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LEGISLATIVE YEAR 2021

RESOLUTION: R-21-152

PURPOSE: Proposing an amendment to the City Charter relative to
adding two additional members to the Board of Health

SPONSOR(S): Alderman Tom Lopez

COMMITTEE .

ASSIGNMENT: Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee

FISCAL NOTE: The City Clerk estimates the cost associated with a charter
amendment as approximately $200 during a regular municipal
election.

ANALYSIS

This Resolution would submit to the voters a proposed amendment to the City Charter providing
for an increase in the number of members on the Board of Heath, from 3 to 5. Election of the
members by the Board of Aldermen and the two-year terms of the members remains the same.
One of the new members will be a physician or an individual who has completed an accredited
doctorate level medical degree, and the other will be an individual with advanced professional
credentials in the field of public health.

The procedure for charter amendments is set forth in RSA 49-B:5. The Board of Aldermen must
hold an initial vote to determine if the amendment is “necessary”, If the amendment is
determined to be necessary, the Board of Aldermen must order that notice be given for a public
hearing on the amendment. Notice of the public hearing must be published in a newspaper of
general circulation at least seven (7) days prior to the scheduled hearing. The notice must
contain the text of the proposed amendment and a brief explanation.

Within seven (7) days after the public hearing, the Board of Aldermen shall file with the City
Clerk a report containing the proposed amendment. Within ten (10) days of filing, the City Clerk
files a certified copy of the report to the secretary of state, the attorney general, and the
commissioner of the department of revenue administration pursuant to RSA 49-B:4-a. Within
seven (7) days after receiving approval from the secretary of state, the attorney general, and the
commissioner of the department of revenue administration, the Board of Aldermen may vote to
order the proposed amendment to be placed on a ballot at the next regular municipal election.

Approved as to form: Office (Open ee
By: Cloke

Date: LD fais ON

Q-21-066

ORDINANCE

PROVIDING FOR ALDERMEN-AT-LARGE TO ACT IN COMMITTEES TO MEET

REQUIREMENT THAT QUORUMS BE PHYSICALLY PRESENT

CITY OF NASHUA

In the Year Two Thousand and Twentn-One

The City of Nashua ordains that Part [Administrative Legisfation”, Chapter 5
“Administration of Government’, Part 2 “Board of Aldermen”, Article I] “General Provisions”,
Section 5-9 “Standing committees.” of the Nashua Revised Ordinances, as amended, be hereby
further amended by deleting the struck-through language and adding the new underlined
language as follows:

Ҥ 5-9. Standing committees.

When a Standing committees lacks a quorum of members as provided-tn
SubsectionsA-and-B physically present, anv Alderman at Large who is physically
present where suid meeting Is held. selected by the Chammiun of the commititee.
shall be deemed to be a member of said committee pro tem for the purposes of

member who is not physically present may in aceerdanee with RSA 9

\:2. I
participate in the meetine. but shall not have a vote than Alderman at Lurge is
serving in his or her stead, pro tem. Should an appointed member arrive at the
mecting thereafter, pro tem members shall step down. and shall have no vote
unless to do so would render the committee without a quorum.

LEGISLATIVE YEAR 2021

ORDINANCE: O-21-066

PURPOSE: To allow Aldermen-at-Large to act in committees to meet
requirement that quorums be physically present

SPONSOR(S): Mayor Jim Donchess
COMMITTEE
ASSIGNMENT: Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee
FISCAL NOTE: None.
ANALYSIS

This provision provides for Aldermen-at-Large to act in committees to meet the requirement that
quorums be physically present.

Approved as to form: Office of Corporation Counsel

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 1

A special meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Monday, June 21, 2021, at 7:09 p.m. in the Nashua
High School North auditorium.

President Lori Wilshire presided; City Clerk Susan Lovering recorded.

Prayer was offered by City Clerk Susan Lovering; Alderman Ernest Jette led in the Pledge to the Flag.

Let’s start the meeting by taking a roll call attendance.

