Board of Aldermen 6-23-2020 Page 47
There were some pretty recent announcements made with regards to COVID-19 and how it behaves in
Public Health fields and in Medical Fields where a number of medical studies that typically take a long
amount of time and don’t happen, you know, happen long before outbreaks of new diseases hit the US,
were still taking place. So we still don’t really know exactly what COVID-19 even does to your system. |
was looking, based on some of these papers, more like it attacks your arteries, your blood system, your
heart and there are neurological impacts too that you can COVID-19, you can be asymptomatic and you
could still have long-term impact.
You can get COVID-19 and you are not immune a couple of months later. There are still a lot of really
strange things going on with this disease and as much as we have been working to support businesses and
get people back out into downtown and working, where we go from here is probably going to be a result of
how people treat that situation. | know that it’s very hot in the kitchen and that people working in the
kitchen don’t like to wear masks. | know that other people may take their masks off or lose them or find
them uncomfortable and all | can say is that the two states that had the highest numbers of fatalities and
infection, now have the lowest transmission rate explicitly because they have face mask ordinances. New
York and Massachusetts have basically stopped it in its track and are very effectively managing what was a
catastrophic situation, because they are taking that step. So earlier we were talking about Dancing in the
Streets, | was like, “I’m not going to go”. | have that opinion and | am not going to go into any crowds right
now if | can avoid them. | am going to be very careful with how | wear my mask. | don’t even take it off
when | am walking down Main Street; that is a personal choice, that’s not required by the Ordinance. But |
don’t know who is going to come walk up to me randomly and start talking to me. And more than once it
has been somebody coming up to say, “hey you don’t need to wear your mask on the sidewalk” and I’m
like, “well now | do, like back up a little”.
So we are still learning a lot and | know people are frustrated with this they are really exasperated but you
need to be listening to public health officials. You can’t be debating with them all the time. You need to
listen to restaurant owners who are trying to maintain their business. | don’t want to see restaurants close
again and | don’t want to see another period of lock down. | don’t think we can handle it. So | just ask
everybody to be very careful with you are treating it.
And then also | don’t know if the other Aldermen are experiencing this, but fireworks are booming literally.
With the Fire Department pay being negotiated, | feel like it’s only fair not to put them in a situation of
dealing with more fire danger than necessary. If people could show a little bit more consideration about
how they are celebrating randomly, | think it would be well appreciated by many. | would like to point out
that the 4" of July Fireworks run by the City are cancelled and that means there’s no schedule for veterans
or people with PTSD to be aware that they need to be shielding the ears or doing something or distracting
themselves. So popping off fireworks at 3:00 in the morning or whenever you feel like it, there are people
living all around you and it’s not fair to them.
So | appreciate all the patience everybody has had up to this point with the COVID-19. | think largely our
results here in New Hampshire where we haven’t had any community-based transmission really, we’ve just
had outbreaks in the long term care facilities, that was you. That was because you went home and you
stayed home and you made sacrifices. | don’t want it to be for nothing. | mean | know that everybody has
the instinct that they just want to move on but | don’t think we are ready to do that yet. Thank you.
Alderman Clemons
Thank you, Madam President. So a little bit of a lighter note to go with what Alderman Lopez just said. |
was in a gas station the other day and these two guys, workers whatever, were in there. And they didn’t
have a mask and the attendant said, “Oh can you please put your mask on” and he said, “Oh | thought we
were in New Hampshire” and we didn’t have to do that. And she explained “Oh we have a City Ordinance”
and the guy said, “Oh well | guess that’s better than Mask-achusetts”. And | thought that was kind of funny
because people tend to think that New Hampshire is a little bit more of the Live Free or Die but there is a
reason that they call Nashua, Nashua-chusetts. So | just thought that was amusing.
