Special Board of Aldermen 12-07-2021 Page 6
expressed an interest in buying the property or he received opposition, he would step away. We're asking you to pass
the bond and confirm to him the city as interest. He's told you already he's going to move forward so he hasn't kept his
word — 2,800 signatures. That's widespread opposition. He hasn't kept his word. So with respect to this measure,
this doesn't say the city buys it. This is a measure to pass a bond to give us the opportunity to buy the property. It
also gives us time and opportunity to get matching funds for the trust for public lands. There's a number of resources
that are available at the federal, State, and local level to get monies to preserve this land. Preserve, protect, and
defend this property. We're getting into technicalities when we start to say it's not inside the park. If you spend any
time in that park, you know this is essentially surrounded, right? This property is surrounded by the park. So it is part
and parcel. It is the essence of the park and it will be permanently diminished if the city doesn't take action.
So a couple facts for you. These are some of the studies. | think some of you may have that from 2014 for the Trust
for Public Lands, but it showed that 76% of residents in New Hampshire participate in outdoor recreation and the tax
revenue from that outdoor recreation generates $293 million a year. | don't know what the number is and what the tax
revenue generated by Greeley Park but if you've been there on any summer day, any weekend, even here in the
winter, if you were there Sunday for Santa in the park, how many children came from all across the city? Many of
them from disadvantaged neighborhoods. So it's not my backyard. It's our backyard and it's used by residents of
every single ward in the city.
If you don't take action today, we lose it forever. There's no undo button. There's no second chance. So a couple
others. This study also found residential lands consume $1.12 in services for every dollar in tax revenue. So we
talked about the cost of the bond. We can't afford this development to go in. It's going to cost us money from here on
out. So the benefits of this development are completely...
Alderman O’Brien
30 second.
Robert Lodi
The benefits go to a developer who's out of State and is developing a development that doesn't fit the city. It's an
enclave and it's not accessible the residents in Nashua. We all know the benefit of being outside and we all know the
two year toll that this pandemic has taken, none of which has been felt more greatly than our children denying them
the access to spend time in a wooded area that's accessible by bus through the entire city is something that cannot be
lost. Thank you for your time.
Chairman Dowd
Anyone else in the chamber that wishes to speak in favor of this legislation? If not, | see someone online. Mr.
Richardson do you want to speak in favor?
Dan Richardson
Yes, | do. This is Dan Richardson, 70 Berkeley Street. Can you hear me?
Chairman Dowd
Yes.
Dan Richardson
Okay. | would like to first start off saying that | fully support the logic that Alderman Klee gave in the introduction. |
have been a supporter of Greeley Park for as long as | lived in Nashua, which is 30 years plus. I'm also a member of
the Friends of Greeley Park and which is primarily concerned with protecting the park and having enhancing changes
to the park when they make sense. One of the things that | am worried about is placement of private projects into a
public park. That's happened over and over again so there's always an attempt being made to diminish the value of
the park.
This is a different case. This is the case where we have land that has been appreciated as part of the park, not
knowing all the time that it had actually been private property. | understand about having a purchase and sale
agreement that we can't interfere with that but | urge you to pass this resolution to make money available because in
the event that we don't have the opportunity to buy the park outright, it makes a whole lot of sense for the developer to