The roll call was taken with 12 members of the Board of Aldermen present: Alderman Michael B. O’Brien,
Sr., Alderman Patricia Klee, Alderman Richard A. Dowd, Alderman June M. Caron, Alderman Thomas
Lopez, Alderman David C. Tencza, Alderwoman Elizabeth Lu, Alderman Ernest Jette, Alderman Jan
Schmidt, Alderman Skip Cleaver, Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright, and Alderman Wilshire.

Alderwoman Shoshanna Kelly, Alderman Benjamin Clemons, and Alderman Brandon Michael Laws were
recorded absent.

Mayor James W. Donchess, Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton, and CFO John Griffin were also in
attendance.

Alderman Wilshire to turn the Budget Public Hearing over to Alderman Dowd.

Chairman Dowd

Thank you. Alderman O’Brien would you like to make a motion to remove R-21-142 from the table?
Alderman O’Brien

Thank you Mr. Chairman.

MOTION BY ALDERMAN O’BRIEN TO TAKE FROM THE TABLE R-21-142
MOTION CARRIED

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

PUBLIC HEARING

Chairman Dowd

So this evening we have a public hearing on the budget and anything with regard to the proposed Mayor’s
budget. When we ask for questions or comments, you can come up to the microphone here on my right.
You have three minutes. When there’s 30 seconds left, | will notify you. If it’s a question, I'll ask the Mayor
who could answer it best. If it’s himself, or Mr. Griffin, or one of the department heads, they are here.

You're allowed to ask one question at a time under the division we’re covering. After everyone has had an
opportunity to ask a question on that division, you could come up again if you had another question. You
still have the 3 minute timing. You cannot yield any time to another speaker. Each person has only 3
minutes.

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 2

Again, I'll be going by division. I’m going at the beginning to mention which departments are in that
division. You can ask a question on any one of the departments within that division. Before we get started
on going through the budget, the Mayor would like to do a brief overview on the FY22 budget. Mayor
Donchess.

Mayor Jim Donchess

All right well thank you very much Mr. Chair and thank you all for attending our public hearing on the Fiscal
2022 budget. So as usual, I’m going to just recap a few things that have occurred during Fiscal 2021 and
then talk about the proposed budget.

So we will go to slide #1. Just to recap some of the things which occurred during 2021 which we all know
was quite a year. We of course the City had our COVID-19 response. Public Health took the lead there.
They did from the beginning contact tracing. Many individuals who contracted COVID-19 were treated and
counseled by Public Health. They reached out to many, many people and people worked 7 days a week
really for along time. They did an extremely good job. During the course of the time up to now, they’ve
done about 7,300 COVID-19 tests at clinics — outdoors and indoors throughout the City. Some at the Elm
Street parking garage, some on the depth of winter.

More recently, the Public Health Department has been involved in administering 18,000 doses. Of course
the lead response is by the State of New Hampshire so these 18,000 doses are for people who are more
difficult to reach and have not come to the clinics held by the State of New Hampshire at Nashua South, at
the mall, and elsewhere. For example, the Public Health nurses have gone to picnics at Greeley Park and
talk to people. If they decide that they’d like to have a vaccination, a dose, they do it there. So there are
many community events that they have attended and will continue to attend throughout the summer and
the remainder of the year.

During the course of the pandemic, the city continued to provide all city services. Some of those in person.
Some remote. Of course City Hall where we had several outbreaks of COVID was remote for some period
of time but then earlier this month, we opened City Hall and we were running by appointments for vehicle
registration and other reasons for quite a time. But then earlier this month, we opened City Hall to visitors.
We have asked people especially those not vaccinated to consider wearing a mask but there’s no
requirement.

We did do City Hall renovations designed to make the building more COVID resistant, make it more
disease resistant in general, and to try to address any future pandemics that we may have. To do that, we
used a little over $1 million in federal or so-called GOFFR funds which were federal funds allocated through
the State of New Hampshire. Significant renovations were done in the automobile registration area, in the
Assessing area, and in the tax area. If you visit now, you will see that the work is going on at the City
Clerk’s area and that should be done within a few weeks. The departments when the work was going on
moved up to the third floor. That’s where the City Clerk and her staff are now.

