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Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 17

had last year. And then it was cut so there are going to be losses. If you take that into consideration when
the fentanyl traffic is growing, and | am sure you get the same reports | do on the arrests that are being
made and during this last year the Police Officers that were physically harmed and/or out of work because
of arrests that were made, it’s not an easy job. It is protecting the people of Nashua. It is a safety issue. |
for one am not going to have the State drive the safety of our citizens in Nashua.

That amount of money will allow them to maintain the same levels of service that they had last year and
provide the services. There are a lot of things that they won’t be able to do, believe it or not, with that cut.
And the people of Nashua are going to — you know right now they are not at the full complement of officers
that they could have and should have by their analysis. | don’t know how many times I’ve heard people
say, OH it takes a police officer 10 minutes to get here. That’s because each sector has one car, three
each shift. We are not over policed, we are adequately policed and they do a great job with the staff they
have. And I, for one, am not going to cut one penny from their request to maintain the services that they
have provided over the past year which were exemplary.

Last year they were commended as one of the best, if not the best, Police Accredited Agency in the United
States. That is something to be proud of. And, | for one, will not cut them to save a couple buck on the tax
rate. You know, if you are somebody out there and your home is being burglarized because drug dealers
need money to buy their drugs, you want a police officer to be able to respond and you don’t want them 10
minutes later, you want them as soon as he can get there. If you follow the amount of arrests and things
that have gone on in the City and the lack of development of drug dealers because we have two POP
units, which we may lose one if this cut does in, | for one, would not ever try to save that much money and
lose that kind of protection.

President Wilshire

Alderman Lopez.

Alderman Lopez

Echoing a lot of what Alderman Dowd said, | find it extremely inconsistent to claim that you have high
respect for the budgetary prowess of the Police Department and respect for the good work that they do on
the job while literally telling them that you are just going to drop their budget done, despite their objections
and despite their concerns with the assumption that they can make it work based on what you are looking
for. | can’t follow that logic. | would say that there’s a big difference between cocaine and
methamphetamine which are two of the more prevalent drugs on the street than fentanyl and carfentanil.
Carfentanil is definitely dangerous because it is an area infector so it is a danger to First Responders. But
someone who is cocaine or somebody who is using methamphetamines is typically much more agitated,
aroused, animated, violent. One of the areas that we scored very highly on in order to get our good
governance was low incidents of violent crime.

So if we decide to ignore the police and what they report as their level of need a time when we are seeing
an increase in the substances that contribute to violent crime, we are going to see a rise in violent crime.
That doesn’t just translate to Wallet Hub rankings that translates to death, injuries, our own people being
put in a greater level of harms way. The best way to respond to those types of situations is to intervene
before they start to become widespread. We did not collective, as a State, do a very good job with the
opioid crisis when it first presented itself, we responded after it was very evident in low income situations or
in areas of poverty, we really only responded to it when it was impossible to ignore.

Our response was extremely effective thanks to a pretty healthy amount of leadership and vision from the
Fire Department and from Mayor Donchess in arranging the Safe Station Program which the State took
over, realigned and redesigned into a model that is not as effective is not anywhere near as responsive.
They awarded contracts to partners that basically resulted in our Fire Department not being able to take 24
hour walk ups or calls because there would be nowhere to send them to. Apparently the crisis is now just
a 9:00 to 5:00 bureaucratic exercise, it is not the same situation. So we don’t have the same protections

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 18

that we had even two years ago against the opioid crisis which was people getting high, people being
sedentary, not people getting animated and attacking each other and using weapons on each other. We
are in a very different risk phase right now.

| don’t know if anybody was not paying attention last year, but tensions got a little bit with the pandemic.
There was a little bit of political friction that was taking place; you guys may have noticed it. And that
hasn’t exactly gone away. There are organized groups that are, as a result of that, operating in Nashua
that Nashua PD is concerned about, Nashua PD is intervening in. Some Wards get a little bit more of it
than others. So | will grant that probably Ward 4 and maybe Ward 3 and maybe Alderman Caron’s Ward
see a little bit more Police activity and need than other Aldermen who feel comfortable cutting the Police. |
don’t, | think it is a very important Department to fund and we can’t look at it being fair to expect them to
take the exact same cut in budget on a numerical basis as like the GIS Department or any of the services
that are really nice for us to have and do contribute overall to the City’s services to constituents but are
more amenities, not requirements. It doesn’t matter how quick with respect to City Clerk Lovering, how
quickly our City Clerk’s Office is able to process your motor vehicle if your car gets stolen.

