Laurie Ortolano, Nashua Board Of Public Works Candidate

Laurie Ortolano

Age (as of Election Day)

59

Position Sought

Commissioner Nashua Board of Public Works

Party Affiliation

Independent

Family

Michael, husband; Michael and Vincent, sons

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government?

No

Education

BS Mechanical Engineering - Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Occupation

12 years in engineering. Homeschooled two sons, at home mom

Previous or Current Elected or Appointed Office

Served in elected office in Litchfield for several years starting around 1995. Served on the School Board and Budget Committee

Campaign website

www.good-gov.org

Why are you seeking elective office?

Since my husband and I moved from Litchfield to his hometown, Nashua, in 2104, I started to become engaged in a few civic activities and various projects. Eventually, as our city’s website encourages, I accepted the invitation to ‘Be Involved’. As an excerpt on the website says: “….being active in a neighborhood improvement organization, ….., or making public comment at the Board of Alderman meetings, Nashua is a place where one voice can be heard.” Well, in the past four years I have been working as a citizen activist to contribute my one voice to improve our beloved city. My initial project to improve the city’s Assessing Department grew out of painful but eventually successful personal experience. This enabled me to help scores of citizens by freely sharing my hard-earned lessons learned on filing abatements. I have built a website (www.good-gov.org) to both share that knowledge and to ‘shed light on important local issues.’ I remain committed to making Nashua a better community for all citizens. I love digging into complex issues and thought I could use my skills and submit for an elected position. I believe my education, background and personal attributes could best be applied as a Commissioner on the Board of Public Works. I respectfully request the votes of Nashua citizens on November 2nd for myself and Tracy Pappas for the two Commissioner positions on the Board of Public Works. I further encourage that citizens to vote for the many other fine ‘Candidates for Change’ that seek to return Nashua to a more balanced city government.

The single most pressing issue facing our (board, district, etc.) is _______, and this is what I intend to do about it.

In a few words “city leadership needs to live up to citizens’ expectations.” When I go door-to-door I hear how disappointed citizens are in not having a voice, not hearing city issues communicated clearly (e.g. both ballot questions), lack of accountability (continuing ineffective management in the Assessing Department, several years after the 1 March 2019 Audit Report of that Department), the deceptive maneuvering needed to advance the Performing Arts Center despite not meeting the $4 million private-sector funding stipulation established in the November 2017 advisory question. In short, many of the citizens I talk with while canvassing feel the city does not deal with them in good faith. Leadership needs to practice honest, straightforward communication with its citizens.

What are the critical differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

My civic involvement over the last three years and helped my understand how this government works. I have attended many Public Works meetings, There are two open seats for Commissioners for Public Works and Tracy Pappas deserve a seat at the table. She is the only incumbent I would stand with and she has done an outstanding job representing the citizens. Paul Shea and June Lemon have not been active in public works issues. Mr. Shea has a conflict of interest in serving on public works and serving as the director of Great American Downtown, which hosts our city downtown parties. He receives a substantial amount of money from City Hall to host those parties and he can not be impartial sitting elbow to elbow at the DPW table with the Mayor and vote on project, including downtown projects, in an unbiased manner. There are three other candidates with no conflict of interest.

If you are a challenger, in what way has the current board or officeholder failed the community (or district or constituency)

The DPW Board voted to limit public input to three minutes despite the fact that almost no one attends the meetings. Tracy Pappas and Shannon Schoneman requested the public be given more time, but the vote failed 3-2. Over the last two years, the City boards, have clamped down on public comment and has worked hard to silence the public. There is a lack of balance in Nashua government. Currently, the 15 Board of Alderman positions are held by democrats and 6 of the nine Board of Education seat are democratic. Twenty one of the Twenty five top seats are from the Democratic Party. As an independent, I don't believe any one party should run a government. Certainly, in Nashua, leadership does not hear the voice of the other affiliations and works counterproductively to discredit them. This needs to change to create a better government.

How do you think local officials performed in responding to the coronavirus? What if anything would you have done differently?

Not well.There was a lack of leadership during this time. Our City Hall was closed longer the public than any other City Hall in the state. The city website frequently did not have the current information so citizen could not tell when an appointment was required and when it was not. The Mayor did not furlough any workers even though employees were not working. Taxpayers footed the entire bill. The Great American Downtown, run by Paul Shea, received $100,000 in 2020 and 2021, combined, to run city street parties that were canceled due to the pandemic. Once again the taxpayers footed the bill. The failure of the schools to open and bring the students back to school was a major failure. The impact on families financially and emotionally was unnecessarily high and our students suffered in the long run for this lack of education and lack of leadership.

Describe the other issues that define your campaign platform.

We need to get serious about understanding our spending and where our money goes. We are entering hard times with cost of living and inflation ramping up and we are not out of this pandemic yet. Next year, the new property appraisals will be released by Vision and the impact will be significant for many residential property owners. The City failed to maintain the assessing data in a uniform manner (by failing to perform the recommended measure & list every 7 years - It has been 30 years since it was done). This has created a lot of irregularities that will be corrected next year. Couple these mistakes with rapidly rising residential market values and people are in for a shock. The Mayor is hiding this information. The elected bodies have to focus on the finances.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

I have the time and energy to give to this position. I love citizen input and would vote to open up public comment. I identified serious problems in the assessing office and worked to correct those issues. I did over 80 abatements last year for free to correct significant assessing inequities and saved taxpayers over $150,000. I helped institute an equitable process whereby the state ratio is applied to every appropriate abatement to create better equity for property owners (this city was incorrectly picking and choosing who got this ratio). I asked for the DPW building committee meetings to be public and not closed door. The Board instituted open meeting. I love transparency and accountability. I am a worker.

The best advice ever shared with me was:

My grandmother alway said, hang around with people who are smarter than you.

What else would you like voters to know about yourself and your positions?