Board of Aldermen 12-14-2021 Page 28
President Wilshire
Anyone else wishing to give public comment? Saying no one.
REMARKS BY THE MEMBERS OF THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN
Alderman O’Brien
Thank you, Madam President. Since this appears to be our last meeting prior to Christmas, | would like to extend happy
holidays and Merry Christmas to my fellow members of the Board and as well to all the citizens of Nashua. | would like to
thank Alderman Lopez. | was wondering what | was going to do for the rest of the week. | will find out where that bench
is going. Thank you.
Alderman Klee
Thank you. I, too, would like to extend happy holidays to everyone here on the Board, and within the city, and have a very
safe and happy holiday.
I'd also like to continue the conversation that | had started with thanking the United Way of Greater Nashua, specifically
Sara Caesar and Michael Apfelberg, and their volunteers who 60 of them wrote 2,000 thank you cards to our healthcare
workers at the two hospitals. Some they did also in Spanish because they know that not everybody speaks that. I'd like
to also think the Brookline and Merrimack Lions Club for their generous donation for us to be able to buy $10 gift cards for
the employees also there. There were also a lot of numerous private donations from citizens throughout. | put up a post,
and they came through, and it was just wonderful to see this happening.
I'd also like to thank the Nashua School District. There were five schools that participated creating various artworks -
some were on glass; some were beautiful painted works of art, and there were two very large pieces of art that came from
the Bretton Woods School. They're beautiful. You can see them online. They say it all. Thank you in multiple languages
across that, the holding of the hearts, and so on. It was truly, truly was very emotional and beautiful artwork and | can't
thank all those people enough for all that they did. | know it seems like nothing just to say thank you to our healthcare
heroes but | made the comment about that we are at the height of the pandemic we are. But when we were at the so-
called part of the pandemic we were standing outside of hospitals and we were giving impromptu concerts, and we were
holding banners, and we were saying thank you to all these people. Well now they're short staffed, overworked, very
tired, no beds at the end, and | think they need that more than anything. | suggested to some people that perhaps they
might want to do some caroling right outside of a hospital - socially distanced and masks on - but that might be a nice way
of just being able to say thank you and we appreciate them. With the holidays here, | think that's something that we can
do. Just an idea I'm throwing out there. So thank you to all our healthcare heroes, all of the people that are in our grocery
stores.
And as far as masks are concerned, | do support a mask but | do think that we need to do better if we were to put it
through and we need to have a better enforcement of it. | don't believe that restaurants need to do takeout. So thank you
very much.
Alderman Dowd
Yeah, just a couple of things. I'd like to wish everybody Merry Christmas, happy holidays to the existing Board and all the
incoming members to next year's Board. | hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday.
Also | spent the entire day today with the Nashua Fire Department doing strategic planning. It was very efficient and
effective and we got through the entire process in one day, which I've been involved in a number of them several at the
city level and after several days, we were not as far along as the Fire Department. So | think you'll be seeing a plan
coming after the first of the year about what they have for strategic plan and | think you'll appreciate all the work that goes
into it.
Alderman Caron
Yes, thank you. |, too, would like to wish everyone a happy holiday season. Hopefully you'll get time to spend with your
family and in friends this year.
And finally, | would like to wish our City Tax Collector/Treasurer David Fredette a happy retirement. He leaves on Friday
and it's going to be hard not to be able to pick up the phone and say can you help someone within my Ward? Can you
