Evening everybody, it is now 7 p.m.

We are convening the human affairs committee here in the Aldermanic Chamber.

Um it has been duly noticed in two places, including the city's website in accordance with the requirements of RSA 91A2.

Okay.

Let's start the meeting by taking a roll call attendance.

All right.

Uh Alderman Thibodeau.

Here.

Alderman Senate is here.

Alderman Greg.

Here.

Uh Alder Woman Kelly.

And Alderman Lopez.

I am here.

We have one, two, three, four in attendance.

Also joining us this evening is uh Heidi Pete Co uh, I always butcher this Coke uh health officer, Mike McGinnis, deputy health officer, and Bobby Bagley, Director of Uh Public Health, and Latonia Musiele, whose title is escaping me right now.

Local legend.

Okay.

Um that was just the first page.

All right.

Um, do we have any public comment for anything?

There's no actual agenda items and like ordinances to be acted on, but if anyone in the public wants to make a comment, we got a microphone right there.

Seeing none.

Um discussions under our presentations.

We're gonna start with rodent activity and prevention.

Uh Mr.

McGuinness, you might want to just have a seat.

Okay.

Uh like right here or something.

Yeah, anywhere.

Make yourself at home.

Oh, all right.

The whole left side is free, you know.

Join us.

Okay.

Um, if any of the other members of public health department want to come and participate, you're definitely welcome.

Plenty of seats.

At least these ones have cushions, right?

Yeah, these are much more comfortable.

Yeah, pews are off.

So sitting is fine.

Yes, sorry, first timer over here.

Well, welcome.

We're glad you're here.

Yeah, thank you for having me.

I appreciate it.

So we'll do a little discussion on rodents and rodent activity in the city of Nashua, as well as a brief overview, kind of what the picture's looking like.

Yeah, uh kind of all around the country and and the world a little bit here.

So my name is Mike McGuinness, for those of you that don't know me.

I'm the deputy health officer for the city of Nashua recently uh uh recently promoted in August.

I was a health inspector for the city for about six and a half years before I became the deputy health officer.

So I've seen some things out there in the field and um have been kind of tracking the trends of uh what's occurring in as far as rodents are concerned.

And this is our land acknowledgement for the city of Nashua.

Uh so we are located on unceded land, occupied land called the uh endokina, thank you.

Uh the traditional ancestral homeland of the Abenaki, Pennecook, and Wabanaki peoples, past and present.

The word Nashua or Niswal K is uh Niswa Oak.

Uh sorry about you.

That uh in the Abenaki language means uh place of two rivers.

And then if we could just briefly pause and acknowledge um and honor the peoples uh that were stewards of this land for generations in the past, um, both land and water.

Thank you.

So our mission statement in environmental health is to protect the public's health by promoting best prevention practices through science, education, and guidance and fostering public trust and enforcement of laws and ordinances.

So if we address on, this is our staff list.

Sorry.

Oh, no problem.

Uh any comments, Director Peak?

Help Officer Peak.

Good evening.

Um, my camera does not seem to be working, and the only way I can view um audio is with my phone.

Okay.

Um, do you is there a button you can press that would make an auditory tone, just if you want to raise your hand.

I have no idea.

Okay, then just say hand and then we'll know to recognize you.

Okay.

If I can um Mike, you want to pull up the next slide, and I can talk about that a little bit.

Sure.

Um, just a quick introduction.

The health officer, Heidi P.

Kakolka.

Um, this is our staff roster.

Uh, myself, the deputy health officer, our office manager and quality improvement and compliance specialist is Linda Alakonis.

We have an environmental health specialist two, uh, April Torhan, one environmental health specialist one, Tim Poitras, and we are currently vacant for our third inspector position.

So we have a team of six fully funded by the city, and uh we are just down an individual at this point in time.

Heidi, are you able to see where we are on the um are you able to see the presentation at all?

I I am okay, good.

Awesome.

All right, proceed.

Um back to the previous slide.

We also have a direct tie-in with the Board of Health, where every time Board of Health duties are mentioned in the ordinances or in the charter, it is the health officer and environmental health staff who complete those activities.

Um so it just wanted to mention that.

And I'll go to the next slide, please.

Uh services and functions, and I'll go through some of these things.

Um let's see.

And you guys can hear me all right, right?

Yep, your audio is great.

Awesome, thank you.

Good phone.

Um food service is our largest program, and it's the one that most people know us uh for.

And we license and inspect about 575 food service facilities.

We conduct plan reviews, uh, respond to emergencies, conduct site visits for compliance, uh, do recall checks, and then are very involved in special events with a mindset regarding uh food service activities and also portable toilets to make sure that there is no public urination after during an event.

Whoops, are you guys still there?

Yep, we're here.

Okay.

Hold on.

Let's see.

Just get rid of that.

And um, as far as pools and spas, we license and inspect about 102 of them, and we test the waters for favor safety and health.

Um we have a category called institutional inspections where we inspect foster homes, child care centers, and schools, and that those are on behalf of different state agencies.

We do not license them except for some child care licensing for food service.

We with um the animal control act officer from the police department, act as the local rabies control authority, and that includes um requiring uh say animals that have come into contact with a rabid animal to be um quarantined for a period of time, and then every time there is a fight report in the city, we make sure that um the animals, the the pets are healthy afterwards.

And let's see.

Mike's been very busy with a lot of our housing inspections recently.

He's done um rooming houses inspections on Temple Street and uh Leighton House, and um we get we get some random complaints.

Sometimes it's a neighbor, sometimes it will be um a manager or a landlord about living conditions, and so we respond to those activities.

We also see the arbiviral surveillance for the city, and we uh for demolition permits.

Um we sign off for the presence of asbestos that it is either not there or it has been properly abated, and we also work with um we we both sit on tech review, which is the pre-planning board group that gets together and hashes out um the respective concerns regarding uh say it's a subdivision or something along those lines, and we also oversee all of the septic activities in Nashua, and that includes test kit and bed bottom inspections, and um we approve the plans as well as the state does, and we license solid weight callers, and we respond to general complaints, and that's kind of what brings us here.

Uh where we've been seeing rodent activity has been certainly in food service, and um it's been a real challenge recently, and Mike will go a little bit over the theoretical why that has happened.

But our our complaints can be anything from smells, those are the scariest because you never know what you're gonna encounter to dog waste to chickens to all kinds of other things.

Code enforcement has primary jurisdiction over the chicken, but if it comes to unsanitary conditions, we are involved.

And then we've more recently become involved in the hygiene and sanitation around encampment and supporting all of the good work that the division does.

And that's about it for that slide.

If Mike, you want to jump right in to the rodent.

Yeah, absolutely, no problem.

So when we think of rodents, we're thinking of primarily rats and mice.

But specifically the Norway where Norway rat, which is the most common rat in the United States in this area, as well as the house mouse, which is very common in this area as well.

Not to say you couldn't have another species get in your house, but that's pretty much what we're looking at.

The house mouse and the Norway rat.

Excuse me.

So nationwide, well, actually, globally, since COVID, we have seen a increase in rodent populations in pretty much all urban areas.

Rats and mice are commensurate animals, and they live very well, if not thrive off of people and the waste that we provide to them.

So in Nashua, since COVID, I have personally observed an increase in rodent complaints, both in housing settings, uh commercial property settings, and food service establishments.

So there are a lot of contributing factors that aid to the rodent population increase.

Some of that is climate change, which is observed globally.

The warmer, more hospitable conditions allow for a larger breeding season, less mortality, and just overall favorable conditions for rodents in general.

COVID-19 really kind of kicked off the world's rodent problems in recent years.

As the rodents closed, I'm sorry, as the restaurants began to close, the initial rodent population plummeted because of the lack of food that they were provided by from the uh commercial food service establishments as well as other commercial facilities.

