Board of Aldermen 04-09-2019 Page 9
This change will do nothing if they want the product they can get it. Vape seems to be what | am hearing
from the crowd here and what | heard from the Committee in past hearings, the problem becomes vape.
We don’t sell vape, we don’t carry vape, we are stuck in with all other tobacco products and it is not fair.
Nashua needs to take a step down and stop the overreaching from this. Thank you.
Ed Santamaria Good evening, hi I’m Ed Santamaria, 15 Spit Brook Road, Nashua, New Hampshire and |
work at Two Guys Smoke Shop. | am in opposition of this Ordinance as written does not curb use for
possession. Past Committee meetings we heard Alderman Wilshire say that she thinks that people are
going to go elsewhere to buy these products. They will go elsewhere, they’ll go to Hudson or Merrimack as
other people have mentioned. Right now they go elsewhere to Nashua, New Hampshire from
Massachusetts from surrounding areas. If you’ve been to the Mall on the weekend, there are a lot of Mass
plates. That’s just business that is going to be lost. This Ordinance is an attack on local businesses; all
businesses like | said the Mall, restaurants, other establishments. It’s not good for business in the Nashua
area. And | understand the pleas of those in favor, but this does not curb use or possession and | think that
it is not going to solve the problem at all. Thank you.
Steven Elliott Hi! am Steven Elliott, 256 Pine Street, Ward 6. In about 2012 a couple years after State’s
started implementing bans on texting while driving, all the studies showed that texting related accidents
increased in those states, including fatal accidents. And so one thing to do when you are looking at laws
like this is to ask what are unintended consequences? And what you will probably see if since people
between the ages of 18 and 21 are the poorest people, the fines are going to make them even poorer.
That means that if you look at the data, poor people have higher birth rates, so you'll have people that are
smokers having higher birth rates, which will probably increase the amount of smokers in the long run. So
your law probably won’t work. Thank you.
Quinn Bardon Hi I’m Quinn Bardon | live at 7 Royal Crest Drive in Nashua. My father is British and in his
home country an establishment may serve a 16 year old with beer and wine that is purchased by an adult.
Not coincidentally in that country youth alcohol poisoning and DUI rates are significantly lower than in the
US. Adult authoritarian control of addictive substances merely creates a forbidden fruit effect where the
targeted substance becomes that much more attractive simply because it is forbidden by those seen as
stodgy and cool. Thus this Ordinance will be counterproductive in that respect.
See reverse psychology here is a genuine phenomenon and on that I’d also like to point out that | find it
curious that many proponents of these types of restrictive policies, also advocate lower the voting age to
something like 16. So apparently a 16 year old is qualified to choose someone with the power to initiate a
nuclear conflict with Russia but has to wait 5 years to pick up a pack of smokes, very curious that. Thank
you.
Howard Ray Good evening Mr. Mayor, Board of Aldermen. My name is Howard Ray, | live at 2 Clock
Tower Place, 133 here in Nashua, New Hampshire, Ward 4. What we are talking about here this evening
really is responsibility; responsibility for your health, your children’s health and so forth. | find it nowhere
that this municipality has the right, moral right or obligation, to tell me how to raise my children especially
after he has reached the age of majority of 18. What right do you have over my child and the decisions that
| make? | would say as a municipality none at all. And | would even argue obviously as a State none at all
either.
My service, | spent 13 glorious years in the United States Army, my service in the United States Army
wasn’t for a group of local politicians to tell me how to raise my children. It was so that | could make the
right decisions on my own to teach my child that perhaps at 18, he should not smoke. Perhaps he should
join the military. Perhaps he may not join the military, perhaps he does smoke, that’s my decision and his
on his own. It’s not yours. About these education camps that were mentioned earlier, you are going to
send 18 year olds to tell them what not to do and as soon as they pay their $50.00 they are going to go
back to their home and they are going to pick up their E-Cigarette and go “Well that was nice”. And they
pay their 50 bucks and it’s a wash. And they got caught again and who cares? Not the people that want to
smoke, not the people that are 18 years of age or older.
