Right, exactly.

Exactly.

Yeah.

So it's um I've always got any I know you get caught up and you just think of things as like uh you're just spending money to have to, but large Michael B.

O'Brien Sr.

will lead us in the pledge to the flag.

Almighty God, we have the high honor and the serious duty to manage the affairs of our beloved city.

Fill us, oh God, with a spirit of unity and understanding, which enables us to face our multiple problems with a serene mind with justice and charity for all, so that any and all decisions made by us will always be for the betterment and greater happiness of all our fellow citizens.

So help us God.

Amen.

One nation under God, let's start the meeting by taking a roll call attendance, please.

Here Alderman Clee.

Here.

Alderwoman Smith.

Here.

Aldman Tebow.

Here.

Aldman O'Brien.

Present.

Aldman Greg.

Here.

Aldman Dowd.

Present.

Aldman Sullivan.

Here.

Baldwin Senate.

Here.

Aldwin Johnson.

Present.

Aldwoman Kelly.

Here.

Aldwin Morgan.

Here.

Aldman Lopez.

Here.

Aldman Wilshire.

Here.

Fifteen present, zero absent.

Thank you.

Also joining us this evening is Mayor Jim Donchus and Corporation Counsel Steve Bolton.

Mayor.

I'm gonna um recognize the city attorney and Alderman Clemens to be sworn in as Vice President.

I'll come to you.

I'll sit here.

Stand and raise your right hand, please.

You solemnly swear that you will faithfully and impartially discharge and perform all the duties income upon you as vice president of the Board of All of the City of Nashville, according to the best of your abilities and agreeably to the rules and regulations of the City Charter and the Constitution and Laws of the State of New Hampshire to help you guys.

I do.

Thank you.

So, Mayor, did you wish to address the board this evening?

Yes, Madam President.

Well, first I want to welcome all of our new members to the first meeting of the what is this, the 113th city government.

I think you will find this a very interesting and rewarding experience.

It's just very interesting to begin to learn so much about city government.

So welcome to everyone.

On the agenda tonight, Madam President, you have, and you will see a presentation by Doria Brown Energy Manager regarding the new rates that are going to go into effect for community power come February 1.

Now you're going to hear that the rates are going to be considerably higher for community power than forever source.

Contrary to what happened over the a number of rating periods where community power had lower rates and saved national consumers, I think $6 million is, I think a correct figure, but multi-millions.

Now the rates proposed by community power will be higher.

And then actually collect from customers.

And of course, the city has to decide what direction to take regarding this.

But before doing that, I think you need to be fully informed regarding the issues that they're going to raise.

As you will recall, Senator Rosenwald sponsored a bill to seeking an appropriation of 20 million dollars from the from the state legislature to buy Daniel Webster College.

Now this was in direct response to the concerns that had been expressed, particularly in the state legislature, regarding the ownership of New Hampshire property by Chinese entities.

And specifically the legislature, at least the majority, even outlawed the ownership or even the leasing, I think, of New Hampshire property by Chinese entities.

So we thought, well, you know, if uh if that's a concern, national security, let's put up some money.

We'll buy Daniel Webster College from the Chinese owner, which is Xinghua Education Consulting.

And we'll buy it, and we can do something productive.

There's a hockey team there, but uh they can occupy part of the site, but we could do housing as the master plan calls for.

So I went up to the legislature today, and Cindy uh Senator Rosenwald, Cindy Rosenwald, and I testified in favor of this bill uh before the Senate Finance Committee.

Now they I heard later um on a four to two partisan uh uh party line vote uh voted to the committee at least to not recommend it be that it be passed, um, which was a little bit of a disappointment.

But of course they have no money and they don't have a lot of money, let's put it that way.

And so it wasn't a huge surprise.

Uh but I was hoping that they might actually be concerned about that this concern about these Chinese ownership might uh if it's real uh lead them to be uh uh to be willing to spend some money to satisfy that concern, but the committee was not.

But then I can't help but point out what I saw after the meeting was over.

Okay, so they vote not to do it, fine.

You know, they they think they want to spend money on something else.

But then a senator, and this is this is what our delegation deals with.

And uh Alderwoman Greg is currently there.

We've had Alderman O'Brien there, Alder Woman Clee, I think uh Alder Woman Johnson was there at one point.

This is what this is what they're dealing with.

So a Senator Birdsell issues a statement.

Now she wasn't even at the hearing.

She calls this a taxfair bailout, and she says, quote, Nashua City Hall let foreign adversaries buy up its land, and now they want New Hampshire taxpayers to pay it back.

Republicans won't stick responsible granite staters with the bill.

All right.

Well, um I think people understand to begin with that this was sold by a bankruptcy court under federal law in an auction to this Chinese owner.

City of Nashua had nothing to do with it.

And is this real?

Does a does a state senator that represents the state of New Hampshire really think that Nashua City Hall could block a sale in the private market?

That we approve these sales, this idea that Nashua City Hall let foreign adversaries buy up its land.

Um does she really believe is she that ignorant, or is this just a an attempt to fool people about uh Nashua's role in something like this?

In any event, I had this is so ridiculous that I I couldn't help but respond to it.

