KEENE, NH – Keene City Councilors will have an opportunity to voice their opinions on the highly controversial Downtown Infrastructure Improvement and Reconstruction project and discuss it amongst each other before it goes into Municipal Services, Facilities, and Infrastructure committee for further action.

Thursday’s full City Council meeting featured a lengthy and at points heated discussion on how to proceed with the project. City Attorney Tom Mullins presented the council with a few options, including sending it straight to MSFI, or workshopping as a full body before sending it to MSFI.

To start discussion, At-Large councilor Thomas Powers made a motion to have a workshop with the full council before sending it to MSFI. A discussion ensued with a lot of back and forth between the councilors, some felt the council needed to trust the process they use for every other project and send it through the MSFI committee, others said they want to have an understanding on how their colleagues are feeling before any action is taken.

Councilor Mitch Greenwald, chair of the MSFI committee wanted to have the project put on his agenda, so he could then schedule a workshop and have more control over the timing, and allow the public to participate.

Other councilors, including Kate Boseley advocated for the workshop process so councilors could discuss it together, and any questions they had would all get the same answer from the same party. Councilor Kris Roberts also noted that he felt the workshop process would provide the most transparency for the public.

Councilor Catherine Workman, who is also part of the MSFI committee along with Greenwald, Roberts, Councilor Bobby Williams, and Councilor Randy Filiault, supported sending it straight to MSFI, saying her fellow councilors should trust the process and would still have a chance to speak, while also giving the public a chance to weigh in as public comment would not have been guaranteed at the workshop, but it is in MSFI meetings.

Filiault was also in support of sending the matter to MSFI, saying in a passionate speech that the process works, and “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

Greenwald had amended the motion on the floor to send the matter to MSFI and allow him to schedule a workshop after that. That amendment failed.

After about an hour of back and forth, a vote to amend the motion to allow for public comment at the Workshop passed, and ultimately the motion on the floor, to hold a series of workshops that will allow public comment with the full council before sending it to MSFI passed with councilor Workman opposed. Greenwald voted in favor of the motion but said he plans to reconsider his vote at the next council meeting.

Mullins noted that the workshops are recognized as a regular meeting of the council, the only difference is there will be no action taken at the end of the meetings as it will eventually wind up in the hands of the MSFI committee for action.

The project has been a point of contention in the city for several weeks, with several community members, downtown business owners, and frequent visitors concerned about the redesign of Central Square. The city previously held two public hearings to allow the community to learn more about the project and provide feedback before it fell in the lap of the council.

Earlier this week City Manager Elizabeth Dragon broke the news on WKBK that the project would be pushed back to start in 2025 due to the timeline of some grant funding. The full interview is available here. That comes after more than 50 downtown business owners singed a letter to the council urging them to delay the start of the project until 2026 to allow them to recover economically from the COVID-19 pandemic.

City Clerk Patty Little said that Council Chambers is booked pretty solidly during the week, so she had to reserve some dates in advance to ensure the council would be able to meet in the chambers. There’s no set number of workshops but the first is tentatively scheduled for Tuesday March 14th at 6 pm.