Local Government Update, January 2026
Listen to the latest conversation with Tyler Cote, the Community Engagement Specialist for the City of Watertown, and Victoria Weichel from WCA-TV to discuss things that have happened during the past month in Watertown through key moments, success stories, and important numbers.
Released January 15th, 2026
(Click here to listen on streaming apps) (Full transcript below)
Links mentioned in the episode:
City Council - December 9, 2025
The City of Watertown Inauguration Ceremony - January 2, 2026
Information About the Alternative Pathway Program for Firefighter-Paramedics
Shoveling Ordinance Information & Exemption Process
Watertown Food Pantry Porch Food Pickup
Historical Commission (Southside Report)
Historical Society of Watertown
River of Light (Listen to Event Highlight Podcast Episode)
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Transcript
Matt: 0:07
Hi there. Welcome to the Little Local Conversations Podcast. I'm your host, Matt Hanna. Every episode I sit down for a conversation with someone in Watertown to discover the people, places, stories, and ideas of Watertown. This episode is one of the monthly local government updates that I do with Tyler Cote, the community engagement specialist for the city of Watertown, and Victoria Weichel over at Watertown Cable Access, WCA-TV. So let's get into the conversation. Welcome to the local government update podcast. This is for the month of January 2026. That's right. I remembered that it is a new year.
Tyler: 0:41
Nice.
Matt: 0:42
We'll see when I write my next check if I put a six or a five. We are also talking before this that this is episode number 12. This will be a full year doing the local government updates. So lots of milestones. Well, as always, I'm here with Tyler.
Tyler: 0:55
Hello.
Matt: 0:55
And Victoria.
Victoria: 0:56
Hello.
Matt: 0:57
And we're here to talk about what's going on in Watertown. So let's kick it off. Moments from the past month, Victoria.
Victoria: 1:03
Okay. So moment I have from this past month is during December 9th’s City Council meeting, the City Council voted to approve to send a letter to the MWRA, also known as Massachusetts Water Resource Authority, opposing the allowing of sewer overflow to be released into the Charles River. City Council President Mark Sideris said it was prudent upon support of this letter, the city has loan orders to pay for cleanup of discharges into the river. City Councilor Vincent Piccirilli also brought up during the meeting that Watertown has never contributed to sewer being into the river as sanitary sewage and storm sewers have remained separate in Watertown's piping and it is expected to remain that way.
Matt: 1:46
So is this happening further upriver and it's affecting us? Is that the issue?
Victoria: 1:51
Essentially we will be the ones paying up for the cleanup and it will eventually end up all into the Boston Harbor. And we'll make the river not as, may not be as pleasant to walk around anymore if there's sanitary sewage ending up in there.
Matt: 2:03
Yeah. You got thoughts there, Tyler?
Tyler: 2:06
I don't other than, you know, the Charles River is one of the most important aspects of our city. That people get to enjoy the access to any waterfront has a lot of benefits from a social emotional level, and then also just enjoying a new space, a new landscape. So ensuring that that continues to be clean and maintained and upkept and everything is really important. So yeah, one step that our council took, encourage that this is something that is done and or rather not done in this case. But yeah, nothing else to add to it.
Matt: 2:40
Yeah. And this is something we'll hear more about as the year goes on, or is this something that's, I haven't heard about this yet. So.
Victoria: 2:47
So the first time I heard about it was at the meeting. So I suspect it will continue to be brought up in discussions as Watertown is a very environmental focused community. And it's also the Charles River. It's a beautiful river. I don't think anyone really wants sanitary sewage ending up in there, regardless if it's coming from Watttown or somewhere else. And especially if Watertown’s the one spending money to clean it up. So I think it's just making sure it doesn't start to become a problem as well.
Matt: 3:13
Gotcha. All right. Well, we'll keep an eye on that one. Not much more to add there, I guess, but yeah. All right, moving on. Tyler, what's your moment from the past month?