I don't believe she's that ignorant, but it's possible.

Um, Madam President, on a on a more lighter note, uh the actor singers this this weekend performed at the at the Performing Arts Center.

Um I went on Sunday, it was a really uh good show, I thought, and I thought they did very well with the Performing Arts Center instead of at Keefe.

Uh the audience seemed to be was was sizable.

I think people really like the show, and I thought it went really well.

And with that, Madam President, uh I will conclude.

Responses to the remarks to the mayor, Aldman Clee.

Thank you.

Um just as a side note to the comments by uh Senator Birdsell, she's the one, if I'm not mistaken, that put through the um legislation that said we would not be selling to any um foreign entity and so on.

So I think this is kind of covering potentially covering what she did and the accusations that they had posted towards Nashua.

And I agree with you.

We don't have anything to say on uh, especially when um the state is the one who kind of was behind that sale.

So thank you.

Alderman Tebal.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um question to the mayor through you on the sale or on the what happened today up at uh uh Concord.

So a few months ago, uh congressional candidate, Republican candidate Lily Tang Williams brought an army in here opposing the Nang Fu sale.

Did she come up and help testify with us for us on the Daniel Webster College build of course not.

Okay, thank you.

Now I'd like to add that the you know the committee was didn't say anything like this.

The people in the committee.

I mean, the the chair of this is um Senator Gray from Rochester, I think.

I mean, they weren't like this.

I mean, they they were polite, and that after the meeting was over, I guess they exec and they decided not to go forward or they don't want to go forward.

But but I just, you know, this thing then came out immediately, and it's just like again, a a sitting senator is suggesting that Nashua could block a private sale.

You know, has she never bought a house or anything?

Uh you know, did she need the Hampton's approval to to buy her house?

I I don't think so.

Alderman O'Brien.

Uh thank you, Madam President.

Um Mr.

Mayor, I'd like to thank you.

I I I thought that was very good after uh spending 16 years up at the House.

The act the saying that is up there.

If you s you know live in New Hampshire long enough, you'll do time in the House.

That's either the House of Corrections or the State House.

But I'll tell you, elections does not really indicate the quotient of what an IQ test actually is.

And I lived 16 years of how these people up there in particular look at Nashua.

Keep in mind on this board, and it is based on whether you're a Republican or a Democrat.

But every single kino ticket that is sold in Nashua to communities that don't sell kino tickets, they go up there with their bucket and the state fills their bucket.

It would be nice that every keynote ticket that is sold in the city of Nashua, that money comes right back to Nashua.

It doesn't.

We pay for everybody else.

So here's an opportunity for the State of New Hampshire to help out its number one generator in revenue.

75% of the income of the tax.

And Mr.

Mayor, correct me if I'm wrong.

But 75% of the income generated to the state of New Hampshire comes from the greater Nashua area.

Am I correct correct, Mr.

Mayor?

We've had this discussion before.

I I think it's Hillsborough and Rockingham counties.

True.

To which we're a big part of.

Correct.

And uh it's shameful for the way that they treat us.

And I think people need to pay attention statewide when we have these state elections to really look for and who we are electing up there, because there's a lot of things that don't really benefit us.

How many years we as a board had to deal with a state that doesn't really try to help us out?

We plow state roads.

Do you see a state plow going down Route 130 in Nashua?

You will not.

So maybe we should uh demand a little bit more from the big boys up in Concord.

Thank you.

Alderman Gray?

Thank you, um, Madam President.

So first of all, Mayor, thank you for going up and testifying us, and also taking um, you know, part of that lead to see if we can get this back.

And I just hope, you know, for my colleagues up at the State House and for all of us that deal in government that we spend less time working, you know, working our constituents up over disingenuous ideas, because in this state we have an uphill battle.

We have decided not to have income tax, not to have, you know, these other taxes, which would make it easier because it would give us incomes to take care of things.

When we focus our constituents on things that are not true, we actually waste a whole lot of time and energy that we need to do on solving real problems that we really have.

So I'm really honored to be a part of this board.

I think that we won't have anything like that, hopefully, in this board, um, and that we can move forward for Nashua because as we see, we're not going to always be able to count on the state to be um forthcoming as to what's going on in here, but especially when we had that hearing where we had a lot of people coming concerned about you know what China was owning and um how that came about.

Um I just hope that that we can be better in this horseshoe, and I think that we can.

So that's all.

Thank you.

Alderman Johnson.

Thank you very much.

Um, Mayor, we're going to be touching on the Nashville community power in a bit.

But and I see the difference in the rates between Eversource and their rates.

And we had our constituents well automatically opted in versus their right to opt in.

My concern as a sitting Alderman is that what happens if our constituents don't know, realize that they're actually opted in, you know, because not everybody looks at their bill and know sees that they have a different supplier other than Ephesaurus.

How are they going to know to opt out, or some of our constituents might not know how to opt out of this, and they're paying the higher rate.

So that's what my concern is.

So I hope somehow we're going to get some type of a message out there and help people to be able to opt out and to really be able to read the bill if they don't because not everybody looks to see that they have a supply, a different supply, and they might still think that they have Eversaw.

