Special Board of Aldermen 03-15-2021 Page 14
communication is necessary because that will bring all of the players in alignment and all those puzzle
pieces — because you can’t put a puzzle together when you are blindfolded. So we need to be very clear
about what the communications are. | think Alderman Clemons made a great point about our own public
health, environmental health, being involved because | am not really confident that the State even, a 2-year
changing policy group of people is going to provide the kind of long-lasting, consistent attention to this that
our neighbors deserve. So | would like when we do get to any negotiations or discussions, to have it
discussed that our environment health department be either in charge of or involved in that process and
that that be funded by the property holders or taxes or whatever.
Another thing | wanted to bring to attention is the actual construction process. Those neighborhoods had a
very difficult time with other construction projects in the immediate area. They are very concerned about
heavy vehicle traffic on Fairmount Street or the increase of vehicle traffic should that street ever be used for
either the Tamposi Project or the developer's project. So those are things we need to be very conscious of
and mindful of. We should have explicit planning, possibly maps, you know, if Alderman Jette is going to
help us make this decision we should have maps clearly showing how things are going to be done there
and who it is going to affect so that we don’t run into years of unintended consequences coloring a project
which ultimately should be about cleaning up a neighborhood and providing access to an area of the City
that right now is not benefiting our residents. So | think there’s a lot of potential in this project for greatness,
but | think we are stakeholders to it as Aldermen, we need a very detailed understanding of what we are
actually being involved in and what is at stake. Thank you.
President Wilshire
Thank you. Alderman O’Brien?
Alderman O’Brien
Thank you, Madam President. Director Cummings and perhaps maybe the Mayor if you want to chime in. |
know it is way, way, way too early so let’s kind of talk about in a hypothetical. Right now, the City of
Nashua really is doing quite well with some of the bonding that we have done like in the past and
everything. We have paid off some of them and everything so we have a pretty good deal. And as the
current financing is sitting right now the bonding is looking pretty good and | just wonder if this is like one of
those projects where it would be a hand in glove to go with the bonding? And if that is the case, and it
looks like if we can get the principals of everybody involved kind of nailed down on this, can we get some
form of scheduling so that maybe we can look at the bonding? Because my greatest fear is | don’t have the
financial crystal ball, Mr. Mayor | don’t think you do and | know Mr. Cummings doesn’t. But in working with
Mr. Fredette, right now the current climate isn’t really that bad. So could we use that as a chip Mr.
Cummings in talking with the principals and everything to say that bring up the bonding issue, the
affordability of the bonding issues and different things like that to start to get some of the dates and
everything nailed down to make us a partner in this while the going is, right now would be considered
financially feasible?
Director Cummings
Thank you for the question Alderman O’Brien. | think you raise a really good point, you use the term
“partner” and that’s exactly what is being asked of us, is to become a financial partner. And | think like any
good financial partner, you need to do due diligence and understand how to underwrite the deal. At this
time, | can’t even begin to do that. Yes | do think we have the bonding capability but we also have a lot of
demands and we have a lot of needs as well. And so it is going to be a balancing act moving forward. And
| think we need to go slow on our end and really understand what it is that we are talking about and what it
is that we are committing to. So that’s my recommendation at this time. We need more information but |
really wanted to talk to you all tonight to just kind of get a sense of whether we really still wanted to have a
TIF on the table. It sounds as though yes, there’s a small appetite for a TIF still which | can continue to
represent. That’s what | am hearing and please, if | am hearing wrong, let me know. But Alderman Lopez
raised a really point and he’s correct. When this conversation first started 3 years ago, the idea is we
