Search

R-21-118

RESOLUTION

ESTABLISHING A HOUSING EXPENDABLE TRUST FUND FUNDED BY
APPROPRIATIONS AND MAKING A SUPPLEMENTAL APPROPRIATION OF
$30,000 INTO THE EXPENDABLE TRUST FUND

CITY OF NASHUA

In the Year Two Thousand and Twenty-One

RESOLVED by the Board of Aldermen of the City of Nashua that pursuant to RSA
31:19-a, the City of Nashua hereby establishes a housing expendable trust fund, funded by
appropriations, that will be used for the foliowing purposes:

e Supporting moderate and lower income housing development with gap financing, for
both renters and owners with a priority on one and two bedroom units
Supporting the preservation of affordable housing units
Supporting a First Time Homebuyer Program
Supporting the creation of new Accessory Dwelling Units
e Educating the public on the need for and benefits of housing

oe 6

The Mayor is appointed as the agent to expend. Any balance remaining in the
expendable trust fund at each fiscal year end will not lapse or be closed out to the Generai Fund,
but will remain in this expendable trust fund.

It is the intention of the City that annual appropriations into this trust fund will be
presented in the annual budget beginning with the proposed FY2022 annual budget, and will
include, but not be limited to, an annual $10,000 per year payment from Nashua Piaza Housing
Associates, LP (“Clocktower”) under an Agreement with the City dated November 25, 1998.

FURTHERMORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Board of Aldermen of the City of Nashua
to appropriate $30,000 of Fiscal Year 2021 unanticipated revenue from Department #118 “Other
General Government”, Accounting Classification #45 “Miscellaneous Revenue”, Account
#45880 “Revenue from Clocktower” into this new housing expendable trust fund, which
represents a recently received three year payment from Clocktower under the agreement
referenced above.

LEGISLATIVE YEAR 2021

RESOLUTION; R-21-118
PURPOSE: Establishing a housing expendable trust fund funded by

appropriations and making a supplemental appropriation of
$30,000 into the expendable trust fund

SPONSOR(S): Mayor Jim Donchess
Alderwoman-at-Large Shoshanna Kelly

COMMITTEE
ASSIGNMENT: Budget Review Committee
FISCAL NOTE: Establishes a restricted fund to account for appropriations

designated for a specific purpose. Proposed current year
appropriation reduces year end general fund surplus. Future
appropriations to this fund are through the annual budget
process.

ANALYSIS

This legislation establishes a non-lapsing housing expendable trust fund, funded by
appropriations, to be used for the purposes listed in the legislation. There is a stated non-
binding intention that annual appropriations into this trust fund will be presented in the annual
budget beginning with the proposed FY2022 annual budget, and will include, but not be
limited to, an annual $10,000 per year payment from Nashua Plaza Housing Associates, LP
(“Clocktower”) under an Agreement with the City dated November 25, 1998. RSA 31:19-a, I
provides for an annual accounting and report of the activities of the trust.

This legislation also appropriates $30,000 of FY¥2021 unanticipated revenue from Other General
Govemment — Miscellaneous Revenue - Revenue from Clocktower into the new expendable
trust fund. The $30,000 is a recently received three year payment from Clocktower under the
noted agreement. Charter Sec, 53 permits specific non-budget, supplementary appropriations.
There should be notice and a public hearing. A two-thirds vote is required under Charter Sec.
56-b for an item or amount not in the mayor’s budget. A roll call is required under Charter Sec.
49.

Approved as to account Financial Services Division
structure, numbers, _

and amount: By: /s/John Griffin
Approved as to form: Office of Corporation Counsel

By: (arb Later,
Date: \\ Adabuasicy, Du

A special meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Tuesday, March 23, 2021, at 6:30 p.m. via Zoom
teleconference.

President Lori Wilshire presided; City Clerk Susan K. Lovering recorded.
Prayer was offered by City Clerk Susan K. Lovering; Alderman Ernest A. Jette led in the Pledge to the Flag.

President Wilshire

As President of the Board of Aldermen, | find that due to the State of Emergency declared by the
Governor as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic and in accordance with the Governors Emergency
Order #12 pursuant to Executive Order 2020-04, this public body is authorized to meet electronically.