That induced uh panic in many of the um many of the colonies that rodents had uh in those areas, which led to a lot of infanticide and cannibalism among those populations, leaving only the strongest, most fittest individuals left, those individuals proceeded to panic more and sought food elsewhere, basically following us back to our residences, which leads us to why we're seeing more complaints in residential settings and just places that are not urban downtown.

We're seeing them basically all across the city, over by the airport, South Nashua, Main Street, all over the city.

We're seeing more and more uh rodents in the area.

So they pretty much live off of us, so they'll follow us wherever we go.

They primarily feed off of food waste and garbage, um, but they're also known to feed on animal and human waste.

Um a lot of things don't get fully digested, and they become a food source for the rodents once they're uh dropped off, I guess.

Ah, they're eating the corn, aren't they?

Absolutely.

Um, that actually leads me to my next topic of the increase in backyard livestock that we've seen.

Um it was a great segue.

Uh, but saw a lot of animal feed and just the backyard animals in general kind of lend to hospitable conditions for rodents.

Um that's both like the the feed that we're giving them and then the animal waste that the the rodents are thriving off of, and then development and construction.

So basically digging up new areas, disturbing burrows, um, displacing the rodents, causing them to look for food and water and harborage elsewhere.

Um does cause them to move into areas and see them where we typically wouldn't see them.

Um yeah, so cities are a challenge because, like I said, they live off of us, uh, they do very well in close proximity with humans, so as the human density increases uh that can increase the refuse garbage and waste in an area, which leads rodents to have more opportunities for success.

Uh we could go to the next slide and just give a couple examples.

So that's a pretty bad encounter in a food service establishment.

That's something we don't want to see at all, but that is something we see in the photograph is a dead mouse next to a bait station surrounded by droppings of other mice.

Um basically a situation like this, we would work with the um the operator of the food service establishment, coach them, guide them, train them up on how to mitigate rodents and uh thank you.

And basically get them to work with licensed pest professional and basically conduct a lot of site visits in order to get a handle on those situations.

So it does chew up a fair amount of time, but it is definitely necessary part of the department to go out and do these site visits and outreach.

So just the next slide is an example of what we would see in a commercial, well, really any facility, but this was a good commercial complaint, not food service related, but this just goes to show that small openings the size of a dime or less can allow mice to pass through an area.

And as you can see in that photo, there's droppings as well as the sebum trails, which is uh basically a scent trail, rodents will lay down so the on the way to find food, they'll lay down these scent trails.

Other rodents will follow those scent trails.

If it doesn't lead to death, they'll keep going back to that same area.

Um if it stops out of trap, you might cause those animals to reconsider their movement patterns.

Um and then the next slide is an example of a colony, a rat colony in a residential setting that's actually underneath the dump.

So dumpsters are supposed to be placed on an impermeable surface.

That is not an imperviable surface, that is just placed right on the dirt.

And that dumpster is the dinner bell for them.

It's they're getting all their food rate from that dumpster, so they are burrowing basically underneath destabilizing the ground underneath that dumpster and having a nice little home for them to live in.

So that's just an example of what we see in you know residential settings, and we see that in people's yards sometimes.

We see that around dumpsters.

Um we can really see that anywhere where there is a but uh a rat population, but that is specifically rat burrows.

Um, as far as prevention practices go.

So basically, we want to deny them harborage food, which is a hiding places, places to live, rest, reproduce, any food sources, um, and denying them water supply.

So that's what we call integrated pest management.

Poisoning, trapping is great, but it's not the only answer to be done in all circumstances.

Sometimes all you need to do is deny them food, harborage, and water, and you can remedy the situation.

We encourage trapping.

That definitely works, but um rats and mice tend to be very afraid of the the new, so anything new.

So there are recommendations when it comes to trapping, not just setting a trap, baiting it and letting it go.

Generally, what you want to do is set a trap, bait it, or don't set it, but place it, bait it, let it sit for a couple days so they get used to it, then you put the bait on, set the trap, and they'll basically fall for it, thinking it's already a safe area for them.

And they will have left that scent trail attracting other rodents that same trap.

Um regard to uh the prevention, food waste.

That's a I mean, any food waste is gonna be a food source for them as well as animal feed and waste, so we just got to pick up our trash, um, get tight-fitting lids and rodent-proof containers for any food scraps, any garbage, any uh any uh animal feed.

Leaky pipes represent a water supply.

So if we deny them water, they can't live.

They're just like us, they can only go so long without food and water.

Water being you know, more dire.

Uh so if we deny them water, they can't they can't live there.

And then if you deny them clutter and debris, they lose their harborage, places to live, places to find refuge, and they won't want to be in that area.

Um so what we want to do is we want to seal cracks, holes, crevices in the exterior of buildings or in the sides of units.

Uh if it comes to like a multi uh multi-unit residential complex, we want to seal all those gaps, um, prevent anything from getting in or out.

Um, maintaining neat and orderly property, for example, keeping wood piles elevated up off the ground, uh cutting back brush and leaf litter and refuse from folks' houses or buildings.

And then we want to clean and monitor, uh clean up any rodent sign, which is tends to be the scent trails and the droppings, so we can monitor for new activity.

As you can imagine, if it's just the same pile of droppings over and over again, you can't tell what's new and what's old.

So we really want to make sure those rodent droppings are getting cleaned and sanitized, so then we can monitor for new activity.

It goes a long way with pest when you get the licensed pest professional involved, they can monitor better if they're not trying to cipher through older sign versus newer sign.

And then lastly, after integrated pest management, may or may not work.

Um, we would encourage working with a licensed pest professional.

But our main role outside of food service establishments is like coaching, guiding, and offering education to any plaintiff that might be dealing with rodent issue or infestation or what have you.

When it comes to like the pools and the places we license like pools and food service establishments, places we license, we get a little more hands-on.

Sometimes that results in ticketing if the messaging is not being received that there's a problem they need to get a hold of it.

Um, but oftentimes is guidance and education to get them to um do what they need to do in order to mitigate the rodent situation.

Um that is kind of my presentation.

So thank you for listening.

I really appreciate it.

Okay.

Are there any questions for me?

Um, I would I it's one of the reasons uh for context that we were uh looking for these kind of presentations, um, is particularly because as the weather gets colder, people are in their units in their apartments uh and wanting to know what the city does provide.

So um, I would say probably mice are second or third in order of most undesirable visitors.

Um so we want to make sure people know what they can do.

So if a person finds mice and they're in a rental property, what are their what are their rights?

Were there what kind of actions can they take?

What would you recommend?

Yeah, so I mean, feel free to call me, call anyone in the um environmental health department.

We'll give you strategies to for to practice on their own.

Um we're not in the business of going into traffic mice ourselves.

I believe we used to have a rodent management program, but that's before my time.

Um as far as say we get a rodent complaint from uh commercial unit, uh, multi-residences, we'll receive that complaint, offer them guidance and education, refer them to generally so if it comes in and the landlord is not doing anything about it, we would refer them to code.

Code enforcement kind of handles the landlord tenant disputes, and code gives the landlord in a reasonable time to respond to the issue.

I think it's 14 days, I could be mistaken, so don't quote me on that.

But I believe it is a set period of time for them to respond to the issue.

Once that gets set, like in motion, um, you have to give the pest management plan time to actually come into effect and work to get rid of those rodents.

So it's not something that's gonna happen overnight.

Um, but it takes a couple different parties involved, both the landlord doing everything they can by hiring the pest professional, and then the tenant doing everything they can on their part to manage the situation on their own.

I hope that answered your question.

I'm sorry if it did not.

No, I think it's it's pretty comprehensive.

I think so.

For people who might be watching this educationally, they would understand they can get information and guidance from the public health department.