One thing that we focused on is in an effort to try to save money because over the period of two years
healthcare costs went up $6 million or around 20 percent in just two years. That’s over Fiscal 2020 and
2021. That trend seemed like it would continue. That $6 million increase equates to a 3 percent tax
increase so we really wanted to address that rising cost. So Administrative Services and others worked to
develop a new HMO plan which has been agreed to by a whole group of employee groups as well as
implemented in City Hall. That has saved us about $1 million over what healthcare costs would be for those
six groups were it not for the revised HMO plan.

Other things that have occurred during 2021, we continue the paving plan of action. We paved 26 miles of
streets out of the 300 that the city has. We did about 20 miles of crack sealing. This is a much less
expensive way of preserving streets which is much less expensive. It doesn’t certainly last as long as
repaving but it can preserve a street for five years or a little longer at a much lower cost. The idea there is
to preserve streets until we can get to paving them. So far after we’re through this paving season, we will
have paved under the paving plan of action about 125 miles of streets and many miles of the crack sealing.

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 3

One area where we really wanted to focus was particularly in the pandemic was the fact that small
businesses were very affected and hurt by the pandemic by the closures mandatory and otherwise. The
city assembled in various batches about $2.5 million of federal funds and we created a COVID-19 impact
fund which was used to extend loans and some grants to small businesses and to some nonprofits
throughout the city.

In addition to address the closures downtown, we expanded outdoor dining. That was authorized by the
Board of Aldermen very early in the pandemic — in the spring of last year April/May timeframe. | think it
went into effect in early May. As a result according to at least one of the largest restaurant tours downtown,
we probably saved many businesses by doing that. That has turned out to be a very popular success.
We've received a lot of positive feedback on that and we have many, many more people downtown than
ever before as a result of it.

Also we are about to complete Public Health building renovations. This is a project that has been
discussed and in the works for at least probably a decade. It’s a renovated space over at Mulberry Street.
They will occupy that really within about a week.

Another project that we’ve undertaken during the pandemic is the Imagine Nashua Master Plan. Of course
the Master Plan is a land use document required by the State of New Hampshire. So periodically it’s
necessary to update the Master Plan. The last one was about in year 2000. So it’s been about 20 years.
That was an interesting exercise, an interesting project because normally of course of all the meetings
would be held in person which could not be done during the pandemic. A benefit or interesting side effect
of the pandemic and the remote participate in the Master Plan is that because it was done remotely, we
had a lot more public input than we have with respect to prior Master Plans. We had hundreds of people
involved. People who probably might not have taken the time to go to City Hall or somewhere else to
attend in person. They attended remotely and provided their input. That will eventually in the next few
months result in a Master Plan document. We're still taking public input so anybody who is interested and
wants to put in their two cents worth regarding any of the areas of the city that we’re looking at, please we
encourage you to do so.

Now let’s go on to the budget that I’ve proposed. The budget that | proposed to the Board of Aldermen and
of course the way this works is that the departments submit budgets to me and then | make changes or not
and | pass it onto the Board of Aldermen — the Mayor’s proposed budget. They are basically the final
decision makers subject to veto and override.

So the budget is up $7.5 million to $290 million but | would like to stress that more than half of that increase
was as a result of the State of New Hampshire’s pension costs increase. Were it not for that, the city
budget would be up as | proposed it about $3.1 million or a little over 1 percent. Now unfortunately the
State of New Hampshire is really going to slam the city, our city, as well as cities and towns across New
Hampshire during Fiscal 2022. One could argue at the worst possible time. These pension costs are going
up. Our bill will now be nearly $29 million. This is unrelated to any increase in wages. Sometimes people
say that oh well you shouldn’t increase wages so much. This has nothing to do with wage increases. In
fact, the State pension system will tell you that 80 percent of the money we're paying in — in other words 80
percent of $29 million is just to just build up their assets. They were fully funded around 2001. They
mismanaged the system, a big mess resulted, and now the cities and towns are being forced to pay to
correct the State’s mistakes. So again $24 million of taxpayer money from the hardworking taxpayers of
Nashua is going - $24 million of the 29 is going to compensate for the State’s mistakes and that will
continue until the indefinite future.