Tyler: 3:23
Yeah, briefly I wanna point listeners to, in case you weren't able to attend or watch or haven't heard, January 2nd, just a few days ago from when we were recording, our city celebrated the 2026 inauguration for all of our elected officials. Swearing in of our city councilors, trustees, school committee members. The reason I mention, I want to bring this up mainly, there's a separation a little bit in terms of like myself, my role. I work for the city manager, city manager works for the council, the council gives directives for the city manager to implement. So there's kind of this space between like my role and the council. But in a lot of ways, the council is the front door to city government for a lot of our residents when they have an issue, when they have a concern, they're reaching out to the city council, or if they have a question about the library, they reach out to the library trustee. If they have a question about curriculum or if they have a question about a school cell phone policy, they may reach out to their school committee member. So they're often that front door for a lot of people into the city. I encourage listeners to familiarize yourselves with your elected officials and at least who they are, how to get in contact with them. You can find all that information in watertown-ma.gov on our website. Whenever you get a chance, reach out to them, introduce yourself. That can really make a difference in terms of just being aware. A lot of these elected officials have their own newsletters. They hold forums or meetings where people can go and ask questions and connect with them. So I highly recommend it. There are big decisions coming down the line in Watertown and all fronts between our library and our schools, and then, of course, just the city council citywide that are going to be made over the next couple of years. There's not another local election for another two years. So familiarize yourselves with all those that were elected and inaugurated in early January. I recommend going and listening to President Sideris’ speech, which he gave at the inauguration. Kind of gave some perspective of what the city has done the last two years since the last inauguration and then what they can expect coming forward and some of the things that he's encouraging his colleagues on the council and the community to think about. So it's a good introduction and kind of orienting speech to where things are at as we are in January 2026 looking ahead. So highly recommend giving that a watch, whether that be on WCATV's website, or you can actually go on Facebook onto their Facebook account and watch it there. So highly recommend giving that a watch and getting to know some of your counselors as we head into the new year. And I encourage, make a goal to join a meeting here in the first six months of the year, or tune into a committee or commission meeting here in the first few months to learn something that's going on. So always encourage engagement in the public process. There's a lot going on in the city, and it's a good way for people to get an idea of everything that is happening.
Matt: 6:11
Yeah. Congrats to everyone.
Tyler: 6:13
Yes, congratulations.
Matt: 6:15
All right. Let's move on to success stories. What's your success story, Victoria?
Victoria: 6:20
So I have that City Council approved three CPC projects. So CPC or Community Preservation Committee brought three Community Preservation Act projects to the City Council on the December 8th meeting. Two of which are affordable housing projects. One, which I think is probably the most assessed, is 108 Nichols Ave, which is for the construction of a group home. This project has been to the Community Preservation Committee several times. This is the first time it got to the council and got approved as well. There were concerns about the site there, as it used to be a gas station. The other affordable housing project is being called Willow Park and it's at 8 Quimby Street. This project was approved for $2 million and will have 138 units. And the last project was for the Commander's Mansion to resolve ADA accessibility and other improvements to the property. The Commander's Mansion received $610,000 for the project.
Matt: 7:17
Gotcha. Any thoughts, Tyler?
Tyler: 7:19
These are good examples of how CPA funds or Community Preservation Act funds can be used to address different things in different parts of the community, right. Like with the rehabilitation of Willow Park and the Housing Authority development, those $2 million were in addition to the $4 million that already had been put into this project in the past, which is going to increase the units from 60 to that 138 number that Victoria had mentioned, which is great. And then with the Commander's Mansion, that's a envelope restoration, which basically means just the outside of the home, essentially. Did not know that until about two weeks ago. So that is new to me. But also elevator modernization as well in that building.
Matt: 8:05
So what's the inside of an envelope called?
Tyler: 8:08
Yeah. It's a, it's a letter, of course. A letter restoration. So it's just a good example of, you know, our CPC does some really great work in terms of the way that they are helping identify and review projects and opportunities to kind of put these funds into different parts of the community to rehabilitate areas or grow areas or maintain spaces that our community can then eventually enjoy. So yeah, it's a good shout by Victoria and mentioning that.
Matt: 8:37
Great. Well, what's your success story, Tyler?
Tyler: 8:39
Yeah, mine is something that we've talked a little bit about. I believe we had mentioned in the past a little bit that the saga of the fire department's second ambulance. There was, I know, a big conversation back in April, May time frame of 2025, where the fiscal and budget oversight committee met with the fire department and leadership to have conversations about like what is it that we can do to meet the NFPA standards or the National Fire Protection Agency Act. So forgive me if I’m mixing up my acronyms here.
Matt: 9:15
You got the NFP, the A you're unsure of.
