Board of Aldermen 08-10-2021 Page 36
In terms of the outreach, there were no community meetings or anything. They took input through like the website or
whatever. Maybe we should do something like that but certainly we plan to propose to you, the Board of Aldermen, as we
get a firmer picture on how much money we really have available given that we don’t need so much for revenue
replacement, how we should use the money.
Alderman Caron
Thank you. | appreciate that. That’s all | have.
Alderman Lopez
First | want to thank former Alderman Siegel for attending. | think one of the comments he made that might have been - |
hope wasn’t lost in the shuffle with regards to this Board, is people who care about the city do have a right to comment on
it and have a right to express opinions. Particularly Alderman Siegel, I’m pretty sure I’m literally sitting in his seat right
now, has served the Board and the City of Nashua and he was always very diligent about researching his issues. He’s
definitely very passionate but | always found him to be very fair. The reason why | want to point out that comment is
because there are different places where people gather in Nashua whether it’s here in the aldermanic chamber, or at the
Library, or on line and those forums have a responsibility to be very conscientious when it comes to how they manage. If
it’s in the guidelines specifically for example that they aren’t going to take output from people who aren’t in Nashua, that
should be applied consistently. A person shouldn't have their conversation rights pulled out from under them in the middle
of a conversation in fairness. | think if you’re going to allow that person to have a conversation at the beginning, you kind
of can’t just pull them out when their conversations become inconvenient. The same way some of the public comment
here is very inconvenient tonight for me, slightly, personally as well but people have the right to speak and they have a
right to be heard. | just wanted to offer that support.
Then in addition, | wanted to thank Mr. Frost not only for his comments tonight but he really has like that corner house has
been well taken care of. It’s an appreciated part of the community. They do a fantastic job decorating for Halloween,
decorating for Christmas, and it really does lift up the city’s surrounding neighborhoods and the city experience because
people use the rail trial to travel back and forth from work. Kids use it to travel back and forth from school. They see the
investment he puts in the community and that matters. | think we do have to match that. | think the rail trail as it is, is very
tired whether it’s murals that are well past their prime, whether it’s infrastructure, roots pushing up on the trail itself, or just
landscaping that has really, really been left to decline. | think we should invest in that. If we’re going to call it a
walking/pedestrian trail and a public park, then we really need to give it the resources that it needs and I’m not sure we do
that.
With regards to the people congregating on it, that area is called by many in the local area “Jacob’s Corner” because
Jacob Wallace sat at the corner for years. Sometimes panhandling, sometimes drinking, sometimes writing weird, unique
words and language on the wall in chalk, and sometimes throwing potatoes at people passing by. So definitely a story
corner but a lesson because Jacob passed away the morning that | ran the first tree streets block party. That puts into
context why | express someone’s concern about people struggling with substance use disorder, specifically alcohol in the
community. The Doorway program does not serve people who are intoxicated. It is meant for people who are under
opioids and being treated for opioid addiction. So there’s perhaps a misunderstanding in our community that the Doorway
is exactly like our safe station used to be. Our safe station used to take people who were intoxicated and his primary drug
of choice was alcohol. The Doorway doesn’t do it that way anymore. They will work with them but they’re not going to
bring them to the respite. They’re not going to provide 24 hour emergency care. That’s a huge gap in our services and
we’re seeing the impact of it. We know drinking has increase exponentially because of COVID. People were trapped
indoors and didn’t know where to go and we decided that among our essential services we’re going to be liquor stores.
So it’s another example of a public health issue that we need to address.
| have to kind of balance the concerns of the immediate residents nearby with opportunities to provide outreach to them
because there aren’t enough programs that will walk up and deliberately engage them in like do you want a cup of coffee.
Do you want to look at sobriety? That type of thing. There are definitely organizations that do that but | say there aren’t
enough because they’re still slipping through the cracks. The rescue mission can be out there 3 or 4 times a week. The
Soup Kitchen has two outreach workers. Our own Public Health Department has outreach workers. There are still a lot of
people who are struggling. A lot of people who don’t have anywhere to find community and a lot of people who combine
the two in a way that is a nuisance to our neighbors. | know some people might consider them undesirable and | can
definitely empathize with no only with Clarence Frost’s experience having to look at that situation every day and also with
his neighbor across the street who his fence is the favorite target of the guy who likes to urinate publicly. So welcome to
the neighborhood.
