Special Bd. of Aldermen — 10/26/15 Page 8
Alderman Jette
When you say you’ve made your pledge, | thought that the City had to establish some kind of an account that, |
can’t remember the details of it, we’ve talked about it before. | thought before we could start accepting money
we had to establish some kind of a trust account.
President McCarthy
That is the agreement with City Arts Nashua that was just talked about. There is negotiation going on and an
agreement to allow City Arts Nashua to be the fiscal agent for the Performing Arts will be forthcoming and at
that point we will accept donations. What was said was pledges, not necessarily that we have collected the
checks already.
Ms. McNamara Let me just clarify, there are some checks that have come in through City Arts Nashua, the
systems are just not yet set up.
Mr. Cummings No| don’t think | need to elaborate any further although | was just going to add is we are
working diligently with City Arts Nashua. | wouldn’t necessarily term it a negotiation; we are actually just
working out the logistics or actually how certain internal processes will occur. You don’t really actually
understand all that goes into it until you actually start doing that piece by piece type of process. City Arts
Nashua stepped up to the plate very early on, was very committed to this project; made this a central theme in
one of their big events earlier in the year.
We are looking now just to memorialize that conversation; we have internal City processes that we need to
through, one being getting the fiscal agent agreement approved by the Finance Committee. | am working really
hard to try to make a November 7" deadline and unfortunately if we don’t make that deadline, the next time we
can actually do that is the first meeting in December which | think is December 5". | have a lot of pressure on
me by a lot of different folks to try and make the November 7" deadline and | am hoping to do that because
that will be the last major hurdle that we have to actually move that particular issue forward.
Alderwoman Melizzi-Golja
Yes | don’t know Betsy if this is for you or Director Cummings or someone else around the table, you talked
about we are looking at $6.5 K, $4 million from New Market Tax Credits Federal money and $2.5 private plus
the NH Community Development Finance Authority. | know we talked about this Director Cummings when you
gave your presentation and | know people ask me because they seem to think | would know and | have no
clue. So | am asking the question here in case it hasn’t been put to directly privately, when this went to the
community we said we were going to raise $4 million. So we know $2.5 is private donations, where is the rest
coming from? Is that coming from the New Hampshire Community Development Finance Authority? That
question has been out there because people are hearing us talk about this and people are seeing these
numbers and going OK and | know that is not a mandate, but | think people just want to know what are we
doing with the money and how are we looking at all of that money coming in.
Mr. Cummings So | will just answer it very simply as tax credits is private sector money. So how we get there
is a matter of we have the best laid plans and as we execute them we will see how we do, but we know right
now we are looking at a New Market Tax Credit of approximately $4 million dollars. We know private
charitable contributions at about $2.5 million, we know in that $2.5 million there will be some percentage for
CDFA tax credit. We also know that we will be looking for foundations and other types of sponsorships to get
to that $6.5, to be clear all private sector funding. But the different sources to get to that $6.5, we will
understand that better as these plans get more solidified. But that is the best outline | can give you right now.