Tyler: 9:17
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank you. Appreciate that support. And they determined, in the aftermath of those meetings they determined that they're encouraging the city manager to find ways to meet those standards to improve our emergency response services with regards to ambulatory response in particular. And in this year's budget, the one that we are currently in, which is the FY 2026 budget, the council started the process of staffing that second ambulance. So the success story, coming all the way back around, is that Watertown, we just launched a new alternative pathway program for hiring firefighter paramedics in particular. This is a new program. It's in collaboration between our fire department and our human resources department in coordination with the Commonwealth of Massachusetts Human Resources as well. Basically, needed to get the approval essentially, or we had to kind of join this program. It's called the Local Register Program. And what this allows us to do is it allows us to expedite the process to actually fill these positions. Because before this program became available, the way that you could join would be through the civil service program, which typically includes an exam. And it can often, one criticism of it is, how I'll say it is that it can sometimes deter people from going for these positions. Also, the exam is not particularly easy. That can present challenges as well.
Tyler: 10:40
So what this does is that it basically allows a percentage of the workforce in the fire department to hire through this alternative pathway program, the local register program, so that we can fill those positions more quickly with qualified individuals who can step in and start staffing that second ambulance or, you know, work towards the opportunity of staffing that second ambulance. So this is one of those kind of under-the-hood things that happen in city hall sometimes. They're not always seen or talked about or recognized as clearly and can't always be captured super easily. But this is a direct outcome of some of those decisions that were made in those conversations that were had back talking about the second ambulance. You know, staffing it and finding qualified individuals to step into those roles present challenges, so this is a way to address those challenges to bring people on board that are ready. Whether you are a paramedic right now and want to apply, you can apply through this program. City's allowed to hire 50% of its new fire department employees through the local register pathway. Interested candidates can apply at watertown-ma.gov slash jobs. I'll include the link in the show notes as well. If you know yourself or family member or somebody close to you that you want to share this around with them, please do. You can also reach out to our HR team with any questions at HR at watertown-ma.gov at any time too. But this is an example, like I mentioned, of some of the sausage getting made, maybe for lack of a better phrase. I'm not sure if that is the better phrase, but these are some of the ways that you can get to the ends of staffing that second ambulance is finding new, interesting, creative ways to get qualified people in the door working here in the city.
Matt: 12:26
Yeah. And this piggybacks off of what the police department did even before that, too.
Tyler: 12:30
Correct. Correct. Yeah. So they're no longer in need of going through the civil service program either, bringing in more qualified individuals as well without having to go through civil service. So, you know, they're separate programs, separate, but they're kind of achieving some of those similar goals of trying to get qualified people in the door a little bit more easily.
Matt: 12:48
Yeah. And it probably gave them the confidence to do that, seeing that it worked for the police department.
Tyler: 12:52
Definitely. Definitely.
Matt: 12:53
Cool. Well, let's move on to our next section. Did you know? All right, Tyler, what's your did you know for this month?
Tyler: 13:01
All right. So I've talked about it before, a little bit about our snow shoveling ordinance. So we are moving into what is probably best described as the final stage of the implementation of our snow shoveling ordinance. So back in 2024, January of 2024. So now we're two years ago at this point, our council passed a snow and ice removal ordinance for small residential properties. So that's basically a property that has one, two, or three residences within the home. And this requires that within 24 hours of a storm ending, the property owner must clear a 42-inch pathway off of their sidewalk of snow and ice off of their sidewalk, or the width of the sidewalk, whichever of those two things are narrower. So that first year in January 2024, and then in the 2024-2025 winter seasons, we were doing pretty much exclusively education about the program. If there were complaints submitted through 311, then the individuals that weren't shoveling would receive a flyer that basically said, like, hey, in future years, you may be subject to a fine. But these are the reasons, these are the benefits for why we have a program like this. Because ultimately, the purpose of the program is to keep Watertown safe and accessible for people to safely maneuver around the city soon after snowstorms as well. We are a four square mile city. It is incredibly walkable in many, many ways, getting from one side to the other if you need to. And we want to make sure that we are keeping our community as safe as it can be, even in those cold winter months, as some people walk, as our host here.
Matt: 14:41
I'm out in that. Yep.