So | think it is important that we recognize the importance of the Police Department with more than rhetoric
and not cut them any further. And finally | would remind my fellow Aldermen that the Police Department
were the ones who found the solution to their overages and figured out the CERF strategy in the first
place. It’s not like they are not trying to work on this and they are not making recommendations. | think we
should listen to the recommendations instead of accepting them and pushing for more despite what they
are telling us.

President Wilshire

All set Alderman Lopez?

Alderman Lopez

Yes.

President Wilshire
Alderman Tencza.
Alderman Tencza

Thank you Madam President. | just wanted to make a couple of points on Alderman Jette’s motion, just
generally. | think when we speak about percentage increases | think it is important to look at what those
percentages mean really for the tax rate because we throw out numbers like 3% or 4% and none of us like
to raise people’s taxes and we all, | think, understand that any tax increase some members of our
community more than others. But just as an example | want to use my house at 10 Monica Drive about
what a 4% or 3% tax increase would be for me and my family. So if | do the math at 3.5% tax increase
would amount to about an additional $250.00 for us next year added on to our tax bill or about $21.00 a
month extra that we would pay. And then a 4% increase in the tax bill would be about $280.00 or $23.00
per month that we would pay in additional taxes.

And so when we say we think of 4% as being an outrageous number, you know, | can confidently speak
for myself, for many of my neighbors when | say that we are fortunate and we gladly would pay the extra
$23.00 a month to keep our City services where they are. Not just Police and Fire but School, DPW, City
Hall, everyone who does a fantastic job to make Nashua such an attractive place to live. One of the things
that we forget about when we are having this discussion is not only what the tax increases are but the
values of property have increased in the City and how that affects folks as well. There are certainly people
who are benefiting because Nashua is an attractive place to live and more and more people want to move
here and be part of our community.

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 19

Certainly like many people have talked about a lot of that is the quality of our services — Schools, Police
and Firefighters. So | think these additional funds that the Budget Committee has included for Police and
Fire are worth the investment. The next thing | just want to point out is if you look at the cities and towns
surrounding Nashua, our tax rate is right in line with what many of the other towns are charging their
residents. Per thousand the Hudson tax rate is $21.37 for 2020; Salem is $22.02 per thousand; Merrimack
is $24.06 per thousand; Hollis $23.18 per thousand. Now those towns don’t offer the same services that
we do; they certainly don’t have the same number of employees. So our tax rate | feel, again, at $22.61
per thousand or even as an increase it still is very much in line with those towns and again a great deal for
our residents.

If you look at cities, the cities in New Hampshire, Manchester’s tax rate is $24.66 per thousand and
Concord’s is $26.76 per thousand. So the residents of Nashua, again, are coming out ahead as opposed
to what other cities are able to do for or the cost to live in those other cities. So | would hope that this
Board and if Aldermen Jette makes a second motion as it relates to the Fire Department | may have some
other comments. But! would hope that the Board takes all of that into consideration. Certainly if there are
people that are affected by any tax increases, | would hope that the Legal Department and Assessing will
work with them to be able to come up with a way that is not a detriment to them, especially our elderly
population or people who are maybe more low income. But given the work and the consideration that the
Budget Committee has done and these Departments have done, | hope that we can come together and
support the Budget as it came out of the Budget Committee. Thank you.

President Wilshire
Thank you. Alderman Klee?
Alderman Klee

Thank you Madam President. | am going to be honest, when | came here | thought why should we
increase Police and Fire the additional amount over the 1.7% cost of living that the Mayor had put in,
especially considering that so many Departments had either gone a flat line or they went negative, they
decreased their budget. But as | have been sitting here listening, | think Alderman Jette made some very
good comments and remarks but then | look to my other colleagues and one of the things that Alderman
Lopez had brought was the number of hate groups coming in. We are seeing them openly doing this and |
can tell you in my Ward | have witnessed it as well. | have witnessed people being threatened. | know we
have had more FBI interaction and so on and knowing that, | would have anxiety of not giving them what
they say they need. | do hear year after year, and | will be honest, if we don’t get this we are going to have
to cut this, we are going to our POP unit, we are going to cut this or we are going to cut that. It does
eventually become noise and that’s kind of the way | walked in here, | heard this last year, | heard this next
year.

