New assistant solicitor joins city legal team

The city has a new assistant solicitor, following an expedited appointment process at Monday’s City Council meeting.

Council members voted to appoint Emily Izzo as a new assistant city solicitor. Izzo, a current employee with the state Department of Regional Services and Watertown city councilor, said she would bring her knowledge of municipal finance law, Waltham’s local context and state legislation to her work in the Waltham Law Department.

Councilor-at-Large Kathy McMenimen asked whether Izzo continuing to serve as a Watertown city councilor constituted a conflict of interest. 

Izzo said City Solicitor Katherine Laughman had no concerns that such a conflict might come up but added that she would recuse herself from any work that might present a conflict of interest with her councilor position.

Further City Council business 

In other action Monday night, the City Council voted to approve $270,000 of Community Preservation Act funding for structural repairs at St. Mary’s Apartments, an affordable housing development at 88 Lexington St. that serves senior citizens. 

St. Mary’s successfully applied for funding at the July 28 CPC special meeting.The development previously requested funding in May but was denied funding at that time because of an incomplete application, according to CPC Program Manager Julie Toole.

The council also voted to reappoint three of the CPC’s at-large members: Erika Oliver Jerram, Loretta McClary and Amanda Thibodeau.

The council also voted to allocate $165,000 toward upgraded licenses for Microsoft Office 365 software for the city and the Waltham Public Schools business office, which will have to be renewed annually. 

Donnie Aucoin, the city’s director of information technology, warned that that number might be an underestimate, saying the upgraded licences could cost $100,000 more than projected. 

He explained that the project involved uploading payroll information currently stored in city computers into cloud storage, cautioning councilors that Microsoft recently announced it will be ending security updates for the software currently used by the city.

Additionally, the City Council

• accepted an $8,500 grant from the Massachusetts Councils on Aging to support outreach efforts in its Ugandan and Latino communities. It also increased the stipends of certain Council on Aging employees.
• granted five special permits: secondhand licences for stores La Boutique, Reclaim Chic and Big Dawg Sports Cards, as well as building permits for an Eversource energy line near the Grant Street McDonald’s and for a home renovation on Greer Street that will involve digging in the road.
• amended special permits for Uma Flowers and Middlesex Integrative Medicine to reflect the city’s recent amendment to its zoning regulations on marijuana sales.
• approved updates to the city’s zoning amendments around floodplans, discussed at a July 16 special meeting.
• began the approval process to take out a $6,420,000 loan to restore the exterior of the Fernald property’s Administrative and Howe buildings. It also approved taking a $2,904,575 loan to demolish two other buildings on the property as well as the former Fitch School on Ash Street.