Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Public hearing on FY08 Budget & CIP

Last evening the Derry town council held it's Public Hearing on the FY08 Budget and CIP ( Capital Improvement Plan ). After many workshops, televised repeatedly on the budgets for this year I was expecting a large turnout of citizens to express the pleasures or displeasure with this upcoming budget.

After last years charter revision proposal- I expected to see the people who wanted to have a say on the budget to be at last nights meeting in force. I was wrong!!

We had maybe 6 people. SIX at the public hearing. And with those six, I heard from 2 of them actual questions on the budget. Very good questions mind you and well thought out. These two did follow what was going on and I felt really had some input.

The other 4 people were the regular nay-Sayers- You know the ones who no matter what you do or say they will find some complaint. Some of these people seem to be regulars and as far as I can remember were always doing what they do best. Did it contribute? Well I leave that up to the people whom have watched over the many years chime in on that one.

Yes, I have been an elected official long enough to know that I'll be hearing from some that will say the reason they stay at home is because we don't listen to anyone or we will hear that people stayed home because they are satisfied with the way things are.

Well, I say that it is called " Copping OUT ". People will use any excuse that will fit and that is troublesome. I will say one thing though. people elected the people they want to do the homework and to make sure things are running smoothly. Time will tell though, how we do during the year.

One interesting comment from a citizen. We should measure our accomplished goals from the previous year. Did we do what we said we were going to do? That's a great idea and one we should follow.

How do you think the council is doing with this years budget??? Comments are appreciated.

Sunday, April 22, 2007

Sanmina coming home to Derry!

After reading the article about Sanmina coming back to Derry, I was extremely happy to hear the news had been public. I was fortunate enough to play a small role in bringing them back here to Derry.

It was about 2 years ago, that I was called by a local Sanmina rep about this situation to see what if any interest we would have in bringing the company back. You see the reason he called me was because I was the District 4 councilor. I then had a meeting with the rep and a big named realtor from the Salem NH area. Both men wanted to make sure that any information they gave me would be held in the strictest confidence and I assured them that I would not say a word to the public that would jeopardize such a great opportunity.

After hearing the plans and being asked what the town of Derry could do to either help or assist swaying the " big wigs" that Derry was the place to do business, I immediately told them both that this was such a big issue that we needed to get George Sioris,Russ Marcoux and the DEDC involved.
I wanted to know how serious they were in considering us and was assured that it was indeed serious, so serious that they flew out an upper manager from San Jose to meet with Myself, George, Russ and Joel Olbreicht and David Bulk from the DEDC. we also invited state officials to this meeting.

At the meeting, we were told that Derry as well as a few other locations ( South Carolina and cities in Canada) would be considered for a new facility that would be a state of the art building. They were going to close the Woburn facility and move it here to Derry. Also, their Manchester Sanmina business was expanding but did not have the facilities to expand the building itself because of land constraints. Moving to Derry and any "over spill" from Manchester could be handled in Derry.

However, they were also looking at South Carolina and Nova Scotia and told us that Carolina was willing to give all kinds of incentives like tax breaks and millions in assistance. The corporate manager then turned to us and said " what can New Hampshire and Derry do for them"

Mike Bergeron, director of Economic Development for New Hampshire said as far as give aways are concerned, New Hampshire had nothing to give as far as money, however he did a tremendous job in selling New Hampshire as a state by selling its strenghts like no income tax, low crime, educated citizens, dedicated workforce and ranking as #1 in the last few years as a place to live, work and raise a family.

The big man from San Jose thanked us and went on his way. We did not get any commitment from them and we were left to wonder if we did enough to convince him.

A year later we finally learn that Sanmina is coming back to Derry. Closing their Woburn facility and bringing to Derry. We learn that they also have plans to add jobs over the next few years and they want their facility here to be a showplace!!

This is awesome news for the town. It can and should bring additional business into the area and with the town ready to invest in Manchester Road and Big Box retailers looking at coming to Derry.- it can only get better from here.

I would like to stress that without the team work of Town officials, The DEDC, and State officials ( I'm probably leaving someone out. ) and the Sanmina official who also pushed for us to his corparate office-This would not of happened. It's all of us who will determine Derry's fate including you! Keep your eyes and ears open and pass the word on if you know of other companies looking to make a move!

Saturday, April 21, 2007

Happy Anniversary!


I want to take this time to tell my wife that I love her very much. We just had our 22nd wedding anniversary and I can't believe how quickly time passes. My wife puts up with alot from me and over the last few years seeing me spending time doing my civic duties as an elected official has not always been easy for her. So, Trish here's to you and me and 22 years of a wonderful marriage.
I hope the next 22 will be just as wonderful!
Love
Brian

Thursday, April 19, 2007

Big Brother and Water don't mix!


Tuesday's 4/17 council meeting was an interesting meeting. First we approved congregate care and assisted living facilities in the OMB zone. Parcels that are close to Parkland Hospital. This makes sense as the facilities will have water and sewer and be close-by to the hospital. This will also bring in additional tax revenues that should help relieve some tax burden on us single family home owners who shoulder much of this burden now. The final vote for approval was 5-2 with Councilors Coyle and Fairbanks voting in the negative.