The other thing that happened is that the State of New Hampshire reduced school aid by $7.4 million. A
big hit during the pandemic. Now if you total those two actions, that is the pension increase and the
decrease in school aid, you come up with about $11.8 million. A negative impact to the city’s taxpayers.
That equates to a 5 % percent tax increase. So going into the budget, we really had to take a hard look
because we needed to try to compensate offset some of this increase in expenses and reduction in
revenue being imposed by the State of New Hampshire.

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 4

With the budget that | have proposed if it were — and we’re going to talk about more of the details ina
moment — but if it were not for the State the actions that they have taken in increasing expenses and cutting
revenue, Nashua’s tax rate for Fiscal 2022 would actually be flat and probably down but we have to try to
deal with this $11.8 million. So at the beginning of the budget, | asked all departments but for one which |
will mention to come in with no more than a zero percent increase to try to compensate for what the State is
doing and because we were in the middle of the pandemic, unemployment at least at that point was very
high. There were a lot of people out of work and it seemed like many people in distress. So we needed to
propose a very tight budget.

| did for one department — that being the School Department — asked for a different guideline. That was
without pension and benefits, | asked for a 1.5% instead of zero. The reason for that was the disruption
that they suffered as a result of the pandemic, the effect on children — education for our children is a right
not a privilege. Every kid deserves an excellent school and certainly the remote on-line learning was a
challenge for both teachers who worked very hard and many students. So the idea there was to allow them
a little more slack to try to compensate for all the disruption that had occurred. So | asked for zero.
Remember that and 1.5% excluding pensions and benefits for the schools. So here’s what in the end |
proposed because you will see that the departments over which | have more direct control certainly
complied with and exceeded the zero percent guideline. Those that run by independent commissions, or
boards, or the like didn’t necessarily agree or comply with the zero percent idea.

So for the City Hall departments, and Department of Public Works, and the Library, City Hall will be down
2.85% percent from the current year. We did that through the health changes, through the elimination of

duplication so thank you to City Hall and all of our employees there who worked very hard and helped the
taxpayers in this way.

The Department of Public Works basically the same thing. We eliminated some unfilled positions, made
some economies, and their budget for Fiscal 2022 is down 1.28% below the current year. Library as well.
They’re down 1.94%. So thank you to all of those departments — Department of Public Works, City Hall,
and the Library.

Now police and fire, and | will mention a little bit — I'll show you what the proposed increases are in a minute
but the Fire Department requested a 4% increase. The Police Department about 2.6%. Now I’ve been
suggesting to all of our outside departments and for several years that they were building in costs which
were not sustainable and that we would ultimately reach the point where we would either have to cut
services or raise taxes significantly. It seems we may be at that point now. | didn’t feel that the — especially
given all these discussions over several years, | didn’t feel that we could afford those increases. On the
other hand, these are very important departments. We all respect the work that our Fire and Police
Departments do for the city so | proposed a compromise with each of them. Instead of the zero percent
increase that | had suggest, instead of the 2.8% reduction like for City Hall | so okay look. How about a
cost of living increase. Cost of living is 1.7 so for each of those two departments | proposed a 1.7%
increase.

