A regular meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Tuesday, September 28, 2021, at 7:33 p.m. in the aldermanic
chamber and via Zoom teleconference which meeting link can be found on the agenda and on the City’s website
calendar.
President Lori Wilshire presided; City Clerk Susan Lovering recorded.
Prayer was offered by City Clerk Susan Lovering; Alderman-at-Large Brandon Michael Laws led in the Pledge to the Flag.
Let’s start the meeting by taking a roll call attendance. If you are participating via Zoom, please state your presence, reason
for not attending the meeting in person, and whether there is anyone in the room with you during this meeting, which is
required under the Right-To-Know Law.
The roll call was taken with 12 members of the Board of Aldermen present: Alderman Michael B. O’Brien, Sr.,
Alderwoman Shoshanna Kelly (via Zoom), Alderman Richard A. Dowd, Alderman June M. Caron, Alderman Thomas
Lopez, Alderman David C. Tencza, Alderwoman Elizabeth Lu, Alderman Ernest Jette, Alderman Brandon Michael Laws
(via Zoom), Alderman Skip Cleaver (via Zoom), Alderman Linda Harriott-Gathright, Alderman Wilshire.
Alderman Patricia Klee, Alderman Benjamin Clemons, and Alderman Jan Schmidt were recorded absent.
Mayor James W. Donchess, Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton, were also in attendance.
REMARKS BY THE MAYOR
Mayor Donchess
Yes, Madam President. Thank you very much. Well, first, | had a few things. First, | wanted to give you a brief update on
the COVID-19 situation. We are still in a state of substantial transmission. Using of course the usual two measurements,
the first being the positivity rate or the percent of people who test positive on any one day. That does fluctuate a bit. It is
most recently at 5.9% and it has been going up and down a little bit between high fours and about 6% over the last month
or more. Also, the other measurement is the number of new infections per 100,000 people. That is now at 326 and up a
bit. Of course we are 90,000 people so that means we're seeing about 20 new cases or 21 new cases a day over the last
14 days. Public Health Bobbie Bagley continue to watch this situation very carefully and we will update you if there are
any significant changes.
There is one | call it alarming development. Hopefully it gets resolved at the State level. The State has been offered the
opportunity to receive $27 million of vaccine related money to pay for staff and other possibly vaccines and other costs
that are associated with bringing the vaccine vaccination rate up. The acceptance of that grant was tabled at the last
meeting of the governing council which was unfortunate and they are meeting tomorrow and hopefully they will take it off
the table and accept the grant. In order to actually accept and expend the money not only does the Governor's Council
have to approve the acceptance but the so-called Fiscal Committee needs to vote to expand the money. At the Fiscal
Committee, the vote was seven to three to table the matter and they are meeting, | think, later this week early next week.
Hopefully they may decide to take that up and actually pass it. The vote on the Governor's Council was four to one to
table on the Fiscal Committee was seven to three. So one of our State Senators Cindy Rosenwald does serve on the
Fiscal Committee and hopefully those votes can be reversed so that the money can be distributed and we can increase
vaccine rates both here in Nashua and across the State.
Madam President, there was another item | wanted to mention which is our 21 163. According to this Resolution, the
amount of $4 million of the surplus revenue would be allocated/dedicated to reducing the tax rate or buying the tax rate
down. This is something we typically do every year out of excess revenue and assuming you pass that, that will help us
keep the tax rate, the increase down to hopefully a manageable level. Somewhere in the two and a half or a little bit
higher range.
The next item | did want to mention Madam President was an item of very good news. It was announced yesterday that
an anonymous donor has given or is going to give $1 million for the Performing Arts Center and the naming rights. So this
is an anonymous gift. So we will never really know where it came from but with it comes the naming rights and | want to
thank not only the fundraising committee who worked very hard on this, but particularly Phil Scontsas who has been
working with the potential large donors and there are others as well and, you Know, is very persuasive in working in a very
sensitive matter with a family that wants to make such a large gift on an anonymous basis. So Philip’s efforts were really
instrumental in making this happen. So | want to thank him and just say that, you know, he's been doing a great job along
with the fundraising committee. Now the total number of dollars of non-city money is up to about $5.2 million. The
fundraising is not over. For example, the naming rights for the auditorium still are outstanding and there are other large