And Chief Carignan always makes the comment, we will make do with what we have and | believe even
Chief Rhodes has made the same comment, we will make do with whatever we have. And | feel confident
that they would. But then looking at this of $241,338.00 | do agree with what Alderman Jette said, | believe
they could find it. But to what cost and to what end. And | can’t sit back and allow these hate groups to
just keep getting bigger and bigger. And as much as | agree with the increase in opioids and all the other
drugs that are coming through here, the hate groups are the things that scare me the most right now. And
| am seeing them all over social media, | am seeing them in pictures that people are proudly standing by
them, those that are running for office and so on. It is becoming the acceptable norm and | think we have
to fight that on all levels and | think even our Fire Department will be fighting those as well. So at this
point, | have kind of been won over to passing this as it has been proposed. So thank you for giving me
the time.

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 20
President Wilshire

You’re welcome. Anyone else? The motion is to restore the $241,338.00 bottom line cut — no to eliminate
that. Seeing no further discussion, would the Clerk please call the roll?

Alderman Klee

So this is not give them the $241?

City Clerk Lovering

The motion by Alderman Jette was to subtract $241,338.00 from the golden rod copy by reducing
Department 150 — Police 90120 bottom line by that amount - $241,338.00.

A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman Jette 1

Nay: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Cleaver,
Alderman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire
10
MOTION FAILED

President Wilshire
Do | have another motion? Alderman Jette?
Alderman Jette

| am sorry to waste everyone’s time but | would like to make a similar motion to eliminate $418,771.00 from
the Fire Department’s bottom line — Account Number 90120.

MOTION BY ALDERMEN JETTE TO REDUCE THE FIRE DEPARTMENT’S BOTTOM LINE BY
ELIMINATING $418,771.00 BY ROLL CALL

ON THE QUESTION

President Wilshire

You’ve heard the motion? Alderman Dowd?
Alderman Dowd

Yes, we are still keeping part of the Mayor’s cut of $80,000.00. What we are keeping in the firemen’s
budget is the ability to keep an entire company of firemen on line. And it is not as simple as that amount of
money would pay for 16 people, it is not the way it is set up. Also it is allowing for a half-time, starting in
January for a safety officer in the Marshall’s Office which will be doing the twice a year, required State
inspections of schools that hasn’t been done. And from the discussions we have had in this construction
project, they are finding a lot of things that should be found by this Fire Marshall. We have 18 schools, that
is 36 different inspections plus this person is also going to be the person that manages capacity at different
places, you know? We don’t want to have some place burn down because nobody checked it and they
couldn’t have that many people in it.

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 21

And also they do the training for the firemen that have been filled in by other people who aren’t doing the full
job that they should be doing because they have to do the training; training is pretty essential. So it is
something that existed before, it was cut from the Fire Department by the previous Mayor for a budget to
stay under the spending cap. And it is something that is required. Let’s hypothetically say if they take a Fire
Company off line, they take a truck off line. We are spending between $800,000.00 and $1.5 million dollars
on trucks. Are we going to have that truck sitting somewhere that it can’t be used. To me that is physically
irresponsible. And also, who is the first person to arrive if you have a medical emergency, a fire or some
type of other activity? It is always the Fire Department. They are all paramedics and some of them are
even more highly trained medically. If you are having a heart attack, do you want to wait a few extra
minutes for the ambulance to get there instead of the fire truck? | don’t think so. | don’t.

We didn’t give them all the money back that they had requested but it makes senses to give them this
amount of money to retain the fire company and hire this person that is critical, | think, to school safety and
the safety of many of our businesses in town.

President Wilshire
Alderman Jette?
Alderman Jette

| won’t repeat everything | said previously about trying to support the Mayor and what | said about the Police
Department pretty much applies to the Fire Department. | haven’t been around as long as you have, but
when Alderman Klee mentioned that every budget season any cut is going to be the end of the world. | don’t
think so. A lot of these problems that you mention are problems that have existed for year. | agree with you
that they should be fixed but picking this year under the financial restrains that we have to remedy those
situations, | just think that it could be postponed and | think that cooperating with the Mayor’s efforts to try to
deal with this budget, is the right thing to do. | would have expected the Fire Commissioners and the Fire
Department to help out as well not try to solve problems that have existed. The Fire Department, I’ve heard
the Fire Commissioners say “it’s never a good year’ and the Chief say, “it's never a good year for the Fire
Department”. But since I’ve been here the Fire Department always needs something. Every Department
needs something.

| am sure there are projects that the Department of Public Works would like to tackle this year. A 6%
increase would enable them to do that. And | understand about the critical role that they play and they may
not believe me when | say this, but | appreciate the firefighters and | am trying to support them but there’s
only so much money and so | am sorry | can’t fully support them to the degree that they would like on this
issue. But that’s why | made the motion.

