Board of Aldermen 08-13-2019 Page 6
PERIOD FOR PUBLIC COMMENT RELATIVE TO ITEMS EXPECTED TO BE ACTED UPON THIS
EVENING
President Wilshire
We have 8 speakers and a 15 minute time period. | will call up the first person, Michael Ortolano, if you’d
give your name and address for the record please?
Michael Ortolano 41 Berkeley Street. | just want to provide some community input regarding the Full
Measure & List, R-19-159. Notwithstanding the Mayor and Attorney Bolton’s comments, the Full List &
Measure is not currently required by the State and it is a more economical approach to it. Attorney Bolton
provided pretty extensive arguments in his testimony before the NH BTLA regarding the statistical status of
the data in Nashua and basically made a strong case that it was within acceptable standard. So the need
to perform a Full Measure & List or to move away from Full Statistical Revaluation are really issues that are
being driven, at least in our perception, by the City not by the DRA or the BTLA. So unless you know I’ve
missed some correspondence or some dialogue on that issue, it hasn’t appeared as stated. So | would
prefer the City to continue its cost-effective practice of using a Full Statistical Revaluation.
Second point is in the event that it is the desire of the City and the Board of Aldermen to move forward with
a Full Measure & List, it seems appropriate that we would want to wait for the input received from several
reviews that are ongoing. One is Mr. Cornell's review of certain procedures that are being used in the
Assessing Department. It seems to me that they make effect the scope of work and the methods used for
a Full Measure & List and it would be appropriate before moving forward to get that input. The same could
be said for the investigation that is ongoing by the New Hampshire Board of Tax & Land Appeal regarding
their observations. There may be items in there, in their situation and in their disposition of the issue that
could affect the contractual elements of a Full Measure & List.
The fourth point is basically that the Full Measure & List is to a certain degree a matter of speculation. You
know we've talked and heard testimony here from the Mayor that different levels have been achieved by
different communities. That’s all well and good but what we actually achieve in this City allows for a
window where the benefits would vary from potentially very strong benefits to potentially very weak
benefits. | think that is the reality of the numbers that we would actually get. The one final point that | will
make is the contractor oversite procedures, it appears that there was a significant miss in the Statistical
Revaluation Contract where the internal inspections of homes was just not performed as outlined in the
contract by KRT. It was a big scope of work, about 1,200 homes and that’s the sort of thing that | think the
monitoring, the contract and the contract monitoring policies and procedures probably need to be
strengthened to make sure that you know when the City specifies a scope of work to be done that it is
actually completed. So that’s all | had for comments, thank you.
Laurie Ortolano 41 Berkeley Street. | want to provide some clarification to a few of the Mayor's comments.
He mentioned that there is no validity for the 15% or 10% entry rate. The Board of Assessor’s meeting on
March 7" of 2019, | would ask you to refer to those meeting minutes where the Chairman, Dave Hansberry,
spoke that he had spoken to Rob Tozier who felt that we wouldn’t get any more than 1/5" entry into our
homes. Based on that, Dan did not, questioned whether a 20% entry and an 80% miss was worth us doing
this List & Measure. So that is on the record. There is another set of minutes, that | think it is documented
that KRT spoke of a 15% entry rate, | couldn’t find them because | was short on time and | was scrolling
through. But March 7", 2019 is a good set for you to look at.
Also, the documentation that the Mayor referred to from the BTLA and the DRA strongly suggesting that we
move forward on a List & Measure, I’d like to see it. | hope that’s not just verbal and | hope you all want to
see it. | want to see what the DRA wrote, and | want to see what the BTLA has written; not implied but
written because | have not seen that and | have been watching these correspondence closely. | have been
in communication regularly.
Regarding the Bob Gagne, | had a chance to talk to Bob Gagne, Bob Gagne used to be a Deputy in our
Assessing Office. He is now the Chairman of the Board of Assessors up in Manchester; he’s their head