Tyler: 14:43
So this year we're moving into that final stage, which will include actual enforcement and fines. So for a first case of noncompliance, a property will receive a warning from our zoning and code enforcement team. Second case will have a $50 fine, and third case is a hundred, third and all subsequent cases after that may be subject to a hundred dollar fine. So highly recommend to go through the process and help us out in terms of keeping Watertown safe and shoveling 24 hours after snow. We at the city are going to be very reasonable with regards to when those 24 hours begin. We will do everything we can to keep all that information up to date on watertown-ma.gov slash snow, which is where we have a lot of our winter updates going at any given time. So if you want to get an idea as to when that time is starting, that's where you can head. If you want to report a case of noncompliance, if there's been a property that hasn't been shoveling for a couple of days and it doesn't seem as though that it's getting cleared and it's in your way of getting from point A to point B, you can submit a report through 311 on see click fix. Within 311 there's a category called the snow and ice removal ordinance. So it should be easy to find, or you can just call 311 as well.
Tyler: 16:03
But I do want to mention the reason I bring this up, even though I've rambled here for a few minutes, is that for those who are unable to shovel due to health and financial circumstances, they can apply for the snow removal exemption program. They can do so at watertown-ma.gov slash shovel. There is a fillable form that can be submitted to our ADA coordinator Jay, which can be emailed over to him at ADA at watertown-ma.gov or can be physically brought down to him here in City Hall as well, if that is preferred as well. You may be required, those that are applying may be required to submit some additional documentation, but Jay can work with you through doing that submission. And if there are any questions, then they can reach directly out to him at that email as well. And from there, Jay will work with you to help find some snow and ice removal resources, some supports that might be available, and then also ensure that if you qualify, that you're not receiving any citations in the process either. So if you happen to have a health and financial circumstance that might make it challenging for you to complete the snow shoveling, then this may be the best route for you to go. Because in the end, the thing that we care about the most is that our sidewalks are getting cleared when they can, so we can keep the city accessible.
Matt: 17:18
Right. And was, I know Rec was working on a program like high school volunteers? Is that still?
Tyler: 17:23
Yeah, so our snow shoveling program through recreation and coordination with the school and senior center typically goes live this month. To be honest, I have not seen a word as to whether it's coming back.
Victoria: 17:37
I was just trying to take a look for that because I was wondering on that too.
Tyler: 17:40
So let me circle in about that. If I find it, I'll make sure I include the link in the show notes before this officially gets posted. I haven't seen anything pop up yet. I will say if you have any questions about what potential supports are available in the area beyond that as well, I still recommend reaching out to Jay because even if you don't necessarily qualify for the exemption program, he can still probably sort out some potential resources that are available that you could still access in some form.
Matt: 18:09
Yeah. I was asking if so, like parents could be like, hey, high school kid, go volunteer and help your neighbors.
Tyler: 18:14
Yeah. I mean, I will say we do this big be neighborly push whenever we're in the winter season and we try it in other parts of the year. But it's particularly prudent in this time of year where being neighborly, you don't need to be tied to a program to jump next door and help out a neighbor and sure stop in, make sure that if anybody needs something that you can, you know, run out and grab a grocery for them if they need or stop in and just say hi. You know, the days are short here in the wintertime and can get dark pretty quickly. So always recommend being neighborly. And if you find yourself helping out others, thank you. We appreciate it whenever it's this time of year, especially when it comes to snow and ice removal.
Matt: 18:55
Yep. Cool. All right. What are we on to now? We're on to questions we get a lot. What questions are popping up for you now, Tyler?
Tyler: 19:04
Yeah, quickly. Residents that have a Christmas tree from the holiday season, we've had some questions as to what they can do with it. You can put your Christmas tree out on your dedicated trash and recycling pickup day through January 19th. But what I do ask is that all ornaments and lights are removed and they do not put it into a bag. If it has ornaments and lights, or if it is in a bag, it will not be picked up. The trees are collected and then chipped, and then we use them for mulch in the future. But this can be the easiest low cost way for you to get rid of your tree.
Matt: 19:38
Gotcha. All right, let's move on. Number of the month.
Victoria: 19:42
I had no numbers this month.
Matt: 19:44
No numbers from Victoria. All right, Tyler. It's all resting on you. Forty thousand. Forty thousand. Hmm. Are you a big Christmas tree decorator? Is that how many ornaments you had on your tree?
Tyler: 19:56
Uh my little four foot tree.
Victoria: 19:57
That’s how many ornaments my mom wants to put on the tree.
Matt: 19:59
Yeah, that's my wife too, disagreement in the house. Anyway, go ahead, Tyler. What is your 40,000? Because I'm sure it's not that.
Tyler: 20:05
40,000. No, unfortunately, not that. That would be a very fun number, or maybe too many. Frankly, now that I think about it. No, 40,000. The number is actually $40,000, which is the monetary donations received over November and December as a part of the Watertown Food Drive.