So that's what my concern is.

So I hope we can address this.

Thank you very much.

Well, I share the concern.

And the I mean, one good feature of this is that if an individual wishes to go to Eversource at any time, they can.

And um, but your you what you've suggested is that people might not learn about this.

And may not know of their options, you know, to opt out, or maybe not even know that the rate's higher than ever source.

Um, yes, that is a concern.

I wish that everyone so I think we should just do everything we can to make sure the community is aware of this so people can make their own decisions.

Um that's best for them.

And in addition, you know, the city has to decide what overall is best in terms of the future with community power.

Alderman Lopez.

Um I just want to thank the mayor for taking some concrete action and addressing uh the housing crisis.

We hear so often people say it's a regional housing crisis, it's a statewide housing crisis.

People are totally happy to use that as a platform, but when push comes to shove, and as you say, maybe they didn't have the money and didn't have the resources, but this was an opportunity to create housing.

It's in our master plan.

Nashua has infrastructure for people who have you know for new housing development to be able to access the resources and things they need.

I I think this probably would have grown the the property tax base in New Hampshire.

Um I would voted against a similar resolution here against foreign ownership because I felt like it was worded in a way that could be um exploited, I guess.

And it struck me as xenophobic.

But if Senator Birdsell actually supported such a piece of legislation, I can't imagine how she would have expected the city of Nashua to know about it several years before she did it, unless she's hiding a time machine somewhere.

So acting like we need a bailout because we were following the movement that she is part of, it seems opportunistic that she would make a point of issuing legislation saying, okay, well, we can't have large pieces of property that are owned by foreign, you know, opponents of our our state or whatever.

Um and we have this whole big scandal over most of last year about how it's X miles away from uh drinking water and X miles away from you know security places, and then the state's not gonna do anything about it anyway.

It just seems like that was a whole bunch of hot air for no particular reason.

Um and it's unfortunate that they couldn't even set aside that part long enough to say, okay, well, let's invest in housing, because that's a very real crisis.

Everybody does see that.

Um, and as one of my fellow aldermen pointed out, we're wasting a lot of time on rhetoric when we could actually be helping people and doing the business we're elected to do.

And I think it'd be nice to see a little bit more of that in Concord, too.

Recognition period.

Discussions, presentations, uh community power energy rate increase.

I'm going to recognize and the energy manager Doria Brown.

Good evening.

Um, thank you all for having me today.

Um, President Will Shire, Mayor Donchis, and members of the Board of Aldermen.

I'm here to do a presentation on our rate starting February 1, 2026, going through to the end of July of this year.

So first I want to give an overview on what community power is, especially for the new members here.

I'm still getting used to the new arrangement.

I apologize.

Um we started community power back in 2023.

We launched a program in April, and that allowed us to pull our purchasing power together with other communities to set a supply rate for the city of Nashua as a default supplier.

Supply is the section of your electric bill that's at the top.

Um it's not your delivery portion, it's the supply portion.

It's the only portion of your electric bill that each person can negotiate on their own.

Usually the utility is the default supplier for a community, but since we launched our program, the city of Nashua has become the default default supplier for the community.

So this program originally launched with the goal of savings for the city of Nashua.

When we first entertained having a community power program, the ever source rate was 22 cents a kilowatt hour.

We launched our program at 15 cents a kilowatt hour, sharing a significant savings for the community.

And we auto-enrolled everybody so everyone could auto-enroll into that extreme savings that we offered to our program.

So next, I want to get into the rates that we have today.

So starting February 1, our rate will be 14.663 cents a kilowatt hour.

That's still about one cent under our first rate with community power.

We are offering three opt-up products that have higher renewable energy content.

Granite Plus, 15.063 cents at 33% renewable energy.

Clean 50, 15.50% renewable energy, and Clean 100, 17.663 cents for 100% renewable energy.

Now I would like to go over the utility rates.

So this rate period for February 1 going through July, Eversource is offering a rate of 11 cents per kilowatt hour.

This marks a big shift between electricity rates.

When we first started community power, the utilities were setting rates in a very different way.

They would get a fixed rate contract for a certain period of time, and that would set their rate for that six month period.

Since we launched community power, the utilities saw how our community power programs were extremely successful because we were able to take advantage of the wholesale market and have an open position, which allowed us to set lower rates.

Now the utilities are able to take advantage of the wholesale market as well, and that has made them more competitive.

Currently, I believe Eversource is assuming a 50% market exposure for their rate period, allowing them to set more competitive rates.

The rate difference between Nashua Community Power and Eversource is about 3.3 cents, and that's about $21 a month for the average electric bill and difference.

Now I think the helpful part about our community power program is that it's a choice.

You can opt out of the Nashville Community Power Program at any time.

Here I have a slide going over how one could opt out.

You could use the online part portal through the link here on the presentation, as well as call this phone number to opt out of Nashua Community Power.

There are no fees.

Let's say you called February 1st to opt out of Nashua Community Power, you would be opted out at your next meter read.

So you might see a bill for February if your meter read was on February 1st and you didn't get to it quickly.

