Conversations with Miguel Meléndez

Since President Donald Trump’s second inauguration in January, Miguel Meléndez’s workday as Rochester City Council president has expanded to include defending the city’s sanctuary status and preparing for possible cuts to federal funding.

On April 24, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit against the city of Rochester, alleging that the city’s sanctuary city policies unlawfully hinder federal immigration enforcement efforts.

“I think this issue is (not) going to go away,” Meléndez says. “My position is specifically that,  based on all the conversations I’ve had, we are within our rights to be a sanctuary city, and we will respond to the lawsuit.

“For as long as I’ve been alive, pretty much we’ve been a sanctuary city,” he adds. “So, I don’t know anything different. We updated the policy in 2017 with support from the attorney general’s office at the time to make sure that we were compliant with the law, compliant with the Constitution etc. and we updated it to expand the protection.”

Meanwhile, with a series of executive orders, the White House has cut funding at many levels. In a partial budget proposal May 2, the administration outlined substantial cuts to nondefense discretionary funding—$163 billion—that would impact programs administered by local governments, including Rochester.

Against this backdrop, City Council has entered another election cycle. Five seats are up for grabs, including Meléndez’s, and the races are crowded with several people who would like an opportunity to shape city policy. Meléndez welcomes the competitive races as a sign of civic engagement. 

“Having so many people run shows that there is interest in local issues, and that’s important,” he says. “And if people have ideas and think they can do the job, they should throw their name, throw their hat in the ring, and I have no issue with that. … The public gets to select five people to represent them.”

Meléndez and I spoke a few times over the last couple of weeks. The conversations were marked not by sweeping declarations or promises, but by deliberate answers. After each question, Meléndez often paused—sometimes for several seconds—before responding. The topics were wide-ranging: In addition to Rochester’s sanctuary city policies and possible federal funding cuts, they included housing, education, crime prevention and the role Council plays in city government. Excerpts from our discussions, edited for length and clarity, follow.

An unusual entry

Born in 1986, Meéndez as a 9-year-old lost his mother; six years later, his father—who came to Rochester from Puerto Rico in the 1970s—died. 

“That forced me to grow up quickly. I was fortunate to have an older sister, my sister, Melissa, who took me in, and my younger sister in. I was at East High School at that time,” he says.

Meléndez, who earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from St. John Fisher, became chief engagement officer at Ibero-American Action League in 2019.

In 2020, during the pandemic, Meléndez was appointed to City Council, when Jackie Ortiz was named Democratic elections commissioner for Monroe County. He was appointed to serve until the end of the term for the at-large seat in December 2021.

“I was doing a lot of work in northeast Rochester through my Ibero hat. … On the one hand, I felt that I was hitting some roadblocks, either policy or investment roadblocks in the neighborhood,” Meléndez recalls. “And then, on the other hand, I felt I knew a lot of the issues, and I knew them well from experience working with people, residents and neighborhoods that have been impacted by the opioid epidemic or gun violence or disinvestment in general.”

So, Meléndez, who grew up in Northeast Rochester, expressed his interest in the City Council post.

“I thought I could take my advocacy and my knowledge to City Hall and provide local government with some real examples of why we need to invest more in some neighborhoods, focus on equity and focus on public safety issues from multiple lenses,” he says, “not just from like a law enforcement approach, but what more could we be doing to invest in the local neighborhood organizations, what policy changes might help particular neighborhood that’s been impacted by the opioid epidemic and that kind of thing.”

He was elected to a full Council term in November 2021, and shortly after being sworn in the following January he was unanimously elected by his colleagues to lead the group.

ROCHESTER BEACON: What do you see as some of the accomplishments of your term as City Council president?

MIGUEL MELÉNDEZ: Wow, … a lot has happened. I became president at a time when there was a lot of change in the city government, and so navigating all of the different personalities and people on Council, I think, was the first task at hand to kind of understand how we’re going to move together and work together. In terms of physical changes and accomplishments in government, I’m most proud of the work that we’ve done around creating opportunities for more housing. We’ve built thousands of units in the city. I know that there’s more work to be done because the cost of housing and affordability is still a pressing issue in this community. 