Matt: 20:24
That's a much better number.
Tyler: 20:25
Yeah. So it is very exciting to receive such a high number of donations and people that were giving just a little bit to larger donations, like every dollar when it comes to a program like this going towards our food pantries, like can go a really, really long way. So we're so, so grateful. Before I continue, thank you to the Wartown Community Foundation for helping facilitate the donation program, in particular, the monetary donation programming, then helping our human services team in coordinating and helping gather volunteers to go around and pick up food from our food drop-off locations and helping sort food. The community really stepped up in a really, really, really meaningful way. Food donations, I don't have a number for how many items of food were donated over the two months, but it really was a tremendous success. Like thousands of items of food were donated over the course of the two months. That food and the money ended up going towards a Watertown food pantry, the Catholic collaborative food pantry, and then the community fridge as well. And then there was also a prepared bag program that was directed to the Watertown Housing Authority.
Tyler: 21:36
So just like an all-around, like tremendous success of a food drive that, you know, having been in the conversations, it came together pretty quickly as looked as though the federal government was going to shut down as we were approaching the end of October into November. The conversations started pretty quickly that the impact on SNAP benefits and also just the change to SNAP benefits that were already going to happen in November, regardless of whether the government had opened back up by then or not. There was a variety of needs that were going to be felt by community members here in Watertown and statewide, nationwide, and a lot of places. So I just want to like truly, bottom of my heart, on behalf of our human services team, Jenna Bancroft, our human services director, who really took the lead on this, the community foundation and the administration just thanking the entire community for the amazing work that they did, the donations, whether you were volunteering, picking up food. You know, we had people going three times a week to the library to grab food because they were filling their bins so frequently. And people coming to the Parker building to sort the food between tables and putting them into bags and then delivering them out to the pantries or to the community fridge. Just it's a definition of a whole community effort.
Tyler: 22:55
So thank you to everybody who helped coordinate. Thank you to everybody that donated. Thank you to everybody that volunteered. And thank you all for showing up for one another. And you know, just because the food drive ended doesn't necessarily mean that there aren't still ways that you can help. You can always still do the food donation pickup program where if you can, I'll ensure that the link is in the show notes, but first Saturday of each month, high school students actually come and pick up food from your doorstep and bring it down to the food pantry, which is great. Monetary donations are always accepted by our food pantries and community fridge as well. So any way that you can continue to help is always, always, always very much thanked by everybody involved. And but very proud of Watertown and everything that they did over the last two months in stepping up.
Matt: 23:39
Yeah. A couple things. One, can't remember if we mentioned the last episode, but the community fridge is now in the back of the library if you were not aware of that change of location.
Tyler: 23:48
Yep. So that's 123 Main Street.
Matt: 23:50
Yep. And then secondly, I just want to give a little quick shout out to Max Ritcey and Ritcey East, who got special recognition from the governor, Healey, for the work that he did of making meals and giving them out to people who needed them during this time, too. So thank you, Max, and other people in our community too who are doing things.
Tyler: 24:08
Yes, absolutely. And thanks for mentioning both of those. Yeah, thank you to Max. Thank you to our businesses. We had several businesses step up and donating food, wanting to have a food donation bin in their store, and then bringing that donation bin over to the Parker to drop off food whenever they had a minute of time to kind of do that. It's stuff like that that just warms your heart to put it as simply as possible, because it really means a lot and made this program such a success. So yeah.
Matt: 24:37
Awesome. All right. Before we go into our normal outro with upcoming stuff, we're gonna try something new here.
Tyler: 24:44
Yeah.
Matt: 24:44
Gonna try a little department or committee highlight here. So what area do you want to shine a light on this time, Tyler?
Tyler: 24:52
Yeah, Matt and I and Victoria and I, all three of us, have kind of been toying around with how can we kind of peel back the curtain a little bit more with this podcast? And one thing that we thought about, yeah, was this department or budget or committee spotlight or highlight or something along those lines? So work with us. And if you like something or if you want to hear something more about something else, like reach out to us at any time and we're always welcome to feedback. But I want to take a second to talk a little bit about the difference and the similarities between our historic district commission and our historical commission. These are two different commissions. For those of you that are listening that don't know, we have appointed boards and commissions in Watertown. We have something like 25 of them or something along those lines, Victoria.
Victoria: 25:39
A lot.