So I would suggest people, if they would like to opt out of Nashville Community Power before the next rate period to opt out either in January or be aware that if you opt out in February, you might see that higher rate on your bill for your first bill, but you'll see the lower rate for your next one.

So I wanted to go through a revenue report for Nashua Community Power.

Since we launched in April of 2023, we sold about $62 million worth of electricity.

Our overhead costs were about $58 million, and we accumulated about $3.2 million in reserves.

This is down from our peak, which I believe was about $7 million in reserves.

And we have eaten away about at that a little bit to set lower rates and to kind of deal with some cash flow issues that we have that the mayor detailed earlier in his remarks.

We currently have 240,000 in discretionary reserves, and that is from when we put a two-tenth of a cent adder on the Nashua Community Power rate when we were under the utility to go towards special programming and energy efficiency for the community.

And that programming is due to be out in Q2 or Q3 of this year.

Customer savings is at about 5.9 million dollars, and community benefit is still at about $9 million.

And to be honest, that benefit and savings is going to go down as we have higher rates than the utility.

Annual savings from Nashua Community Power.

So in 2023, when we launched and we were far under the utility when they were at, I think about 20 cents and we were at 15 cents, we had 4.6 I'm rounding up million dollars in savings.

In 2024, we provided the city of Nashua 2.3 million dollars in savings.

And now in 2025, since we've been above the utility, we're providing negative 951,000 in savings for the year 2025.

The reason why our rate is so high is so that we contribute more dollars into joint reserves, and these funds are extremely important for the health of a community power program because we've learned what happens when you draw down all of your reserves.

And these funds are extremely important for the health of a community power program because we've learned what happens when you draw down all of your reserves.

You don't have the money that you need for cash flow problems.

When you sell electricity on the large scale that we're doing for Nashville Community Power through the Community Power Coalition, you don't see your revenue until maybe two or three months after you make that transaction.

So we're purchasing the power each month, selling it to individuals.

We're billing these people the next month, and then we're seeing receiving that cash the month after.

So it's really difficult to keep up with that cash flow.

Oh, sorry, where you might have about 12 million dollars going through power a power cost for the community power coalition with I believe about 40% of that power cost being attributed to the city of Nashua.

So by increasing our rate for this rate period, we're going to be contributing more money to joint reserves for our program, and that will allow us to have more of a liquid advantage in our cash flow to allow us to be more competitive with the utilities who are kind of adopting our business model for setting electricity rates.

So I think it's they do about three-tenths of a cent every rate period, that's what they add on to their rate.

And they're using those funds to do other energy efficiency projects within their community.

That's just something that they like to do.

But it's up to the community, and the city of Nashua has chosen not to do that if we're not under the utility rate.

Um right now open it up for questions and answers.

But I did want to say that we have the acting general manager of the community power coalition here, and he's here to assist me if you have any financial questions that I cannot answer.

Thank you.

I just want to before I see all the hands going up.

So I'll entertain questions, obviously, but I don't want it to go on all night because we're gonna have this another night.

Okay, I'll start over here.

Alderman Clee.

Thank you.

I just just want to define what you you had said when you talked about the um admin cost of uh 58 um point nine million.

And when you're defining that admin cost, is that that joint reserve?

Is that what that or I'm calling it admin cost?

You said total cost in in your spreadsheet there.

Is that what that joint reserve is, or is that yeah, so where it says total cost?

Um so reserves, joint reserves are reserves.

I apologize for not calling them joint reserves in this slide.

So the reserve number that 3.2 million that the city of Nashua has, that would be reserves.

Oh so the total the total cost there that you that you have cost total revenue and total cost, what makes up the total cost?

Total cost is the cost of doing business.

So selling the electricity, paying off the cost of um kind of uh borrowing to be able to manage cash flow, that's overhead per staff, customer service costs, that all goes into the total cost for selling.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Madam President.

Alderman Keyboard.

Thank you, Madam President.

Um I think my question probably won't be one that would natural community power would answer anyway.

Um so obviously this is disappointing because you know when we came on, I was so excited about this that we were gonna be able to just put everybody on, everybody's gonna get a cheaper bill than what they were getting.

Obviously, now it's flipped.

And you know, the great thing about electric bill, we can't do anything about the the uh delivery charges, but we can shop for supplier, right?

So I think it's harder to just flip them all back on to EverSource.

I think I don't know if there's any issue with that.

Probably this is probably some kind of regulatory thing.

You can just can't put everybody back on Eversource.

Um but to Alderman Johnson's point.

You know, I I've I've sent out emails my to my constituents only ones I have emails for, right?

Or want my emails.

Um I'm sure they get to other people as well, but that's still a minute uh amount of people in Nashua.

So, you know, and I've gotten questions from my email.

Um, you know, Alderman Sullivan sent you know post on on Facebook today, and I shared it.

Um but again, you know, we're you know, we're popular, but we ain't that popular, right?

So not everybody's gonna see see that.

Um, and I got a question this morning too about well, some people might not want to change because Eversource doesn't offer you know green energy um options like community power does.

So don't assume that everybody's just gonna want to you know flip flip back to to Eversource.

So I had to kind of you know uh put that out there as well.

