With COVID Restrictions Ended, Framingham Youth Council Sets Goals To Hold Youth Summit And Find Solutions To Keefe Tech Pool Closure & Parking at High School

By Ashlyn Kelly

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FRAMINGHAM – Framingham Youth Council discussed subcommittee assignments and goals or ideas for the council to work on, during its meeting Feb. 27.

The first goal Youth Council Chair Chloe Mills brought up was continuing the work of creating a youth summit. 

Mills said the original plan got “unneccessarily complicated” but the Council will “rework it” to “get it to be as helpful for everyone as possible.”

“We were hoping to host a lot of youth in Framingham and to have everyone share all of their ideas about what is wrong with the city and what they want to change,” Mills added.

After the summit, the Council would then narrow down all the ideas “and focus on a couple to specifically work on and try to push for the City Council.”

Another idea that was brought up was discussing the Keefe Tech pool closing at the council’s next meeting.  SOURCE first reported on the Keefe Tech pool closing this summer on February 8.

The final goal that was discussed was creating more parking at Framingham High School. 

In an interview, Mills said she would “like to focus on more outreach and getting things out to the city’s youth.”

“We say we are here to represent our peers, but they don’t really know we’re there right now,” Mills said.

Mills said the Youth Council also wants to finish up some existing projects, such as lowering the municipal voting age in the City of Framingham to 17.

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Hamza Rifki, vice chair of the council, said he wants the Council to be “more efficient, and to also meet more consistently, and set and complete projects by the end of our terms.”

The Youth Council was created in 2019 by then Framingham High senior Isabella Petroni, who authored the ordinance. The City Council passed the legislation in spring 2019.

The Council has 13 members, one from each of the City’s 9 Districts appointed by the District City Councilor, two at-large members appointed by each of the elected At-Large City Councilors, and two additional at-large members appointed by the Mayor.

The District Youth Councilors serve a 1-year term from July 1 to June 30.

The at-large Youth Councilors serve a 2-year term.

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Mills is an at-large Councilor who was re-appointed by Councilor George P. King Jr. in 2021. Her term ends on June 30, 2023.

According to the Ordinance passed by the 11-member City Council to create the Youth Council, its and responsibilities include:

• Evaluating and reviewing issues facing youth in the City
• Representing youth in the City of Framingham, and advising elected officials and other policy makers regarding matters of interest or concern to young people
• Providing information to and advocating before public entities including the mayor, municipal government, state government, federal government, police, school districts, and high education institutions, in support of young people in the City of Framingham
• Providing a structure for all young people in Framingham to learn the value of civic participation and thereby encouraging lifelong participatory residents
• Offering policy recommendations on issues affecting and of interest to young people
• Engaging with young people in Framingham to informing them of opportunities and listening to their suggestions regarding how the community can better serve its residents

The Youth Council’s next meeting is Sunday, March 27 at 6 p.m. via Zoom. All are welcome to attend.

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Ashlyn Kelly is a Spring 2022 SOURCE intern. She is a is a senior communication arts major with minors in political science and journalism at Framingham State University. When she is not writing an article, you can usually find her in a theatre.