We can’t build housing fast enough, so we need to continue to do that. I also think (that) public safety is a major challenge in our community; there’s still some issues that we need to continue to work on, such as vehicle theft and vandalism. But considering that, we have seen the investments that we’re making in violence prevention having an effect. Our shootings and homicides (are) still way too many, still way too many, but we are starting to see them trend back closer to pre-pandemic level. We have some work to do still. 

Around code enforcement and housing, we’ve invested more in personnel to get more code enforcement officers out in the community. We had a huge backlog during COVID because we effectively were not inspecting houses at that time. Catching up to that, I worked with the Council and the administration to change our fee schedule and fine schedule for code enforcement issues. Before we did that, it was the cost of doing business to just pay the fees instead of repair the properties. Making it more economical to fix the properties was part of our vision and mission. 

Last year, we also put out a document called the Pact with the People before the budget, and a lot of those things are still in motion, but we’ve invested money in our fire department to increase our medical response. We’re looking to purchase that first ambulance for the fire department to pilot it and see how that can go, which I’m assuming will be in this year’s budget too. 

We have worked on the ROC Vision Zero planning process … to really focus on ‘How do we reduce pedestrian deaths to zero?’ That’s the aim. So, that’s going to come with a whole slew of strategies, some that are about design, some that are about enforcement. Around public safety, the biggest challenge we have (is) holding people accountable within the law. Certainly, with the vandalism issue, not only the vandalism issue, but store theft is another thing that has been underway, particularly pharmacies. We’ve had to figure out more ways to get creative in that space, and I’ve worked with the mayor and administration to be more proactive with some of the businesses to try to come up with strategies. And as pharmacies have closed, you know, we have worked to convene people to reopen in a different way; if it’s not a national chain, you know, we have local entities that can do more, so we’re trying to do those things.

City Council’s role

ROCHESTER BEACON: How do you view the role of City Council, and how do you think our community should view it? 

MELÉNDEZ: We are the second balance to the administration. I mean, if you look across all nine Councilmembers, we all have different viewpoints, many different things. But the reality is, 95 percent of the time we vote together. There’s always just those small things where we might have nuanced differences, where there’s no votes. The way I view our role is to ask the questions that the public cares about that we are sent to ask. We are sent to really review what the administration proposes. We also propose our own legislation. I think we’ve done a lot more of that under my leadership in the last couple years. Then our main function beyond this policy is the budget. We approve a budget every year in June, but throughout the year, there’s amendments to that budget consistently that we are reviewing and updating and improving. 

I think the community should view us as a coequal branch of government. That doesn’t mean that we’re going to be fighting the administration all the time. There’s been times when we have pushed back. We had one particular project, the ambassador project, or the ambassador program. There was a downtown version and there was a neighborhood version, and we decided to move forward with the neighborhood version at this point, pending what was going to happen with, at that time, the (Business Improvement District). So, we push back appropriately. What I believe our role is to do is to make sure that we’re putting the best possible plan forward for the city that we can get to as a group.

ROCHESTER BEACON: Can you give me an example of proposed legislation?

MELÉNDEZ: The code enforcement example is one; that came from Council. Good Cause eviction also was Council legislation. We went through a process. People didn’t like how long it took, and depending on which side you’re on, they didn’t want to see it happen, too. There was certainly a lot of deliberation in the community. In shepherding that process, I wasn’t in a rush to move without having thorough conversations with different voices in the community. We landed it in a space where at least everyone felt heard, whether they liked what we did or not. And that’s the job, in my opinion, of Councilmembers, (it) is to be deliberative. We’re not in a rush to railroad something; we need to be thoughtful thought leaders in the community.

Legislative issues

City Council’s passage of Good Cause made Rochester the largest city in the state outside New York City to adopt the protections after Gov. Kathy Hochul signed the state’s Good Cause eviction law last April.

When Rochester’s Good Cause law was first proposed, the legislation used the state’s threshold for the “small landlord” exemption. This would have exempted units with landlords who own fewer than 11 properties. A November 2024 report by City Council staff found that criterion would have excluded roughly 36 percent of the city’s rental market, or an estimated 24,181 units.