But um a lot of people, I would say 50% of people get their bill electronically, which is even less that you look at it, right?

I get mine paper because I want to look at it.

But I'm old, I'm old, I'm an old timer.

Most people don't do that, you know, 50% probably at Eversource.

Um, and others probably get it auto-paid as well, probably more than 50% get auto-paid.

I even do that.

So, you know, people are just gonna let it go and they're not even paying attention, right?

Because I mean, most people don't watch what we're doing here, you know, to be to be honest.

So, you know, I don't know.

I mean, is there a way to I mean, if we send out a card saying something, how easy is that gonna be worded to be able to say something?

Also, that's gonna be a cost, you know, to send out.

So I don't know, is is there a way that we can try to get this out to as many people?

I mean, we could we could all as aldermen go out to our wards, but again, we're only gonna hit as many people that want to talk to us.

And believe me, it's a lot of people that don't want to talk to me.

So, you know, it's it's as good as we can do, which is not enough when there's you know 40,000 homes or whatever.

So I do have an answer to your question.

Um we released a press lease release about our rates in December when the rates were set.

So that was our first point of a community communication with the public.

Eversource also released a press release with their rates as well in December.

Eversource also has more direct contact with people who do online billing, they get emails from the utility.

I believe that the utilities have sent emails about their rates as well.

So we're not the only point of communication about utility options.

Also, third-party providers often send out emails and communications to people about what the community power rate is and what rate they can offer.

So there are a lot of people who are trying to get to people about the different options that they have in New Hampshire for electricity rates.

We will continue to share information about this on our website for um the city of Nashua, we have our community power rates, and then if you link to Nashua Community Power, where we have the opt portal.

Sorry, I'm gonna go back to it.

Um we will be putting the Eversource rates on our portal so people can see that and they can make a decision when they look at the National Community Power website.

So we're gonna do everything that we can for people to make an informed decision and be able to pick the rate that's best for them.

Um I don't know if you realize this, but community power is really close to my heart.

I sit on the board of directors for Nashua Community Power and helped move this forward when we set a rate that was astronomically lower than the utility, and it made a whole lot of sense to enroll people onto that lower rate because how are we gonna communicate to them that they have this much lower option?

It's the same conundrum.

Um I think that it's important to recognize the benefits that community power has given the community, which have been savings for the last two years, as well as um a voice in the legislator and the PUC through community power.

We have actually stopped a lot of things from happening to ratepayers, including the charge of under collection costs from the utilities being in the wholesale market, being put on everybody instead of those who take supply from the utilities.

So I think there's a lot of benefit to community power right now.

We're at a higher rate than the utility, and we need to do our best to get that information out there and tell people how they can opt out or make the best decision for them.

So I recognize the issue, and we're gonna keep communicating, and we're gonna hope not hope, but we know that our competitor, Eversource, is gonna be communicating as well as all the other third-party suppliers.

Just to follow up to that, please.

Um, so yeah, and I I think you know, again, I mean, I was the one of the biggest supporters.

I voted for it each time we had to vote for it.

Um, but to be be frank, people don't read press releases.

Yeah, uh, and I I work for Ever Source, and I am ashamed to say this.

I don't didn't know what the rate I knew the rate was gonna be different, or uh I should say better than Nashville Community Power, but I couldn't tell you to the cent what it was.

Um so I think you know it's yeah, I mean, I don't know how to get it out any better than what I'm trying to do with with my constituency, but it's it's um and trying to also you know, like you said, offer the benefits of it, but a lot of people don't read email, our boxes get jammed up as uh you know people out there.

So I think you know, I think it's still something you know we have to do, and we have to make sure people know it, and maybe people don't go on the community website and see that they'll oh the price is different.

I'm sure, you know, um you know, ever sources are gonna help national community power, but and and the other thing, you have to be careful with these third parties, not only because you gotta make sure you're not in a contract or there's opt-out fees or all that, but working for every source, I hear lots of scam calls to people saying, hey, we uh you know we're better than EverSource or whatever, and it being a total fraud and scam.

So you have to be a little careful with those third parties, even though you know they can help people if you pick the right one.

So thank you.

Yep, I agree, but I think it's also important that we are offering two viable honest options with community power and ever source that at least gives people two options that they can trust that they know it's not a scam.

Thank you.

Okay, anyone else on this side?

I'm trying to go around.

Alliman Sullivan.

Thank you.

Uh full confession, I switched.

I opted out.

Totally fine.

Uh so um anyway, uh no.

My question was that you had mentioned that um you know the lift in the rates is to build your reserves.

Have you run the numbers on the attrition rate and what that might be?

I mean, if people opt out like yours truly, and then several thousand other people opt out.

Won't that hurt the reserves because not many people are paying in?

And have you run those numbers?

Are you forecasting that?

What what do you see there?

So I'm gonna hand the mic to acting general manager Herndon um to answer that financial question.

Okay, thanks.

Uh good evening.

Uh the answer simply put is yes, uh, as part of our financial modeling, we do have um attrition assumptions built in based on historical actuals, um, and we have adjusted those over time as rates have adjusted relative to the utilities, so that is considered in our financial modeling.

