Board of Aldermen 12-11-2018 Page 10
Lisa Bissonnette Hi, Lisa Bissonnette from Amherst, New Hampshire, | work downtown in Nashua at a
large real estate development company. | am also the President of the Board of Directors of City Arts
Nashua which is a non-profit Arts Service organization here in Nashua. | want to echo Judy Carlson’s
remarks in particular about the creative community award that Nashua received last year. Nashua is
actually the only City in New Hampshire to ever win that award twice.
We have a significant and vibrant arts community, lots of supporters and it is very collaborative
environment, there is no question that community and the wider community of Nashua support the
Performing Arts Center and want to see it happen sooner than later. From a business perspective no
growth comes without investment, | think that’s well understood by everyone here tonight. We are
hearing a real willingness to make that investment in Nashua which we all believe in so much.
| will also say that as an investor in real estate, it is completely true that no one makes a significant
commitment of funds without a concrete design and plan. You want to know what you are spending
your money on and you want to have the sense that what you invest in will be completed successfully. |
think the Steering Committee for the Performing Arts Center has shepherded these early stages so well
and obviously asked a lot of questions, hired the best consultants in their fields to make the best
possible recommendation for Nashua and so | agree with Mr. Buckley it is time to proceed, let’s get it
done. Thank you.
Fred Teeboom | must be the last, I’m not the last. Fred Teeboom 24 Cheyenne Drive, Nashua, NH.
Let me say some things about the amendment that haven’t been talked about. The amendment says
that the $4 million dollars of charitable donations tax credits do not have to be solely spent on
operations, you can spend it on construction. The sole operator to bid, Spectacle Management
requires no subsidy. There will be no subsidy if the data has 700 seats, what they call a sweet spot for
Nashua. So you don’t need the $4 million to subsidize operations, if they give you a $1.00 to rent the
facility, they will operate the rest of the year and ask for no additional money. That is their proposal.
Now the recommended bidder by the Steering Committee is Icon Architecture. Now ICON architecture
was selected by the Committee. They did an absolutely outstanding job making the presentation,
almost like a preliminary design review, such detail, just blew everybody else away which is why they
got selected. They recommend a 700 seat theater, just like the operator. That requires building it from
the ground floor up, which I’ve always maintained makes sense, don’t put it on the second floor, think of
the egress problems, think about people that have died, have crashed through the floor, you have 1,000
people standing on the second floor, waving their hands, stomping that is a serious structure problem.
They don’t design it that way, they design it from the ground up. However, a 700 theater, even from the
ground up is going to be more expensive that a 550 seat theater. | have no doubt about that. The cost
estimated, the sole contracted cost estimator for this job Fennessy Consultant. They were hired by
Boonacot who partnered with Duncan Webb to do that original study. Fennessy Consultant estimated
the 550 seat theater to cost $16.4 million dollars. There is only one other legitimate estimate sort of,
McCarthy went to Harvey Construction, well established, do some school work and asked them to take
a look at the $16.4 bid and look at the comparison between the NH market and the Boston market.
Harvey reduced that $16.4 to $15 million construction cost.
Tim Cummings kept saying $11.5 million, | have asked him over and over again to produce the details.
He waves his hands, he talks about all these people that come around that he dealt with but he has
never produced details behind his $11.5 million. The cost is $15 or $16.5 million which is $5 million
dollars above what you have got funded in the current bond resolution. So you are going to need every
penny, every penny of this $4 million to $6.5 million that Mayor Donchess expects to receive from
charitable contributions for tax credits, you are going to need every penny for construction. That's what
is good about this amendment. It says you can use this charitable money, tax credit money for any
purpose to realize the Performing Arts Center. And that is a very good thing.
| think with this approach, now well thought through, having advance designs spending money on the
design so you can convince people that they should donate. | know I’ve built a memorial, the first thing