Please note that there is no physical location to observe and listen contemporaneously to this meeting,
which was authorized pursuant to the Governors Emergency Order. However, in accordance with the
Emergency Order, | am confirming that we are:

Providing public access to the meeting by telephone, with additional access possibilities by video or
other electronic means:

To access Zoom, please refer to the agenda or the City’s website for the meeting link.

To join by phone dial: 1-929-205-6099 Meeting ID: 898 8851 4603 Passcode: 347707

The public may also view the meeting via Channel 16.

We previously gave notice to the public of the necessary information for accessing the meeting, through
public postings. Instructions have also been provided on the City of Nashua’s website at www.nashuanh.gov
and publicly noticed at City Hall and the Nashua Public Library.

If anyone has a problem accessing the meeting via phone or Channel 16, please call 603-821-2049 and they
will help you connect.

In the event the public is unable to access the meeting via the methods mentioned above, the meeting will
be adjourned and rescheduled. Please note that all votes that are taken during this meeting shall be done
by roll call vote.

Let’s start the meeting by taking a roll call attendance. When each member states their presence, please
also state whether there is anyone in the room with you during this meeting, which is required under the
Right-To-Know Law.

City Clerk Lovering called the roll and asked them to state the reason he or she could not attend, confirmed
that they could hear the proceedings, and stated who was present with him or her.

The roll call was taken with 15 members of the Board of Aldermen present: Alderman Michael B. O’Brien,
Sr., Alderman Patricia Klee, Alderwoman Shoshanna Kelly, Alderman Richard A. Dowd, Alderman June M.
Caron, Alderman Benjamin Clemons, Alderman Thomas Lopez (arrived after roll call), Alderman David C.
Tencza, Alderwoman Elizabeth Lu, Alderman Ernest Jette, Alderman Jan Schmidt, Alderman Brandon

Michael Laws, Alderman Skip Cleaver (arrived after roll call), Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright, Alderman
Wilshire.

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 2

Mayor James W. Donchess, Corporation Counsel Steven A. Bolton, and Fire Chief Brian Rhodes were also
in attendance.

ROLL CALL

Alderman O’Brien

| am present, | can hear the proceedings and | am home alone.
Alderman Klee

| am home alone, | can hear the proceedings and | am present.
Alderwoman Kelly

| am here, | am alone and | can hear everyone.

Alderman Dowd

Yes, | am present, | can hear the proceedings and | am here alone.
Alderman Caron

Yes, | am here, | can hear everything and | am alone.
Alderman Clemons

| am here, | can hear everyone and | am by myself.

Alderman Tencza

| am present, | am alone and | can hear everyone.
Alderwoman Lu

| am here alone and | can hear you.

Alderman Jette

| am here alone and | can hear the proceedings.

Alderman Schmidt

| am here alone and can hear everyone.

Alderman Laws

| am here, | am alone and | can hear everyone.

Alderman Harriott-Gathright

| am present, | am in this room alone and | can hear everyone.

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 3

President Wilshire

| am here, | am alone and | am being drowned out by sirens in the background. So | don’t know what that’s
all about and | can hear everyone. Thank you.

Susan Lovering, City Clerk
You have 13 in attendance.
President Wilshire

Thank you.

City Clerk Lovering

You're welcome.
President Wilshire

Also with us this evening is Mayor Donchess and Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton. We also have Fire
Chief Brian Rhodes in attendance. Tonight we have a presentation on the Master Plan Study for Nashua
Fire Rescue and | would like to recognize Fire Chief Brian Rhodes on the Master Plan Study for Nashua
Fire Rescue. Chief?

PRESENTATION

Master Plan Study for Nashua Fire Rescue

President Wilshire recognized Fire Chief Brian Rhodes on the Master Plan Study for Nashua Fire
Rescue.

Brian Rhodes, Nashua Fire Chief

Good evening. Thank you to all of you for taking this extra time tonight to hear the final results of this
Master Plan Study. So I’d be remiss if | didn’t thank you again for your support, the Board and the Mayor
that allowed us to proceed with this Master Plan. It is a pretty comprehensive document that takes a couple
of readings to start to understand. But | think we are very happy with the process; it took a little longer than
we wanted to due to COVID. Full disclosure, when the presenters come on, they are the two principals
who conducted this study, when we first talked, they asked, “Is there anything in particular you are looking
for’, and we said, “No, we want you to come in and | want you to tell us what is good, what is bad and what
is ugly with us”, because that’s the only way we are going to get better.