Okay, great.

Thanks.

That was it.

Alderman McKelly, I'll keep my questions short.

Um you asked you talked about the adder, um, and then we've only was that a decision that was made by National Community Power, you made that decision.

So that is a good question.

Um that was a decision that was made by the city of Nashua.

I did a presentation on the adder to the Board of Aldermen before it occurred to get all of your feedback.

Um, and then I went to the Nashua Community Power rate setting meeting, and I am the person that kind of decides what products the city of Nashua will have after I get advised from the aggregation committee, the board of aldermen, and the mayor.

Um, and I put the two-tenth of a cent adder because it was amendable to this group.

And then if I could follow up, yes.

This is my own personal question.

Yeah.

In I cannot remember if the additional, like if you go up to clean energy, if there's any adders in that, are there?

No.

Um, there is no adder, like discretionary adder on our rate right now, to be clear, um, and to repeat to make sure everybody knows we do not have an adder that's going towards anything extra on our rate.

Um, if we did have one, it would not be offered in the opt-up options.

You would see a rate um sheet that looks a little bit different than the one here.

Um, first underneath granite basic, you would see national community benefit rate, and that would be the rate with the adder, and then you would see granite basic as an option, and then you would see plus clean 50, clean 100, and none of those opt options would have an adder included.

Thank you.

Aldman Morgan.

How often can our constituents opt in or out?

Um, you can opt in and out at any given month.

Um, but it's gonna happen in the next um month.

So I opt out in February, it's gonna be opted out in my bill in March.

Let's say I call in March and I want to opt out, I'm gonna be opted out in my bill in April.

So you can flip-flop as much as you want.

It's a lot to manage.

Um, but some people do it.

Thank you.

Alderman Lopez.

I just want to quickly thank you for all the work you've been doing on this.

And yes, I think we do know how passionate you are.

Um, and we know how much leadership you've shown in this, and obviously we all want to be the better option and the you know on the winning side, but that's not always how it works.

So I appreciate your transparency.

I think we're here tonight because you're trying to be forthcoming.

You've been nothing but honest and clear about how to switch over.

It's right in the slide.

So I appreciate that effort and I appreciate your commitment to our city.

Thank you.

I'm gonna echo what Alderman Lopez said.

Thank you for everything.

Um question.

Attorney Bolton.

Doria, from what I gather from your presentation, approximately two years ago.

The rate that public service had was 22 cents per kilowatt hour and some fraction.

And now it's down to about half of that.

Yes.

Is it fair to think that the entry into the marketplace of community power impacted that downward shift by public service?

I I believe so.

Um, I think an introduction to a worthy competitor often drives rates down or things down, and the introduction of community power into the market and auto-enrolling customers as a new default option, um, drove the utilities to want to figure out how to offer lower rates and and be more competitive in the market.

So I would say yes.

So to that extent, Nashua rate payers are still paying less than they might have.

Um I don't have a magic crystal ball to be able to say that, but um but 11 cents is a lot less than 22 cents.

Absolutely.

Yeah, thanks and so is 14.

You're welcome.

Yeah, thank you, Dori.

I appreciate your presentation this evening.

And we will work out through Donna a night that maybe we can have a full presentation, that we can learn everything that we need to know.

Yes.

And we'll be having aggregation committee meetings in February, March, and April, um, where we'll be further discussing Nashville's participation in the program as well as the financials behind CPCNH and um rate setting for the next rate period.

So I hope that if you're interested, you attend.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Reading minutes of previous meetings.

None.

Communications requiring only procedural actions and written reports from liaisons.

Communication has been received from Lynn Fournier, superintendent of Woodlawn Pinewood Cemeteries regarding requests for joint convention.

In communication has been received from Linda Laflame, Chairman of Board of Library Trustees regarding requests for joint convention.

There being no objection, I'll accept the communications, place them on file, and schedule joint conventions with the trustees of Woodlawn Pinewood Cemeteries and the Board of Library Trustees for January 27, 2026 at 7:30 p.m.

in the Aldermanic Chamber.

Public uh period for public comment relative to items expected to be acted upon this evening.

We have one person signed up, but we are not taking up the ERC.

There's no action being taken tonight.

So communications requiring final approval.

Aldermanic committees 2026-2027.

Well, despite all the back and forth we had Alderman Clemens on getting these right, I sent out the draft instead of the final copy, and my apologies to everyone.

You're up.

All right.

Uh I'll I'll move to approve the revised 2026-2027 aldermanic committees.

Discussion.

No discussion.

Alderman.

I just want to expect my express my appreciation for clearing my Wednesday nights.

You're very welcome.

Okay.

All those in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed?

That motion carries.

Petitions.

None.

Nominations, appointments, and elections.

Appointments uh by the mayor, ethics review committee.

Justin Gerstenfield, new appointment term to expire December 9th, 2028.

79 Gilson Road, Nashua, New Hampshire 03062.

Lou Jarrus, new appointment term to expire February 10th, 2029, 56 Haynes Street, National New Hampshire 03060.

Mine Falls Park Advisory Committee, Justin Hoprich, new appointment term to expire January 13th, 2029.