Of course, if they're going to make a complaint, then they really need to go to the code enforcement department.

Um, and making a complaint doesn't mean immediately everything can happen and be resolved.

It takes l the I guess the department time to contact the landlords, and then the landlords also have some time to address the issues and resolve it.

That's correct.

Okay.

Any questions from the committee?

Thank you for the presentation.

Very well.

Thank you for the presentation.

We definitely appreciate it.

Um can I jump in?

Sorry, uh, Director Bagley's hand is up, but I also heard Heidi, so let's go with their uh Heidi first.

Oh, thank you.

Um I just wanted to mention a couple of things that um we have on our um inspection form that's a number 35, which is a critical violation.

And it uh talks about the presence of animal pest, etc.

But it also covers open doors.

So we always want to see for a license facility that the outer envelope is always closed, and there are no whole gaps that will allow rodent easy access to a building.

Um that's one thing, and where we also advise people to in their home to not have their trash barrels right against a wall.

Both rats and mice, they're extremely good climbers, and can then access the rest of the building and the rest of the unit.

So there should be some distance from where the trash is stored and um to where the entries to the um units are as well.

And um I think it's this is actually become such a big issue that they're actually having rat walks in urban Massachusetts.

Um I'd love to attend one.

We talked about doing it as a field trip, uh, but they're typically at night, and I know I would break my neck.

Um but it's a huge issue, and everybody with a degree of urban density is grappling with this issue.

Not to say that your pastoral lands aren't affected because they've got plenty of food and animal waste to support rodents.

Um, but this is this is unprecedented to see just the numbers that we have.

But we're not alone.

And that's about it for me.

Uh yeah, that's a very good important thing to comment because uh obviously if somebody finds mice, then the first thing is I have somehow failed in my hygiene and my whatever.

I am humiliated and embarrassed, and the reality is there's a massive surge of them.

I mean, it's not like anyone who's living in Nash in the last couple of years hasn't noticed uh uh an abundance of bunnies.

That's not explicitly one person's fault.

It's a systemic issue.

So if people do find mice or rodents, then reaching out to the public health department is a very good step.

You can get insight, input, knowledge of where to go, you know, to start from scratch, um, and then you know, the tools that you need.

Um Director Pagley.

Oh, I'm just gonna add um Director Bagley um division director.

Um that the environmental health department uh in its most humblest ways of all the work that they do with the team that size um takes on a significant role in the city with helping with maintaining you know the the businesses and the economic stability in our city because of the work that they do around um you know enforcement and you know the biggest program that they talked about was the food inspections and all, and so you're looking at a team that is providing health and safety for uh you know not just our um our food and environmental uh spaces, but also um providing information and education to the community as well.

So I do want to thank our environmental health team um and help um hope that our aldermen understand the importance of the work that they do, and um you know, one of the things that this team also uh you know focuses on is data collection and collecting information and being able to get information back out scores to restaurants and facilities um really quickly, and so we have uh uh a software uh need for this department, and I hope that that'll be considered as well as we move forward in the rest of the year of service and understand the importance of the work that they do.

Um can you clarify that a little bit?

I thought we talked about the software.

Um are you talking about report monitoring software?

Because we had brought that up in the committee here, like I think a couple of times uh in past years, and then I thought that there had been uh a budget item for that.

A budget item that wasn't funded.

Yeah.

Okay, well, it works better when we actually give you the money that's yeah, it it actually does, and it actually helps them do their work better so that we're not using an antiquated system but having more efficiencies because they're five f three people strong in the field, right?

And then they've got over 500 restaurants inspections that are done.

So 525.

So we do you know off the top of your head how much that item is?

Um for install um I think the install was a little over 20.

Heidi can correct me, and then there's the maintenance of it about 17 a year.

Okay, I know not necessarily how to do the per year part, but we do have unexpected fund revenues which are being transferred around, so maybe we should be including that in the requests.

Okay.

Um Heidi.

Yes, thank you.

Bobby, you hit the numbers pretty much on the head.

Um just I don't mean to belabor the point, but I believe that we are the last self-inspecting jurisdiction to be doing our inspections on paper.

The rest of the state has been able to do it.

Um, the current software that was primarily for building department will not support through a bust inspection that we need.

Um, and the software we were looking at would take care of many of those other programs as well, including the pools and spas, rabies, uh, all of those things.

So it's it was uh it's very disappointing to see that that was not approved.

And we are also tremendous revenue generators as well.

Okay.

Well, I mean, certainly at the very least, make sure that we're discussing this overtly.

Um I know I think I focused more when we were doing budget season on the the employee shortages, um and we were able to return that part, but uh in the grand scheme of larger things that are being done in the city, this is about as much as we're spending on Christmas lights.

So we really need to start investing where it does the most good.

Um and so we could advocate for that.

I think the finance committee is probably the best place to directly advocate, but it also does need to go to the mayor's office, obviously.

Chris said his hand up.

Other Mentivedo?

Um I'm just curious about the um that it's all currently paper.

Um how voluminous is that paperwork?

Is it multi-page, right?

So there's obviously gonna be a cost savings for for the labor portion too, I'm I'm assuming, because you're gonna be able to process that more efficiently as well.

So I mean just wanted to make that kind of an observation.

But uh I don't know if there's a concept of what that how much time, you know, so you can if you wanted to you know put a label on that return on investment kind of thing, but it just you know, if it saves anything, it's probably still gonna be worth it.

But uh if I may, uh depending on the report, it can generate several sheets of paper.

Um some of those tend to be carbon copy paper, um, which I understand is a little more expensive.

But just to break down time-wise, for uh, you know, a small convenience store inspection, you might only be taking five or ten minutes to write a report, but for a larger full service restaurant where they might need a lot of help, or there's uh some things going on, you could be writing that report for about an hour, if not longer, um, just handwriting a report and then going over it with the operator, which is a mandatory part of the every inspection.

There's the the inspection portion, the write-up, and then the review.

Um, but it is a very time consuming task when most people nowadays tend to operate quicker on a keypad rather than pen and paper.

Um it does chew up some time.

Plus, would you be able to use the previous inspection as a template and say, okay, well, I don't need to start from scratch describing this, I can use last year's and then add on to it.

Uh in certain circumstances that can work out.

Um other times if they correct all the issues from the last inspection, we kind of have to start at a fresh page.

But yeah, there are certain facilities where you can almost carbon copy the last report and then that'll segue into other other problems, but we don't need to get into that here right now.

Okay.

Chris was up again.

Other Mentido.

And just do we also um scan and store all those reports digitally too?

So there's another process, right?

We do so which would all be generated automatically with the software.

Right.

So every time we come back out of the field, we scan the reports into our system, save it on our hard drive, and then upload it into the current um the current uh I guess software system we're working with.

So there's a lot of steps and it's kind of clunky and it's not really as smooth as it probably could be.

Um but all yes, all that I probably spend if I go out and do three inspections, I have to factor in probably ten seven to ten minutes per inspection of just logging that data somewhere and then uploading it.

So if I do three inspections, that's a half hour of work just applying it to the system and getting it to where it needs to go.

Some of the I was gonna say some of that work can be cut out with a new system, some of it because we have to always email the operator or copy their report.

Um so some of that work doesn't always get uh some of that could be alleviated with a better system.

But 20 grand is cheap money, sounds like that's the install money, and I mean I I think probably we could figure out how to and from the legislative aldermanic side, figure out how to allocate that.

It's more like the yearly budget part that really we want to be more attentive to because that is the mayor's role.

Yeah.

17 grand is the I believe so.

The maintenance annual still pretty.

Well, less time spent writing reports might be more time spent inspecting and more time bringing in revenue from that.

Sounds reasonable.

I agree.

There's every reason to do it.