In the report, Meléndez wrote, “If Good Cause is going to work as many hope, we need to fully understand it and be sure we get it right from the start.” 

The adopted version of the law has a revised threshold. It only exempts landlords who own a single property. According to the report, this will cut the number of units exempted on “small landlord” grounds to roughly 6,155, or 9.2 percent of the city’s rental market. This lower threshold is in line with most other cities that have adopted the law.

While announcing the law’s passage, Meléndez recounted the lengthy deliberations that brought the Council to its 7-2 vote.

“The job of a legislator is to do the work to understand the implications of any law we pass deeply,” he said. “And given the gravity of this law, it was important that I did so. Voting is easy—governing is harder.”

While Good Cause was passed, Rochester’s vision for a Business Improvement District fell short. The idea for a BID came from a recommendation in the ROC the Riverway Phase I Vision Plan. The improvement district would be an area where property owners self-tax for services and improvements in the absence of government support.

However, the plan was nixed in March 2024 after inadequate support from City Council. Councilmembers Willie Lightfoot, Stanley Martin, Mary Lupien, and Kim Smith had voiced concerns about the idea, and it faced opposition from some community members.

ROCHESTER BEACON: Were you surprised that the plan for a BID didn’t get approved?

MELÉNDEZ: I’m not surprised. There was a lot of tension, turmoil or worry at the time. People didn’t necessarily understand what it was and what it wasn’t. I think because we didn’t see a plan, it’s hard to speculate what would have happened. But you know, the process ended based on the fact that Councilmembers couldn’t commit to something that they didn’t see a plan for. That’s the bottom line.

Federal funds at risk

Among the biggest projects now underway in the city is Inner Loop North, which aims to reconnect downtown to neighborhoods separated from the city’s center by the Inner Loop. Plans call for replacing a 1.5-mile segment of the Inner Loop Expressway with an accessible, multimodal, at-grade network of complete streets. Its funding includes a $123 million commitment from the state and the city of Rochester to complete design and construction.

In January, the project received a $100 million boost from the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Reconnecting Communities program, an initiative designed to address the repercussions of previous transportation infrastructure decisions. But Trump administration actions have thrown a wide range of federal funding into question.

ROCHESTER BEACON: Are you worried about what’s happening at the federal level? How do you expect that to play out at the city level? If you’re worried, what are some of your concerns there?

MELÉNDEZ:  We all are very concerned about what’s happening at the federal level. I do my best to keep tabs on the executive orders and the news. We’re in conversations often with our local and federal leaders about what’s happening. My main concerns are a couple (of) things. So, one, we are a sanctuary city, and we’ve said that we are, and we’ve doubled down that. In my view, my opinion, for as long as I’m a Councilmember, I would not vote to change that in any way. But that may have some consequences. There was an executive order targeting sanctuary cities, and a federal court has already ruled that the federal administration cannot strip away resources based on that designation, so I’m thankful for that.

The biggest concerns beyond that is just the amount of potential challenges we could face with things like our HUD funding. We don’t know what the federal administration plans to do in that space. We have an annual action plan that’s funded by HUD (and) that supports things like our roof repair program, our home renovations that we do for first time homebuyers, housing people with AIDS, our ESG grants, which are focused on doing outreach to the homeless. All those things could be impacted by this.

The other is infrastructure, roads and major infrastructure projects throughout the city. We don’t know how the federal government’s going to treat that. We had a very supportive approach from the previous administration; it was the Infrastructure and Jobs Act that produced a lot of funding, as you know, (for) our Inner Loop project. We have $100 million that’s supposed to come from the federal government. 

ROCHESTER BEACON: Do you think that would be impacted?

MELÉNDEZ:  Well, nobody knows. All indications are (that) the allocation has happened and we should be OK. But things like the rule of law don’t mean a thing, it seems, in some spaces. So, we have to be cautious and concerned. And then if you go a layer out from just like city government funding, and you start to go into (the) community, I’m worried about nonprofit services, programs like Head Start that have been effective for a long time. You have 50 years of Head Start being effective, and the federal government is saying ‘we want to cut that funding.’ That is local jobs, that is local education for our young people. These are the concerns. There’s going to be a lot of consequences, and I haven’t even gotten into Medicaid or any of these services.

