A regular meeting of the Board of Aldermen was held Tuesday, March 22, 2022, at 7:30 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 Alex Comeau 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 13 members of the Board of Aldermen present: Alderman O’Brien,
Alderman Sullivan, Alderman Moran, Alderman Lopez (arrived at 7:58), Alderman Jette, Alderman Clemons, Alderwoman
Kelly, Alderman Comeau, Alderman Dowd, Alderman Gouveia, Alderman Cathey, Alderman Thibeault, Alderwoman
Timmons, Alderman Wilshire.
Alderman Klee was recorded absent.
President Wilshire
Thank you. Alderman Klee did notify me that she was not feeling well and was unable to join us this evening.
Mayor James W. Donchess, Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton, were also in attendance.
REMARKS BY THE MAYOR
Mayor Donchess
Yes, | do Madam President. Thank you very much. | wanted to update you on a few new companies that have opened in
Nashua. Extremely good for our economy and economic development. The largest of these is KJ Cam. Now this is a
company from Malaysia who the biggest can making company in Southeast Asia. They have actually obtained a lease to
renovate our former building on Bourke Street - the one we bought for the purposes of the Public Works garage at least
and to get some land for the sewage treatment plant. So they are going to invest $120 million there - 120 plus to make
aluminum cans. It is a perfect fit for them because the building formerly Ingersoll Rand is 800 feet long, straight, and
they're going to run two can lines there. Employing 200 people. They may add some other stuff as they go along. They
will make 2.4 billion cans a year and the purpose of the move - and the gentleman from Malaysia was here, his name is
Mark Yeo, as well as somebody from Pasadena who's overseeing the US operation - is that the cost of shipping this
material these cans is so expensive now if they were made out of the country, out of the US, that it is cheaper and better
to make the cans here. So they're opening this can factory. It doesn't include any contents. They just make the cans.
They're sure they can sell them with no problem. The market in the US is huge and they believe they will have the first
line running by July. So | want to thank the State. They helped attract this opportunity - Taylor Caswell and his staff, Tim
Cummings who worked with them, our building people who are helping permit that the plant. This is a really good ending
Madam President to the long odyssey of that building, which we had hoped might suit Public Works purposes but really in
the end because of the piers was not ideal. Trucks couldn't really move around inside the building but for the can making
operation, the can manufacturing operation, it is a perfect building because the piers just go right along - parallel to the
line. So they're not an obstacle for this company KJ Can at all. That was good news.
Secondly, Rambling House Tale Spinner. | heard Alderman Clemons talking about it before the meeting. They opened
with a brewery and a restaurant on Factory Street. The brewery comes in behind off Water. | went there with my wife. It
is very good. It is our fifth downtown brewery and one of the plus two on Amherst Street. One of the other brewers from
another brewery said, you know, that's really good news because if we can get a good enough concentration, people
might come here to go from brewery to brewery. Maybe we should do that, too. | want to congratulate the Gleason family
on that venture.
And then another one, which is a different business, this | visited in the last week or so. This is a business called
“Stargate Ventures” formed by five Nashua High graduates. | don't know. They're around the age of Alderman Gouveia.
They're around 24. Maybe you knew some of them. Rob Lavine is the head of it. There's Colleen. There's Ari. There is
Oxy. There's Orson who's a little older. They're located on Quincy Street and their expertise is in cryptocurrency. If you
talk with them, and the metaverse. They know like everything, everything about cryptocurrency, a lot about the
international financial system. This is exactly what we want to see in Nashua. These are, you know, Nashua kids who
