Special Board of Aldermen 03-14-2018 Page 4
years of stability for our teachers, for our school district and most importantly for our students. |
wanted to thank the Budget Committee and Alderman Dowd for their formal support and a unanimous
decision to send it forward to the full board and | look forward to hopefully having a unanimous
decision tonight to send forward to the membership. Thank you.
Ren Beaudoin, 90 Burke Street, Nashua, | also do work here in public health. I’m here to talk about R-
18-008. | just wanted to make a brief comment. | did send some of the concerns that I’ve had over to
a few folks earlier, so | thank you all for looking at that. | just had something to ask the board to just
take a little bit of time to really look into that merit plan. The plan itself looks like a good plan, but the
grid which was made, the old grid versus where new folks, or folks that land on that new grid versus
the old grid, a lot of people have gone down. And that’s where | really would ask the board to really
take a critical look at, to see where folks were and where they land on this new plan. That’s all.
Thank you.
Gary Hoffman, 38 Perham Street, Nashua, New Hampshire. I’m here to speak in favor of R-18-008,
the new collective bargaining agreement that’s been tentatively agreed with the Board of Education
Nashua Teacher’s Union. The first thing, I’d like to thank the Budget Committee for unanimously
passing this agreement a couple weeks ago. Alderman Jette had asked a question about the
spending cap and | know that it’s been deemed unenforceable by the Courts but I’m sure it’ll still be
used in planning purposes at the very least. But the number was 1.9% this year and | confirmed it
with the CFO the city government inflation was 3% last year so no matter what happens at least for
the next three years that 3% number will be with us so it’s likely to you know, just for a base line. If
you're curious about any of this information, feel free to contact me. | keep spreadsheets on it all.
Regarding the new Collective Bargaining Agreement | guess in terms of planning this deal is unique in
the fact that previous collective bargaining agreements that have been brought before this Board
usually the money, the expensive parts of the budget, are towards the end in years 3 or 4 and then it
tends to be leaner in the beginning. I’ve always thought that is sort of psychological break because
always assume the future is going to be better than present conditions. This agreement actually does
the opposite. This agreement becomes less expensive in years 3 and 4 then it is in the beginning of
the contract, | realize that year 1 is already paid for and has already been budgeted. Years 3 and 4 |
believe the cost increase is actually below 2% so as a Board going forward and planning, it’s nice to
have an agreement where the numbers actually go down and it becomes actually more affordable.
So it’s something to consider. Also just by passing this agreement it is going to improve morale in the
public schools. | am a public school teacher as many of you know. | view this contract as more ten
years in the making. The last time we had significant movement on the salary schedule was 2008
and so a lot of teachers have been waiting for about 10 years and some stopped waiting a few years
ago like Mayor Donchess said and did move to Amherst and even Manchester in some cases. So |
urge you to unanimously support this agreement and thank you.
COMMUNICATIONS REQUIRING FINAL APPROVAL — None
PETITIONS — None
NOMINATIONS, APPOINTMENTS AND ELECTIONS
Appointments by the Mayor
The following appointments were read into the record:
Downtown Improvement Committee
Michael Watt, Alternate (New Appointment) Term to Expire: March 31, 2021
5 Strawberry Bank Road, Apt. 16
Nashua, NH 03062