For the School Department, things are a little more complicated because although this suggests a 2.29%
increase, they proposed 2.39 with healthcare. The thing you should keep in mind is that under the
teacher's contract and our teachers based upon comparisons with other districts are underpaid. We're
about 60" jn the districts of New Hampshire. About 60 districts pay more than Nashua does. This includes
the healthcare but healthcare is not resolved for our largest employee group those being the teachers
because that’s in negotiations now. If the teachers were to adopt the healthcare plan proposed by the city,
that number would drop from 2.29 to about 1.6%. So that’s in discussions in negotiation. We'll see how
that comes out but unlike the other departments where healthcare is a fixed. We know what’s going to
happen. There’s nothing agreed to on either side with respect to healthcare for the school department.
Overall, they really did what | asked and without the benefits and without healthcare, they came in at 1.7. |
had asked for 1.5 so there again a proposed a compromise to split the difference at 1.6. If you go to the
next page which Mr. Griffin is going to get for us, this just gives you some of the detail. It just shows you
what the detailed numbers are and you see the same percentages on the right-hand column that you saw

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 5

on the previous slide. Again it just gives you what the raw numbers are. Now just to review what the
departments requested, again the Fire Department requested a 4% increase. My budget proposes 1.7.
Police — 2.59. My budget proposes 1.7 and the School Department requested again with the assumption
that the healthcare would not change but it very well might — | think it will benefit everyone if it does. They
proposed 2.38. My proposal was 2.29 with the healthcare or 1.6 without it. So that kind of shows you more
of the detail again.

Now | thought it was interesting to show you the six year budget analysis because | have been saying in
various State-of-the-Cities, and budget discussions, and all over the place that building these budgets that
are not sustainable there’s going to be an end to this. There has to be. Over the last six years you can see
what’s happened. There is a significant difference in the amount that the budgets have been raised over
the last six years. Fire Department is the most — 27% and that’s if their 4 percent raise is agreed to by the
Aldermen, then that will be a 27% increase over six years. If my budget held, it would be more like 25%
over six years.

Police same deal — 21%. Schools — 17.9%. Again if their proposed budget is adopted not mine. City Hall
almost 17 but 10% below the top. BPW 15 and the Library almost 12. DPW almost 16 but you can see
that — and | had this in mind when | proposed some of these guidelines. | certainly had in mind that over
time not that these percentages should be absolutely equal but we need to — all of these services are
important and we need at least to have in mind what we’ve done in the past to decide what we can afford
and where the most needs are in the future.

That gives you | think an overview of the numbers and the increase. I'd like to stress, again — oh one more
thing. Fortunately for us there is funds coming through the federal government through the most recent act
that was passed and so the budget suggests that we would apply about $4.4 million to replace some of this
lost school revenue. That will help us get it below that 5.5% increase imposed by the State of New
Hampshire. So thank you to the federal government. The American Rescue Plan helping to rescue us.
But if we left — and I’m going to stress one more time what that one slide said — if we could eliminate these
actions by the State — if we could just keep those things the same without the federal government, this tax
rate would be lower and probably down coming this fall but the $11.8 million from the State of New
Hampshire is a lot of money to make up and to try to maintain quality services.

Looking forward which is our last slide here, we are going to continue with the paving plan of action. The
city got way behind in terms of its infrastructure, in terms of paving and we are trying to catch up and | think
we’ve done a lot in that direction but still we have some streets that are not in good shape so we need to try
to press forward and continue with the 20 to 25 miles a year threshold that we’ve been reaching.

Another thing we’re pushing for is to try to increase tax revenues and deal with a housing crisis, a shortage
of housing at all levels of affordability. So we are optimistic that we can complete the School Street
housing 150 units. That’s market rate housing. Henry Hanger conversion — that’s 88 units. Again market
rate but also a Bronstein redevelopment which we’ve agreed to with the Housing Authority. They’ve been
very innovative in developing a financial plan to increase the affordable units on Bronstein and increase the
number from about 48 units to something over 200 units. So | think it’s an increase of about 160. That will
be helpful but we still have a housing crisis. We still have a shortage of housing and we need to add
housing wherever we can. There are other smaller projects that we’re working on. Things that are in not
quite the final stages that those are and of course we'll be talking about those in the future.

