A special meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Tuesday, February 16, 2016, at 7:00 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-at-Large Daniel T. Moriarty led in the Pledge to
the Flag.
The roll call was taken with 15 members of the Board of Aldermen present.
Mayor James W. Donchess was also present.
MAYOR’S ANNUAL STATE-OF-THE-CITY ADDRESS
Good evening President McCarthy, Vice President Wilshire, members of the Board of Aldermen, Board of
Education members, BPW Commissioners, other elected officials, city division directors, city staff, community
members, and guests. I'd like to thank you all for being here this evening. |’d also like to thank my wife, Vicki,
for being here.
| have now been in office for a little over a month. Many people have asked me what it is like to be Mayor
again. While many things are similar and some of the challenges are different, one thing is the same - the
quality and dedication of the people who work for the city — our city employees — is still very high. | am proud
to be leading them in serving the citizens of Nashua.
Since my term began, I’ve held a town hall in every Ward of the city. I’ve spoken with residents, and listened
to your ideas and your concerns and many members of the Board of Aldermen have joined me. | have been
inspired by the hundreds of people who have attended, showing their support and concern for the city’s future.
At our town halls we have discussed many issues and problems raised by Nashuans — roads and streets
paving, sidewalk plowing, the importance of our schools, greater river access, traffic lights and timing, lighting
on the rail trail, our riverwalks, downtown housing, and many more issues. We've learned that Nashuans are
certainly not passive. They want to play an active role in the well-being and vitality of our community. This
commitment is an undeniable asset for our city.
As Mayor my goal is to make Nashua a city that works for all of our people, for our senior citizens and our
younger generations, for high tech engineers, and for teachers, firefighters, police and custodians, for lifelong
Nashuans and for new residents. This was one of my goals in holding the town halls — to hear from all citizens
in their own neighborhoods about their hopes for Nashua over the next four years and beyond — in order to
make our city one that works for everyone. | welcome the opportunity to work with the Board of Aldermen over
the next four year’s. The Board is my partner in city government. | have enabled Board members to work
directly with city employees to make city government work more effectively on behalf of the citizens of Nashua.
My door is always open to any Aldermen who want to work on any city issue or problem.
In addition to the passion of our people and the capability of our Board of Aldermen and city employees,
Nashua is blessed to have a strong Veteran’s community. Bob Coutemanche is one of those Veterans who
might be here tonight. Bob and his wife Barbara work tirelessly for Veterans in Nashua and throughout New
Hampshire. The financial health of the city is strong. Fitch recently affirmed their Triple A bond rating and
Standard and Poor’s reaffirmed their AA+ rating, one notch below Triple A. | want to thank City CFO John
Griffin and City Treasurer David Fredette, who is here for all of their work on the city’s finances and with the
rating agencies.
As Mayor one of my main responsibilities is to focus on city operations — making sure the snow is plowed and
the garbage picked up, taking care of our parks and public spaces, making sure that our money is spent
carefully, trying to improve traffic flow, etc., but as Mayor | also work broader concerns like the long term
economic health of our city.
