In a wild and somewhat unprecedented evening on April 1, the Windsor Town Council held its first virtual meeting via the meeting app Zoom.
On site in the council chambers were Mayor Dominic Foppoli and vice mayor Esther Lemus as well as councilmember Debora Fudge, sitting well over six feet apart. Town staff, including Town Manager Ken MacNab, sat at temporary desks around the room. Checking in over Zoom were councilmembers Sam Salmon and Bruce Okrepkie and town attorney Jose Sanchez.
The meeting even started with a virtual pledge of allegiance, with an animated flag waving on the Zoom screen.
The fun and games started when the meeting was opened for public comment. Citizens were encouraged to have either emailed their questions ahead of time or to join the Zoom and “raise their hand,” a feature of the app. Emailed comments were not read aloud, but will be entered into the record.
While there were a few genuine commenters, a significant number of them were clearly young people looking to prank the council.
The first identified himself as John Smith and attempted to order a pepperoni pizza. Other callers used colorful and oftentimes vulgar language, culminating in a caller asking about the anatomy of the mayor. The council kept a good humor about the whole thing.
“Would anybody who doesn’t go to Windsor High School like to call into our meetings,” asked Foppoli with a laugh. “Getting Zoom-bombed means we’re trendy, all the hip kids are doing it. Hey, you should come to real meetings. I guess people are bored at home.”
After a question, the town attorney pointed out that they did need to keep taking the calls, though they were allowed to not answer any obvious aliases, such as Samuel L. Jackson and Alexander Hamilton.
After a few more interesting calls, Foppoli observed, “Welcome to city council meetings in the pandemic era. To put a positive spin on it, the leaders of tomorrow are being engaged in some capacity.”
“And at least they know there’s a council meeting,” added Fudge. “It gives us hope for Gen Z or whoever they are.”
After that, the meeting flowed smoothly, with a few items of business being handled.
The 2018 Edition of the International Property Maintenance Code was approved on second reading, and all previously adopted Property Maintenance Codes which conflicted with it were repealed. The code provides requirements for continued use and maintenance of building elements, site conditions, swimming pools, plumbing, mechanical, electrical and fire protection systems in existing residential and nonresidential structures.
Also approved was a resolution for the amendment of the Windsor Water District Sphere of Influence to include APN 059-310-051, colloquially known as the Amador property, just south of Shiloh Road. This adoption is part of the annexation of the property into the town, with an eye toward future development.
The meeting concluded with a message from the mayor, who, after jokingly expressing a desire to have spoken with Samuel L. Jackson, said, “Windsor stay healthy and feel free to reach out. Your council is here for you.”
