“Hypocrisy: prejudice with a halo” —Ambrose Bierce
Nashua Alderman at large Lori Wilshire seeks an ordinance in Nashua that would ban new establishments from selling alcohol within 500 feet of a school. Wilshire openly admitted tot he Nashua Telegraph her intent was to block the Nashua VFW Post 483 from placing its post in the Crown Hill Fire Station, located next to Dr. Norman W. Crisp Elementary School. Wilshire finds it, “just terrible,” that Veterans of Foreign Wars would engage in the selling of Libations next to a school. Just “terrible,” oh the scandal…So much so that Alderman at Large Wilshire thinks Nashua should ban it and has put forth a measure to do exactly that. You don’t say, Lori?
Nashua Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire is also the business manager for the Nashua Children’s home. Nearly twenty years ago the Nashua Children’s home sought to move to its present location on Concord Street and residents rose up in opposition to it then. Somehow the children’s home prevailed over the snotty pernicious NIMBY politics that continues to disease the Gate City. “Not In My Back Yard!”, that is, unless, of course, it is your own sacred cow.
In October of last year, Nashua rejected Nashua Soup Kitchen’s plans to move to the West Otterson Street area. NIMBY politics reared its ugly head there as well with Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire speaking up on behalf of the Soup Kitchen. Finally in February the vote went in the affirmative.
Personally, I am puzzled by the opposition there. Many who have been to West Otterson street agree when I say the neighborhood is crap. It is not really any one thing or the other. West Otterson Street in Nashua has but a few neatly groomed family homes, a neatly groomed Multi-family apartment house and a bunch of other commercially used buildings, some weeded over vacant lots, abutting a school at the head of it all. This is evidence that truly underscores how deeply rooted many Nashuans are to their adherence of NIMBY politics.
Alderman-at-Large Lori Wilshire advocated for the Children’s home on Concord Street twenty years earlier while the NIMBY’s who opposed it cited fears of Juvenile delinquency; Wilshire advocated for the Nashua Soup Kitchen while the NIMBY’s found their voice in others on the Aldermanic board to oppose the W. Otterson Street location for fear of Junkies, bums and homeless people moving ‘to and fro’ in their faux idyllic neighborhood in search of a hot meal. And now this…The very men, and women who took up arms and served this country, are opposed by the likes of Lori Wilshire because the building they seek to purchase is next door to a school: Norman W. Crisp Elementary School.
The Arlington Street neighborhood is remarkably better groomed than the West Otterson Street neighborhood, but again, still a neighborhood of mixed use and scale.Not to mention the sidewalks in disrepair.
There might be something to be said if an entrepreneurial club owner was seeking a variance for a “Titty-bar” or a “Thug watering hole,” with the comings and goings of low-slung loud exhaust-laden Japanese Cars pounding out the thump-thump base speakers; ‘Youts’ walking around with hats on backwards and pants nearly falling down; loud conversations piercing the night air where every other word is, “motherfucker.” But this, folks…THIS ain’t that!
Wilshire’s proposal is not only shameful, but an insult to all the honorable men and women who served on foreign soil, leaving parts of their bodies and souls on battlefields far and away. Wilshire is not blocking a watering hole. She is attempting to block a fraternity…a brotherhood of those who gave the most to this society…those who made it entirely possible for Wilshire and her ilk to make such proposals. “Thanks for your service, but go away now.”
Nashua sucks. In the last thirty years it has become chucked full of people who come from locales South of the Granite State Border who think we all are a bunch of hicks and rednecks. The arts and croissants crowd is going to shove down our throats, their branding and their nurturing acculturation. Remember, just last year a member of the Nashua Aldermanic board sought an ordinance to ban the dressing and processing of deer in residential neighborhoods because one anthropomorphically-challenged, talking animal movie fan was horrified to see ‘Bambi’ hanging upside down in a neighbor’s yard. Finding sycophant Mark Cookson to put forth the proposed edict banning the practice, the measure ultimately failed. This is just another of many nonsense proposals found in the Gate City.
Finally, Alderman at large Lori Wilshire’s proposal demonstrates the sharp endemic nature of NIMBY politics in the Gate City. The VFW is a fraternal organization, The over arching VFW’s mission is,
To foster camaraderie among United States veterans of overseas conflicts. To serve our veterans, the military, and our communities. To advocate on behalf of all veterans.
Nashua Aldermanic board ought to throw this proposal out on its ear…and the Nashua voters ought to throw Lori Wilshire out, too.
SUPPORT THE VFW!