We just have to figure out how to do it.

Um okay, any other questions?

Thank you.

All right, seeing none.

Um if you guys want to hang out, we're gonna go through some of our um routine here, but we were gonna do an open-ended discussion, which is like basically last.

So hang loose.

There's nothing else on the agenda.

Communications.

Unfinished business.

Um business.

None.

New visit uh word resolution, new business ordinances, none.

Tabled in committee, there is not general discussion.

There we go.

All right.

So uh I invited Director Bagley here, um, and Tani, of course, as well.

Um, because at our meeting last Thursday, we sort of some of us were very oh, well, what we need to do is just stand up a shelter in the next couple of weeks and address the unhoused shelter population.

And I I may be pessimistic, but I I've stood up shelters before with the safe station program and bringing Maple Street online from a period of dormancy, I guess I would describe it as.

We've got about 35 volunteers from the United Way that have signed on to that.

Um, and we've interviewed probably over 20 individuals for the per diem support staff, and so we've had the opportunity to complete at least orientation with probably a third of that staff, and so we're still looking to try and be on target for December 1st opening, which you know that's only what a week and a half now, a week and a half away.

And so it's starting to get cold.

I think this is colder than it was last year around this time, even the year before.

Um, and so we may need to look at um as we move forward, anticipating um the need for this to be um you know opened up a little bit earlier.

But it brings us right into that that segue of you know the need in this community for uh there to be um a another shelter here.

So, you know, what we're working on right now is providing a warm space for people to be able to go inside, you know, overnight, um, in addition to uh the shelters that we have in the city that are already at capacity, right?

And so this extension of the warming station allows for us to take care of folks in the evening.

Um we also talked about opening up a resource center that will also allow for people to have a place to go during the day.

Um, but we're still going to fall short if we don't consider um conversations about putting the shelter of having another shelter available where people actually have places where they can sleep and facilities where there's washer, dryer, and all those other things that people need.

Um, and so it's a good discussion to start, you know, having as far as you know, and we we we listen to a lot of complaints and and things, and so I've come to this place of rather than just complaining, let us start planning, right?

And so when we have these complaints, what's our plan moving forward?

So we know that those are some things that we have to start considering um very seriously for the city of Nashville because it's not um things aren't going to change.

Um building a shelter is not gonna bring more people here.

We want to take care of the ones that are here right now, and we're just not able to do that in the in as an effective way as we can.

The warming station certainly is gonna help.

Having a resource center is going to help, but our ultimate uh plan that we need to look at is what kind of additional sheltering, bedding, um, facility support are we gonna have in the city?

It's worth pointing out that the comments about complaints, um, particularly as aldermen, they are they can be unfair, but they could also be irresponsible because people there were sentiments expressed periodically that oh, we haven't been doing anything.

It's very easy for people to forget we didn't have a warming station until last year, and the warming station that we had was only part of the time.

I think we we started it in January, right?

We started in January, yeah.

So this is still a very new prospect for the city to even be entering into.

I think a courageous one because the city hasn't directly tried to operate these things.

They've they've maybe partnered with people like with Safe Station, they were able to partner with uh Harbor Homes that would rent it.

But from the city's perspective, we need to build the institutional experience, we need to pull together logistics, and a lot of that has been done with not the traditional tools.

We don't put into the budget.

This is what the warming station costs, and this is what this costs.

Last year, when we were launching as a as a pilot program, I think primarily the opioid abatement funds were being used.

And so that was a huge step for last year, and we haven't been doing nothing.

That was a major step.

And then previous to that, we started adding the outreach workers, the um the uh outreach uh activities, which did happen before, but not in the targeted specific way.

So each year we've been building and adding you know resources to this.

So it's not like it's fair to say public health hasn't been doing enough or hasn't been doing what it should.

Yeah, Ian.

If I could just add to that, so three years ago when we had that really bad winter storm, December 1st.

I remember it, it was like negative whatever degrees out there.

Um, and what our outreach team, our community health workers and outreach workers did was we went out to find people to make sure that they had survived during that evening.

We knew the temperatures were gonna drop.

We actually went out to tell people to go into the shelters that we have, and there still weren't enough spaces.

And right, and so that's where the the concept of having the warming station came into play so that at least we could get people out of the cold overnight into some place that would be safe and that would be warmer.

Um and then that you know led to even more planning as we started to see more individuals unhoused, you know, in down by the railroad, downtown, you know, area, and that led to us bringing on the housing services officer position because we really needed to have a more uh planned approach with some strategies.

Um and um Latanya has done a really good job and doing some of the research that's needed across the country with all every state is dealing with unhoused individuals and that population increasing uh for the myriad of reasons that we've already talked about.

Every single state, large city, small towns.

I was on the call today, and um there was an uh person that's up in one of our smaller towns, and he was talking about the unhoused population that they have in here.

So it's affecting everyone.

Um, and so by having a housing services officer, you know, on board that's a part of the the council, and she's gonna talk a little bit more about that and stuff that she's doing, gave her the opportunity to look at some of the strategies that have come out nationally.

So there's 19 strategies that are in place for addressing homelessness and um creating strategies within cities that they can operationalize to deal with this issue.

And so Latanya can speak more to that um Alderman Lopez and even talk more about you know the the need for the additional shelter as we move forward with the resource center, even thinking further along as to what's gonna be our future plans for addressing this issue.

Okay.

Um Latanya, do you want to start with the resource center and talk about the things that you anticipate us being able to support with or even what the community might be able to do?

Sure.

Um I think the main one is funding to support the staffing that's necessary to operate the resource center.

Um and there will be more, I'm sure we'll have a formal presentation with those exact numbers.

Um I think there's a budget committee meeting next week.

Um, but also um we're still in the process of looking for a space.

Um our community partners showed up um frequently throughout all the discussions about the recent ordinances for no camping.

Um so just having their support as well.

So I'm sure they're watching, I'm sure they're listening, they're close partners of ours.

So um just having their support as well, because we do have outreach staff, our community health workers are great at street outreach, but we also really need the mental health professionals and the substance use professionals as well.

Um, as well as any service providers that are well versed in getting folks connected to Medicaid, Medicare, um, because again, we know that health has an impact on housing as well.

Um so it's really a community effort and a city effort.

I think that sometimes, you know, as public health leads the warming station and the resource center, um, a lot of that responsibility falls on us, but all city departments are impacted by housing stability or instability in our community.

So we really need to have a team effort to addressing this.

Um we will be coming out with you know, like a wish list of what we need.

So that'll be sent out to partners for the warming station, and then similarly, once we have a resource center up and running, um, we'll be looking for some of those donations as well.

Some of the businesses that were um concerned about activity downtown have also c said informally that they would be willing to donate product, so things like old coffee or the day made the day of.

Was that stuff that would be welcome?

Or um we certainly have to vet some of those things with our health officer and deputy health officer.

When I said old coffee everything, yeah, there's there's certain things we can't accept and we can't, but that is on the old rice.

I I learned that much.

Yeah, no more rice.

Yeah, so um we again, but we work as a team, we work very closely, like even with the um the warming station right now, we've vetted out certain donations that we can't accept.

Um, and our health officers have been very supportive last year with some of our extended hours and you know, just bringing food to support some of the folks there as well.

So we'll continue to do that.

Um so there'll be more to come once we have some more of the fine details in place regarding the resource center.

Um, but certainly again, um, just supporting the work that we do, um, supporting the place and just supporting um the the financials for the staffing.

A lot of the organizational partners that we have in the community are worried about their funding, worried about the capacity of people they can serve, um, maybe a little bit uh conservative in their efforts, and it has, I think, been long past due to see people saying, okay, well, we really need to get in there and start doing it.