In this report, | think there are some good things, there are some things we can do better and there’s some
things that we need help with. So without further ado, | think what I'll do is I’ll turn this over to Stuart
McCutcheon and Mary-Ellen Harper from ESCI; let them present to you. If you have any questions when
this is over, I’d be glad to answer them.

Stuart McCutcheon, Director of Business Intelligence, ESC!

Alright, can everyone hear me OK?

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 4

President Wilshire
Yes.
Mr. McCutcheon

Thank you so much. My name is Stuart McCutcheon and | have with me Mary-Ellen Harper. We are here
to present the final findings and a presentation of the Master Plan. In this presentation, | am going to spend
some time in the beginning covering some of the Department’s performance and identifying trends so then
when we get to the recommendations we have some of that little bit of background and hopefully answer
some questions that otherwise would be difficult to know without seeing some of that data in front of you.

So with that, let me get my screen shared. So Mary-Ellen and | work for ESCI, the Director of Business
Intelligence; she’s the Director of Operations. Just a little bit on ESCI, I’ve been in the business for over 40
years with the consulting arm of the International Association of Fire Chiefs. In addition to Master Plan, we
do community risk assessments, executive searches, hiring and testing, ISO benchmarking studies which
was included as a separate piece of our contract with you all and Chief Rhodes has that. And really what
we are here to do is to provide data driven approach so that when we find gaps or issues that need to be
addressed, we can provide you all, the elected officials, with some 2 or 3 of the most feasible options. The
data behind that to back it up and support it and then allow you all to make the best decision for your
community.

So here is me, Director of Business Intelligence. Prior to working for ESCI | was the Chief at (inaudible)
City Fire, which interesting point of fact, | found out later that Chief Rhodes’ brother lives in (inaudible) City
as well as also the Chief at Auburndale and the City of Davenport in Central Florida. And next I'll turn it
over to Mary-Ellen quickly so she can introduce herself.

Mary-Ellen Harper, Director of Operations ESCI

My name is Mary-Ellen Harper. | am the Director of Operations for ESCI. Prior to coming to ESCI | spent 20
years in Connecticut as the Director of Fire & Rescue Services for the town of Farmington Fire Department.
I’ve also done some teaching for the (inaudible) Fire Academy in New Haven, Fire State Fire College. And
my interesting point of interest is that my sister actually lives in Nashua and she’s been there for about 5
years and she’s a teacher in the next town over. So it was really nice to be able to come back and work in
a community where my own sister lives.

Mr. McCutcheon

Alright so just a little background, September 13, 2019 we were contracted to do a long-range Master Plan
for Nashua. And as Chief Rhodes mentioned, we had a few months’ hiatus there in the middle trying to
figure out how to get the process back up and going again. But the main purpose for this was to evaluate
the current operational service delivery, identify future service delivery and then to provide some
recommendations for approving service delivery.

So this is just a quick snapshot of the call volume year-to-year from 2014 to 2019. If you look at the EMS
you will see a spike there in the middle and that was due to the way that burn permits were being issued
and also running additional calls that were not emergency in nature. After a couple of years of trying that
the Department decided to go back to the way they were originally doing it and that returned that call
volume back. But overall, call volume is gradually increasing year-over-year. About 60% of what the Fire
Department does are emergency medical service responses. And then you see on the other side where
we have fire it is about 2%, false alarms, good intent and service calls; those are all non-emergency calls to
the Fire Department in addition to a lot of EMS. They also respond to a lot of incidents that are not
emergency calls but they are still responses that they have to go to.

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 5

This is a quick map just showing you where incidents occur. So we took the incident locations, you are
seeing a scale so dark green there was only 1 call within that 10 acre hexagon; red there are more than
250 calls. So you can see that in this downtown area is where the majority of your calls occur. But in
addition to that, at the bottom right to the east of Station 3, there’s quite a bit of call activity on the other
side of the interstate as well as on the northside of the airport, there are pockets there were incident activity
is greater than the surrounding areas. This is a hot spot map, it’s just a different way of looking at the same
information and it is showing that the majority for call concentration is happening downtown in-between
stations 1, 2 and 4. And so this is what you would want to see that your stations are centered around
where your activity is located so that way you can get your firefighters to the scene.

