A regular meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Tuesday, July 10, 2018, at 7:30 p.m. in the
Aldermanic Chamber.
President Brian S. McCarthy presided; City Clerk Patricia D. Piecuch recorded.
Prayer was offered by City Clerk Patricia D. Piecuch; Alderman Lopez led in the Pledge to the Flag.
The roll call was taken with 13 members of the Board of Aldermen present; Alderman Wilshire, Alderman
Gidge was recorded absent.
Mayor James W. Donchess and Corporation Counsel Steven A. Bolton were also in attendance.
REMARKS BY THE MAYOR
Mayor Donchess
You probably all saw that Nashua was ranked 9"" in the United States out of 150 cities in terms of being a
well-run City, which | think is an honor which we all should be very proud of. They particularly looked at the
factor of how the quality of the services compare with the amount of money spent per citizen. On that score
we did very well, scoring really at the top of quality of services and one of the most inexpensive cities or one
of the cities that spends the least in terms of dollars per resident. So | think we all have contributed to that
result and | am glad that we have been recognized.
There are a couple of grants on the agenda which | think are significant. First we have the grant for the Fire
Department. They have been awarded $600,000 some dollars to buy a new piece of equipment which is
going to be able to consolidate three former pieces of equipment, a bucket truck and some other things. It is
going to save us quite a bit of money. We have proposed, of course, accepting the grant and also
appropriating $65,000.00 of local match of nearly a 10 to 1 ratio to fulfill our obligation under the grant. The
Fire Department has done a very good job in pursuing this and getting this money for us so | want to
congratulate them and thank them for their efforts.
Also the Police Department, another public safety agency, has been awarded an opioid grant from the State
of New Hampshire in order to help continue to attack the opioid crisis. This is similar to the Granite Hammer
and other overtime grants that they have got. This money will be devoted exclusively to anti-drug
operations, mostly to buy money and vehicles and overtime that is specifically related to drug investigations
and arrests. Again, they are doing a very good job on this front and it is helpful to all of us that they again
receive this grant.
A few things have happened in terms of activities here in the City that | think are worth remarking on. First
of all, the Farmer's Market has been doing very well. It has now run for 3 weeks downtown on Main Street.
If you talk to the farmers or to the vendors, they will tell you even though it is kind of early in the season that
their sales are way up. There are many people attending the market, more than before. | think the fact that
it is consolidated and has kind of an atmosphere of pedestrian atmosphere really helps, attracts, customers,
and in the end will attract more vendors and farmers because the customers are definitely there.
We also had a very significant event on June 30" which was the Pride Parade. | would say 1,000 to 2,000
people came downtown. The parade was 20 or 30 minutes long and then many hundreds of people
gathered in the Renaissance Park by the river for music and other festivities and | think that went really well.
It brought a lot of people into Nashua and | think made a lot of Nashua citizens feel good and proud. | think
we should thank everyone who has been involved in that; Alderwoman Shoshanna Kelly was very active in
getting that going, as well as other people in the community. | think it was really a very big success.
Finally, many of us attended the 4" of July Celebration at Holman Stadium. The fireworks were, | thought,
spectacular, more than even in prior years. But a highlight of the event was the swearing in ceremony for
the Holman Stadium Hall of Fame and one of our own and former City employee, Alderwoman June Caron,
was inducted into the Hall of Fame. | was fortunate enough to be able to be there so | would like to