President Wilshire

Alderman Lopez.

Alderman Lopez

So my impression is that these aren’t these are like “to do projects” or like on the same level as repainting a
park or trying to re do a pool. Making sure that we have our schools inspected for fire safety is more
leveraging assets against a large unmet need. So the fact that we’ve gone this far or we have had this
many years without being able to address that issue doesn’t speak particularly highly of the governance that
we were ranked with. It probably speaks more to the Fire Department compensation for their lack of
resources by working overtime and | am pretty sure that was part of the Chief’s reference as well that they
are being spread increasingly thin. We have expressed a lot of pride in ourselves at growing the tax base
and investing in new opportunities to build and grow our City; that comes with dangers, that comes with
liabilities. There’s a huge building that collapsed in Miami that speaks to the need to do regular inspections,
when you don’t do that the human cost is high, a tragedy is enormous.

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 22

But more specifically the actions and the reputation and the performance of the Fire Department does
specifically benefit people’s insurance premiums and that is a financial value. | think they’ve been asking for
another fire station for years and we have not been able to even approach finding the resources for that. But
being able to make sure that they are keeping up with the training of the fire department that they have
without overextending their existing staff as it expands to respond to calls with taller and more complex
buildings that we are authorizing — that’s being frugal, that’s being efficient and that’s being responsible.
This year of all years, doesn’t mean that there is going to be less fire just because Concord decided that
they were going to play a little fast and loose with our ability to self-govern Nashua. There have been more
fires | believe, there have been more incidents, we just got through a major heat wave. And again,
yesterday we had a fire in the middle of a rain storm.

So | don’t think that the bottom line of the Fire Department is going to be contingent to politics. | think we
need to be looking at the needs that they present and what they are actually going to do with the money. |
don’t think they are asking for anything ridiculous, if we have events and people are coming out of COVID-
19 and restaurants are trying to recover from economic damage and they want to bring in as many people
as possible, we should probably have somebody there to manage that occupancy so that we don’t have to
call all of the fire companies to deal with a major first aid disaster or a major event. Recently the Fire
Department has been called for mutual aid calls in some pretty big situations in other cities too when those
cities found that they didn’t have the capability to respond themselves and that’s not something we should
be entertaining.

| think, again, some neighborhoods are different. Mine has a lot of older buildings, has a lot of older citizens
in those buildings who may not have the same access to using stairs quickly or mobility or that kind of thing.
So using the example from a couple of weeks ago, what was stopped immediately as a mattress fire could
have been a devastating event which as a City, would have cost the taxpayers a lot more to respond to and
would have cost the families and the associates of the people involved even more. So | support their
request and | don’t think that the minimal impact that it would have on the individual tax bill is equivalent to
the services that the offer. | think it is important that we actually make difficult decisions in terms of
governance. And that doesn’t just mean figuring out what we can cut and tell ourselves we made a good
decision, it also means having the courage to say there are some services that are very important. Their
services are important and we are going to match all the rhetoric we give in support of them with actual
action supporting them.

President Wilshire
Alderman Klee?
Alderman Klee

Thank you again Madam President. | just want to make a comment. When we talk about the possibility of
having to close a fire station and knowing that all the reports of recent time are telling us we should increase
by 2 fire stations, | get a little anxious. | know | had someone kind of joke to me and said “how would you
like it if the Amherst Fire Department was one of those that had closed”. And | said, “no it is the most historic
one, it’s got to stay there and | will fight for that”. But then | look back at recent times within the past month
there was in one 24 hour period there were two (inaudible — audio interference) in Ward 3. One on Concord
Street where the entire home is gone. That family has been displaced and luckily we had no damage to the
buildings that were very close to it and that was because we had fast response from the Amherst Street Fire
Department. They are right there, right around the corner and no other homes were lost; that one was sadly
lost. And it is part of the historic district and it brings a tear every time | drive by it. And then Leighton
Street. We had a fire there that ended up with a lot of water damage and those people had to be displaced
and so on.

