CENTER CITY COMMITTEE
MEETING MINUTES
January 8, 2002

PRESENT: Brian Baraby, Marshall Field, Matt Fitzpatrick, Bob Flynn, Nancy Kleniewski, Janet Leggat, Bill Lipchitz, Joe Lipchitz, Bill McGowan, Kathy Muldoon, Maria Vegar-Borison, and Bill Samaras.

Today's meeting was held at the LSBAC.

Bill Lipchitz gave an update on plans for the 30th Anniversary Celebration of the Committee and the Annual Meeting scheduled for February 5, 2002 at 8:00 AM at the LRTA Maintenance Facility.

The five people to be given awards have been contacted and will attend with the exception of Pat Mogan who will be in Florida and is not expected back in Lowell until April. The program should consist of a brief history interwoven with the contributions of the awardees, along with a presentation by the LRTA. The awardees will each be given a few minutes for remarks. In addition to the regular membership, some of the new business people in town will be invited.

Bill also passed around some examples of the proposed calendar and asked for input. It was the consensus that the calendar project should go forward with the expectation of producing the calendar before the end of the month. Janet Leggat volunteered to determine the dates of events whose dates are known such as the Winterfest, the Folk Festival, and the Southeast Asian Water Festival and to help with the photos for the calendar. Bob Flynn volunteered to work on logistics for the meeting including securing a projector and a screen for a power point presentation.

Bill reported that he has been unable to meet with Tom Galligani about the downtown plan due to the holidays but will be scheduling something with him next week or soon thereafter to discuss ways for the CCC to be transformed into the entity envisioned in the plan. The request for input on a proposal to DPD only received one response.

Bill Samaras noted that following the meeting last month, the High School has changed its policy towards truants. Bill McGowan explained that students picked up for truancy who used to be suspended and sent back to the streets will now be placed in in-house detention and then required to attend a Saturday session consisting of tutoring, support services and discussions with the Lowell Police Department Resource Officers. If they don't attend the Saturday session, they will be given 3 days of in-house detention. Students who do not comply will be expelled and their parents fined. Some space in the alternative School will be utilized for the detention.

Marshall noted he has received several positive comments from people about how nice the downtown looked over the holidays and how clean it is. Maria mentioned the smokestack Christmas tree as a highlight and wished to commend John Power for doing it every year.

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