Council makes second offer for administrative assistant

The City Council unanimously approved offering the position of administrative assistant to the council to Chelsea resident Nancy Lopez at Monday night’s meeting.

The council initially offered the position to Marilyn Ingles Guzman at a special meeting in August, but Guzman decided not to take the position.

During Monday night’s meeting, the council also approved a conflict of interest exemption allowing former administrative assistant Fatima Malera to assist the council during its September meeting, and to help bring Lopez up to speed on her new position. Malera currently works for the school department.

“We need some assistance for the new administrative assistant that is coming in and we know that is a difficult job to be able to master,” said Councilor-At-Large Leo Robinson. “So we asked Fatima to give us a hand and help us out.”

Councilor-At-Large Damali Vidot thanked Malera for the work she did for the council as its administrative assistant, as well as for being willing to come back to help train the person the council is going to hire.

“She really is a star and I don’t know if we ever gave her the kudos that she deserves,” said Vidot.

During the previous subcommittee meetings to select an administrative assistant, the subcommittee met in executive session and did not invite councilors who were not on the committee to attend. At the most recent subcommittee meeting, all councilors were invited to attend.

In other business, the council held a swearing-in ceremony for firefighters Danny Soto-Heyer, Rony Gomez, Adam Giancola, Edwin Sola, Alexander Monterrey, and Nicholas Bridge.

During the public announcements portion of the meeting, District 6 Councilor Giovanni Recupero said he would like to see the school department or School Committee address parking issues during student drop off and pick up at the Mary C. Burke Elementary Complex.

“I go to pick up my grandchild at the Burke complex, and there seems to be a big issue with the parking,” said Recupero. “I know the City Council cannot tell the school what to do, but we also represent the public. I go to pick him up and they have the parking lot closed, there is no parking.”

Recupero said the parents and caregivers have to go down to Clinton Street and then back to pick up their children. He said the School Committee should consider a plan where there is parking available for parents to pick up their children at the complex.

The councilor said when he asked why the parking lot was closed to parents, he was told it was because parents were fighting over spaces in the lot.

“Instead of resolving the situation, (they) ran away from it and closed the parking lot,” said Recupero.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *