Funding for the 2025-2026 Warming Center operation was approved at the Finance Committee’s latest meeting.

By Jordan Pagkalinawan

On Tuesday, October 21, the Somerville Finance Committee met to review requests to fund three community-oriented projects, approve prior-year invoices, and extend two design services contracts.

The committee first approved an appropriation of nearly $148,000 from the COVID-19 Stabilization Fund toward the 2026 Warming Center, which will run from Dec. 1, 2025, to April 12, 2026. Director of Health and Human Services Karin Karroll explained that the financial increase is needed to accommodate additional beds and rising operational costs, including “inflation, external contracting needs, and personnel.”

Karroll said HHS plans to use over $424,000 from state grant funds to cover operational costs for 14 of the 19 weeks the Warming Center will operate. The department asked the committee to approve “the first five weeks” of operation, from the beginning of December to Jan. 4, 2026. In addition to operational expenses, the appropriated funds will cover the cost of an external security firm hired by the city.

“The funds need to be allocated in October in order to meet a starting deadline of December 1st,” Karroll added.

Members then greenlit a $500,000 grant toward six dual-port electric vehicle charging stations, gifted by the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center as part of the On-Street Charging Solutions Program. According to Christine Blais, the Director of the Office of Sustainability and the Environment, those six stations would “double the amount of publicly-accessible ports” EV owners could use.

The stations would be constructed in the spring and become fully operational by mid-2026. They would be installed in the following locations:

• Newbury Street at Teele Square
• Monroe Street at Prospect Hill Park
• Josephine Avenue at Ball Square
• Evergreen Avenue at the Winter Hill School
• Hudson Street at Labyrinth
• Stone Avenue at Union Square

With the addition of six EV charging stations, Blais said the Office of Sustainability would “be on our way towards our climate forward goals of decarbonizing our electric vehicle supply.”

Prior year invoices

The committee approved two prior-year invoices totaling roughly $14,500 to the Parks and Recreation Department for pool chemicals to maintain the Ginny Smithers Pool and Dilboy Pool.

“These invoices were for orders that were placed in June,” Parks and Recreation Finance Manager Linda Duong said. “But because of turnover within the pool manager position, the invoices weren’t received until September, which is why they weren’t able to be paid in fiscal year 2025.”

Infrastructure fund creation

The committee then heard from Director of Finance and Community Development Alan Inacio, who explained a request to establish two infrastructure stabilization funds for BrickBottom and Boynton Yards. The BrickBottom fund came with a request for nearly $764,000, while the Boynton Yards fund had a request for nearly $384,000.

“Finally, after many, many years, many of our larger development projects are hitting the stages of their covenant agreements, where their phase of completion is triggering certain payout times and off-site infrastructure payments,” Inacio said. “They are meant to be spent primarily in the adjacent vicinity of development. These will mostly be engineering, mobility, open-space type projects.”

Inacio also clarified a query from Councilor Wilfred Mbah, noting that the funds are “net new funds” and not being repurposed like other stabilization funds.

Design services contract extensions

The committee’s final agenda items focused on a pair of time-only contract extensions for design services on several projects.

The city’s contract with Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners was extended until the end of 2028 for design services on the Building Master Plan. Director of Infrastructure Asset Management Richard Raiche said that has strong knowledge on several current projects—including the Winter Hill School’s Edgerly site and the roof and clock tower of City Hall. That trust led the department to request a three-year extension with BBB.

“Their understanding of these buildings give them a great start on these projects, and their work is absolutely outstanding,” Raiche added. “We don’t have a specific project lined up for them, but we want to keep the ability to tap them at a moment’s notice to do projects like that.”

A similar three-year, time-only extension with Kleinfelder Northeast Inc. was also approved, with work focusing on the Morrison Avenue Linear Sewage Project.

“Kleinfelder did all the preliminary design for that project,” Raiche said. “We’ve been happy with their performance and successfully negotiated a scope and fee for them to continue on to the next phase for final design. We’ve already allocated the money for it. This is the contract extension that allows us to continue that relationship with Kleinfelder for this work.”