29 Lutheran Drive, National New Hampshire 03063.

Paula Lockhead reappointment, term to expire January 27, 2029, Four Westbrook Drive, Nashville New Hampshire 03060.

Kamal Musan, new appointment, term to expire February 10th, 2029, 20 Jennifer Drive, Nashua, New Hampshire 03062.

Michael Slilwa, new appointment, term to expire March 10th, 2029, 28 Woodfield Street, National New Hampshire, 03062.

So without objection, I am going to suspend the rules to allow for an appointment that was received after the agenda was prepared.

Penetrech Water Board of Directors.

Nadra Bell to Farley Street, Nashville, New Hampshire.

Term to expire at the annual meeting of the shareholders in 2028.

There being no objection, I'll accept the appointment by the mayor as read and refer her to the Penituk Water Special Committee.

Reports of committees Committee on Infrastructure.

Sorry.

Oh, sorry.

There being no objection, I'll declare the report of the September 24th, 2025 Committee on Infrastructure be accepted and placed on file.

Confirmation of mayor's appointments.

None.

Unfinished business resolutions.

None.

Unfinished business ordinances.

None.

Business unfinished at previous meetings.

None.

New business resolutions.

First reading of R-26-001.

Approving the cost items of a collective bargaining agreement between the National Board of Education and the Nashua Teachers Union local 1044 AFT AFL CIO Unit E.

Interpreters for the deaf in hard of hearing in unit F family engagement coordinators from July 1st, 2025 through June 30th, 2028.

So when the clerk reads new legislation, if you want to sign on to it, if you want to be a sponsor and endorser, this is where I will call for additional sponsors.

So if you're interested in this legislation and you want to co-sponsor it, now's your time.

Alderman Clemens, Alderman Clee, Alderman Tebow, Alderman O'Brien, Alderman Gregg, Alderman Sullivan, Alderman Senate, Alderman Morgan, and myself.

Giving its first reading, I'll assign that to the budget review committee.

First reading of R-26-002, authorizing a one-time stipend to Board of Public Works Retirement System Retirees as requested by the Board of Public Works Retirement System Board of Trustees.

Additional sponsors, Alderman Clemens, Alderman Clay, Alderman, Alderman Smith, Alderman Tebow, Alderman Gregg, and myself.

Given its first reading, I'll assign that to the budget review committee.

First reading of R-26-003.

Relative to the supplemental appropriation of 200,000 of assigned fund balance into the Department 194 contingency account 70100 general contingency for the intended purpose of covering expenses to clean up Main Street in the riverfront.

Additional sponsors.

Alderman Clee, Alderman Smith, Alderman O'Brien, Alderman Dow.

You people need to go back to your own seats.

I'm so confused.

Given its first reading, I'll sign that to the budget review committee and schedule a special board of Alderman meeting on Monday, January 26, 2026, in the Aldermanic Chamber at 7 p.m.

The next piece of legislation.

It has been requested by Director Photo that resolution 26-4 be removed from the agenda as further amendments are needed to the agreement.

So we're going to skip over that.

First reading of R-26-005, authorizing the mayor and city treasurer to issue bonds to refund all or a portion of certain outstanding bonds of the city in order to achieve interest cost savings.

Additional sponsors.

Alderman Dowd.

Alderman Lopez and myself.

First reading of R-26-006 relative to the acceptance of 20,000 from the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation into Public Health and Community Services Grant Activity NHCF Grant Partner Program.

Additional sponsors.

Alderman Clee, Alderman Tebow, Alderman O'Brien, Alderman Gregg, Alderman Smith, Alderman Dowd, Alderman Senate, Alderman Kelly, Alderman Morgan, Alderman Lopez, and myself.

Given its first reading, I'll sign that to the Human Affairs Committee.

First reading of R-26-007, authorizing the mayor and city treasurer to issue bonds not to exceed $5,500,000 for the public works division garage design.

Additional sponsors.

New business ordinances.

First reading of O 26-001 relative to flag polls on City Hall grounds.

Additional sponsors.

Alderman Tebow, Alderman O'Brien, Alderman Dowd, Alderman Smith.

You got to get your hand up quicker there, Ms.

Smith.

Alderman.

Alderman Lopez.

Given its first reading, I'll assign that to the Personnel Administrative Affairs Committee.

Period for public comment.

We have one person signed up, Lori Alano.

No, no ordinance.

I'm sorry?

No business ordinances.

Yeah, we did it.

We just didn't.

We did it.

Sorry.

Lori Ordolano, 41 Berkeley Street.

I just want to address the board on a couple things.

And one of them is what is an NRO mean?

What is an ordinance and what's the value of it?

And what do rights do we have as citizens when it comes to enforcement of ordinances?

There are laws, but but what rights do we have to those laws?

And one of my concerns is with committee appointments and how we deal with handling uh matters through committee, such as the Ethics Review Committee.

It was really short, was supposed to be a 30-day turnaround.

It got derailed.

A member quit.

I didn't realize that until you know farther down the road.

I just got some emails that showed we had somebody sign in in September.

But we've um request to serve after this other member quit.

But here we are, January, and we have a committee right now with five individuals.