Poverty and public safety

Many Rochester residents rely on Medicaid services and Section 8 housing vouchers, which could be in danger. Last Friday, the Trump administration shared its recommendations on discretionary funding levels for various agencies, including the Department of Housing and Urban Development. It could mean a more than 40 percent reduction in rental aid. The plan places the burden on states to either continue offering assistance or not.

According to the Rochester Monroe Anti-Poverty Initiative, nearly a third of the Monroe County population lives below the poverty line, with a concentration in the city of Rochester. Of these, half live in extreme poverty, the agency says. One out of every two children in Rochester lives in poverty. Programs such as Section 8 and Head Start play a crucial role in providing relief in various ways.

ROCHESTER BEACON: It’s no secret that we have one of the highest child poverty rates in the nation. How has Council prioritized closing that gap?

MELÉNDEZ: The vice president (LaShay Harris) and I were using our Council committees to do more proactive work on our part, and one of the things we released this year was a child poverty report. In that document we have, I believe, 13 recommendations that we can move forward with, and a lot of it is advocacy, because the city doesn’t control things like social services, or things like the Housing Access Voucher Program, which I think is being contemplated in the state budget, the Child Tax Credit. These are all things that are outside of the city’s responsibility, but it doesn’t mean we can’t go and ask for those things to be included in the budget. We have a process called memorializing resolutions, and what that means (is) Councilmembers can sign on to a resolution that we send to the governor or the state delegation or the county and we have used that process to do much more advocacy from the Council to other bodies of government. We started that process maybe two years ago with the intention of (having) a more active advocacy approach on Council.

ROCHESTER BEACON: What does an equitable future for Rochester look like to you?

MELÉNDEZ: When I think of equity, I believe we should be doing more in the places and spaces where we do have concentrated poverty, where we do have a lack of economic opportunities, where we don’t have grocery stores, where we don’t have banks to uplift those communities, and figure out, how do we create more access to opportunity for our residents? How do we introduce the idea that employers should be coming into our neighborhoods and recruiting our residents? We shouldn’t be looking (externally) to other communities to recruit people to our jobs that are here. We have people here that are capable, given the opportunity. 

Equity is being intentional. You have to go where people are. And one of the things I’ve done in my time as a Councilmember is I created an effort called Roc the Block employment fairs. The whole intention behind that is really to break the ice, to get employers out of the office, or out of the traditional setting. Then we create a block party-style fair, where we have a DJ with music. We have someone on a grill cooking out. I always say it’s food, music and jobs.

(Meléndez has conducted 16 Roc the Block fairs since he’s been a Councilmember. He says sometimes, people are hired immediately. He believes face-to-face interactions go further than an online application.)

ROCHESTER BEACON: You spoke of equity and resources, but not all city neighborhoods are the same. Some are disproportionately impacted, especially when it comes to gun violence. Do you take that into account?

MELÉNDEZ: For me, public safety—and specifically around gun violence—is an all-hands-on-deck approach. We fund Pathways to Peace, the Homicide Response Team out of Crisis Intervention Services. Unfortunately, we’re responding to a homicide, but we’re also trying to prevent the next one. As part of that approach, making sure families have the resources and support that they need, and (focusing) on issues of retaliation and that kind of thing. We also have our Person in Crisis team, which I view as a violence prevention effort.

One of the big things that I want to see, and this is another Council legislative item: We ordered a study of our neighborhood service centers. I believe that our neighborhood service centers can become more of a hub for all sorts of efforts, including (violence) prevention. We have crime prevention officers that are at the service centers now; we have staff that are there doing work with neighborhood block clubs, they attend monthly meetings, they address issues in their community. But I think there’s more that can be done. … We want to think about, does code enforcement have a more proactive role there? Could the Office of Neighborhood Safety be part of that in some way, or (could) the Mayor’s Office of Violence Prevention be more intentionally part of the neighborhood service centers? 

