Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee

PERSONNEL/ADMINISTRATIVE AFFAIRS COMMITTEE December 14, 2015 A meeting of the Personnel/Administrative Affairs Committee was held on Tuesday, December 14, 2015, at 7:00 p.m. in the Aldermanic Chamber. Chairman Paul M. Chasse, Jr. presided. Members of the Committee present: Alderman June M. Caron Alderman Ken Siegel Alderman Michael Soucy Alderman Sean McGuinness Also in Attendance: Alderman David Schoneman Alderman Dan Moriarty, Arrived after Roll Call PUBLIC COMMENT Fred Teeboom My name is Fred Teeboom. I reside at 24 Cheyenne Drive. I want to address what’s on the agenda O-15-46. This must be here the umpteenth time. I would like to address first of all, I’m going to address a number of things. First of all the suspension of the rules. NRO 523 requires a two-thirds vote to suspend the rules. NRO 519 prohibits reconsideration of the Mayor’s veto. What was voted was moved by Alderman Soucy was to suspend the rules. Now 523 which deals with suspension of the rules in the NRO takes a two-thirds vote has been effective since 1975. In the 23 years I’ve been involved with the aldermen in one capacity or another, I’ve never seen this rule be violated and take less than… Chairman Chasse Mr. Teeboom that was taken care of at the full Board and we got the bussing from the Corporate Counsel. You can dig up all you want but Corporate Counsel say it was okay. Fred Teeboom Corporate Counsel said it was okay to suspend the rules. Corporate Counsel did not make any ruling on a two-third vote. It was stated by Alderman Deane and referred back to Alderman McCarthy who referred to the Charter if you look at the minutes. There is nothing in the Charter… Chairman Chasse What does that have to do with what’s on our agenda tonight? Fred Teeboom That the ordinance shouldn’t even be before this committee. Chairman Chasse It will be in front of our committee and we will send it back up to the full Board. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 2 Fred Teeboom I’m just trying to make a point to the fact that it shouldn’t be. It didn’t receive the two-thirds vote. It only got 8 votes. It should have gotten 9 votes. You violated in doing so Mason Rules as well as the ordinances that you pledged to uphold. Next thing let’s get to the ordinance. There are three State laws that deal with safety for pedestrians – RSA 265:35, RSA 265:37 b, RSA 265:40. We’ve talked about this before. It deals with soliciting. It deals with safety, blockage, and right of ways. O-15-146 pretends to be about safety could affect, penalize ice cream purchases from a truck. It talks about exchanging objects in the roadway. As an example where I live at 24 Cheyenne Drive, it’s all roadway. There’s no markings. When the Good Humor truck comes by, you have to actually swerve around it. Not a steep swerve, it’s a fairly wide road, it’s all roadway. There’s no parking area marked. So if somebody, some kid, a little child is going to buy some ice cream, he could be cited for violating the proposed ordinance. It says “roadway” and it says “travel lane”. One of the many amendments roadway got further modified to say travel lane. It’s all travel lane. There’s nothing on the roadway marked anything but travel lane and everything in that roadway is a travel lane. So this fine distinction is a distinction of no value. So you can penalize kids. Also it penalizes – Alderman Soucy keeps saying it will penalize only the panhandler. It takes about distributing from and receiving from that could penalize the driver the way it’s written. There’s no two ways about that interpretation no matter what Alderman Soucy said. The Town of Hudson was sued for $37,500 because they made life difficult for panhandlers. It says in the consent agreement, this went to US District Court, it says as long as do not obstruct pedestrians or vehicle of traffic of obstruct entrance to a business, can’t stop a panhandler from soliciting. Obstructing vehicle of traffic is covered in the State laws I already mentioned. I cited at least three of the State law. So the likelihood of getting another lawsuit – in fact it mentioned on the ACLU website that the City of Nashua already has a lawsuit against it for panhandler. We don’t know this because it would be in nonpublic session but it’s not nonpublic on the ACLU website. It says Nashua. I don’t know if it’s still in place or they settled but the Town of Hudson settled for $37,500. The real purpose of O-15-156 has nothing to do with public safety. It’s to ban panhandlers. Now why do I say that? If you look at the minutes, the Board of Aldermen when the suspension removed which I cited earlier, an improper suspension, it cited second reconsideration O-15 it says I know and I’m quoting directly Alderman Soucy. “I know that the majority of this horseshoe would like to see this happen (meaning reconsideration) and the polls are indicating that 81.46 percent of the citizens would like this to happen based on that 81.46 percent of the citizens.” Now what did Alderman Soucy base that on the 81.46 percent? Well I researched that subject and it was very interesting. There was a poll on the Nashua Patch. In fact, it’s mentioned in Nashua Patch. It’s called “thepolldaddy.com”. The Nashua Patch mentioned 90 percent. Alderman Soucy mentions 81.4 percent. If you look at this poll, it says, “Should Nashua officials pass a law banning panhandlers?” This is the site poll cited by Alderman Soucy. It says yes 68 percent and no 30 percent. Both like any poll, you got to look what’s behind that poll as you know that for the Presidential poll. The total number of people voting in the poll with 2,197 people. The number that voted yes was 1,494 votes. 1,494 votes presents 1.7 percent of the citizens in Nashua provided all those who voted live in Nashua. It would be less than 1.7 percent if they didn’t live in Nashua. So how can Alderman Soucy say 81.4 percent of people would like this to happen? Completely misrepresent this. Furthermore, there was a later poll conducted by polldaddy.com later that very same month. We’re talking about the month of April. This was after the aldermen turned it down by 8 to 7. It says, “Do you agree with the decision to reject the anti-panhandling law?” The exact opposite. Guess how that poll came out? 68.5 percent says yes to these to reject and 30 percent said no. Almost the exact opposite. An exact same opposite question. The number is also small. I could sit here and say 68 percent of the people wanted it and that could also say 68.6 people didn’t want it. In all cases do I deal with a very small percentage of the population? When you deal with nasty laws, when you deal with laws that attack people’s undesirables and by god we have enough of it now in the Presidential election. It’s nasty stuff. When you misrepresent it with so-called polls, that’s really nasty stuff. Alderman Soucy you ought to be ashamed of yourself. Chairman Chasse Mr. Teeboom you’re out of order. Mr. Teeboom no attacks please. No attacks please. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 3 Fred Teeboom I am not attacking him. I am making a claim about prejudism against a poorest of our population. Unidentified Male Alderman Point of order. Fred Teeboom There’s no point of order Sir on my public comment. You can point of order on these aldermen here but not to me and I’ll give you something to comment. Chairman Chasse Mr. Teeboom let’s get back to the business please. Are you done? Fred Teeboom No. Highly prejudicial. The fact that it was turned on three times and comes back again and again. This Mr. Chairman should not leave this committee again or we’ll face the same music again. The full Board, the Mayor already vetoed it. The Mayor understood what this is all about. I’ve been here four times now. Five times talking about this thing. This is one of the most disgusting pieces of legislation I’ve ever seen in my 22 years. Chairman Chasse Thank you. Is there anyone else who would like to speak? Please come up and state your name, address. Maryellen McKay Thank you. My name is Maryellen McKay and I live at 9 Webster Street here in Nashua. I guess I’m going to be kind of a rebuttal to Mr. Teeboom. I want to relate a personal experience and that night at the Aldermen’s meeting I alerted the Police Chief about my personal experience. On Amherst Street going almost to the Merrimack line when you sit at those lights, I sat there one day and there must have been about 6 people running in and out of the traffic banging on the cars, shoving buckets in. It scared me to death as a driver because if I didn’t see somebody coming from the side or coming from behind, what if somebody got hit. So for me this is a real safety issue. I don’t’ see it as a social issue. I don’t see it as an issue violating a class of people because I don’t think that’s what this issue is. I think this issue speaks to people driving and wanting to feel safe and follow the rules of the road without having somebody come up when you’re stopped at a red light when you should absolutely be paying attention to when the light changes and if there’s going to be anything in the road in front of you. For that reason, I fully support this and everyone I’ve spoken to all of whom live in Nashua are fully supportive. I haven’t talked to anybody personally who said no. So I just want to step up and say I had a different point of view and thank you for listening. Chairman Chasse Anyone else like to speak? Okay. We’ll get into the interviews. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 4 INTERVIEWS Conservation Commission Brandon Pierotti (New Appointment) Term to Expire: December 31, 2018 Mayor Lozeau I think this is my last time visiting you with nominees. I have a lovely selection this evening for your consideration. Chairman Chasse Thank God. Mayor Lozeau The first nominee this evening is sitting to my left Mr. Brandon Pierotti. I’m sure that you’ve had an opportunity to take a look at his information. Brandon actually is one of our Eagle Scouts here in Nashua. That’s when I first met him. While he was in college, he was interning here in our Community Development Department. Very interested in trying to find a way to give back to the city. He reached out to me and talked to me about going on the Planning or the Zoning Board. I told him although I loved his enthusiasm, I thought maybe he might want to start with a different board and learn some of that from the ground up here in the city. Conservation seemed to be a good fit for him. He has an understanding of that. He’s willing to be out there looking at what’s going on and participate with the committee. I think it’s a wonderful opportunity for him to learn about the city from a different perspective. It is my distinct pleasure to be bringing him here tonight to speak to the committee. I know that you met him before at a full board meeting. He came in and shared his interest with you as well. Brandon Pierotti Thank you very much Mayor for that introduction. I believe she summed it up pretty well. In college I was very active on different boards and things and now that I’ve graduated from school, I really don’t want it to be any different. I’ve lived in Nashua all my life and I want to give back to the community and stay involved. I believe that I can positively contribute to the Conservation Commission. Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to thank Mr. Pierotti. It’s always nice to have somebody who’s a Nashua native and an Eagle Scout come back to the city and want to contribute. Thank you very much. Chairman Chasse How did you get your Eagle Scout? What did you do for a… Brandon Pierotti I did landscaping at St. Christopher School in Nashua. Chairman Chasse Good job. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 5 Alderman Schoneman Thank you Mr. Chairman. I’m not on this committee but I am here for some of the appointments that have come in this evening. I have not had a chance to meet with you or speak with you but I really want to second Alderman Siegel’s thanks to you and his pleasure at seeing that you’re stepping up to serve. I think being an Eagle Scout is great. It’s a program that encourages leadership and teaches people things. One of the things it provides is an incentive to come back and do things for the community. So thank you for your service to Nashua and we’re looking forward to your service on that board. Chairman Chasse Thank you for your willingness to serve and we’ll take up your nomination in a few minutes. Brandon Pierotti Thank you very much. Cultural Connections Committee Jean Adie (New Appointment) Term to Expire: December 31, 2018 Mayor Lozeau Thank you Mr. Chairman. You probably had an opportunity to look at Jean’s resume tonight as well. As you can see, she has quite a remarkable background. I was very pleased when she reached out and said that she was excited to learn that we had a Cultural Connections Committee in the community and that she would like to serve on it. Her experience with Dartmouth and the population that we’re trying to make more of a part of our community I think is really remarkable actually when you look at it. I’m really kind of dazzled. I look at tonight as well. As you can see, she has quite a remarkable background. I was very pleased when she reached out and said that she was excited to learn that we had a Cultural Connections Committee in the community and that she would like to serve on it. Her experience with Dartmouth and the population that we’re trying to make more of a part of our community I think is really remarkable actually when you look at it. I’m really kind of dazzled. I look at 3, 4 degrees. I don’t know how you had time to do all of that and still give back and work full time. It’s a very impressive. As Jean was telling me earlier, she’s a fourth generation native to our city. As many of you know, the Chairman of the Cultural Connections Committee is an alderman elect right now. So that committee certainly would benefit from somebody that brings a lot to the table. Jean’s been attending their meetings already on a regular basis and so I think she has a lot to offer. It’s my pleasure to introduce you to Jean Adie. Jean Adie Thank you Mayor Lozeau. Thank you very much for having me here tonight. As Mayor Lozeau said, I am a fourth generation Nashuan. My great grandparents came over as immigrants from Lithuania, Poland, and Canada Quebec. When they came over to this city, they lived in the Bridge Street area. My mother grew up in what she calls the Lithuania ghetto. They worked the mills. The city we have here today, the community we have here today is because of the many immigrants that came in. I look at our community today and how many different racial and ethnic individuals are moving in from places that may be more exotic than Canada was at the turn of the century. What they are is our future. All of the culture that they bring in to this city today is going to make our tomorrow. Being a mother of two daughters who are Nashuans, I would love for them to see what a colorful future we will have. Because of the Cultural Connections Committee – something that wasn’t here at the turn of the century – we have a way to increase communication and to celebrate that diversity. I can’t think of a better way for me to professionally enhance my job but also personally enhance my soul. I know that that sounds really kind of grandiose but I am really excited about this committee and being able to serve in the community on this level. Thank you. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 6 Alderman Caron Thank you. Ms. Adie your willingness to serve on this board is really great because your enthusiasm I think is going to bring some good perspective to that committee. I think it’s wonderful. I read your resume before and I think it’s great. Thank you so much for your willingness to serve. Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chair. Outstanding resume I must say. I’m really impressed. Intimidating actually but in a good way. I’d like to thank incoming Alderman Tom Lopez for heading up that committee and also I went to the cultural navigator’s graduation ceremony. I’ll tell you what, Nashua is a great place. We have some really good people and this kind of work you sit there and you realize that that’s really important to make people feel a part of the community. This is great. Thank you. Jean Adie Thank you very much. Chairman Chasse Thank you for your willingness to serve and we’ll take up your nomination in a few minutes. Hunt Memorial Building Board of Trustees Harold Solomon (New Appointment) Term to Expire: December 31, 2018 Mayor Lozeau Thank you Mr. Chairman. Now you’ve seen some pretty impressive resumes to date. I think when it comes to Harold Solomon, there’s no need for a resume or a bio. I think most of us in the community know of him and of course his wife Marilyn. As many of you know, she served on the Hunt Memorial Board for as long as I can ever remember and the Hunt Board has benefitted significantly from all of her efforts both in her dedication to it, in her vision of what its future was, the fabulous book that she wrote. Its proceeds have brought in more than $25,000 to the Hunt for what they’re doing. Harold has been attending meetings at the Hunt for a very long time as the mascot and you know it occurred to me when I was looking at that board and when I was attending the celebration of life for Marilyn that there would be no better person to serve on that board that would understand its history and care about it as much as Harold did. It’s funny the former Chairman Joy Barrett sent me a message and said you know who’d be great for the Board of Trustees? I told her that great minds really think alike. I think Harold brings a lot to the table. I think the city would be really fortunate to have him among those Trustees and it’s my distinct honor to ask for your consideration for his appointment tonight. Harold Solomon Thank you. Mayor I really appreciate the opportunity to give back to the community and to continue on what Marilyn had started. I have been kind of a mascot taking her to the meetings. I have a good feeling of what is going on and what things need to be done. I have some ideas as well. I also have about 4 gigabytes of Hunt information on my computer. I really want to thank everybody for an opportunity to give back to the community and to continue Marilyn’s work. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 7 Alderman Siegel Again we’re three for three here. Again for the sake of the community, it’s an honor to have you step up and I appreciate that the Mayor is bringing this nomination to the table. Thank you very much. Chairman Chasse You’re going to get away easy tonight. We’re going to take up your nomination in a few minutes. Thank you. Nashua Airport Authority Michael Mahoney (New Appointment) Term to Expire: August 31, 2017 Robert Scheifele (New Appointment) Term to Expire: August 31, 2019 Mayor Lozeau This evening the two Airport Authority nominees, this is the first time in the 8 years I’ve been nominating people for your consideration that I have neither spoken to nor met with either of these two gentlemen. The reason is because based on all of the different things happening at the airport and two open seats, I thought it would be really important to take a different approach to make sure that people have an opportunity that were interested to apply. So I asked both Alderman Schoneman and Alderman McCarthy if they would sit on an interview team where they would take in applicants that had written in. We put an ad in the paper and that sort of thing and if they would interview them and make recommendations. They did that. They invested the time and they spent a full day doing interviews, made a recommendation to me at the end of the day of the two gentlemen that you see here today. I spoke with Mayor Elect Donchess to make sure that he was fine with us moving forward so we could get them started and he was fine with both the process and the nominations. I wanted you to know that too. As you know the Airport Authority Commissions there’s a term there and it’s important to make sure that everybody understands the issues that are happening at the airport and the skill set that we’d like to bring to the table to join the remaining members on the Airport Authority. I would thank Alderman Schoneman and Alderman McCarthy for their efforts and I would thank both gentlemen for taking the time to be interested and to apply for those positions. It sounds funny to say they’ve applied. They get no pay. It’s all volunteer just in case. It’s my pleasure to introduce them both to you tonight and my pleasure to have met them. Michael Mahoney Thank you Mayor and thank you folks. I’m Mike Mahoney. I’m actually a resident of Hudson but I’m a pilot. Flown from the Nashua Airport for many years. By day I’m a mild mannered financial analyst for Lockheed Martin with a specialty in governmental accounting. I learned from Alderman Schoneman that there was a need at the airport specifically on the Authority. It’s something I’m very interested in. I think the airport is a great resource. I think it needs to be protected. It needs to be run right. I’m happy to be able to volunteer to give back to the community in any way that I can but particularly for something that matters so much to me personally. Alderman Siegel I’d be remiss if I didn’t thank you for stepping up to the plate. I think it’s great that you have a background as both a pilot and also a financial analyst because after all the airport has to run as a business in a sense. That’s great. Thank you. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 8 Alderman Schoneman Thank you Mr. Chairman and thanks for both of the candidates coming in tonight. I appreciated having a chance to interview both of you. I’ll speak about Mike Mahoney in just a moment here and I will speak about Mr. Scheifele in a moment too. I would say that the five candidates that we interviewed were all highly qualified candidates and it was a pleasure to have a chance to talk to so many people about the opportunities that are available at the airport. I’m glad that we had so many good ones. We tried to compose a team of 5, in this case picking 2 people, it’s somewhat like picking players on a basketball team. There are 5 men on the court. You don’t want 5 centers. You don’t want 5 forwards. You don’t want 5 guards. You need a variety of people. Looking at the composition of the members on the board presently and the characteristics that both of you gentlemen bring, I think we’re able to put together a team on that board that will serve the airport and will serve the community well. Thanks both for stepping up and Mike I appreciate your background and your willingness to serve and the same for Mr. Scheifele. Thank you. Robert Scheifele Good evening. Thank you Mayor for your fine comments. I’ve spent the majority of my life living outside the United States. In 1991, I left Europe where I was yesterday by the way and I came back to the United States with a terrible burden and that was I could pick anywhere in the United States that I chose to live. I had no restrictions on anything and I remembered my days of reading Money Magazine and I got impressed by the City of Nashua. So I decided to come here and I sat on a bench on Main Street and watched the street for about an hour. I went into the Chamber of Commerce and got the literature about the town and read about it. Within another hour, I made the decision that this was going to be my home. I fell in love with Nashua. I married here and I have a daughter who is born here, has gone through the entire education system here, is a college student here in Nashua. She’s going to be a Registered Nurse soon. I realized that while I have been traveling all over the world and learning all about the world, I was not very good as an American citizen and my citizenship skills were lacking. I started to devote myself to re-educating myself on American, the United States and particular in small town. I became very interested in American history and traveled to a lot of location in the United States to further my education. I became engaged here in Nashua as a volunteer with the Red Cross and that eventually lead to employment, eventually lead to becoming the leader of the Red Cross here in Nashua and other activities. I’ve been on the Review and Comment Committee twice. I’m a firm believer in community service and giving back to the community. As I said during my initial interview, I am not a pilot although I have flown considerably especially in Vietnam as a crew member but not as a pilot. I am not a member of the airport community but I am a member of the Nashua community. I have a business management leadership background and I’ve done a multitude of various things including being an instructor at the college level. I still do lecturing. I write an occasional column for the Telegraph. I am embedded in this community and I am absolutely committed to doing as much as possible that I can for this community, this city, and I am active in the Office of Emergency Management here. I’m just very proud that I’ve arrived at this juncture and I’m looking forward if finally appointed to continue serving the City of Nashua. Mayor Lozeau Now I know why I know ya. Could you pronounce your name for all of us so we say it correctly? Robert Scheifele Shy-full. Yesterday it was pronounced Shy-ful-la in Germany when I was there. Alderman Siegel Mr. Chair I’d like to thank my colleagues Alderman McCarthy and Alderman Schoneman for going through the process and the Mayor for bringing the nominations forward. I think it’s an excellent idea and Mr. Scheifele I appreciate your coming forward. It’s nice to know those Money Magazine articles actually matter. If not for that, you might not be sitting here. Who da thunk? Fantastic. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 9 Alderman Schoneman Thank you Mr. Chairman. I apologize for mispronouncing your name. Again thanks to you two and to all the volunteers who came out tonight. I don’t speak on every one and not a member of the committee as I said before. I’m very, very grateful for all the service that volunteers provide whether it’s the Airport Authority and the other boards and commissions. Volunteerism is a big part of municipal and civil life really and things don’t get done if it isn’t’ for all the volunteers which includes us around a horseshoe too when it comes right down to it. Thank you very much. We’re looking forward to meeting in January assuming the nominations goes forward and looking forward to seeing you. Alderman Siegel With regard to the comment about volunteers, I thought you might be interested in knowing that Tennessee is known as the volunteer stated. They have it written on their license plate. The State of New Hampshire has more active volunteers than any other State in the country. Unidentified Male Speaker That’s because we live free or die. Chairman Chasse Well gentlemen I want to thank you for your willingness to serve and we’ll take your appointment up in a few minutes. Mayor Lozeau Mr. Chairman if you wouldn’t mind indulging me just for a moment seeing it’s my last meeting with the committee anyway. Chairman Chasse You’re not going to cry I hope. Mayor Lozeau How long have you known me? All right. What I wanted to do was two things. The first thing is I wanted to mention that I hope the committee might be able to take up the CTAB legislation tonight before the end of the year. I met with the CTAB Committee to walk through it about the appointments and what’s been recommended. I talked to the Police Chief, the Fire Chief, Public Works, all the group and would really appreciate if the legislation has an opportunity tonight. Now ordinarily I would stay for that but we have 35 cheerleaders who are coming back to Nashua having placed second in Florida for the Nashua Elks Crusaders. So I’m committed to greeting them when they get back to the city. The legislation is O-15-038. The reason for the change if you wouldn’t mind me just quickly telling you is you know when CTAB was first started, we didn’t really have operational stations. At that time, it made sense to put so much of the city Directors onto the committee as it was developing. Now that it’s a pretty well-oiled machine and operating well, it seemed to make sense to take some of those positions off now. City Corporation Counsel doesn’t have to be a regular member, the Fire, Police as I said. The only thing that we talked about changing was item F which would say, “Four members of whom three are Nashua residents” to allow for a business owner. So I just wanted to say that. The last thing I wanted to say is I did want to tell the committee thank you for – I’ve spent more time in this committee than on the other committee other than budget time. I have appreciated the courtesy that you have shown the volunteers that I bring before you and me in the efforts that I’ve put in trying to make sure that we have full representation on all of our boards and commissions. We’ve appointed over 300 people together and I think that’s’ pretty amazing. I just wanted to say thank you. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 10 Chairman Chasse Before you go Mayor, the reason we tabled that was because I had asked for an attendance record for the individuals who were on that committee. It seemed that some of the people that were showing up all the time were the ones that were being taken off the committee. Alderman Moriarty was supposed to get that attendance record for me and we’ve never seen it. I’ve asked him twice. I don’t know who you’re planning on putting on there. Mayor Lozeau So we’re leaving the members that are there – we’re shrinking the size of the committee because it’s not necessary to be so large. We’re adding the Emergency Management Director because that makes sense based on what they’re doing. We’re leaving the Public Library designee, somebody from the schools, the IT Director is going to stay on it, and then we have a member of the Nashua business community that’s on it. As I said, four residents appointed by the Mayor. So who’s coming off is the Mayor. The Director of IT is on there. I think the Mayor is well represented. The Director of Public Works, the Chief of Police and the Fire Department Chief, and the City Attorney so otherwise the members will stay. You’re right some of the consistent attendees are fire, police, and Public Works but there’s just not really a reason for them to be members of that committee and there’s not really a reason for the committee to be as large as it has been. It’s different now. Chairman Chasse I guess I’m going to try to brainstorm. How about if we send it up to the full board without any recommendation if it’s the will of this committee and then we can have the names in front of us for the next full board and we can handle it right there. Mayor Lozeau Be happy to do that. Chairman Chasse Get it into our packet on Friday or something like that. Mayor Lozeau Happy to do that. I also did talk to the Mayor Elect about this legislation as well to make sure that he didn’t – I didn’t want to let be pulling a fast one when it looked like it was lingering. Chairman Chasse You know there’s another little Christmas gift for you. COMMUNICATIONS - None APPLICATION TO LICENSE HAWKER'S, PEDDLER'S, ITINERANT VENDOR'S LICENSE - None Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 11 APPOINTMENTS BY THE MAYOR MOTION BY ALDERMAN CARON TO RECOMMEND THE CONFIRMATION OF THE FOLLOWING MAYORAL APPOINTMENTS: TO THE BOARD OF REGISTRARS: KATHRYN FOGAL AND PATRICIA LUCIER FOR TERMS TO EXPIRE DECEMBER 31, 2018; TO THE CONSERVATION COMMISSION: BRANDON PIEROTTI, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE DECEMBER 31, 2018; TO THE CULTURAL CONNECTIONS COMMITTEE: JEAN ADIE, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE DECEMBER 31, 2018; TO THE HUNT MEMORIAL BUILDING BOARD OF TRUSTEES: HAROLD SOLOMON, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE DECEMBER 31, 2018; TO THE NASHUA AIRPORT AUTHORITY: MICHAEL MAHONEY, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE AUGUST 31, 2017, AND ROBERT SCHEIFELE, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE: AUGUST 31, 2019; AND TO THE NASHUA HOUSING AUTHORITY: TOM MONAHAN, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE OCTOBER 14, 2020 MOTION CARRIED APPOINTMENTS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN MOTION BY ALDERMAN CARON TO RECOMMEND THE CONFIRMATION OF THE FOLLOWING APPOINTMENTS BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF ALDERMEN: TO THE HUNT LEGACY TRUSTEES: ARTHUR OLSSON, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE DECEMBER 31, 2017; AND TO THE IRA F. HARRIS LECTURE TRUSTEES: JUDITH CUDHEA, FOR A TERM TO EXPIRE: DECEMBER 31, 2017 MOTION CARRIED UNFINISHED BUSINESS – RESOLUTIONS – None UNFINISHED BUSINESS – ORDINANCES O-15-046, Amended Endorsers: Alderman Michael Soucy Alderman David Schoneman Alderman Sean M. McGuinness Alderman Ken Siegel Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire PROHIBITING THE PASSING OF OBJECTS TO OR FROM THE OCCUPANT OF A MOTOR VEHICLE ON A ROADWAY  Reconsidered & Re-Referred – 11/10/15 MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO AMEND ON THE QUESTION Alderman Siegel Are you going to speak on a variety of topics and then propose the amendment or is there a paper copy? Alderman Soucy I am just going to amend it right now. I think this is like the third time this will be amended. While I was amending this ordinance I took to heart some of the things that I’ve from the public and my colleagues. When you look at the beginning it says “distributing or receiving objects to or from occupants of a motor vehicle.” I want to add a definition in there so under I. we will put definition of striped travel lane. The definition of a striped travel lane is a striped lane to define the intended path of travel of a motor vehicle on a public roadway. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 12 Alderman Siegel I’m trying to figure out where that exactly is. Alderman Soucy If you look at the title 320-22.1 – Distributing and Receiving; before we get to intent of section, I’d like to put the definition there. I mean the definition can really go anyplace and that’s up to legal but the important thing is that we get the definition in there. The definition of a striped travel lane is “a striped lane to define the intended path of travel of a motor vehicle on a public roadway.” Alderman Siegel Is the intent here to not include suburban side streets? Alderman Soucy The intent is to save the ice cream truck. The primary issues were that people were almost involved in accidents were getting a little afraid or where the solicitors whether they be firefighters, the church groups, PAL, or the actual panhandlers are on the main road such as Amherst Street, Broad Street or D.W. Highway. These are all striped roads. Basically, I am taking a significant portion of the roadways in the City of Nashua out of play. All of these little neighborhood roads that don’t have stripes are now out of play. We don’t see solicitors or panhandlers on any of these roads because traffic tends to be a little bit lower, they will be on busier roads. You can also look at Kinsley Street, that’s a striped road but again, if a vehicle comes out of the striped travel lane and legally parks they will be fine. There’s no question now about the ice cream truck or the Telegraph carrier or anyone else out there on these roads trying to make a legal exchange. MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO AMEND BY ADDING THE FOLLOWING DEFINITION IS SECTION 320-22.1: STRIPED TRAVEL LANE. “A STRIPED TRAVEL LANE IS A STRIPED LANE TO DEFINE THE INTENDED PATH OF TRAVEL OF A MOTOR VEHICLE ON A PUBLIC ROADWAY MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO FURTHER AMEND O-14-046 ON THE QUESTION Alderman Soucy In section B, section 1 says “no person shall distribute any object to or receive any object from or exchange any object with the occupant of a motor vehicle when the vehicle is located in the travel portion of a roadway.” I am amending this to take out “the travel portion” and change it to “a striped travel lane or on an off-ramp.” The sentence will now read “with the occupant of a motor vehicle when the vehicle is located in a striped travel lane or an on and off-ramp.” I wanted to add the on and off-ramps because I am not sure if every one of them is striped but I think it’s just as dangerous to be on an on and off-ramp with people out there soliciting. Alderman Siegel Do we have authority over on and off-ramps? Alderman Soucy Yes, we do. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 13 Alderman Siegel For Route 3? Alderman Soucy Yes, we do. We have joint jurisdiction with the state and the city. MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO FURTHER AMEND O-14-046 ON THE QUESTION Alderman Soucy If we look at the last sentence of section B, section 2; “no portion of the vehicle is located upon or is obscuring or obstructing any portion of any travel lane.” I want to add in the word “striped” so it would be “obscuring or obstructing any portion of any striped travel lane or on the roadway.” MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO FURTHER AMEND O-14-046 ON THE QUESTION Alderman Soucy The next amendment is in section C. I’ve heard some people say that a $500.00 fine is far too much money for those people that can’t afford it. I’ve argued that it’s only up to $500.00 but I wanted to put in the words “community service.” The sentence will now read “any person violating this section shall be fined as follows: The offense will have a fine of not more than $500.00 and/or community service.” Even though that option is already available for a judge, I wanted it to be clear. What a great thing; sending someone who is in need to the soup kitchen to maybe get the help that they require. MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO FURTHER AMEND O-14-046 ON THE QUESTION Alderman Soucy I believe I got the last amendment out of Charleston, SC. It’s called the “yellow card.” The last sentence of the ordinance says that “this ordinance shall become effective upon passage.” I would like to amend that to “this ordinance shall become effective upon thirty days of passage with the intent of providing an education period relative to this ordinance.” How that education is done is not even implied. It can be done any way that they see fit; it’s up to the police. They can give them a copy of the law and when it will be effective and then what will happen. Hopefully they can also put telephone numbers and services of things that these people may or may not want but at least it’s offered to them. Alderman Siegel Now I’m confused because you have a warning clause. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 14 Alderman Soucy No, that was taken out. Alderman Siegel It seems like the language is a little bit awkward. Upon thirty days of passage? What does that mean? Alderman Soucy After thirty days…say if this passed on the 22nd and it’s not vetoed, then thirty days after August 22nd this ordinance will be in effect. Alderman Siegel So it will become effective following thirty days after its enacted. Alderman Soucy Yes. Alderman Siegel Can you read the sentence back to me again? Alderman Soucy Sure. “This ordinance shall become effective upon thirty days of passage with the intent of providing an education period relative to this ordinance.” Alderman Chasse I think that needs to be cleaned up. Alderman Soucy Okay. Alderman Chasse How about “this ordinance will become effective thirty days after passage. Alderman Soucy Okay so let’s read it again. “This ordinance shall become effective upon thirty days after passage with the intent of providing an education period relative to the ordinance.” Alderman Siegel My colleague, Alderman Soucy, loves the word “upon.” I think it should be “this ordinance shall become effective thirty days after passage.” There’s no upon. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 15 Alderman Soucy Okay so it’s “this ordinance shall become effective thirty days after passage with the intent of providing an education period relative to this ordinance.” Alderman McGuinness I think that’s fine. MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE AS AMENDED ON THE QUESTION Alderman Soucy I want to bring up the fact that the laws, again, address under 265:40 and 265, they are not duplicate laws. The legal ease in the wording does not cover the intent of this legislation. It does allow people to still be on medians, it just speaks about people not being in the roadway. This is unfairly being compared to the Hudson lawsuit and I would ask people to really look at the Hudson lawsuit and see what happened. That was harassment and First Amendment Rights and holding signs. This is completely different. This allows people to hold signs and exercise their First Amendment Rights. They just can’t do an action in the roadway. When we talk about that it’s likely to be challenged, that again is incorrect; it hasn’t been challenged. This is the model, the best practice that we have seen around the country and it started with Concord and it’s moved onto Rochester and it’s going down to South Carolina. I sat with the ACLU and they will not challenge it because it’s constitutional sound, they haven’t challenged it in Concord for over a year and they haven’t challenged Rochester either because it’s not a First Amendment violation. Panhandling always brings in the ACLU to look at carefully if people’s rights are being violated. When we start talking about permits especially downtown is the model that people are using, it has not been challenged at this point. The poll, yes, a very small percentage; any poll is a small percentage; I used the 81.4% because that’s the number that the poll was the day that I used it. It’s a fluid poll that goes up and down and I rightfully sited my poll and where it came from. The problem is not panhandlers; I know it’s been called the panhandling law. The problem is really solicitors. In all honesty I am getting more complaints about firefighters and the Police Athletic League in which I was the police officer director of PAL, an organization that I greatly love and respect. I am getting complaints about the church groups, all of them are more than the panhandling. This is really a solicitor’s law in the striped travel portion of the roadway. To imply that I am being prejudice and that I should be ashamed of myself, I can assure you that I am not ashamed of myself, I am representing my constituents and my core belief. I think when it becomes personal it’s wrong and out of bounds and good, valid arguments that differ from mine somehow lose their validity when personal attacks are made. I have debated this issue with integrity and I have listened respectfully. Challenge my vote, my opinion or whatever you want to do. Alderman Chasse Two weekends ago PAL was collecting at Exit 6 going into Home Depot and it was aggressive. There were four people standing on the sidewalk and three people standing in the middle of the road taking their buckets and tapping on windows. I’ve never seen that before. I spoke to the director of PAL and he said he was going to handle it. That’s why I asked the City Clerk if they needed a permit. Seeing that I’m leaving at the end of the year maybe some of the other Aldermen that are going to be carrying on can put in some type of legislation that reminds them that there is a state law and there are rules and regulations on what they can and can’t do. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 16 Alderman Soucy As a last thought, the Mayor did veto this for her own reasons and I respect the power of her veto and will not challenge that. However, one of the things in her veto that I noticed where we are in agreement is she did indicate that people on the median was a safety issue. By removing people from a median without this law and if they want to continue that means that they now have to come out of a median and go to the sidewalk side. If they go to the sidewalk side, the median is always going to be on the driver’s side and it’s much easier to make the exchange that way. Now they are just coming out of the median and they are just moving people from one unsafe location to a more unsafe location because now you have to reach over to the passenger side to make that exchange. I am hoping that with some of the amendments here that maybe the Mayor and I can marry up some of our concerns and get this moving forward. Alderman Caron While I appreciate Alderman Soucy’s amendments and ideas, you haven’t changed my mind. In Manchester the police chief is ticketing their drivers who are giving the money to the panhandlers. Why aren’t we ticketing both? The driver is the one that’s causing the safety issues because there are laws about travel lanes and not being able to stop in them. To me it’s one sided. As far as the police and fire, I find that offensive that these people are aggressively soliciting for funds and that we really have to look at that. Hopefully the police commission will come down hard on PAL. The driver of the vehicle is responsible for stopping in the travel lane to hand someone money. You will still get a no vote from me but I respect all of the hard work that you did on this. Alderman Soucy Thank you, Alderman Caron, I find your argument to be the strongest argument out there against it but here’s my response to that. The ticketing happening up in Manchester, they are being ticketed under 265:37-B “Avoidance of Lane Blockages” and you are right that they deserve a ticket for stopping. The problem is they are ticketing today and they are going to ticket tomorrow and next month and the next five years and the reason why that’s going to continue is that it’s never going to stop the problem because there are hundreds of thousands of drivers using these roadways and they are stopping and a lot of people aren’t familiar with the law so while you have that one solicitor in the median, the officer can go and stop the vehicle and while he’s writing his ticket he drives away and then another vehicle is going to run into that. The best comparison is if a child comes home sick from school you treat the child but if three or four come home maybe it’s time to go after the root of why the child is sick. I am saying that the solicitor is the root of the vehicle stopping. It’s much easier to address a law with five, six, seven people and if you address it you take away that root cause. Alderman Siegel I doubt I will change my colleague, Alderman Caron’s mind but to add, none of what we are doing here precludes ticketing the drivers and that may be appropriate under certain circumstances. The problem is that without this we have a very incomplete tool kit. Imagine if our drug laws were set up so the only we could do was to ticket the people who injected heroin but not the people that sold it and I know that’s not the same thing. In each case one is the nexus of a particular problem and in this case it would be the solicitor and the rest of the people are sucked into doing something that is not safe for the rest of us. This is an adjunct law that is something that helps complete the enforcement tools. I know you will still vote no. Alderman Schoneman Thank you, Alderman Soucy, for all of the amendments. I like the legislation and I think it’s the right thing to do. I had an experience at Home Depot as well and it was very aggressive. I also had an experience a few weeks ago and I was on a motorcycle and traffic just stopped and the rest of us weren’t expecting it and the guy behind me had to slam on his breaks. This ordinance can eliminate one of those reasons for someone stopping when the rest of us don’t expect them to stop. It doesn’t solve all of the problems with people Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 17 stopping. I respect the arguments on both sides and I don’t see this being a First Amendment issue because there is no imposition on free speech or assembly, it’s just a safety factor. Thank you for your work and I support it. MOTION CARRIED NEW BUSINESS – RESOLUTIONS O-15-077 Endorser: Alderman-at-Large David W. Deane ESTABLISHING A SUBSTANDARD LIVING CONDITIONS ALDERMANIC SPECIAL COMMITTEE MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE ON THE QUESTION Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chair. I’d like to propose an amendment to this legislation and I’d like to speak about it as the current Chair if that would be okay. I’d like to propose that the special committee of it says, “comprise of three aldermen” in Section 6 A. I would like to propose that would be five aldermen instead of three. That is based on my experience as the committee Chair. I think there’s a lot of work that needs