Tyler: 25:40
Yeah. Victoria is often working the Zoom and recording and taping all of those and editing them. So she knows them all quite well. But we have these two different commissions that have a lot in common but are distinct in their own way. Our Historic District Commission is involved in administering the Mount Auburn Street Historic District. Essentially, they oversee that area of Mount Auburn Street. Their main goals are to preserve and protect the characteristics of the buildings and places that are significant to the history of the Commonwealth. So in that main area, in that historic district, which is a physical space on a map, they are really focused on kind of protecting the characteristics, protecting the way that the area looks, the historic significance of that area as well. They also encourage designs that are compatible with existing buildings. So people that live in the district that may want to make some changes to the outside of their house. The historic district commission has reviewed and seen designs that kind of match what is existing in the area so that it can maintain that historical significance while also, you know, being made beautiful again, if it's something that is being renovated in some way.
Tyler: 26:55
And they review exterior architectural features in the public way. They also will help prevent demolition or inappropriate alterations of properties that are within a district, too. The people that are on this commission, again, still on the historic district commission. It's property owners within the historic district. There is a historical society appointee. We'll get into that here in a minute, which is a third, third body in the kind of.
Matt: 27:23
Three-body problem.
Tyler: 27:26
Yeah, yeah. There's another player in the room. We have a realtor. We have a nominee from the local American Institute of Architects chapter. So there's a range of residents in the area to subject matter experts as well, is how I'll describe, that sit on this board and review plans that come across about some of the homes that are in this area and really advocate and protect some of the characteristics. Now, that is the historic district commission. Then we have the historical commission. This commission is responsible for protecting, preserving, and advocating for the city's historical and archaeological resources. Whenever you hear archaeological, I'm just like, man, there's dinosaurs.
Matt: 28:08
We got dinosaurs.
Tyler: 28:10
They're somewhere here, man. There's another mascot for Walker Pond.
Matt: 28:14
Oh, yeah.
Tyler: 28:16
They conduct research on places of historical significance. They conduct outreach. They implement the Demolition Day Ordinance, which this is where you see a lot of the overlap between them. The Demolition Day Ordinance helps protect buildings that are more than 50 years old from being inappropriately altered or demoed at any given time. So an example of the historical commission where they may differ from the historical district is they just completed a report on the south side properties, so south of the Charles River, up Galen Street in that neighborhood. They ended up doing a full study telling the story of the history of a lot of those properties and a survey of those properties in that area. It was quite interesting from the industry that was there to the residential properties and the changes in terms of their architectural styles from time to time. And that was a pretty interesting report that was published. All the documents actually just got published about a month ago in December. So I'll make sure to link that folder in the show notes as well for anybody that's interested.
Tyler: 29:17
And before I end, there is a third body here, as I referenced. There is also the Historical Society. Now, the Historical Society is a nonprofit group in Watertown. People may be familiar with Historical Society, particularly from our treaty day celebration in Watertown. They're very actively involved in the treaty day celebration, which I'll have plenty more to talk about here before the end of this year, before we approach the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Watertown in July later this year. But the Historical Society is a nonprofit in Watertown, not an appointed board, not a member of the city, but they certainly are a city partner. We work with them and collaborate with them on many things. There are members of the Historical Society that also sit on the historical commission. So there's a lot of overlap in different places and in different ways. A lot of them are focusing on maybe some of the same things or advocating for the same things, but there are some lines of demarcation between them and some differences between them. So that is maybe the simplest yet most rambling way that I can describe the differences in some form between our historic district commission, our historical commission, and a little bit of the historic society, which again, not within City of Watertown's umbrella, but definitely an active player here in the city in their own way.
Matt: 30:42
Yeah. And I think for some people might just be helpful hearing, oh, those are three separate things. Rather than like, oh, every time I’ve heard that historic blah blah blah, that's that thing. You know, it's three things. Yeah. So maybe that needs to be a new ordinance in the city that anything named cannot have two of the same words that another thing in the city already has. Because we'll come across as we go through more of these departments and committees, we'll come across this again.
Tyler: 31:06
Yes. And it can sometimes make it feel as though that some of the stuff isn't very approachable because of how just convoluted and there doesn't seem to be a difference between them. And the differences between them seem to be so slight and so little, but they do have their own purpose, they serve their own purpose. And I'm happy to get into more of these as we start getting into more departments and commissions and committees and councils and everything else in between.
Matt: 31:29
Oh my.
