City Council in brief: Conditional approval for National Grid work 

A planned National Grid project to replace archaic gas pipes in the Felton Street neighborhood received a recommendation for council approval from the City Council’s Licenses and Franchises Committee.

The approval recommendation came at Monday night’s committee meeting. 

The recommendation comes about a month after a hearing on the plans; some councilors who were concerned about the effects of ongoing construction on residents had pushed back on the project when City council first discussed it in October.

Ward 9 Councilor Robert G. Logan, in whose ward the project would partially lie, recommended City Council approve a grant of location for the project only if National Grid fulfils certain conditions before it begins excavation. The conditions include getting additional permits from the city and the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority, passing a traffic mitigation plan by the Traffic Commission, avoiding construction outside of standard work hours and consulting with city officials. 

The grant of location also does not include work on Fern Street, which is a private way where the city cannot approve construction.

The Licenses and Franchises Committee voted to conditionally recommend that the City Council approve the grant of location, along with another grant for National Grid to move two vent poles near Hall Street that are currently on private property.

In other business, the City Council committees

• approved an annual traffic safety enforcement grant of $60,895 distributed by the Massachusetts Office of Grants and Research from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration for the Waltham police department. (Finance)
• renewed multiple business licenses, including for used car sales, hours extensions, a secondhand shop, a lodging house and a fortune teller. (Licenses and Franchises)
• gave preliminarily approval to a permit for a drive-thru ATM operated by the Digital Federal Credit Union at the 130 Lexington St. plaza. The ATM will take the place of a machine previously operated by Chase Bank. As part of the permit, the DCU agreed to repaint lines and arrows directing traffic in the plaza. (Ordinances and Rules)
• recommended that the City Council approve a two-year extension to a permit for the cannabis dispensary company Middlesex Integrated Medicine and continued work to finalize a requested permit amendment. (Ordinances and Rules)
• requested that the Law Department propose edits to the city’s noise ordinance to clarify its language and explicitly divide enforcement duties between the Waltham Police Department, the Health Department and the Building Department. (Ordinances and Rules)
• requested an Engineering Department survey and Law Department updates for a petition to repave the private Blossom Way under city ordinance 17–80, which splits the cost of repaving between the city and the petitioner. The proposal now includes resurfacing a private part of the adjoining Pine Hill Way. (Public Works and Public Safety)
• requested to follow up with the Law Department on an update to petitions to make the private ways Forest Park Drive, Lory Drive, Matthew Lane, Michaelchris Drive, Raffaele Drive and Roseanna Park Drive into public streets and receive any additional documentation. (Public Works and Public Safety)