{"id":1000,"date":"2026-07-27T09:41:34","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/?p=1000"},"modified":"2026-07-27T09:41:34","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T13:41:34","slug":"april-2026-minutes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/?p=1000","title":{"rendered":"April 2026 Minutes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association April 2026 Minutes  <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ken called the meeting to order at 7:01 pm on April 27th, 2026. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Treasurer Update (Dom): There were no transactions and the current account  balance is $1,314.29. We were able to acquire a new EIN number from the IRS  and are in the process of transferring the account from Rockland Trust to  Eastern Bank. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Police Report (Captain Demaris) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 Downtown bike operations – police conducted an operation on April 22nd  targeting reckless bike riders downtown and observed 8 juveniles riding  recklessly. LPD plans to conduct similar operations in the future, including  during vacation week <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 Broken windows – police were able to identify and arrest a single individual  apparently responsible for the March spate of vandalism and broken  windows on Merrimack Street. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 Car break ins – decrease from 12 (February) down to 5 (March). Police have  arrested and charged 3 individuals responsible for many car breaks in the  area. Reminder to lock car doors and to avoid keeping valuables (purses,  wallets, backpacks, laptops, etc) in plain site <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 Brief discussion of other incidents reported to police <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Police Q&A <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 Discussion about alternative approaches to discourage reckless driving of  bicycles in the streets downtown. Police are working the school resource  officer to talk with families of kids to discourage the behavior. City is  working on special events and is in talks with the Bike Connection and  other partners to find alternative attractive places for kids to bike (e.g. a  mountain bike trail in the Lowell state forest). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2043 LPD confirmed there are no Shot Spotter devices in the city <\/p>\n\n\n\n

17th Middlesex District Representative candidate introduction (Dr. Harini Aiyer) – Dr. Aiyer is running for the state rep seat for the 17th Middlesex District. She  described her personal background and history, what drew her to Lowell, and  her top priorities as a candidate – affordability, safety, and transparency. – Note: there are two other candidates for the position. We hope to hear from  them at future LDNA meetings<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lowell City Budget Update (Lowell CFO Conor Baldwin and Deputy CFO Austin  Walk) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– The CFO gave an in-depth presentation describing the process of creating the  annual budget. The city sets tax rates in the fall, departments submit funding  requests from the fall through the spring, and the city manager submits the  budget to the city council in May for review and approval. The CFO identified  5 major fiscal challenges, including increased pension, health insurance, and  energy costs, increased state assessments (especially for charter schools)  and increased debt service costs for capital improvements like the new high  school. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– The full budget is available online on the city\u2019s website (https:\/\/ www.lowellma.gov\/151\/Budget) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Discussion in the meeting focused on the parking enterprise fund, which is  separate from the general fund. This enterprise fund accounts for the debt  service and operating costs of the garages, and translates to the usage rate  of the garages downtown. The increases in the downtown parking rates have  gone to pay for debt services for improvements to the Downes and Ayotte  garage and the construction of the Hamilton Canal Garage. Some residents  expressed concerns that downtown neighborhood is disproportionately  impacted by parking costs and parking enforcement relative to the rest of the  city. The CFO discussed some anticipated upcoming relief (e.g. the Early  Garage debt service should be paid of within 5 years). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

City District Updates (City Councilor Sean McDonough) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Sean discussed the process for and difficulties with repairing the sidewalks  downtown. In some situations, abutting owners own vaults below the  sidewalk. The vaults fail, causing a sinkhole in the sidewalk and leading to  complications regarding who is responsible for fixing the issue. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Sean is working on a list of sidewalks, fences, and bridges that need  improvements in the district. The city engineer may also have a separate list  of upcoming and recently completed road and sidewalk improvements. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– The association discussed ways for the city to improve communication about  what\u2019s been repaired and what is on the city\u2019s radar for future improvements <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Announcements from the President (Ken) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

– Due to time constraints, we deferred conversation about the front-runner city  program and the downtown business improvement district to June. (We will  not hold a meeting in May.) <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The meeting adjourned at 8:30 pm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association April 2026 Minutes   Ken called the meeting to order at 7:01 pm on April 27th, 2026.  Treasurer Update (Dom): There were no transactions and the current account  balance is $1,314.29. We were able to acquire a … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1000"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1000\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1001,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1000\/revisions\/1001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ldna01852.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}