This is an estimates 4 and 8 minute travel time, NFPA 1710 is the industry standard for career fire
department performance. So this is measuring or a model of how Nashua compared to that. So as you can
see it is about maybe not quite 50% yellow and then the rest green. There are a few areas in the City of
Nashua where travel times would be in excess of 8 minutes but they are either at the northwest or the
southwest portions of the City.

This is part of ISO, the Insurance Services Organization, this is a different way to measure the same thing,
but this is grabbing road miles within 1 % miles of your fire stations and comparing that to the overall road
base. And so with your current deployment, you are at about 50% coverage and they are trying to estimate
that same format of travel time.

This is an overview of your effective response force so you know a lot of times with fires, we might probably
only need one engine or maybe two engines to pump water, the rest of it we need people. For a normal
fire, around 17 to 18 to be able to conduct all the different tasks and operations that are going on
simultaneously. And so in this, your dark colored area are the areas where you are getting between 20 and
into 30 fire fighters to the scene, your very light areas you get 4 to 7 there within an 8 minute response. So
while it’s better to be able to get someone there than not at all, there are some areas particularly in the
southwest part of the City where coverage is pretty light as far as the number of fire fighters you can get
there.

Lastly, | am going to cover some of the Department’s performance and this is, again, NFPA 1710, in New
Hampshire when you call 911 all the calls go to the State Processing point to be then disseminated back to
the cities. And so what | am going to show you would be sort of going through the data is the impact that
that has on your performance. So this is the New Hampshire Emergency Communications Center. This is
how long it takes them to process calls. The Industry Standard is 60 seconds for fire and EMS processing
and overall at the State they are at 3 minutes, 11 seconds at the 90" percentile. So the reason we are
using percentiles and not averages; averages are subject to outliers and can really sway one direction or
another with a few outliers. The percentile performance is we are lining it up from the smallest to the
largest times and then taking 90% of that. So they will perform at 3 minutes, 11 seconds for 90% of the
calls and better and then the other 10% is going to be in excess of 3 minutes and 11 seconds.

Nashua, once they receive the call is processing the call within 1 minute and 3 seconds overall and so the
NFPA 1710 calls for 60 seconds, 12 21 which is the one that’s referenced from that is 64 seconds; so really
once the City gets this information, they are doing an outstanding job. But we’ve got to keep in mind for the
callers experiencing this, probably about 4 minutes has elapsed before that first unit is ever notified. Here is
our total call processing time; 3 minutes and 32 seconds from the time it goes to New Hampshire until the
time that Nashua is able to dispatch it. And then the next metric we are looking at is turnout time, this is we
have received the notification, and how long does it take for the firefighters to get into the unit and begin to
actually respond. So the standard is 60 seconds for EMS, 80 seconds for Fire and Special Operations. So
at 3 minutes and 13 seconds, there is some good improvement that could be done. Anecdotally if you
travel across the country, the fastest Departments we see are at about a minute and a half so really at 2 13
it is not that bad but it could be improved upon. And it’s not just the Fire Fighters being slow getting to the
vehicles, things like station design, the way the apparatus is staffed and a couple of other factors can effect
these turn out times.

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 6

Next is travel time so this is from the time they get in the apparatus and begin responding until they get on
scene. Overall it is 4 minutes and 48 seconds, the standard calls for 4 minutes, so | mean overall this is
very good performance, you know, among the best we see. So | think this is a difficult measure to improve
upon because you can only get there just so fast but what it does show is that your current deployment
model is doing a pretty good job of meeting your demand. If in the future we begin to see this lag out and
there’s 5 minute travel time or 6 minutes, that would be something, again, to keep track of because what
that is showing you is, is there’s probably not enough units to service those calls or that the place where
they are occurring there’s not a station close enough to service that demand.