to be done. We run a risk if two aldermen for one reason can’t make it, we don’t have a quorum whereas with a five member committee we would. I just think it’s just a practical change to what we have now. MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO AMEND SECTION 6A TO COMPRISE OF FIVE (5) ALDERMEN MOTION CARRIED MOTION BY ALDERMAN SOUCY TO RECOMMEND FINAL PASSAGE AS AMENDED MOTION CARRIED NEW BUSINESS – ORDINANCES – None TABLED IN COMMITTEE MOTION BY ALDERMAN CHASSE TO TAKE FROM THE TABLE O-15-38 MOTION CARRIED O-15-038 Endorsers: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau Alderman-at-Large Daniel T. Moriarty Alderwoman Pamela T. Brown AMENDING THE COMPOSITION OF THE CABLE TELEVISION ADVISORY BOARD  Tabled – 3/16/15 MOTION BY ALDERMAN CHASSE TO SEND O-15-038 TO THE FULL BOARD WITH NO RECOMMENDATION ON THE QUESTION Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 18 Alderman Soucy You know I think the Mayor is absolutely right and I’m going to support this when it comes up. Years ago I sat on the CTAB and it was just too, too large of a committee. I’m going to support it. Chairman Chasse Let the record show that Alderman Moriarty has just joined us. I’m sure he wants to speak but before you do let me just tell you what happened prior of you showing up. We had a discussion with the Mayor after the interviews and she didn’t have all the names of the people that are going to be, who’s getting on, who’s coming off. I told her I would sent it up to the full board and that she will have the names in our packet over the weekend so that we know whose going here or there. I had requested from you their attendance records which we never received. Alderman Moriarty I made that request and they don’t keep attendance. Chairman Chasse Really? Alderman Caron They must have minutes. Alderman Moriarty You can disagree if you want but the fact remains that I made the request and they do not have the attendance records. Chairman Chasse So in other words you’re telling me they don’t have minutes of the meetings? Alderman Moriarty Pretty much. Chairman Chasse Wow. Okay. Alderman Siegel Isn’t that a requirement? Am I wrong here but that seems to be a minimum requirement is attendance and at least some minutes which reflect what actions were taken at the meeting? Chairman Chasse I always thought so but evidently surprise. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 19 Alderman Soucy We had minutes and attendance when I was on about 8, 9, 10 years ago. I’m surprised by that myself. Chairman Chasse I think this is going to be brought up at the full Board. Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chair. I’m loathed to recommend legislation that doesn’t require that. I don’t even know if we can amend it at the committee level but I just thought that’s just standard fair for committees. How can a committee function without an attendance record or minutes? It’s supposed to be in the public record. Alderman Moriarty If I can finish. I’ve made copies and I was going to suggest a couple of changes. Chairman Chasse Yeah we’re sending it up with no recommendation so maybe you ought to save those changes for the full board when we get it up there. It’s going out of this committee tonight one way or another. Is it a lot of amendments or is it the names of the individuals? Alderman Moriarty We had discussion at CTAB and I talked to the people and some people attend a lot. It’s pretty obvious who attends and who doesn’t. For instance, Ed Lecius is there all the time. There are some people that are all – the original legislation that the Mayor had suggested ended up eliminating a couple of positions which happened to be some people who have excellent attendance records. So I’ve found out a way of keeping the opportunity for them to be on the board by making a few adjustments here. I can just resubmit it next term for all I care. Chairman Chasse No, no. It’s going to be at the full board meeting. We’re not making any recommendations down here. I’m sending it up there with no recommendations. It’s going to come out on the docket and so we it will be there. That’s when you can because the Mayor in the interim is going to put the names of the individuals that are going to be staying on and who’s being removed. It’s going to be in our packet this weekend so that we have a chance to see the maneuvering of the individuals – who’s going, who’s staying. Alderman Moriarty Who’s expiring and who’s being… Chairman Chasse Yup. Alderman Soucy Thank you Mr. Chairman. Yeah I’d be leary of looking at any amendments when I don’t have it in front of me today also. I think that time would be the full board. It may be obvious that – I did not research it tonight because it was tabled. I didn’t think that it was going to come up tonight until the Mayor brought it up. It may Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 20 be obvious on the attendance issue that Mr. Ed Lecius is always there but it’s not obvious to the public or many of us. I would hope that there are minutes and attendance to this committee. My personal feeling if there are no minutes and no attendance, I’m not doing anything with this. I’m just going to vote no. Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chairman. I remember that there was some mention made earlier to amend stuff so that Mr. Lecius could be a member of the committee. I know that I had a big problem with changing legislation to fit a temporary membership. This could last 50 years. It was being torqued around so that we could make sure that Ed Lecius stayed on the committee because he was kind enough to attend. I appreciate his service but that seemed at the time to be an unusual reason to change the legislation. Put the people in there and then make sure whoever is serving shows up and take attendance and take minutes. I’m stunned. Chairman Chasse Alderman Moriarty I guess my question to you is that list that you have match what the Mayor has? Alderman Moriarty From the CTAB members what we suggest the changes be made to O-15-38. This is a copy of O-15-38 marked up that I was going to hand out and go through quickly to see what we would recommend changing. Chairman Chasse Well you’re going to have to do it at the full board anyways because we’re sending this up with no recommendation. So you might as well do it at the full board in front of all 15 aldermen and do exactly what you have in your hand to all 15 individuals so that we can vote on it. That’s my suggestion. It’s up to the rest of the committee. Alderman Siegel Thank you Mr. Chairman. Doesn’t that violate a fundamental tenant of Alderman Chasse’s entire term which is all this type of work should be done in committee? Chairman Chasse Kind of like but this is a going away present you know what I’m saying. It’s going up to the full board because I’d like to see it get taken care of. Alderman Moriarty Let me hand these out at least so at least you have a preview and let you know what was the purpose. At least CTAB agreed. There’s one problem. There are too many members and we have a hard time getting a quorum. So it would help allowing – we’ll have 7 people sitting here and not have a quorum because it sits 15 members on the board. So amongst ourselves, it seemed obvious to everybody that attends all the time that if we reduced the size of CTAB then we’ll be able to improve the likelihood of there being a quorum. So we went through and looked at what people never attend; what people probably shouldn’t attend; people who should and who stay on and marked it up. This is for the recommendations of CTAB is what I’m going to hand out. Alderman Caron I have to agree. I think that since Alderman Moriarty did bring in those changes with a possible recommendation even though we have that information from the Mayor. I think we should listen to them before we vote. We’ve taken it off the table so why can’t we talk about it? Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 21 Alderman Moriarty If they’re easy, then vote on it. If they’re not easy, then I’ll let legal print it off and then we have a neater coy for the Board but at least it’s worth a shot. I don’t want to force anything. Chairman Chasse I just wanted to say I’m not quite sure. You indicated that you looked at the attendance to see who’s coming and who’s not coming but earlier you indicated that they don’t attendance. Is there attendance or is there not attendance taken? Alderman Moriarty We don’t have any record of attendance. Chairman Chasse I don’t mean to badger but you just indicated that you looked at the attendance to see whose coming and not. How far back did you look at meeting from meeting? Alderman Moriarty No I didn’t say that. There are people that are there all the time and it’s pretty obvious whose there all the time. Larry Artz is there all the time. I don’t have to take attendance to know that Larry is there all the time. So what I did is associate with who tends to show up all the time with – putting that aside, forget who attends and who doesn’t attend. Start from scratch. The number one problem is CTAB has too many people and we’re having a hard time getting a quorum. The markings up top were just my notes. So just go straight down to the suggested changes, the bottom line where it says “memberships”. “CTAB will consist of 11 members total.” That’s the goal. Currently it consists of 15 members. So that’s the number one theme is to reduce it to 11. It says the 4 members who were appointed by the Mayor shall serve for three years. That falls out from the remaining sections. That’s not important. The most important thing is CTAB is currently 15 and we’d like it to be 11. So who do you eliminate? Who does CTAB recommend eliminating? What positions? You may have a difference of opinion but this is who we suggested to eliminate: Corporation Counsel which is item B. Everything else on the front page you keep. So the Mayor suggested eliminating the Chief of Fire Department and the Chief of Police. We said let’s just leave that alone. I spoke to sort of the people who attended representing them and they liked attending. There seemed to be a good reason to have those representatives on the board. So then you turn the page and we eliminate the Director of Public Works and the Mayor and then reduce it from the number of people that Mayor appoints. Instead of the Mayor appointing 4 members, the Mayor appoints 3. I’ll repeat. CTAB would like to reduce from 15 to 11 and to reduce from 15 to 11 we recommend eliminating 4 positions: Corporation Counsel, Director of Public Works, the Mayor, and then reduce the number of appointees from 4 to 3. Those are the 4 spots. There’s a little note up here that we said so what will be Section H, 3 members at least two of whom are Nashua residents so it allows a little bit of flexibility. If the Mayor wanted to appoint somebody who’s not a Nashua resident, then they could appoint a non-Nashua resident. That’s it. So it’s eliminating 4 spots. Alderman Caron This is what we got from the Mayor before she left so you have hear. My notes show that it would be reduced to 9 members. There would be 4 members, 3 who would be Nashua residents and 1 who might own a business. Then added in would be emergency management, library, school, IT, and business community. So she was taking out BPW, the Mayor’s office, fire, police, and the attorney. So you’re within 2 of what she had. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 22 Alderman Moriarty Right so think among yourselves do you want to remove the fire and police at the Mayor’s recommendation? CTAB would rather you keep fire and police on. That’s up to you to decide. The library wasn’t on here in the first place. I didn’t bother adding in library. The person who represents library could be one of the ad hocs anyway. Alderman Caron I have to agree with you. My feeling is that we need police and fire on there rather than somebody from the library. I think that would be more appropriate. I guess my question to you through the Chair is why would you want to reduce appointments by the Mayor from 4 to 3. Alderman Moriarty Because then that makes it an odd number of members and so if you have 12 members, you need 7 to make a quorum. If you have 11 members, you only need 6. That was why. It was a matter of the goal of making it easier to make a quorum. Alderman Soucy If I may ask a question of Moriarty through the Chair. Could you just give me an idea of what type of decisions this board makes on a daily basis? Alderman Moriarty It’s very easy going. It’s the easiest committee you could ever get on. Very little happens. The meetings take 15 to 20 minutes in the morning. The number one thing we do is we approve the communications from the three representatives: the public, Access representative who talks about what did the public access do, the educational representative, and then the government channel. So they get the three reports and then we flip through the budget. Once in a while they’ll say we need to buy a repeater. We need to buy a camera or they’ll expense something. It’s a little bit of budget. Alderman Soucy In principle an agreement that it should be reduced however you indicate that the number one problem of the CTAB is that it’s too large and that maybe the number one problem. If that is the number one problem, for me the number two problem and I’m very, very troubled by this is the lack of attendance and minutes. Who’s making these decisions when they’re there? I think that’s really, really problematic for me that we’re not seeing minutes. I always assumed that there were minutes for any meeting and that there is no attendance. I am in agreement with you in principle and would like to see it reduced but we really need to see minutes and we really need to see attendance on any committee. Thank you. Chairman Chasse Who’s the Chairman of that committee? Alderman Moriarty Andrew Cernota. Chairman Chasse Any you are the liaison? Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 23 Alderman Moriarty Yes. Chairman Chasse I have a problem with the structure. If there’s no minutes and there’s no attendance, then they’re violating the city codes. There’s supposed to be minutes and everything. This is something Alderman Deane will be thinking about for the next meeting. In my opinion right now, I don’t feel like doing anything with what you gave. I do agree they should be decreased but I’m not biting until there’s a structure to that committee and somebody gives us some guidelines about how things are supposed to be done in the city. That’s my personal opinion. Alderman Moriarty If you’d like to recommend banning me from CTAB liaison, be my guest because I’m not sure I’m going to attend it. Chairman Chasse No I think they need a guiding light. Alderman Siegel I actually echo your sediments. I really don’t want to do anything. I don’t want to leave people on the committee that have decided that it’s okay not to have attendance records and meeting minutes. Suppose they’re the ones that show up. That to me is just irresponsible. I just assume do nothing with this but I’d be happy to recommend it going to the full Board for no recommendation and see what the rest of my colleagues think. Chairman Chasse Hopefully the rest of the full Board will catch this meeting especially this Board should have a meeting and we have some time to think about before this goes out to the full agenda on Tuesday night. Alderman Caron I don’t know if it’s discussion but I agree that we should just send it to the full Board but maybe our recommendation would be to Alderman Moriarty to put this together so that it becomes part of the agenda as an amendment to that legislation so that you have something to work with when you have that conversation with the full Board. I agree but I have to say I’m wondering if they’re just listening to it on TV and they don’t worry about taking minutes down. Now I know that for one of the small committees I sit on, they just take the audio and staff doesn’t even type of the minutes. You have to go back and listen to the audio. There’s no written information. I don’t know if that’s what they do for that as well. Chairman Chasse The reason I wanted the attendance is because anyone of the appointees that came to committees or reappointments, the Mayor over the last 8 years made sure to get their attendance record. That’s before she reappoints. I feel very confident that she’s done that. Now if she’s going to have reappointments or maybe the next Mayor elect if he doesn’t have the attendance records, how can he feel confident saying well I’m going to nominate and reappoint somebody and that person shows up 25 percent of the time. MOTION BY ALDERMAN MORIARTY TO TABLE Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 24 ON THE QUESTION Chairman Chasse You’re not a part of the committee. Alderman Moriarty I’m an endorser so I was berated the last time that I have the ability to make a motion as the prime sponsor. Chairman Chasse Do you want to rescind your motion for a minute? I suggest you rescind it. If you really want to table it, it’s going to die in this committee. Alderman Moriarty I recommend tabling. I maintain the motion. Move to table. MOTION CARRIED Resolutions R-15-136 Endorsers: Alderman Ken Siegel Alderman Michael Soucy Alderman-at-Large Jim Donchess Alderman David Schoneman Alderman-at-Large David W. Deane Alderman Sean M. McGuinness ESTABLISHING THE PERMITTED LOCATION FOR THE OUTDOOR DINING PERMIT FOR THE CITY ROOM CAFÉ  Tabled – 6/2/15 Ordinances O-14-017 Endorser: Mayor Donnalee Lozeau ADOPTION OF AMENDMENTS TO MERIT EMPLOYEE RULES AND REGULATIONS EFFECTIVE JULY 1, 2014  Amended & Tabled 4/21/14; Referred to Budget & Tabled – 6/29/15 DISCUSSION Chairman Chasse I’m sorry that he tabled that. I would rather see it go to the full Board and get it cleaned up. It’s something for you guys to think about in the next term to maybe a guiding light for those people so they kind of follow the process. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 25 PUBLIC COMMENT Bob Keating The name is Bob Keating from 5 Coburn Woods here in Nashua. Given the time here, you’ve been here a little over an hour and a half. I was going to speak at the beginning, although I had some questions since I didn’t know what the amendments and Alderman Soucy was kind enough to suggest that I might think that over given that he was going to submit some different revisions on it. I’m going to make my remarks very brief since it is coming back. I do want to speak to the people that are here and that I think that there certainly was some changes here. I particularly like the idea of having an alternative to a $500 fine as it was clear when we discussed this the last time. People have gone to jail for not paying fines. That’s a very real impact. I certainly continue to feel that this is not a good piece of legislation and I won’t belabor the point. I did want to say about this 81 percent that it’s been used repeatedly. I think it becomes sort of a reality that’s not a reality and that it was a patch survey about panhandling and not this ordinance. I think that’s a very important distinction. Tonight there is three people speaking about this so far. Two of them have been opposed to it and I think if you looked at the notes of the previous things that you certainly would not have that kind of discrepancy. In fact, I suspect that there is more people speaking out against this than there was for. As representative from the aldermen yourselves that you voted it down and then you voted it back, and you know the rest with the veto. I just want to make that clear