So, really understanding what the model is today or maybe yesterday, and then what could it be tomorrow? That’s something that I care about. … Having neighborhood hubs where residents feel like they have a place to go to address issues, many City Halls, if you will, but also that those centers empower residents with resources. I was on the Committee for Neighbors in Action, (involved in) the development of that process, which was going to model after Neighbors Building Neighborhoods in some way. I was intentional and pushed for getting the resources in the hands of our residents. A small amount of resources to a block club or a community association is violence prevention, if they can do a community garden on the street, or have an active role in creating walking groups or beautification projects, murals etc. Those things bring people together, and then when you see people out in the street doing positive things, you’re less likely to want to do something negative.

ROCHESTER BEACON: One part of public safety is the Police Accountability Board, and the PAB has largely been unable to function in the way it was expected to. What are your thoughts on the PAB, and why has it been so hard?

MELÉNDEZ: My message to the Council, the community and the PAB was that we shouldn’t be throwing the baby out with the bath water. I think there (were) a lot of calls for this to be ended, this was a failed experiment, but in the grand scheme of government, people have to understand that the PAB, still, even to this day, is in its infancy.

The first two years, I would say, had the most problematic challenges, and then we were also litigating the functions of what the PAB could do and could not do, but as we got past

those things and really started to sit down and align what the Councilmembers wanted to see happen with this. There’s still work to be done. We have some other litigation that’s hopefully going to wrap soon that allows us to move forward (with) next steps. We are now getting to a point where we have stable and consistent leadership in the executive director. The board has been around long enough and has changed over in terms of membership. I think there’s only one original member still remaining on the PAB board.

There’s more collaboration with the administration. I did appoint a Councilmember to be the liaison with the PAB and to work through issues. We’ve hosted some work sessions this year, so we’re going through the process and doing our best to fulfill the mission of the agency. What I hope for is at some point in the PAB’s lifetime, and our RPD’s lifetime, is that people will view this as a civilian agency that is fair, and if they make a recommendation, it’s because whatever recommendation it is, that there was due process and deliberation and consideration, that a community member feels it’s fair, that an officer feels it’s fair. That feels like a dream right now, but I’m hopeful that as this continues on and there’s more collaboration, we can have those discussions.

(City Council created Rochester’s PAB in 2019. It was a ballot initiative that received overwhelming public support. City Council’s objective in creating the board was, and remains, to bring greater public accountability to the Rochester Police Department.

Last week, a court ruled in favor of the Locust Club—the RPD officers’ union—to curb PAB’s power in terms of disciplinary action. The PAB has decided to stop investigations and reviews into individual misconduct allegations for now. I called Meléndez again to learn what he thought about the ruling.)

ROCHESTER BEACON: What did you think of the ruling? Did you expect it?

MELÉNDEZ: I was honestly shocked in terms of how sweeping the decision was. We certainly respect the law and the judge’s ruling. At this point, we are getting in compliance with that ruling. However, we’re also looking to fight this or make some adjustments. It’s very early on for us; we still need some time to process and determine next steps, but we are getting in compliance with the ruling at this point. 

(The city filed an appeal on May 2.)

Public power

Meléndez and I also spoke about the proposed city public utility feasibility study—Metro Justice continues to lobby for a report. Recently, the organization graded city incumbents and candidates on their commitment to a Phase 1 study to replace Rochester Gas and Electric with a public utility. Meléndez, Harris, Malik Evans, Michael Patterson, Bridget Monroe and Luis Aponte got an F.

ROCHESTER BEACON: One thing we didn’t talk about was the public utility feasibility study. You weren’t very convinced that the city should go it alone. Why?

MELÉNDEZ: I saw (Metro Justice) put their report card out yesterday,

ROCHESTER BEACON: You didn’t get a good grade.

MELÉNDEZ: No, I didn’t get a good grade. … You know, they can do it however they want to do it, but I don’t think that it was a fair approach. Because here’s why: For the last two years, I have introduced legislation to put $500,000 aside for this potential study. The money is sitting there. It’s been there, and they’re changing the rules. They’re changing the rules of engagement around this study. 