Next up was the interesting part of the evening as on the agenda we had a proposed ordinance for well water. The idea that was presented by staff was to create stricter guidelines that would apply to developers of new sub-divisions. The reasoning was that some parts of the town have had water problems and well problems and that by creating more housing in the general area- it may in fact draw down less water for surrounding, already established neighborhoods.

In the new regulations, you must show a 4 gallon a minute flow.
You must also follow EPA standards for drinkable water and show test results complying to such standards ie.. bacteria levels, coliform, arsenic, these are primary testing qualities however tests for Radon and MBTE as such would be a very costly test and would for sure bring up the cost to the developer and then obviously to the buyers. I had some concerns about this and expressed them at the meeting.

Next to question was Kevin- He had some concerns but then made the statement that it would not be fair to make developers alone follow this rule and he thought everyone with a well should need to follow the new rules as well - including anyone who needed to drill for a new well to replace an older well or to upgrade to a better type well.

I thought about what Kevin was saying and said to myself- He is being sarcastic and was trying to make a point. He did not like this ordinance as well, but from here it got even crazier.

Brent (newest councilor) and Janet both agreed that everyone with a well should follow the new rules and they thought Kevin's idea was the way to go.

At this time, I started to cringe and thought to myself this is Big Brother trying to tell citizens when and how and how much water they should have. ( A very dangerous proposition) Sort of like the new seatbelt law or helmet law. We should educate not mandate!!!

Lets remember a few things here #1- Land owners have rights in this country including Derry#2- Adding more government bureaucracy is NOT a good thing! #3 EPA standards are for more than 10 people on any one water system. individual well owners have NO regulations on them - But some councilors want that to happen!! Can you say LAWSUIT!!!

I'm 100% against this because it simply does not make sense and smacks completely against property owners rights and is an insult to citizens everywhere.

Can you imagine being told you can not live in your home because the town says you don't produce enough water- Is your requirement of water the same as your neighbors?
I recommend you call your councilors and tell them to stop this silliness today!!

For more info on EPA water issues check out this link below
www.epa.gov/safewater/

Sunday, April 15, 2007

Wasting taxpayer's money


At yesterdays budget meeting councilors were in an all day Saturday marathon of budget meetings with a full slate of budget discussions that had us meeting from 8:30Am until 3:00pm.

At the end of the meeting, councilors came out with a reduction of only $21,000!or to translate a penny per $1000 of home value

I made a motion on 2 items that could of saved this town an additional $145,000 but it failed to gain support. The biggest problem was that these two items are not what I would call critical( must haves) in a budget year that is as tight as tight can be!

The first item was $62,000 for sidewalk construction from the Upperroom to Barkland Dr. While this project has merit, I would not say this is something that we must spend on to do this year. In fact, If this is the route that 4A will be taking, They may have to widened this road eventually and the sidewalk may have to be torn up and re-done. Also, If it were a sidewalk to be used for children walking to school, then I could see a critical need.

The second, is a road being proposed to be paved on Manning Street( not to be confused with the already established Manning street the next road over) between the courthouse and connecting to Rollins St directly across the Street from Hood Park. Again this is not critical and is in fact being used as "political payback". Why do I say this? Because some people believe that when I spoke up about this a few years back, they claimed that I was against this because it was in my back yard- You know the old NIMBY claim. NOT IN MY BACK YARD!. Well it simply was because neighbors had a complaint and ask for me to speak on the issue for them. And I did and I was successful in delaying this project.

By not doing this project this year-we could have a Savings of $ 80,000- This council choose to keep it alive with discussion to come later.

Now lets look at the issues on this subject. It was mentioned that by paving the Manning St it would help traffic flow for Trucks. It was then mentioned by Kevin Coyle that it would open up commercial land ( Bensons Lumber property ) This is his way of increasing commercial base?? It's already there! With a fence looking at a lumberyard.

Here is why I'm against it at least for now.
1) This part of the road was never officially laid-out by the planning board according to state law.
2) Bike path is designated in the exact same location
3) Railroad right-away runs smack down the middle of this road
4) Town's engineering company CLD did a traffic study on this and the study itself said that this project is a waste of money. In fact I challenged all councilors to do the research themselves and see this report. Will they take the recommendation ( I doubt it! ) because then the taxpayers will see what a waste this project is.
The study itself said that because the DMC is so close to the Londonderry line Most people traveling to the DMC come from the East and would not use this road to navigate. Some like Janet say to alleviate traffic from West Broadway ( Is she kidding) people use maple street already they are not using this to navigate from West Broadway it does not make sense.
5) This area is used by lots of kids and families as recreation and we have a tennis court that will be so close to the "new road" that tennis balls could come into traffic
6) Sight distance will make it very tricky for cars turning left or right from this new road-

Anyway, Wasting taxpayers money is a pet peeve of mine and you the taxpayers must know about these issues. So if you want to spend money for the two businesses that have trucks going to them so be it ( One company already send its fleet of trucks through to rollins every morning) the other company wants it for their trucks to have an easier time.

