Thank you to everyone who attended the City Council inauguration—it was wonderful to see so many familiar faces, and we were fortunate to enjoy clear weather that helped set a positive tone for the new term. The spirit of community was evident, and I appreciate your continued engagement as we begin our work together.

As we transition from celebration to governance, I am focused on catching up with constituent communications and preparing to introduce new legislation this spring. My priority is to ensure that our legislative agenda reflects our shared goals and the needs of our residents.

First meeting of the new term

Our first meeting as the new Council convenes this Monday. While much of the agenda covers routine matters such as establishing meeting dates and making committee assignments, there is also a substantive item up for discussion that warrants your attention.

Short term rental moratorium – R-50-25

R-50-25 is being introduced by Alderwoman O’Neal and Mayor Littmann. It would place a moratorium on all new short term rental licenses for non-owner-occupied properties. I am adamantly against this legislation. First of all, traditionally we do not have substantive legislation until January, given that we need time to get oriented and schedule our committee meetings, and rushing this short-shrifts the Council and the public process. Let me explain a bit: if this legislation passes on Monday on first reader, since our committees are not assigned yet and won’t be until January, that means we will have only 60-days to conduct our review versus 90. While the full 90 may not be needed, we don’t know that yet, especially in light of many members being new to this, and we are artificially limiting ourselves. While we could, and may, suspend the rules to give ourselves more time, such a maneuver should be rare. And in this case I in no way think this is an emergency that warrants such extreme actions, especially in light of the fact that we just passed monumental legislation limiting STRs not even 3 months ago with O-17-25. Furthermore, creating the precedent that it’s ok to introduce substantive legislation at our first Council meeting is not a good precedent to set. I fully understand that some made promises to do this, without fully understanding our processes and schedule, but at this stage of on-boarding and orientation I feel that what’s good for the body needs to take precedence over what may be politically expedient. For these reasons I will likely be voting no on this on First Reader. I have a lot of other concerns on the merits of this legislation, but First Reader/introduction is typically is not an appropriate time to have such a discussion on merits, so I will save that for a future email. Suffice it to say even the merits give me great pause on supporting this effort.

Closed session at 6pm

We are having a closed session at 6pm to brief the new Council on legal cases. Our regular meeting will resume at 7pm.

Despite this bumpy start, I look forward to continuing to serve you and working with the new Council.

Stay healthy and safe,

Rob

Thank You

I want to extend my heartfelt gratitude to you for re-electing me to serve a third term as your Alderman for Ward 7. Your continued trust and support mean so much to me, and I remain committed to representing you with transparency, integrity, and dedication. Please know that you can always reach out to me with your concerns or ideas. I value hearing from you and working together to strengthen our community.

As we begin this new term, I want to note that our administration and constituent services office are currently in a state of transition. This may cause some delays in my ability to get resolutions to your inquiries, but rest assured that I will follow up with the new administration as soon as possible.