Tyler: 31:30
Yeah, no kidding. And how they differ and how they are alike.
Matt: 31:34
Cool. Well, thank you for that introduction to that new segment. Yeah, if you're interested in anything historical, check out one of those three places.
Tyler: 31:40
Yes.
Matt: 31:42
All right. Now let's roll out with our upcoming. Anything upcoming from you, Victoria?
Victoria: 31:47
I do not have anything upcoming.
Matt: 31:49
All right. So just check out WCA-TV and all their meeting coverage. And Tyler, what do you have upcoming?
Tyler: 31:56
I'll give a mention to two upcoming events, probably before we end up recording again. One is the River of Light Lantern Parade that's happening on January 17th at 4 p.m. at the Mosesian Center for the Arts, which is at 321 Arsenal Street. Are you involved in that, Matt?
Matt: 32:14
I'll be, I am on the Public Arts and Culture Committee that helps that is part of the team that runs that. So I will be there volunteering. Come say hi if you see me.
Tyler: 32:21
Awesome. So definitely go by, check that out. I went to last year's. It's a lot of fun. It is a good event to go to. And then Walker Pond, the third and final community meeting happening on February 5th at 6 p.m. at the Jewish Community Day School. This is where we're going to take and show all the feedback that we've received from the meetings, the surveys, everything, and how we have used it to refine it down to one final concept draft for Walker Pond. There will still be a chance to kind of ask a lot of questions, share a little bit more insight into what, you know, some of the finer details, but this will be kind of the final big process before we get into the hardcore design. You know, taking something that's more of a concept into the, okay, there are this many things underground that we need to make sure that we're avoiding when we're building anything, for example. So again, February 5th, 6 p.m. Jewish Community Day School on Stanley Ave in the West End. And hopefully I'll see you there. If not, I'm sure it will be covered by WCA-TV. And if you have any questions, you can always reach out to me at tcote at watertown-ma.gov.
Matt: 33:32
And reach out to him with any mascot suggestions.
Tyler: 33:35
That's right. We're still taking suggestions for mascot.
Matt: 33:38
When will the mascot poll go up?
Tyler: 33:40
It's never ending, actually.
Matt: 33:43
All right. Well, keep us posted.
Tyler: 33:45
Will do.
Matt: 33:45
All right. Any other last thoughts? We good?
Victoria: 33:47
I'm good.
Tyler: 33:48
Thank you for a year of podcasting.
Victoria: 33:50
Yeah, thank you.
Matt: 33:51
Yes. This is our 12th episode of local government updates. So if you're curious, you know, what happened last year, go back and listen. Thank you, Tyler.
Tyler: 33:58
Thank you, Matt.
Matt: 33:59
Thank you, Victoria.
Victoria: 34:00
Thank you.
Matt: 34:01
So that's it for the update with Tyler and Victoria. I'll put links in the show notes from things that were mentioned. If you'd like to go back and listen to the rest of the year's worth of government updates, or you want to listen to any of the other interview episodes, live event podcasts that I do, head on over to LittleLocalConversations.com. You can find all the episodes there, information on upcoming events, and you can sign up for the weekly newsletter that I send out so you can stay up to date on everything related to the podcast. And if you'd like to help support the podcast, keep these conversations going, you can click on the Support Local Conversation button on the menu on the website. Again, LittleLocalConversations.com.
Matt: 34:36
All right, and I want to give a few shout-outs here to wrap things up. First one goes to podcast sponsor, Arsenal Financial. They're a financial planning business here in Watertown that's owned by Doug Orifice, who's a very committed community member, and his business helps busy families, small businesses, and people close to retirement. So you need help in any of those areas, reach out to Doug and his team at arsenalfinancial.com. I also want to give a thank you to the Watertown Cultural Council, who have given me a grant this year to help support the podcast. So I want to give them the appropriate credit, which is, this program is supported in part by a grant from the Watertown Cultural Council, a local agency, which is supported by the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency. You can find out more about them at WatertownCultural Council.org and MassCulturalCouncil.org. And a couple more shout outs to promotional partners. First one goes to the Watertown Business Coalition, which is a nonprofit organization here in Watertown, and their motto is Community Is Our Business. Find out more about them at WatertownBusinessCoalition.com. And lastly, Watertown News, which is a Watertown focused online newspaper. It's a great place to keep up to date with everything going on in the city. Check that out at WatertownMANews.com. So that's it. Until next time, take care.
