City Hall: Replacing wooden signs at Gill with bronze plaque an 'awful idea'

Feb. 23—ALDERMAN AT LARGE Dan O'Neil didn't mince words in reacting to a proposal to remove the wooden signs outside Gill Stadium and JFK Memorial Coliseum — commemorating individuals and organizations who donated trees to the area — and replace them with a single bronze plaque.

"The signs are one of the good things about Manchester," O'Neil said. "I think this is an awful idea."

During a meeting of the Aldermanic Committee on Lands and Buildings on Tuesday, Mark Gomez, the city's chief of Parks, Recreation & Cemetery, pitched his proposal to remove those wooden posts and signs in favor of a bronze plaque.

The wooden signs, all 122 of them, are part of a program launched more than three decades ago, when trees were planted adjacent to Gill Stadium and the JFK Coliseum.

Plantings were financially supported by donations, and large signs on tall wooden posts were placed in front of each tree with the name of the sponsor.

Gomez said while his department remains appreciative of the efforts of those who helped beautify the area around both facilities, the wooden signs have "basically been a headache from a maintenance standpoint for many, many years."

"We get a lot of them that are damaged by vehicles," Gomez said. "We get signposts that are rotting. We have to replace signs because they get graffitied; sometimes they get bent, damaged. It takes up a lot of our labor hours. The presence of the signs themselves sometimes complicates snow removal and vegetation removal."

Gomez estimated the material and labor costs associated with the signs' maintenance at about $10,000 per year.

He recommends continuing to honor the individuals and organizations that made donations by creating a bronze cast plaque displaying donors' names to hang on the side of Gill Stadium.

"We would also have a wayfinding map so that people who are visiting and want to find or identify the tree they might have donated or might have been donated on behalf of a family member or an organization they participated in, they can find that tree easily," Gomez said. "Any of the family and friends that might be interested in having the existing nameplates, we would make those available to them."

Gomez estimated the cost of the bronze plaque at about $10,000, "maybe slightly north of that."

The idea went over about as well as you might expect with some longtime aldermen.

"I apologize if I get a little emotional about this — these plaques are the history of Manchester," O'Neil said. "You drive by and you see many names of people who have contributed athletically to the city of Manchester. I don't understand why today it's a maintenance issue, but 10 years ago it wasn't and 20 years ago it wasn't. $10,000 a year — that's almost somebody doing 10 hours a week working on it to replace them or repaint them.

"I don't buy it's a major maintenance issue, why 30 years later it's a major maintenance issue. We owe it to the individuals on those signs and their families."

O'Neil said if a better way to handle long-term maintenance of the signs could be drawn up, he would volunteer to be a part of it.

Alderman Pat Long said he was "leaning not in favor" of the idea.

"I'm just under the belief that these people paid for something that they expected. It is what they expect, and I don't think the $10,000 a year is problematic," Long said. "Of course we're going to have maintenance and it's going to include workers to do that maintenance."

Alderman Norm Vincent asked Gomez if efforts could be made to contact the families and organizations honored on the signs for their input on the proposal.

"We'd certainly be willing to be very proactive about trying to reach out to them, let them know the plans that we have, and again make sure they know that the signs, the nameplates are available to them if they'd like to have them," Gomez said.

"I agree it is sad, they have been there a long time and they are a pretty important piece for some of these families," Vincent said. "But I also understand the need for the request as well, so I see both sides."

Committee members voted unanimously to table the item until feedback is received from the families and organizations affected.

"What I've learned being on this board is if you don't communicate, then what happens is we pass it, and there's 200 people in here yelling at us," Alderman at Large Joe Kelly Levasseur said. "So better we go safe than sorry, and then take it from there."

Moving people

Shannon MacLeod, policy director and chief of staff for former mayor Joyce Craig, has been appointed to the board of directors of the NextGen Manchester Resiliency Council.

The appointments bring NextGen's board of directors to 12 members. Manchester's Director of Economic Development, Jodie Nazaka, serves as chair and deputy executive director of Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute (ARMI). Maureen Toohey is Secretary.

MacLeod helped lead the city's application to the Build Back Better Regional Challenge.

"I am thrilled to announce the addition of three outstanding members to NextGen's Board of Directors. Their expertise, steadfast dedication, and consistent support towards our objectives are key to advancing the biofabrication industry in Manchester," Nazaka said in a statement. "I believe their contributions are crucial to effectively leverage the Build Back Better Regional Challenge to spur economic development and strengthen our community's resilience."

"Healthcare as we know it is changing in Manchester's Mill Yard, and the work of the NextGen Manchester Resiliency Council will ensure that the biofabrication industry's impacts will be local as well as global," MacLeod said in a statement. "It's an honor to join an organization that is poised to have such a significant and positive impact on the Manchester community."

And — as first reported last week by the Union Leader's Kevin Landrigan — Marisa Nahem, who joined Craig's administration as communications director in mid-2023 before filling the same role for Craig's gubernatorial campaign, has been hired as state communications director for the Biden-Harris reelection campaign.

Her past Democratic Party efforts included work on the 2020 Democratic National Convention Committee; Amy Klobuchar's presidential campaign; gubernatorial campaigns in Ohio and Pennsylvania; Theresa Greenfield's U.S. Senate race in Iowa and a congressional campaign in Ohio.

Paul Feely is the City Hall reporter for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News. Reach him at pfeely@unionleader.com.