Here is a graphic of showing what your travel times look like overall just for a visual. So most of your
incident demand is happening downtown and downtown you have very good travel time where we are
seeing problems is between stations 3 and 4 down in the southeast and then north above the airport and
then along the western border towards the south where travel times are beginning to reg out, mostly due to
the location of the stations and the amount of travel they are doing to get there. Here’s response time
performance, I'll quickly breeze through a couple of these, this is turnout and travel. So 6 minutes, 47
seconds, again that’s really pretty good performance. Total response times, this is just for Nashua so when
you call 911 90% of the time or better, Nashua unit is going to arrive in 7 minutes and 15 seconds from the
time that the Nashua dispatch center receives the call. When you factor in the state piece now we are at 9
minutes, 45 seconds. And so for folks to wait 10 minutes or more for the first unit to arrive shouldn’t be a
surprise because we are picking up around 3 minutes just before Nashua ever has the opportunity to do
anything with the call to begin with. And so with that, I’ll go ahead and turn it over to Mary-Ellen so she can
present the summaries of the plan findings and cover the rest of the report. Mary-Ellen?

Ms. Harper

Thank you, Stuart. Good evening. | am going to try to move through this; it is a 175 page Master Plan, |
want to be respectful of your time; | am going to hit the major points but certainly would be happy to take
any questions about anything in the report when we are done. The first thing that | would like to say is that
it was absolutely a pleasure to work with Nashua Fire Rescue. We do these projects all over the country
and the level of engagement and the people that had thoughtful questions and were just willing to be part of
a process for betterment of the system — you guys are second to none. You really have a good group of
people that are doing good work and we would be remiss if we didn’t mention that.

At the end of the day, Nashua is a very proud and very traditional New England Fire Department.
Operationally, you are meeting most of the standards through the Provision of Fire Rescue Services. But as
Stuart said a little while ago, that’s right here and right now and today. You are going to need to monitor
that going forward. You are a growing community, the demand for services is changing, the places people
live and the kind of services they need is changing. You are going to need to monitor that going forward to
make sure that what you have is still adequate because all indications are that at some point in the not-too-
distant future you are going to need to add additional resources in the system just to maintain the service
that you are giving right now.

That said, right now here and today, there are quite a few administrative and support functions that are
woefully understaffed and we are going to spend a little time just showing you what those areas are and
where there is absolutely room for improvement. The other thing I’d like to get on your radar is that the
facilities for the Fire Department are absolutely going to require a financial investment in the very near
future and we will talk about those as well.

So the first thing we want to talk about is Community Risk Reduction. Community Risk Reduction which
include fire prevention but is above and beyond fire prevention. It’s not just fires, it is medical calls and
other types of emergencies, it is really the most vital non-emergency function in the fire service. And the
reason for that is the safest emergency is the one that is prevented. So we can do anything as a community
to help our residents not to get hurt, not to get injured, not to have property damage; that’s what we owe
them. We owe them the opportunity to try to prevent those damages before they happen. And we can do
that in 5 major ways.

Conxsau pos

Slope Toe

NUMBER PLATE

F T= 7 tH YY
iPad
SHELF Va
1-COAT ROD 6 4-SINGLE
PRONG HOOKS i“
a
" “
STAINLESS STEEL a, | 21 4/16" 72° wai
RECESSED HANDLE ie) CLEAR Li“
LOCK HOLE FILLER i | /
i“
Exar,
Le se”
SuRis 4
M, a
DIAMOND PERFORATED DOOR la . YY
: sen oe | bit sto ano
ne : . ‘ | a » ao. 4
INTERIOR MAX __| | SINGLE ROW
ELEVATION TYP. £ND ELEVATION
FRONT ELEVATION

HEAVY DUTY. IKD COLLEGIATE LOCKER FRAME 247 X 24° X 72° S.R.S.T

ASSC ~bic week, Avwets

Slore Toe - Cone aves _t

——— ERECTOR TO ANCHOR
ON 36° MAX. CENTERS
[HEAVY OuUTY LOCKERS]
var
Setio — sives
LOCKERS SHALL BE
ANCHORED IN AN
APPROVED WORKMANLIKE
MANNER
BASE
Female Paxoo \
Exigkwg Co nerete
Gage
ral? -
) \ * L Exergy
ACS Conccere
Baye
xe us| Added
Porro\ a, wsoob Base
Marching 4 Sow ExrxG
mexAL @-GBase Lockets