Um, do you contemplate the resource center not just being a place for pamphlets, but maybe for people to be present, like um rise above or or revive to have a presence to assess or do intakes or like you mentioned mental health programs, harbor homes, um that's the goal, especially where we know there's going to be more enforcement with our encampments.

So again, um as service providers, we meet people where they're at, and if they can't be anywhere, um they have to be at a resource center, so that's where folks can meet them and provide those critical services.

So we're welcoming any partners that are willing to come on site and provide those critical resources as well as paper materials and pamphlets.

Um, but we find that the most effective approach is human-human and just talking to folks, getting to know folks, even just showing up.

So some folks might not be willing to engage right away, but if they recognize, hey, you know, Alderman Lopez is here every Monday, um, and he always asks me how I'm doing, and maybe when somebody's finally ready for recovery or just take those next steps, they'll feel comfortable approaching that person that they've seen for the past few weeks.

Okay.

Um so the resource center will also have volunteer opportunities similar to the um overnight warming station?

Yes.

Okay, are you concerned that there might be like competition for it?

Like now, people who are very much moved to do something might say, Oh, well, the day one.

Or do you think maybe people who do it during the day might be kind of warmed up to the idea that okay, well, I could work in the evening or I could get up earlier.

Yeah, certainly.

We're we find that um with the overnight warming station, a lot of the folks have um other obligations during the day, therefore they're not able to uh volunteer their time during normal business hours.

Um so we're hoping that maybe we can reach a population that does have some availability during the day.

Or have you heard from any organized volunteer groups like the Lions Club or the Rotaries or things like that that might be willing to take on a day or you know a shift and then cycle their own numbers through it?

Um so they've been very supportive of the work we're doing more at the COC level.

So I think there would just need to be some coordination.

Um there's certainly partners that have been very involved in this work and trying to figure out how they can support.

Um so that would just require some coordination on my end to to formally reach out and try to get that going.

Okay.

Um I guess other committee members want to give a shot.

Um what exactly is a resource center?

Sure.

Um, so well, we we've presented a couple of concepts of it, but ideally, we would have a place where it's low barrier and it's meant to be like a drop-in center.

So folks can come in similarly to the warming station, but it's during the day.

Um and they can come in, they can warm up, they can coordinate um services so they could work with a community health worker.

Um so we would be doing an assessment for folks.

We do an intake right now at our encampments, so this would just give us a building to do it in.

And we assess what their needs are.

So we're seeing do you need help with transportation?

Do you need help with employment?

Do you need help with housing?

Um, do you need help with uh food security?

Um and once we identify their needs through that brief assessment, we try to coordinate them with the service providers that can fulfill those needs.

Um so we're really trying to serve as the community safety net.

So any folks that aren't connected to some of these services, the resource center is a place that they can come to get connected to those services.

Um again, primarily our population is for our unhoused population.

So you would call it a homeless resource center because we're really looking to get folks connected to emergency shelter, transitional housing, permanent apartments, um, or you know, any other place that they may want to be.

We do have some folks as we continue to see more folks falling into homelessness.

We're seeing more and more older adults with um physical disabilities.

So some of those folks are in need of assisted living, um, and they might not have Medicaid.

So we have to help them start that process, go through the process of getting connected through the Choices for Independence program that helps fund assisted living for folks that are low income.

Um, and then we really try to provide that warm handoff.

So we like to do a lot of wraparound meetings with multiple service providers to make sure that once we get folks connected to services, all of their needs can be met through a variety of providers.

So that's the goal of the resource center is really to support anybody that's looking to get connected to any support.

And if I could just add some models, um, you know, because we're hopefully once we open this resource center, this is something that will be year-round, right?

Because we already know that we have the issue with once the warming station closes, that's at night.

Um, you know, people were then, well, what am I going to do during the day?

So we have the resource center.

So we have the resource center, it also allows a place where people can just have some respite for the most part, individuals that are unhoused if they're if they don't have a ten or if they're not standing in their car, or if they have either one that they're staying in.

This offers them another place to be able to go respite, and they can you know use um resources there.

So if they sometimes people don't have a place to charge their phones, so they may be able to do that.

They um may be able to come in to make uh phone calls and get connected.

Um we have some iPads that would donate it to us from Rivier University during COVID that will also be able to have so people can utilize those as well.

So it allows for people to get connected uh to people to places and to things as well, and some of the models actually that's what you know they have, they offer in those different spaces.

Um just a place for people to come and respite and then be able to do some of those other things that they won't be able to do outside.

Um so in my opinion.

Oh, Latanya, sorry.

Yeah, I just wanted to say too.

Um a lot of communities have moved towards this model to also alleviate some of the burden on their public libraries.

So we know again when folks need to charge their phone, when they need to apply for jobs, um, they're going to the library or when they just need to stay warm.

Um, and you know, library staff aren't necessarily equipped to deal with mental health substance use and some of the other um comorbidities that come along with homelessness.

So that would be the goal too is to alleviate some of what's going on at the library right now to kind of attract folks to a place where we do have the support staff that can kind of help meet their needs, and of course, we've had a lot of conversations around public restrooms, so this would be a place where folks could have access to a public restroom where staff are checking on them and just trying to make sure that they're safe.

That was that dub tells it to what I was gonna say is the city has a vested interest in attracting people who are in the city and are in need of these services to a resource center so that we can we can help them navigate to solutions rather than sort of either be stuck in limbo or B put together solutions that don't work, like maybe I'll get out of my unsheltered situation by panhandling, but that uh you know frustrates or annoys all the businesses that are around.

So, in my opinion, this is a necessary response to the situation we have.

Um, and we have some amenities that are public, but sort of being overshadowed by the needs that other people have too that are that are public, but if we had a better tool, they could use it.

Um have you contemplated things like having laundry access or um even showers, uh exam rooms, things like that?

We have.

So I think it was last year we had presented a model that included showers that included laundry facilities that included shelter space and transitional housing.

Um I think given the current crisis, um, you know, it's unfortunate when we defer addressing some of the needs that folks have because now we're kind of in a rapid fire trying to quickly stand something up.

Um, and all of those other amenities take significant time, especially depending on the bid building that we'll be using.

Um so I think as of right now, um, you know, we're contemplating how we can just quickly get this open and hopefully we can address some of those other needs as time goes on.

Okay.

Is that a possible scenario where having the um the fund value the fund space for it, it might attract partners like Home Depot could bring in washers if we need them or things like that.

Yeah, absolutely.

Um, you know, once we know where we're going to be and when we're opening, um, and just kind of get an idea of you know, are people coming, what would attract people to come.

We know folks need to do their laundry.

Um, that's something that we hear about constantly.

And I think that's also kind of what contributes to a lot of the costly encampment cleanups that we have right now.

You know, folks don't have the funds to do their laundry.

Um, and they if you get wet or if you you know, especially with snow and other things, your clothes are completely soiled.

So folks just leave those things behind.

Um so I think it would help the city overall if it was something that we could include.

There's the obvious there's also the obvious public health aspect of kids or people who can't clean themselves and can't clean their clothes, can transmit things or attract things, so people will be able to perform better.

This isn't like a luxury amenity, this is a basic human need um intimate.

Thank you.

Um so it was brought up at our last meeting that um some different locations have been looked at um for renting and leasing and one of the other Alderman brought up um Elm Street School.

So I'm just curious why not, right?

So why not transition to resource center?

It does have a ticking clock on it, so it can't be the forever place.

I get that.

But if some of our neighbors are already there for the nighttime portion, right?

And then they need the daytime place to go, they're already be there.

Could that work?

What's involved in making that work?

And then what other things would be needed to meet those other goals, right?

Because I know working there a few times that right, Wi-Fi, right?

So if you were gonna do that and you want to be able to have people access computers and job applications and forms and all that, obviously gonna want to get some Wi-Fi in there.