that that 81 percent is a patch survey not related to this ordinance. The final thing, and I speak to that more with all of them and asked at the full aldermanic meeting next week, is I think this has become sort of legislation by attrition. I don’t think it’s a good thing to continue to repeat. If your by-laws allows this to happen and I know it was suspended last time to be able to bring this back by saying that it didn’t need a person who was on the other side of the issue to bring it back, I think that after a point in time you’re good volunteers. You keep coming. I don’t think the public can continue to keep coming. I think it’s had its opportunity to be heard and heard in a fuller sense. I appreciate and Alderman Soucy for your persistence and I guess maybe we’re parallel in terms of our persistence on the thing. I think at some point as our youngest granddaughter who was with us this weekend, she sort of let it go sort to speak. That was her big song for a while. Let it go. Let it go. I really do think that this has had its airing. We’re going to have a new body next week will be your last aldermanic meeting. Just ask for that consideration that it’s had its course in my view. Thank you. Chairman Chasse Anyone else? Fred Teeboom Yeah I’m not going to talk about O-15-46. I’ve said enough about it already. I’ll address it to the full Board. I did want to talk about CTAB. When I was an alderman one of my favorite boards I served on was CTAB unlike Alderman Moriarty. That’s because we were building a studio from scratch. This city owns the studio and it’s probably worth about half a million dollars and we built it for $200,000. CTAB was very much involved with the design and everything else. Now lately CTAB hasn’t done much because they’re not building a studio. The reason they don’t have minutes, at least written minutes, is because if you have no quorum you have a non-meeting. The non-meeting doesn’t require minutes. The non-meeting is a required quorum. A non-meeting doesn’t make any decisions. They vote on nothing. When they have no quorum, they can’t vote on the budget. They can sit and talk. They can take reports from one of the three managers but you don’t’ make a decision on that. You don’t accept it necessarily. You don’t pass the budget. You don’t do anything. So it’s called a non-meeting. They do have minutes however because they’re the very first board actually that instituted audio minutes naturally because they’ve got all the equipment. From there, the full Board got into audio minutes. It hasn’t been around all that long – about 5 or 6 years. That’s the reason they don’t have written minutes. They do take attendance. If you listen to the audio minutes that they have, you’ll see there’s attendance taken. Now I was myself concerned about some of their minutes because of my concern about this whole business about the fees, and hiring, and how much we paid, and how much money we took and assigned it to the local access operation. As you know, we had a lot of discussion about that. I actually Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 26 checked the minutes to see which ones were taken and which were not. Quite a few minutes were taken but a lot of minutes were not taken or these written ones and nothing. There’s no record of them in the written minutes section. It’s just because there’s no quorum. Therein lies the problem. If you have a 15 member board, you need 8 members. That’s a lot of members to show up. Now why is the police on there? The police used to be on there because they own the system so they’ve been in from the very beginning when we just had cameras up at Spit Brook Road about 20 years ago. They don’t really do perform a function any longer. The firemen like to be there. The Fire Chief likes to be there. I’m not sure why but at least Morrissey kind of enjoyed just being some place other than the fire station. I’m not sure what function they performed. The city attorney was rarely there. We had to call her in actually a couple of times when we dealt with issues on the contract dealing with the studio. She came running down and gave us an opinion on something. She’s not necessary either. Not every time they meet. Public Works. I never did quite understand what Public Works was doing on there. The library because they got the educational function. The library makes sense. The Mayor doesn’t have to be on there. The Mayor once appeared 3 or 4 weeks ago and said this is the first time I’ve been in this meeting for the 8 years she’s been around. So 9 makes sense. It should have citizens of Nashua because these are Nashua stations. You should not have a citizen outside of Nashua. They may be broadcasting to Merrimack but Merrimack got their own stuff. Manchester owns stuff so why appoint those citizens to a Nashua CTAB. It doesn’t make any sense. The Mayor has proposed – I looked at it carefully. First oppose I said why would you do that? If you think about what she did, she gives it a lot of thought. The stuff she does she really gives a lot of thought and 9 makes sense. Now finally, who’s in charge? Andrew Cernota. Andrew Cernota is a well-respected attorney. He’s a patent attorney. He’s been a patent attorney for many years. He’s been Chairman of CTAB by at least 8 or 9 years. He does a good job when he chairs it. He can’t chair a meeting when there’s no quorum. What I would suggest is you actually reconsider this thing and accept the Mayor’s recommendation and send it back to the full Board. Thank you. Chairman Chasse Anyone else? Alderman Caron Can I just ask a question? I would assume that all meetings are subject to the public Right to Law. All the meetings I’ve either chaired or clerked regardless of whether there was a quorum present, we took attendance and minutes. We just couldn’t vote. We always kept a record so that the next meeting we would then have a quorum and we would be able to vote. The vote is dependent upon the quorum not so much the business or the recording of that. I applaud you all for recognizing that there should be minutes and attendance. Thank you. REMARKS BY THE ALDERMEN Alderman Soucy First of all to my new friend Bob Keating, thank you for coming in. You’ve been a very, very passionate on the opposing view as I’ve been for trying to get this ordinance passed. I just wanted to make one minor correction. This board initially did pass it 8 to 7 with an 8 to 7 majority. It did go down in defeat with a 7 to 7 due to an absentee. The reason why I use this unique parliamentary maneuver was because I knew we still had the majority of the board. Furthermore, I saw in the Mayor’s veto a safety item. I thought with that if I could find a parliamentary maneuver to do something within the bounds, I did. That’s where we’re at now. Thank you and I want to thank this committee because we know I did not run for re-election. This is probably my last PAA meeting I hope. Mr. Chairman you’ve been a great mentor for the last two years as an alderman and Ken not only a colleague but a very, very close friend as well as Sean, Mr. Schoneman and June we go back a number of years. It’s been a pleasure working with all of you. Personnel – 12/14/15 Page 27 Alderman Siegel I just want to thank both of my colleagues who are the front of the room right now. This is your last meeting as aldermen and thank you very much. It’s been a pleasure. You aren’t just colleagues but you also have become good friends. Thank you for your service and once upon a time we’ll get together again right Alderman Soucy. Alderman Caron Thank you both Alderman Chasse and Alderman Soucy. We go way back when you were young, played softball, and chased the kids on the playground. Thank you both Alderman Chasse especially because we worked very closely when I came on board for my first term and I enjoyed it. Alderman Soucy I love it when we can agree to disagree because it’s been a pleasure working with you and I’m really happy that you keep your ideas and you work with them and even if you lose, you still put a happy face on. I appreciate that. Thank you. Alderman Schoneman There’s one thing I neglected to say earlier when I was speaking about the Ordinance 15-O-46. That has to do with the numbers and the polling. I know that polls are scientific and the polls that were taken by the Patch are not scientific. They’re just asking questions and that’s why some of the numbers can be all over the place. Nevertheless though one of the best ways that I have to ascertain what people in Ward 3 want is to listen to their comments. While there aren’t thousands who are calling, there are certainly some and the overwhelming majority are the ones who do reach out to me favor doing something to solve and they do see it as a safety problem. I just wanted to make sure that was clear. Finally thanks again for both of you serving. I’m not on this committee but I’ve always enjoyed these meetings. Thank you very much. Chairman Chasse What Mr. Teeboom said at least I feel a little bit better. At least they got an audio for minutes. It’s a warm tingly feeling. It makes me feel a little bit better knowing that at least we have that. I’m sure we can pick up the attendance from those things. Yes this is the last PAA meeting and I want to say it was an honor to serve with all of you. We kind of have a little bit of a relaxed atmosphere here and I know we all put in long hours, long days, and I don’t like to run a real tight ship. Kind of leave it lose and keep everybody – I didn’t have anybody yelling at each other this year so that’s a good thing. Look under your Christmas tree, you might find something special for yourselves. POSSIBLE NON-PUBLIC SESSION - None ADJOURNMENT MOTION BY ALDERMAN CARON TO ADJOURN MOTION CARRIED The meeting was declared closed at 8:50 p.m. Alderman Michael Soucy Committee Clerk