Now they want the city to do this study alone. I do not believe that the poorest ratepayers in the city should be paying to study power in Webster or Penfield or Pittsford or Greece or wherever, for that matter. My responses to the survey were, yes, I will continue to reserve funds for this cause. But no, I’m not interested in, at this point, dictating that the city does it by themselves. I don’t think that we should dictate the terms of who should be at the table for that. Council doesn’t have that role. It’s the administration’s role to put together the RFP and whatever else would happen if a study were commissioned. I think this is being weaponized and politicized, but the proof is in the pudding. My actions have already shown what it needs to show in terms of support for the idea and Metro Justice is changing the rules of engagement.

ROCHESTER BEACON: Councilmembers have differing opinions, whether it’s the feasibility study, the PAB or neighborhood development. How do you balance that?

MELÉNDEZ: There’s many areas where Council is aligned, and then there’s just a few areas where there’s some rub or difficulty around how we might do something. My approach is usually to listen to all sides and try to find a path forward that seems to make sense, that I think can move the city forward, or has the opportunity to be debated and passed. I think it’s healthy for any legislative body to have diversity of opinion. It makes our process better if we have diversity of opinion. I think every single Councilmember comes in with their view from who they think they represent as constituents of Rochester.

ROCHESTER BEACON: I wanted to ask you what you think about the city’s relationship with the school district. I understand there are limits; are there other ways to help with education?

MELÉNDEZ: I’ve had some conversations with some of the commissioners at the Board of Education. I would love to contemplate neighborhood schools again. I don’t know if there’s an appetite for it, but I feel like if your school is part of a connection to the people around it, it creates more opportunity for learning beyond whatever the school hours are, until 4 p.m. One of the things we’ve done with the School Modernization Project is the city co-located services, so we have some libraries and rec centers. That model needs to continue, but the city does have a responsibility. … I think we have responsibility to make sure that our children are educated as well. Council is working on some literacy initiatives. Last year, we funded the Raising a Reader program, and I think we can utilize our rec centers to continue education beyond the school day. I know that there’s only so much (you can) push on young people’s brains. You don’t want to overstimulate, but I do think that there’s some options and opportunities for us to participate more as well.

Thinking boldly

ROCHESTER BEACON: If you had to rally the city around one bold idea this year, what would it be and why now?

MELÉNDEZ: One of the big things that’s going to happen, (it’s) probably going to be into the fall and maybe into the winter, is Council is going to have a zoning realignment that’s going to happen that will set the stage for the next 25 years of community development in this community. I think the one thing I would rally (around, a) big bold idea is specifically around housing and housing types that are allowed in our city. There’s a lot of not-in-my-backyard, (that) kind of approach to housing. I would love to see us diversify the types of housing that is allowable. I would love to see options for more tiny homes if someone wanted to build and develop those.

We should be looking at the possibility of manufactured housing. There’s some high-quality versions of that that exist that are cost effective, because the cost to build continues to go up, and that is why you see a lot of these big structure builds where there’s 100-plus units in a building, because it’s easier to build multiple floors of a building from a cost perspective than it is to do single-family or smaller-scale, scattered-site housing. We have a lot of vacant lots in our community that present us with opportunities to do nice developments in the city. We just got to get creative now on what are the types that we would allow, and could we do more with things like accessory dwelling units, ADUs. Other cities are doing that. The state is funding that, and Rochester doesn’t allow it right now.

ROCHESTER BEACON: Do you think that would bring more people to live downtown?

MELÉNDEZ: One of our issues is the amount of demand we have for housing has driven up the cost of housing. If we created more supply, I think we can (bring more people downtown). We’ve kind of gone in reverse. We’re going back in reverse order now, so we spent decades tearing down housing, much of which needed to go because of the quality of the house. Now we have to build. 

We are a city that was built for 330,000 people at the peak, and we spent decades tearing down. Now we’re going in reverse order. We have to start building back up. If we had more available units across this community, you would start (to see) housing affordability improve. We can’t build housing fast enough. Right now, it’s our biggest challenge. We’ve built almost 4,000 units in the last four years and it’s still not enough.

Smriti Jacob is Rochester Beacon managing editor.

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