Um but then you're not paying rent at another facility, so that gives you more capital to work, you know, some other things, you know.

Um so and I don't know when Alderman Dowd brought that up if that's been looked at, and if so, you know, what was the outcome of that?

And and could we even do that?

And then some of the other things, it's kind of a long question, but um, and then one of the other things you brought up was using it as the shelter space, okay.

Again, has a dick and clock to it, so it can't be the forever place, but could it be the interim place until we can no longer use that so we can work on something more permanent?

So I as chair, I just want to kind of moderate that a little bit.

We're asking the public health department if the public health department had objections or a reason not to, but if other departments might have their own reasons, they're the ones who need to explain their reasoning.

You don't have to answer it for them, right?

Correct.

Um well, and that was kind of going to be my answer.

So again, this is a citywide effort.

So public health, our role is really just coordinating the operation.

So we coordinate the staff, we coordinate the resources.

Um, so in terms of finding a building in space, um, we have to lean on our other city partners to fully answer the question that you're asking.

Um we're prepared, we have job descriptions ready.

We you know, we are we have a plan in place um once we have a location.

So that's really all we're waiting on, and and we're ready to go to start that process.

So without putting too fine a point on it, there is one person who's in charge of all these departments you could ask uh Alderman Senate.

Uh thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

And uh I'm I'm glad you sort of led off with that with the the job descriptions and being ready to go because that dovetails into the question I had, which I guess is sort of the 300,000 question.

Um without having to um refer to a crystal ball to set up the scenario where funding is in place, the city has said go, a building has been identified.

What's the timeline on standing something like this up look like from that from go to being online?

So, well, when we think about what we've done, so what this the resource center is modeled very much um after what we're doing at the Wami Station, right?

And so we started our process with getting folks on board for that in September.

And we're in December, and we're still getting those folks on board.

Um, and so you're looking at what almost three months just for that piece with getting um the staffing number.

We have the job descriptions and all those are in place, and we did it last year, so we didn't have too many nuances that we had to change, but that process still takes a little bit of time.

Um, and even if uh a space is um you know identified, we still have that to work through.

Um the $300,000 question is that covers operations.

Um that does not cover the cost of um leasing, you know, a space.

That's just for operations by itself.

Um, and that's uh um you know, a number that includes have an additional uh full-time staff that works with the staff that we currently have right now, because it'll be during the day, and as Latanya said, our staff instead of having to go out to the encampments will actually be assigned to spend time at the resource center working with individuals, and because this is Monday through Monday, there's the Saturday and Sundays that need to be covered, and that's why we need the additional staffing.

And thank you for that because I I think you might actually have a crystal ball over there because you anticipated my next question as a member of the budget review committee, which was is 300,000, which is what is being legislatively proposed right now going to be enough.

And what I'm hearing is yes, but not really.

Um I think to to reach the ideal state of what this resource center would look like online.

So I'm more putting this out there just for the public listening at home, or maybe you know, anybody who sits in this chamber who who's listening at home is you know, we kind of almost feels like we're dangling this carrot out in this well, no, look, we have we have this lingering in the future.

We're gonna set up a resource center.

This to me feels like it's still a long ways away and has a much higher ticket than I think we're anticipating at this point, which I'm fine with.

I am prepared to spend the money to get this set up because to me, I had this discussion with somebody else last night.

This is the city's priority right now, and I and I think it needs to be.

We've identified that I mean it's conquered so many of our meetings right now, you know, in and out of committee that this needs to happen.

And so I just hope for any of my colleagues listening at home or the the general public, know that this is coming.

It I I've said since the beginning of my term, there is no magic wand.

We're not that far off.

But the 300,000 is not that far off.

There's certain things that we that are uncertain, right?

So um, you know, the the cost of utilities.

We don't know that.

So that 300 is like right there.

Maybe it's 325, maybe it's 350, but it's it is very, very close.

Right.

And but that that's for and correct me if I'm wrong.

Um 300 is a stand-up cost to get going.

But I have to imagine that going forward, especially as we get into the next term and the next year's budget.

This is something that's gonna need to be baked in for it to survive, correct?

Thank you.

Yeah, and I think that again, it's only going to be as successful as the investment that we put into it.

So again, if we really want to attract people to come, then we need to have the resources that they need.

Um, and to Alderman Lopez's point earlier, showers, laundry, you know, things that people need that they're not getting elsewhere.

Um, and again, it's you know, I someone might come in so that they could take a shower every week, and through those interactions with the staff and and getting used to coming to the resource center and getting comfortable with the people that are there, they may opt into receiving other services.

It's very expensive to support somebody who's experiencing homelessness in our community.

So it's in everybody's best interest for folks to get moved on to some sort of housing.

Um, and again, through those small baby steps, we can do that.

We've seen it, we're doing it now.

We do it in the encampments.

So this is just changing the location of where we'll be doing that.

There is also the public pressure, and I I call it a profound misunderstanding of the situation, that if we start offering services to people, we're encouraging them to be or do what they're doing.

And to that I would say that people who are very outspoken about how they felt personally impacted by what has been going on in other people's lives, don't know what the full scope of it was.

There was a lot of concern and complaints brought by the downtown community about a very small portion of the community that uh, in my opinion, in my observation was characterized not by people who are homeless, but by people who had extra needs that lived adjacent to downtown and still do.

If we don't address the situation, we don't make sure that there is a path for people who are struggling in crisis out of that crisis, then we're not going to see a reduction at all of anything.

We're gonna see escalation and more and more dangerous situations happening.

So I think the resource center, it's important as a message, and for all of us at the board, you know, what we were invited to put our big boy pants on.

That might look like actually having to stand up for something that other people don't understand and explaining to them that we're listening to our public health professionals, and they know what they're doing, and there is really only one way to to help end homelessness, and it's by helping the people who are homeless end their homelessness.

Um I do think we've as someone who's had practical experience standing this up, you can scale upwards from a certain point.

Like you can't do it with like 50,000.

I mean, maybe it'd be like one person there for some hours of the week.

Um there is a starting point that you're gonna have to hit, but you don't necessarily have to put all the bells and whistles on in the full rollout in order to do something that makes a huge difference.

Yeah, agreed.

Particularly when it's cold and particularly when it's freezing out and people get increasingly desperate to go inside and find a place to stay.

Uh um, and and to your point, I think uh I'm very happy that we're having this conversation and that that we're taking the steps to address this because it's only going to get worse.

Um so just historically speaking, New Hampshire's point in time count numbers.

So every year we have to count the number of individuals experiencing homelessness in our community.

So the Greater Nashua Continuum of Care, public health kind of leads the point-in-time count process just because we have all of the data on where our encampments are.

So those numbers are creeping up every year.

And you know, we also know that there's significant cuts at the federal level to our permanent supportive housing and our continuum of care funding.

So again, folks aren't going to disappear.

Those folks are going to fall into homelessness and they unless they have some sort of contingency plan, which might be family or other places that they can go.

We know that that's hard to come by.

So I think you know, we need to start addressing the problem now because right now we're in a position of you know deferring doing something.

You know, we've been presenting what we need to do, we've deferred that, and now we're at this crisis.

Now the businesses are suffering, um, and we're seeing larger numbers at our encampments because we didn't really do anything.

Um so I think we have to continue moving forward and and really try to focus on the understanding that this problem is getting worse day by day, um, and it's going to cost money for us to address it.

And I'm happy that we can open up a resource center, and I welcome the idea of scaling it up over time.

I think that we're going to need to to address the need, unfortunately.

And our city continues to grow in size, uh, but our shelter space doesn't.

So we just need to be really really realistic at creating a plan on how we want to address this and how we want to prioritize this.

