Special Board of Aldermen 07-01-2021 Page 28
Alderman Klee
Robustly, yes. And everybody on both sides made very good points and | think you did come up with a
good budget and | thank you for that. You made our job here a little easier because you ferreted it out
during the meetings. I’d also like to just kind of comment again on the fire on Concord Street. When the fire
happened it was called in by the local ice-cream truck gentleman who was going by and saw the smoke
and called the fire. And as a result of that, he got stuck there. He could not leave because there were
hoses all around him and he made a bad situation good by giving the children who were being displaced as
they got out of school, he gave them popsicles and different things to try to soothe them. He also gave
popsicles and | believe water to the firefighters that were there. So instead of sitting there and being grump
and so on he reached out. | don’t this gentleman’s name, but I’d like to publicly thank him.
Alderman Lopez
Hazy ice. He lives in Ward 4.
Alderman Klee
Hazy Ice, who lives in Ward 4 but he helped out those in Ward 3 so | would like to publicly thank him for
that. And | want to make a reminder that 4"" of July is coming up this weekend. We are having a firework
display at Holman Stadium and | pray that that’s where it stays. | know it won't, but | know there will be
some private ones. Let’s not put our firefighters and our police to any extra work, keep them at home and
where they belong. And please stay safe this weekend. Thank you.
Alderman Lopez
Ironically Hazy Ice could not join us for the Tree Street Block Party because the Fire Department was
helping us with the road closure and he kind of got deflected a little bit. But we appreciate you, both of you.
Nashua Fire actually helped us with our road closure and had to go respond to a fire so the Nashua PD and
their Command Center were surprisingly well positioned as well. We had a really good event. | want to
thank all the City Departments that participated too in the Touch a Truck event because there’s a lot of City
services that they don’t really get a chance to meet the bus driver when they are not like hurrying on and off
of it. They don’t get a chance to talk about the Token (inaudible) which is a really helpful way to be able to
pay for transportation to and from things. Even the Solid Waste Department was there and demystifying
sidewalk pickups and solid waste pickups and all that kind of stuff for residents is really, really helpful.
| want to thank the organizers that worked with me, a lot of residents were contributing their time really as a
labor of love. One couple that has been volunteering regularly for years the wife was in and out of the
emergency room like 3 different times and they still found time to help. One of our food providers lost two
close relatives in a week and was pretty close to Reverend Perkins as well and still made time to help. And
just the amount of problem solving and overcoming adversity that | saw just in organizing a simple street
party was very inspiring. And we need it because we are coming out of COVID-19, we were originally
planning this thing when we were still unsure of whether vaccines were going to be effective and all of that
kind of stuff and people stuck to it. So | want to thank everybody that helped organize the Tree Streets
Block Party.
| do also want to comment a little bit on some of the public comment that has been made and the opinions
that have been offered. | am concerned about the ratio of private properties to commercial properties —
residential properties to commercial properties as well. But | would point out that there was probably some
role in how the residential properties were more intrusively and thoroughly assessed because of tireless
advocacy on the part of a small group of people who are now going to present as though that had nothing
to do with this sudden shift of ratios and how people’s property taxes are going to be going up because
their houses were assessed at a higher value. People try to take on political positions and they are not
necessarily taking on any position of responsibility for the results of those actions. It is frustrating to see.