That was within a 24 hour period; one happened very early in the morning and one happened in the
afternoon, | think it was. If that Fire Department had not been there, would we have lost more, would we

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 23

have lost lives? Luckily those on Concord Street were not home at the time so there were no lost lives. But
there were houses that were houses that were right next to it. And | shudder to think of what would have
happened (inaudible — audio interference) the homes on Concord Street are basically wood-based and they
go up like a matchbox. And we have a lot of old homes as Alderman Lopez had brought up throughout our
entire City that are made of just wood base and so again | came with the idea that nope, we are not going to
do this. | was of the same mindset that Alderman Jette was. We are not going to increase this and listening
to the others speak and so on, | think we do need to give them the $418,000.00. So thank you.

President Wilshire
Alderman Schmidt?
Alderman Schmidt

Thank you Madam President. The economy is cyclical. There are times when you really have to tighten
your belt and everybody suffers. There were, what 10 years ago, 2010 — the State also decided to tighten
belts and hurt the City. And we had to tighten our belts. | wasn’t part of this Chamber at that time but | still
remember it. | don’t think this is the time to tighten the belt of the Fire or the Police, | really don’t. | think that
they are the boots on the ground, they are the people who save lives, they are the ones that show up every
single time. And if somebody has to wait an extra 10 minutes to get their registration done on their car so
be it, we can live with that for a little while. But we cannot have somebody with a heart attack waiting 10
minutes, that’s just not the City we are. We have to be proud of the service we receive and | personally am.

Also | don’t think there’s any fat in any of these budgets. We see to the penny where they plan on
spending. We see to the penny what the State is demanding from us, what the requirements are that we
have to live within. And there’s no question in my mind that there is nothing that we can really cut without
hurting ourselves. Now the study that was done on the Fire Department really surprised me in a couple of
ways. Now we know that there’s buildings in tough shape for the Fire Department, we know they need
updating. We know there’s many things that we could do to improve — something that really surprised me
was the morale, | remember that being an issue. And it is easy to see why it is hard for the Police or Fire to
feel that they are not important in the City. It’s very easy when you sit and you listen to people say well you
can cut out another $200,000.00 without really hurting anything. It’s not the truth, you can’t. This is
important money for important service.

And | really feel that taking this money out away from you is an embarrassment to the City if we do that. |

really feel that very strongly about it. And frankly, | pay taxes here too so | am not interested in raising my
taxes any more than anybody else is. But | am really grateful that you are here and listening to this. And

thank you very much. Thank you.

President Wilshire
Alderman Dowd?
Alderman Dowd

Just two quick things. One there are a number of things that the Fire Department could have asked for,
especially as a result of that report. They are not asking for us to build another station right now anyway
which would add at least one fire company; and now we are talking about cutting one? And the number of
developments that have gone on in this past year and are continuing to go on, with the same number of
people they’ve had, unless we cut their budget and they have less people. You know, we have got a new
high rise going on School Street. On West Hollis Street we have that wooden condo structure, the Hangar
Building is being renovated and that’s a whole building. And | don’t know how many new houses have been
built. | Know when | was still in real estate | sold a bunch of them. And there are a lot of them, | wouldn't
venture to guess — it’s in the 100’s — in the last year. And more importantly, we are building a 4-story new

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 24

school down south, | want a fire truck there if we have a problem. Now granted, we are going to build it so it
is anti-fire, but you never know.

Alderman Lopez

Especially if it doesn’t have a road.
Alderman Dowd

That would be difficult.

President Wilshire

All set Alderman Dowd?
Alderman Dowd

Yes.

President Wilshire

Alderman Tencza?

Alderman Tencza

Thank you Madam President. Again just briefly, | think that the difference in the money restored by the
Budget Committee in the Mayor’s Budget is really minimal to include it for the Fire Department. | just also
wanted to point out similar to what Alderman Schmidt was saying, | think we should look at this a little
differently and be proud of the money we are funding for these Departments. Again, Police and Fire are a
source of pride for the Board of Aldermen, the City; certainly we tout all of their accomplishments and
everything they have done over the last — throughout their histories. And so again it is a good investment.

But | know that there were some concerns about how their budgets have increased over the last 6 years. |
went back and | looked at the numbers and if you take out the fringe benefits which the Departments really
have no control over and you look back at the Fire Department’s budget over the last 10 years, yes it has
increased over the last 5 or 6 years, but over the last 10 years it has only increased at a pace of 1.5% per
year. So again, | think we should be proud that we are making the decisions to kind of restore their budget
to where it should be or it should have been all of the last years and | hope that going forward, | think that
the Fire Department, as a liaison, | can say that | think that they know that going forward their budget and
these increases are not always going to be able to be what we have been — the 3% and 4% that we have
been able to give in the last several years. But really what we have been doing is playing catch up for the 4
years previous when their budget only went up about 1.0% a year. So again | hope that we can support this
and keep the firefighters on the road and in their fire houses. Thanks.