And for my complaint, two have to recuse.

So we're down to three.

But we never really filled the three um alternate seats to have a committee.

And you know, the one thing I hate is being lied to.

And I went to a committee meeting on December 4th, and Chairman Bush lied to me.

Why would a man who works at a prominent law firm, who sits on the Judicial Selection Commission for the Governor, who sits on the advisory judicial ethics committee for the Supreme Court, not be honorable.

Why would he give information out that was untruthful?

And it's because the city's game with me is always the art of the ambush.

And that meeting on December 4th was the ambush.

I couldn't figure out why there were recusals.

Although there were three people present, I assume the recusal people weren't there, but I knew that could have been a trick.

And the trick is kind of coming to light now.

But in order to figure out the trick, I had to file repeated right to no requests.

I'm in the process of getting 150 emails.

I'm 86 into it after five, six weeks, and I got another six weeks to go.

Why does the city put me in this position to have to file repeated right to no requests for something I asked in a meeting that was so simple and straightforward that shouldn't have taken any?

You know, the mayor talked about the ignorance of a leg uh of a state senator.

I'm gonna talk about the ignorance of this lawyer, who is prominent and powerful, pretty darn stupid for how he acted, and he sits as the chair, and that is unacceptable to me.

Please look at your ordinances because I am, and I'm gonna look at enforcement this year.

And I expect you all to look at enforcement as well.

Thank you.

Remarks by members of the board.

I'm gonna start over here.

Alderman Lopez.

Um, so this Monday is Martin Luther King uh Junior Day.

Um I just want to share that Soul Sisters will be having a Martin Luther King breakfast.

If anybody's looking for something to do uh from 10 a.m.

to 1 p.m.

Alderman Kelly.

I was gonna say that, but you got me there.

Um I just wanted to thank all of the new board um welcome all the new board members and thank the inauguration committee for doing such a lovely job on the ceremony.

It was always a joy to be at the National Center for the Arts.

Welcoming in new people.

Alderman, do you prefer Alderwoman or Alderman?

Alderman.

Alderman Johnson.

Thank you.

I just want to say what an honor and a privilege it is to sit in this chamber, and I thank the people who voted for me in November.

And I look forward to working with everybody.

Thank you.

Alderman Senate.

Just want to extend a welcome to uh all my new colleagues.

I'm looking forward to working with everybody Alderman Sullivan.

Ditto Alderman O'Brien.

Yeah thank you Madam President I just want to say anybody that heard the rumor of my demise it's greatly exaggerated.

I'm here we learned not to leave that a while ago.

Alderman T both thank you Madam President um I too want to welcome all the newbies and uh you got off easy tonight this was an easy one.

And I also want to you know thank uh Miss Brown uh manager Brown for coming in and doing her presentation I know it's not easy to to come in here with news that may not be as good as we would want it to be so I know her passion and I am always been a big fan of the work she's done for the city so I just wanted to make that clear thank you Alderman Clee oh thank you Alderman Smith you gotta get it up you've got to get your hand up quicker I I will defer yes okay alderman Smith up right after um so I just want to um to thank everyone as a newbie for uh welcoming us and as a newbie want to apologize for my late arrival I realize now I need to double triple check all of my email communication so that I can hear at 7 and not just 7 30 um but it is definitely an honor as someone who's just a grassroot um advocate and ally out in the community to be able to sit here with all of you and to be able to serve the city and to you know to put faces and voices with names and I want to thank everyone here who presented this evening it just makes me proud to be a member of the national community and so glad that I moved here in uh 2013 so thank you I look forward to serving everyone thank you thank you alderman clee uh thank you I want to welcome everybody as well um both uh past colleagues and new colleagues um I also want to extend a thank you to Alderwoman Kelly for lending her voice uh at the last minute at the inauguration what a beautiful voice I've heard that um alderwoman Smith also has a beautiful voice so if we ever need anything such as this but uh um at the last minute um we wanted to do amazing grace and um due to other circumstances we weren't able to so um Mr Gorino um who had passed as well as Alderwoman Timmons who I'm blessed to sit in her seat um uh volunteered to sing as long as you didn't have to do it alone and Alderwoman Kelly stepped right up and uh it was quite beautiful and moving and I want to thank her personally thank you alderman Clemens thank you I just want to uh welcome all of uh the new aldermen and alder women here and welcome back all of our colleagues and I look forward to working with uh all of you uh in the new year I've already welcomed all the new people so I'm gonna thank the inauguration committee and you can sing she belted that that was great thank you for that that was pretty amazing not no pun intended but um I'd like to thank the inauguration committee including uh city clerk healy our legislative manager alderman clee alderman jetty and alderwoman grey get there so thank you all it was a great inauguration um I think everything went swimmingly well thank you uh committee announcements alderman keyboard um the PDC meeting next week will be canceled there's no legislation nor um any presentations for ready for next week oh maybe we can slide the energy thing in there any other committee announcements none okay alderman Clemens uh thank you madam president I move that the January 13th 2026 meeting of the board of alderman be adjourned motion is to adjourn all those in favor say aye aye opposed we are adjourned at 857 p.m we are not leaving