The middle school upgrade project, the expansion of Fairgrounds Middle School, which has already
occurred, the work at Pennichuck which is going on now and then the construction of a new Middle School
out on Buck Meadow Road which is a less expensive — still a lot of money — but a less expensive way to go
than trying to refit Elm Street. That’s an important project for the City, we are trying to upgrade the Middle
Schools and when we finish we will have State of the Art schools, all powered electrically at least by solar.
Alderman Rick Dowd is Chair of the Joint Special Building which is overseeing those projects. And we will
be moving forward with the Riverfront Master Plan; that was adopted some time ago to enhance the beauty
of the Nashua River which, of course, is a wonderful natural asset that the City has right in the core of
downtown.

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 6

Now | think that gives you an overview and, of course, we are here to listen to comments and answer any
questions. So | will turn things back over to you Mr. Chairman.

Chairman Dowd

Thank you Mayor. Just before we get going, just a couple of things. | would prefer that people restrain from
using any City employee’s names; rather use a position because the Board of Aldermen can only add or
cut positions, they cannot hire or fire any employees. So we are talking about the budget so let’s keep it to
that. The other thing is on the 51 Accounts — the Salary & Wages — that is either by Union Contract or Non-
Affiliated Legislation so those are fixed as long as it is the same number of employees. And the 52 — Fringe
& Benefits — also set under the guidelines by City Hall and are not in the purview of that particular
department. Again just reiterating the rules as we go along. When | open up a Division, | will mention
which Departments are in that Division and you can ask a question on any one of the Departments; come
up to the microphone. Please try to socially distance, six feet apart if you’re in line. You can ask one
question at a time on that Division and you have 3 minutes and when you have 30 seconds left we will give
you a warning. Please do not extend over that, because we have other people that wish to speak. When
everyone has had an opportunity for that Division, if you have another question on a Division you can come
back up and ask the question again, same thing, one question — 3 minutes. You can also not yield any time
to another speaker.

Sequence in Which City Department Budgets will be Discussed:

Dept. Revenue Appropria
# tions

GENERAL GOVERNMENT DIVISION

101. | MAYOR'S OFFICE 54
102 | BOARD OF ALDERMEN 55
103 | LEGAL DEPARTMENT 58
107 | CITY CLERK’S OFFICE 30 63
108 | ENERGY MANAGEMENT 68
109 | CIVIC & COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES 69
131. | HUNT BUILDING 309
158 | PARKING ENFORCEMENT 30
166 | PARKING OPERATIONS 31

183 | ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES|

DIVISION

106 | ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 89

110 | ARLINGTON STREET COMMUNITY 93
CENTER

111 | HUMAN RESOURCES 97

113 | BENEFITS 98

120 | TELECOMMUNICATIONS 101

122 | INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY 107

Special Board of Aldermen 06-21-2021 Page 7
128 | RISK MANAGEMENT 112
129 | CITY BUILDINGS 116
130 | PURCHASING 32 120
132 | ASSESSING 32 125
134 | GIS 32 129
FINANCIAL SERVICES DIVISION

126 | FINANCIAL SERVICES 33, 34 136
POLICE

150 | POLICE 36, 300 142
FIRE

152 | FIRE DEPARTMENT 37, 311 150
EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS

156 | EMERGENCY MANAGEMENT 158

157 | CITYWIDE COMMUNICATIONS 162
OTHER PUBLIC SAFETY

159 | HYDRANT FEES — FIRE PROTECTION 165

162 | STREET LIGHTING 166
PUBLIC HEALTH & COMMUNITY
SERVICES DIVISION

171 | COMMUNITY SERVICES 173

172 | COMMUNITY HEALTH 38 179

173. | ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH 39 183

174 | WELFARE ADMINISTRATION 188

175 | WELFARE ASSISTANCE 189
PUBLIC WORKS DIVISION

160 | PUBLIC WORKS ADMINISTRATION 40 195
AND ENGINEERING

161 | STREET DEPARTMENT 40, 312 200

177 | PARKS AND RECREATION 41, 301, 302 205
PUBLIC SEVICES DIVISION

140 | PINEWOOD CEMETERY 211

142 | WOODLAWN CEMETERY 42 212