Board of Aldermen 3-10-2020 Page 6
From: Larry D. Goodhue, CEO, Pennichuck Corporation
Re: Notice of Annual Meeting of Sole Shareholder and Proxy Statement
There being no objection, President Wilshire accepted the communication and referred it to the
Pennichuck Water Special Committee.
From: John Plourde
Re: Last Call Extension
There being no objection, President Wilshire suspended the rules and accepted a communication
from John Ford regarding last call.
PERIOD FOR PUBLIC COMMENT RELATIVE TO ITEMS EXPECTED TO BE ACTED UPON THIS
EVENING
Selectman Stacie Laughton | am Selectman Marie Laughton, 80 Elm Street, Unit 1, right here in Nashua.
Tonight | actually was only initially coming to speak about one thing but then | notice you want to extend
last call. Now | live in Ward 4; we see a lot of different things. We see addiction, we see lots of people
suffering from alcoholism, and | really feel like in the City, | am not saying that you know everybody | am
assuming wants to make more money, but | mean when we are suffering from terrible addiction in the City
such as alcoholism, drugs, and what not? | really don’t think we should be extending the time in which we
sell alcohol, not at a store, not ata bar. Now I’m Irish, everybody knows the Irish like to drink, but even |
have to hold back sometimes. There’s no way | need to drink until 2:00 in the morning. Maybe on New
Year’s we could drink until midnight, but | really don’t think we need to extend it right now. | mean maybe
with some more study, but | mean | am not sitting here saying that business are going to be like, “Well we’d
like to make some more money”. To be honest, I’d like to make some more money too, but not like this.
That’s what | have to say on that issue.
Also, welcome to the 21*' Century. The Board of Aldermen is considering changing what it will call itself.
We are changing or we have renovated City Hall in recent year, we are renovating the Aldermanic
Chamber, now it is time that we renovate the name. Now | mean | am sorry | saw some comments on TV
some Alderman had said, “Oh let’s leave it the way it is”. | am tired of leaving things the way they are. If
you are non-binary why should you be called “men”. If you are a woman, why should you be called “men”,
you know? | am openly transgender, I’ve served in office before and | am currently serving in a City
position. Even my ID tag that is given to us elected officials says “Selectmen”. I’m a woman, | should be
like “selectwoman”. | really feel like this Board has an opportunity to make a bold statement, you know, an
Alderboard, Alderwoman, Alderman, Alderperson, that’s, you know, we need to bring the Board of
Aldermen in line with the 21*' Century. | strongly suggest that you take a stand; sorry about for the folks
that feel as though that we should just leave things the way they are. Again, I’m tired of leaving things the
way they are. The Board of Aldermen has an opportunity to make a statement and kind of make itself it
more LGBT friendly.
So again, | strongly support the passage of you changing what you call yourself. What if there is a non-
binary person that comes to this Board; they don’t want to be called “men”. They want to be called women,
they want to be a person, you know? I’m transgender, | identify as “she”, “her” and “hers”. And so if |
happen to someday serve on this Board, | don’t know, but no | am not taking your job Tom, but | just, | feel
as though we really need to, you know, be in line with you know the way the LGBT Community and be
more accepting. This would be putting the Board in line and being more accepting. Again, I’m sorry that
the Board Members that might not agree; but it’s time, you know? It’s time that we, you know, that we do
this. That’s all | have to say on this issue and I’ve signed up for the next comment period. But that’s what |
have to say and | just hope that you make the change tonight. Thank you.