So, in terms of shelter capacity, when Maple Street was still operational, I think like five years ago, I forget even how long it's been since it closed, that was an extra probably 70 beds that were available.

Um there were single male, single female, and then um some higher level like need programs that were at work.

And then that closed.

And then at the same time, uh National Soup Kitchens, both of their individual shelters were extremely distressed buildings that needed to be uh not only replaced entirely, but then reconceptualized.

So they invested in the Spring Street project.

The city helped to expand that capacity.

And again, I it's a narrative that the city hasn't been doing anything, it has been, it just hasn't been keeping up with it.

But the city was very instrumental in making sure that the soup kitchen was able to not collapse under the weight of the problem.

But that whole effort yielded us almost the same, if not slightly less emergency shelter beds.

So when we say Nashua's been growing as a city and the capacity hasn't, the capacity has been the same and somewhat inadequate for at least six or seven years, and probably more than that, because we also at the same time as we took safe station offline due to I guess I'm gonna summarize it as state level meddling.

Um we also lost the Peggy Gilmore Medical Respite Center, and uh a number of efforts started to get off the ground at providing more intensive mental health intervention that didn't really get as far as they could have because COVID happened and programs got overloaded or underfunded or health professionals you know were not available to support it.

So it's not just Nashville, it is regionally our public policies have been falling short of where they should be.

The only exception I could say I could point to at all is the recovery community has been firing on all cylinders privately.

I don't know that they've gotten the level at the state that they are that would really be pragmatic, but a lot of privately run sober houses and sober community programs have been developing in the Nash area, and they're facing pushback too.

So we are gonna have to look at different levels of this as politicians and make sure that we're not creating policies or contributing to short-term solutions to one thing that end up dooming our efforts on the other side.

But I think having a resource center, period, and the overnight warming station is a point where we can actually make a difference, a positive difference, and it does provide a demonstration model that this is where some of those other partners and other programs can partner with the city.

Because to the data gathering point, it was my experience that the point-in-time counts were nowhere near as effective or accurate until public health got involved.

And at that point, we started to get really useful data instead of we think we're doing good, we're just on the cusp of of ending homelessness, and yet somehow the soup kitchens line is getting longer, and the rescue mission is adding overflow beds and like all this contra-indicating information.

It's because the city and public health has been growing that we're even able to understand what we're up against.

Uh Director Bagley.

And I would just um, you know, you know, add to as we're looking at the picture, we have to look at the bigger picture, right?

And so we have to look at the root cause of what is a contributing factor to the growing number of individuals that are unhoused.

What are the circumstances and situations that people are finding themselves in?

So if you're on a fixed low income, you're on SSI, um, or um you're you you have an apartment and you're you're you're in that apartment with a partner, that partner dies, you're on a fixed income.

Half of that income is now gone.

That individual is going to struggle with housing stability, right?

And so um, you know, we want to think big picture of like what are some of the contributing factors as well as we're planning how we're going to address meeting the needs of those individuals that we've identified right now that are unhoused.

We've got quite a few folks that are staying in cars that we are not even aware of, and then we've got folks who are you know in a place where their housing is being threatened for low income or lack of income or increasing rent costs.

So it's it's a it's what I call a wicked problem because there's so many different tentacles and factors that go along with this.

And so while we're looking at addressing this one component of it, we also want to think about what are the other things that we have to um as a city as a community with our partners also focus on at the same time.

I mean, it might seem like a little bit of a uh an out there comparison, but we used to have a much more robust robust version of labor ready located right downtown, and we don't now.

It turned into people ready, and then it went over to the little section of Nashville that everybody forgets over the bridge is actually Nashua.

And that meant that a readily accessible day labor opportunity for people who couldn't maintain regular employment or um struggled with you know needs and just needed uh could maybe make sprints isn't really available.

So when we say we this resource center is a resource for people who are unsheltered, it's also a pot, it's also an opportunity for resources to go to and be accessed.

So I mean, maybe able, I don't think able actually is still existing right now.

Um maybe um my turn or um temp agencies also take a shift and the the age-old cry of well, why don't people get jobs?

Well, if we can make it feasible for them and they don't have to walk all the way into Hudson to do it, then we may see better return on investment.

We may see people who are able to start increasing their income and then stabilize their housing and and all those kind of things.

Um we touched on the shelter part.

Um I had kind of imagined we need to be talking more about making sure we had physical space designated and beds and all those kind of things.

Um in your opinion, do those is it possible and pragmatic to try to do something like that at Elm Street, like with where the um cafeteria is located, would we be able to put something in proximity that would be reasonable to staff without trying to open up a whole building?

So when we first looked at Elm Street and we took the tour uh through the building, we landed on the cafeteria because it was a nice space large enough, but also um where we could contain ourselves.

So we didn't have folks wandering throughout this a big building.

Um where we are right now, and we've talked about this before, which people weren't happy about, but the the warming station is a warming station, it's not a shelter.

It doesn't have showers.

There's um limited bathroom space in that in that area, and so we we haven't you know entertained the thought of let's make this a shelter space because it's inadequate.

Um and when we did our tour of Elm Street and we looked at other areas in the school, it was kind of difficult to kind of like lock some of these places off where you could keep it contained.

Um it's a fun place to be in if you could just run a run amok.

And just when it was open, that was half the reason we had a problem with it.

Right, and so a bathroom with no windows or anything, and all everything was going on in there.

Yeah, and so we want to make sure that you know, while we're operating things, you know, we have the cap capacity to do that well and safely.

Um, and so and and I and I and I know that our friend Bob is like, we gotta make that a shelter space.

It's like, but that won't work in the confines of how that space is actually set up.

You need more bathroom space.

You you you need um uh space for people to just be able to like run water to brush their teeth.

I mean, it's just it's not set up that way, but to be able to drop in, warm up, rest, go to the bathroom without having to think that you're gonna be in there for for the ones who volunteer there, right?

You get somebody in there for 15 minutes, you can't that can't happen.

I know, right?

That that just can't.

Well, I'm just doing whatever.

Well, you know what?

You can go in there, you can do number one, you might have a little bit more time to do number two, but you cannot go in there and try to shower and get your own.

Yeah, day four without a shower, you're trying to use the watered up toilet paper to sponge bath.

Like you have to.

So yeah, so that's the only, you know, um constraint with trying to turn that into a shelter.

It just won't it that space is not designed for that.

It was the space brought up was the building.

So like it was suggested, oh, just open up one of the gyms, but I'm not super familiar with Elm Street's layout because every time I go, I go into one part of it and I never went to the whole thing, but I don't think the gyms are next to the cafeteria.

So the there was an issue with um partitioning.

So again, I we have to look at the priorities of everyone and other departments.

So I know that the the Keefe Auditorium is still being utilized, and there's a lot of sensitivity around that.

Um, and those folks that are utilizing the Keefe Auditorium need access to restrooms, and we didn't really want to have multiple populations in in different restrooms.

And last year city hall.

Yeah, and and last year there was also issues with um there was bitty basketball in the bathroom, um in the gym.

Um so we didn't want to have children in the same restrooms as the guests of the warming station.

So that's really how we landed on the cafeteria space.

Um if we're looking at the rest of the school, we would need other departments here to kind of speak on that.

Okay.

Again, we know who's in charge of those other departments, and if he wants to call an interdepartmental meeting and let us weigh in, that'd be fine.

But I I suspect that'd be more of an internal discussion.

Um there's heat complexities too.

So I know I think there was an issue with the um heating in the larger gym on the um I think it's uh not Lake Street side, Chestnut Street Gym.

Um and then there's a smaller gym, but I think that one isn't partitioned off from where the um the auditorium is.

So there'd be some cross cross uses of those restrooms.

So there isn't a silver bullet that we've all been sitting on and just deciding we didn't want to use.