Don't get me wrong here. I do understand that I am one block from the downtown but to spend money on something paid engineers are saying is a waste is another thing.

What are your thoughts??

Thursday, April 12, 2007

DEDC self sufficient

The DEDC, Derry Economic Development Corp has announced that it will no longer ask the town for any funding this year. In the towns FY 08 Budget, The acting town administrator had a line item for $60,000 slotted for the funding of the DEDC, however we just learned that the DEDC has decided to NOT request funding because it says after the sale of the very last lot on Ash St- It can become self supporting.

This has been a goal of the DEDC for many years and on that note I would like to congratulate them on their success!

But what now does the town do to make sure it is doing everything possible to bring tax relief in the form of bringing business into town? This is the next big question the town must need to answer.

The DEDC says it would like to remain working with the town in accomplishing its goals of increasing economic development and that is a good sign.

This also takes away some of the negativity that sometimes happens when discussions in town meetings occur and the issues of economic development come up.- Those issues will now be a thing of the past ( I hope ) Time to move-on to bigger issues and real issues.

Also, businesses that are thinking about coming in will not be discouraged when they read newspaper headlines that thrive on conflict ( after all it does sell papers don't you know. ) We can't afford this anymore- We MUST get serious about doing all we can to attract and retain more businesses. Derry is a good place to start a business after all and we must focus on the positive!

So, I look forward to talking with people and other councilors on new ways to bring in more businesses and to help lower property taxes.

What are your thought on the subject- ( for anyone new to this blog site, just hit the comment section and leave us some comments)

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Budget Schedule

In an attempt to give the citizens of Derry ample time to follow the town council in its budget meetings, I will post the schedule below so that you may have an opportunity to make comments or contact your councilors with concerns or input. Here is one of many chances to "have a voice" in your local government!

Phone numbers and e-mail addresses can be had by going to the town web-site link on this home page! I look forward to hearing from you!!


April 10Th Tues night starting at 7:30( this was scheduled for 6:30 however it has been bumped so that council can go into non-public on the town admin search! We will be going over the following departments:

Police Animal Control Finance Assessing Tax Collector Town Clerk Elections


April 11Th Wed: Fire Prevention & Emergency Svcs Dispatch Emergency Management


April 14Th Sat: Starts at 8:30 Am -3pm Executive Administration Information Technology Planning Public Works Highway Buildings & Grounds Cemetery Code Enforcement Parks Recreation Vehicle Maintenance Transfer Station Waste water Water

April 19Th 6:30 Executive Health Cable Derry Public Library Taylor Library Human Services Other Municipal Obligations

April 24Th 7:00Pm PUBLIC HEARING- Budget and CIP

MAY 3RD 6:30 If needed- Final Budget workshop

May 15Th: Adoption of Budget & CIP by council

Notes: All workshop/hearings/meetings will be in the Derry Municipal Center 3rd floor meeting room. EXCEPT FOR 4/11 workshop which will be held in the cable studio room on the lower level of the DMC.

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

TC meeting 4/3

Quite the interesting meeting last night for the town council. Our first meeting after our organizational meeting was nothing short of bizzare. It started off well with a new tradition from our council chairman to select someone from the audience to start everyone off with the pledge of alliegence. Then we went to the much anticiapted public interviews of potential board appointments.

The conservation commission was first up- Interviewing 4 candidiates took about 45-50 minutes in which candidiates were allowed to say why they were interested in the appointment. Here we had 2 members with multiple years experience and 4 new people that wanted a seat in this important board. I will say that the candidates all impressed me with their backrounds and will to serve.

One experienced member Bill Hoyt did not make the final cut however I did support him in his effort to continue being an active member. I would like to thank Bill for all of his hard work and effort for the town of Derry and hope that he continues to volunteer his time! Thanks Bill

Next up was Planning Board. After another round of 30-45 minutes each candidiate spoke and again I was impressed with everyone. The way it all finalized though was not what I had in mind. Mr Nelson ( whom with very strong experience) only got the one year seat. I would of recommended the 3 year seat. Ginny Roach got a 3 year seat and Dave Granese got a three year seat. Now I do like Mr Granese, however I would of keep him on as an alternate with one year under his belt. I believe Mr Tripp should of gotten a chance at a regular seat as he has been waiting for 3 years as an alternate.

Zoning Board was my biggest surprise as the council decided to give a 3 year seat to a one year alternate vs re-appointing a very good member who has experience. I was truly shocked that Mr Virr did not get re-appointed

Then we had Public hearings on Yield signs at peabody road annex

We tabled a request to release Public Servatude on a paper road because I wanted to make sure the abbuter ( whom was in Fla) knew exactly what he was in for. We had an e-mailed copy from the neighbor but no clear indication of the possible ramifactions and I also wanted a notarized sealed copy signed by these people so that the town is protected.

Last we spoke of the congrgal care and assisted living to be added to allowed uses in the OMD district. A very small district that is close by to the hospital. Most in the public spoke in favor and a very small amount against. We will finalize our voting at the next regular meeting in two weeks

All in all we spent about 4 1/2 hours in session, and got little done.