President Wilshire

Thank you. Alderman Cleaver?

Alderman Cleaver

Thank you Madam President. | am very impressed with the Budget Committee’s work with all the
Departments and their work and | think we have done extremely well, especially Fire and Police. And | think

we have the duty to pass this budget as is, without any cuts. Itis already bare bones if you will and | think it
is outstanding as it is, and we are very fortunate that we have been able to get it under control and keep it

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 25

as low as it is. So | am in favor of the budget as is, very strongly in favor of no cuts and passing our budget
as it has been prepared. Thank you very much.

President Wilshire

Thank you. Anyone else? The motion is to reduce the Fire Department Line 90120 by $418,771.00.
Seeing no further discussion, would the Clerk please call the roll?

A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman Jette 1
Nay: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderman Dowd,

Alderman Caron, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,

Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Cleaver,

Alderman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire

10

MOTION FAILED
President Wilshire

Are there any further motions on the budget? OK the motion before us is to amend by adopting Resolution
21-142.

Alderman Dowd

To the golden rod copy.

President Wilshire

The golden rod copy, yes — by Roll Call. Would the Clerk please call the roll?
Alderman Klee

Just one clarification, I’m sorry. We are approving the $368,438 ,438.00 for the General Fund Appropriation
and the $142,390,499.00 to the General Fund Revenues, correct?

Alderman Dowd
Yes.
A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:
Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderman Dowd,

Alderman Caron, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,

Alderman Jette, Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Cleaver,

Alderman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire

11

Nay:
MOTION CARRIED

Alderman Dowd

Madam President, | think we are ready for the final reading on R-21-142.

Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 26

President Wilshire
Yes, | am.
UNFINISHED BUSINESS — RESOLUTIONS

R-21-142
Endorsers: Mayor Jim Donchess
Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright
RELATIVE TO THE ADOPTION OF THE FISCAL YEAR 2022 PROPOSED BUDGET FOR THE
CITY OF NASHUA GENERAL, ENTERPRISE, AND SPECIAL REVENUE FUNDS
Given its second reading;

A viva voce roll call was taken which resulted as follows:

Yea: Alderman O’Brien, Alderman Klee, Alderman Dowd,
Alderman Caron, Alderman Lopez, Alderman Tencza,
Alderman Jette, Alderman Schmidt, Alderman Cleaver,
Alderman Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire
11

Nay: 0
MOTION CARRIED

Resolution R-21-142 declared duly adopted as amended.
PERIOD FOR GENERAL PUBLIC COMMENT

Jim Tolner Yes | just want to thank the Mayor and the Board for their hard work on this budget and | am
sure you are very happy that this is resolved. And | appreciate the support. Thank you.

Laurie Ortolano 41 Berkeley Street. Just a couple of things. You know | want to remind you that when
Alderman Tencza talks about the impact of a 4% increase on property valuations, you are failing to
recognize that next year is a reassessment year and we are going to get a new 2022 tax rate once Vision
reassesses all the property. And we have not had really any information from the City that | know of that
has talked about the impact and the balancing between the Commercial and Residential properties. | can
tell you looking at the abatements right now, there’s a lot of big commercial abatements, | think the
valuation is for assessment reduction is somewhere around $68 million and | know the commercial
properties during KRT’s update were valued around $3.7 million and residential was around $6.3. We were
able to balance that off 50/50 but you are seeing the commercial drops substantially more with potentially a
higher vacancy rate.

| Know what the economy is doing when it comes to home prices and | will tell you something, you’ve got a
big issue coming your way with senior citizens and | addressed this to you already but the Board ignored in
this budget. Your exemption program for senior citizens based on hardship for 75 and older is $224,000.00
is your max exemption. Well when that was set, KRT in 2018 the average home price was $260,000.00
that means seniors could get a pretty good exemption at $224,000.00 and at 80 years or older it was
$280,000.00. But look at what has happened now, the average home price in Nashua this year, it is not
even finalized is probably closing in on $430,000.00 to $450,000.00. Your seniors are not going to get an
exemption at all like they got. They are going to be paying $224,000.00 of taxable income. And you had,
according to your MS1 you are giving $160 million dollars in tax exemptions to senior citizens on your MS1.
That is primarily out of your residential total assessment of $6.3 billion. That's a substantial amount. So
you have just swung a whole bunch of seniors out there and that 4% increase on top of a Vision