each. Yeah. A hundred, $138,000 for the transaction. Uh, for, for One, I think I, I’d have to move back and try to suss out Yeah. If it was for both of ‘em or if it was just for that transaction. Hu Um, but we spent just over $24,000 for Yeah. Both of Them. So that’s, that’s big. Yeah. You know, to, to, to publicize that. Yes. Yes. So if you’re not throwing money away Yeah.

30:36 That was the whole idea was, you know, to do, you know, to go dive back into that really look to see where we can save costs. Yes. Um, and that was definitely one area. Like, no, let’s get these made offsite. Let’s, you know, change some, change some of the design to them. Um, let’s, you know, scale ‘em down a little bit. Yes. They still have heat and ac they still have transaction wind, but we tried to make them fit into, you know, a reasonable budget. Mm-hmm. Well, that was being very creative and I think we, we together, we, we were able to do that. Yeah. And you, you’ll still be able to do that for, for the swap share too. So Yeah. Again, we’ll continue to look at these things to see where we can one by one, you know, one by one. Yeah. To see where we can, you know, make cost savings. Good. All right. So our, our next meeting, uh oh.

31:23 Is anybody on, uh, we have to move, move to Ajour. I’m just gonna tell them when the next meeting is. No. Think’s Just us. Our next meeting is February 11th at seven 30. Uh, here at the downstairs. And Mary, me motion to adjourn. So will second. All in favor. A, it’s unanimous. Everybody wants to get.