“LYON, Lic. THIS DOCUMENT IS CONFIDENTIAL AND
P.O. BOX 671 SUBMITTED BY PROPRIETARY. NO PART OF THIS

5 DOCUMENT MAY BE DISCLOSED iN ANY
AURORA, IL 60507-0671 MANNER TO A THIRD PARTY WITHOUT THE
www. fyonworkspace.com PRIOR WRITTEN CONSENT OF LYON L.L.C.
CAT# XXN5S78NDDCL 52021

Special Board of Aldermen 03-23-2021 Page 7

Emergency Response obviously is one of them. If something happens that you respond and try to fix it. But
on the front end, there’s plenty of opportunities with educating the public how to not get themselves in
trouble, how to not cause problems. Engineering — things that we can do to build buildings safer so that
when things do happen they are not as catastrophic. And then Code Enforcement and Economic
Incentives, you can always reach somebody with Economic Incentives and having Codes and building
procedures are absolutely a way that you are going to want to enforce things to keep them going. So with
that in mind, we looked at the Nashua Fire Marshall’s Division. They are primarily charged with the
managing of this. Quite honestly, this Division is challenged in many different ways. They have coverage
gaps within the amount of staffing they have and the hours they can cover. The have a lack of ability to
perform inspections just because they don’t have the staff that is required to deal with the workload that is
on their plate. Staffing in general is a challenge at a Division where people promote in and then promote
out; workload because you are a vibrant city, you are growing and moving forward things are happening
which is a wonderful thing. But for every building that comes in there’s plan reviews and inspections that
happen in each division so all of this good work that’s happening is creating additional work for this already
overburdened area. And then, obviously, funding is a challenge; they need additional staff but that comes
with a price.

At the present time, the Fire Marshall’s Division here in Nashua is staffed by an Administrator, a Fire
Marshall and two Inspectors. So there’s somebody giving administrative support, the Fire Marshall is in
charge and there’s two inspectors who are helping to do investigations. During the year 2019 they did
3,170 inspections and/or investigative activities. The Fire Marshall and the two inspectors conducted an
average of more than 1,000 activities each; 5 per work day. Just consider, you know, an 8 hour work day
for the normal person, everything they do requires significant documentation. So they are not only out there
inspecting, they have to come and write reports and look at codes and look thing up. They are really
working at a very fast pace to try to get as much done as they are actually getting done. In addition to all of
that plan review is required for all fire protection systems, new construction — that is required by the New
Hampshire State Code. And in 2019 there were an additional 1,200 and those had to happen on top of all
the other work that was in that office.

So what does that mean? What that means is when we look at your office right now, it is staffed Monday
through Friday from 7:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. There’s no on-call coverage for after-business hours, so if we
are outside of those hours, there’s nobody assigned or available that can automatically help with those
issues. What happens after hours is that they go look for somebody and about 50% of the time they can
find somebody that can help with those things after hours. The other 50% of the time, whatever the issue
is, complaint, code enforcement, investigation they are not followed up on until the next day because
there’s just nobody there to deal with it. So that’s a gap in coverage that you should be aware of and when
we are looking for places that we can improve, having the ability to hire people, put them on call or make
them otherwise available would really go a long way to providing more consistent coverage to the
community. But with the number of people you have now, they can’t work 24/7, they are already
overwhelmed, we can’t put them in on nights and weekends, we need to find a way to kind of spread that
workload out.

Beyond that, the current staffing does not allow for regular inspections to be completed at your target
hazards. And target hazards are places where there is a significant life safety issues; there’s hazardous
materials, there’s other things that make that something more dangerous than the areas around them;
things like apartment complexes, multi-family dwellings. Ideally you want to do regular inspections, you
want to make sure that those places are safe and if something were to happen that we can mitigate that
with as little risk to life safety as possible. Nashua just does not have the capacity to do that right now
because that office is just not staffed to that ability. Right now, these places are only being inspected if
somebody calls and makes a complaint because that is the best they can do.

So when we look at Community Risk Reduction here in Nashua we have a couple of recommendations.
The first one is that you really need a formal Community Risk Reduction Program and it needs to be
reinstituted in tandem with the Public Educator that was eliminated back in 2006. There are so many