Commissioner of Public Services and Utilities Ricardo Morales explained a plan for Pittsfield to enter into a 5-year agreement with the neighboring town of Dalton to install a fiber optic cable between the city and its Cleveland and Ashley water treatment plants.
“It is to support telecommunications at the plant bring it to today's standards," said Morales. "Right now, there's not enough cell signal in that area. Employees doing operational work would sometimes, more often than not have to communicate, move away from the plant to the road or somewhere they can find cell signal to communicate. That's on the communication side, phone to phone. There's also Internet communication that will be provided with this. Currently, the only internet communication at the moment interferes with telephone landlines at the plant, so cannot be operated at the same time. And lastly, the system communication for controlling the different controls of the water treatment plant at both locations, Ashley and Cleveland, and its connectivity with the different pump stations throughout the city.”
The agreement includes a stipulation that Dalton can use four of the 12 lines within the fiber optic cable, which would be run along the town’s utility poles.
“The 12 strands within it has no value for Dalton, they might not even use the four lines," said Morales. "We are just allowing them to tap at their own expense to that, because we're not using four of the 12. We're only using six of the 12. We are running the cost of- We are incurring the cost of running the cable. We are getting permission from Dalton to use their polls.”
Morales estimated the project would cost Pittsfield $53,000.
The council approved the plan with only Ward 2 city councilor Charles Kronick in opposition.
Finance Director Matt Kerwood addressed the council in his capacity as Chairman of the Pittsfield Retirement Board about a cost of living adjustment for those who receive a city pension.
“That pension varies on each individual depending on, you know, when they retired, age, years of service, etc." said Kerwood. "So, for the purposes of establishing a COLA, which the board votes on an annual basis to give a cost of living increase for retirees, what is before you tonight is just, is using, will use, is proposing to use a base of $16,000 for the purposes of calculating the COLA rather than $14,000. And the last time that this was changed was around, it would I believe it was 2010.”
The cost of living adjustment – which would total just over $30,000 a year for the city – came before the council with the unanimous backing of the board from an April 28th vote.
According to Kerwood, as of February 2022, the city paid pensions to 806 retirees, 473 of whom would be capped at a maximum base of $16,000 if the council approved the plan. In 2010, the council approved raising the base from $12,000 to $14,000.
The council approved the adjustment with Kronick in opposition and at-large city councilor Karen Kalinowsky – formerly a city police officer – abstaining.