No, it's very hard to partition the area off because the school's huge, so it's really difficult to allow people to have access to the restrooms but not have access to the whole school, the staircase that leads up to the other floors, um, and we need an area that has heat that's working.

So Daniel Webster was also brought up, and uh, I guess somebody who who can contemplates that has the ability to contact the guy who's renting it or to own it, rent it, pay for that, figure out how to do it without arousing the larger state of New Hampshire in conspiracy, and and somehow give us access to it this year.

But if we actually had some company who could snap their fingers, I helped look at a model for that, and one of the biggest concerns we had was it's nowhere near anything.

So you'd have to literally create a shuttle bus down there, and that's immediately gonna shake off half the investment.

People don't want to be relocated to another area and then be reliant on that bus to get back and and whatever.

And then those neighbors aren't necessarily gonna be like, oh sure, bring everybody out here, you know.

So um has that been contemplated by your department?

So I know that that space is also being utilized.

So I just went on the bid a tour.

Um, it's being utilized by the hockey academy.

I don't know how much space they have over there.

Um but I think there's like 200 students or something.

Um there's like two different dorm rooms or dorm buildings, and I think one of them was being used.

Okay.

But that doesn't necessarily mean that if you use the other one, they won't need like a place to eat or you know, it won't impact them.

So I the other tenants might have some say over that.

Yeah.

I think I think with that, there's certainly going to need to be staffing in that area.

Um there needs to be a community conversation with the neighborhood, so similar to similarly to like what we did for the warming station.

Um, you know, we put a mailer out to the abutters to the Elm Street property and had a listening session, so folks could come in, ask questions.

So I think that would be a step that's necessary in taking um not on our end.

You know, again, we can really operate wherever we need to.

Um, but there would just have to be a look at um, you know, the cost and everything else for for leasing that space out compared to other spaces.

Um but I certainly think it's a creative solution, and I think that we need to have more out-of-the-box thinking like that.

Um I know that folks don't love the idea of dormitory style living or single room occupancy units, but we have a lot of very, very low-income folks who can't go anywhere else.

Um so we need to get creative at looking at solutions like this.

Um and again, as we continue to see older adults falling into homelessness, we need to look at interim models that don't require them to be in the most restrictive setting, such as long-term care facilities.

There's folks who can function on their own with supports in place if they just had a place to be.

Um so I think we need to look at some of these interim strategies.

Um we've brought some up before.

Um, like I said, we brought up the resource center, we've brought up some of the transitional housing, we've brought up the potential safe parking lot programs.

Um so we just have to get a little more comfortable with being uncomfortable with some of these solutions.

I think it's going to take a lot of out-of-the-box thinking and a lot a mixture of all of these things.

Additional shelter, a resource center, more housing, and also some of these more affordable housing units, whether it be tiny homes or pallet shelters, or you know, really any of these things.

Just to plug it, I did sponsor legislation for accessory dwelling units to get those going.

Everybody kept asking about tiny homes, and that's partly what that's supposed to be.

So it's it's going through our committees and should be approved very shortly.

Excellent.

I can't, I mean I can't predict it, but it seems like it's well written.

Um and then the last thing to bring up uh was kind of a blast in the past about 15 years ago.

The local churches partnered to have a rotating shelter.

That was specifically for families, and it ended up becoming Anne Marie House, and then ultimately uh Family Promise took over that role.

But um, has it been contemplated trying to see if we get partners that might have general use space to do a limited run like you do it this week and then next week it's over here, and then so that none of no one partner is like, oh, you can't take our hall over forever, but maybe with some organization we could at least do something.

I think we've thought about it.

Um, we know that there's been some conversations just regarding some of the unfavorable behavior that has occurred at some of the the faith-based communities that have offered some of their space and they've had to scale some things back.

Um, you know, pre main example being the porter potty um over at St.

Pat's and just what the kind of behavior that that was attracting, and the unfortunate move to have to trespass people from the property that were continuing to sleep there.

Um so I think it would just need to be a conversation with our faith-based partners, as well as additional training.

So we want to make sure that people are set up for success in working with uh a population that has some complex needs.

Um so we want to make sure that if our faith-based partners are willing to do something like that, um, we're setting them up to be successful and helping them, you know, learn how to use Narcan, um, get comfortable using the rapid response crisis line and some of those things because it's it's very challenging to try to support people when you don't know how to.

Um so we just want to make sure that that training is there, but certainly open to a conversation again, any kind of creative solutions that folks may have and leveraging space that we already have available.

Uh if the city suddenly came into possession with a bunch of heavily used RVs and campers that it doesn't know what to do with, is there any way to repurpose those?

It's a great question.

Uh I would hope so.

Um, but it's not something that we have explored at this time.

Okay.

I know you guys will have to do inspections and make sure they're even sanitary.

Yeah, unfortunately, some of the ones that we've received, not really great shape.

Um so I think it would have to be a case-by-case basis.

Okay, like I said, and that's another thing I can do.

I think it helps a person, right?

I don't know if we can plug that, but um uh you know, we do see a lot of folks donating some of these RVs and campers to folks to help them, but also to get rid of them.

Um but the condition that they're in, like a lot of these don't move.

So that adds another complexity.

So when we're closing encampments down, these things have to be towed out because you can't drive them, um, or they're just in really bad conditions and they've been infested with pets, uh as we've been speaking about the rat issue.

Um so we've seen a number of those.

Um pests.

Yeah, pests are pests, um, and they're getting in everywhere.

So just want to make that plug that you know, maybe just consider all of these things prior to um you know gifting some of these RVs because it does create some complexities.

I mean, I would be concerned if I were trying to gift an RV to somebody who's doing it on a handshake that if that person doesn't actually register or formally confirm ownership of it, then you don't know what they're gonna do with it, and you don't know that's gonna trace back to you.

So uh any questions from this side of the committee?

I've been monopolizing.

All right, any further comments or statements or things we should be thinking of?

No, thank you.

Besides actually funding the efforts we talk about wanting.

Yeah, no, we just thank you for the opportunity to um you know to hear some of the things that we've been considering, uh, planning, uh contemplating, researching.

So we appreciate this your time.

Thank you.

Thank you for taking the time in addition to all the work you're doing to try to walk us through this.

Thank you.

All right.

Um other topics of general discussion anybody would like to bring.

Um so just a quick walk through the there's a general discussion part where committee members can say we'd like to talk about this, and then we we talk about it in general discussion, and then afterwards is the uh public comment, lots of public here.

Um, and then um remarks by the alderman.

When we get to the remarks by the aldermen, that's not supposed to be discussion, it almost always gets like confused, but I mean I'm not a heavy-handed chair either.

So I did it last time.

Someone said something and then I want to explain.

I'm still on my tour of learning.

So all right.

Well, uh, thank you for joining us.

Feel free to have a seat unless there's discussion you want to participate in, but I think we're gonna move to the next thing here.

Thank you so much.

Thank you.

Thank you for the tip of putting out the trap without loading it first.

I never went up to it.

Oh, yeah, I'm gonna go home and move my garbage.

I've seen the new one with the bucket.

You put a bucket in the lid like tips, so then they just keep dropping in the bucket.

That can be effective.

Yeah, we've got some mice.

Yeah, oh I hate those.

Uh yeah, those are pretty non-alical.

Are there yeah, oh, they're not illegal.

Oh, I'm on.

Oops, rather mice, always on.

Yeah, we're live, huh?

All right.

Any member of the public wishing to make public comment?

Anyone at all?

All right.

Um remarks by members of the board.

Anyone got any remarks?

Absolutely.

Seeing no hands, I guess we're good.

Um I get a motion.

Alderman Senate.

Motion to adjourn.

All right.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed.

We are adjourned.

Uh 826.

Thanks so much.

Thank you.

Thank you.