Debbie Auger owned a home in Tilton well before Walmart or the Tanger Outlets came to town. For years, promises of lower taxes were backed by claims that these commercial businesses would bring more revenue.

But for 22 years, Auger saw her tax bill continue to rise each year. So in 2017, she sold her housing and moved to the city next door.

Now, she feels the same fate is in store for her Franklin neighbors. With talks of a proposed $20 million bond, Auger fears that there are false promises of lower taxes tomorrow for a costly investment today.

“Them saying, ‘This is what’s going to happen.’ It’s just theory,” she said. “You know what never happened [in Tilton]? My taxes never went down. They went up.”

Ahead of the Franklin City Council’s July meeting on Monday, Auger stood out front of the Opera House  with a sign: “No $20m.”

Although a bond proposal has yet to come before the city council – with a public hearing likely to come in September, at the earliest and no mention of the proposal in Monday’s meeting agenda – residents like Auger are trying to get ahead of the vote.

The $20 million proposal

For the 30 minutes of public comment in front of the Franklin City Council, all comments but one circled an item for which there’s no formal proposal yet – a $20 million bond that would fund road repairs, Opera House maintenance, the Trestle Bridge and the final two phases of Mill City Park.

It’s an idea from the city’s Economic Development Team – a five-member group with Judie Milner, the city manager; Seth Creighton, Franklin’s planning and zoning director; Neil Cannon, a finance consultant to the city; Jim Aberg, executive director of the Franklin Business and Industrial Development Corporation; and Marty Parichand, the founder of Mill City Park.

In a presentation in March, titled “The Tale of Two Cities,” the team outlined Franklin’s past, present and future investments.

Historically, Franklin is a struggling former mill town. Of New Hampshire’s 13 cities, it’s not only the smallest but one of the poorest.

In New Hampshire, the median family income is just over $108,000, according to the U.S. Census. In Franklin, it’s $78,000.

The economic development team’s conclusion was that the city needs $20 million to help with necessary maintenance and invest in a new downtown business – Mill City Park – that they hope will revitalize Franklin’s economy.

The specifics of the bond have not yet been brought to city councilors. Instead, the team is talking to residents, with presentations on what the bond would entail and public listening sessions first. The next is on Thursday, July 13, at the Waterhorse Pub downtown.

The request would be for the city to authorize $20 million in capital expenditures. This means the money would not be funding specific projects, but rather available for what the council sees fit.

At the city council meeting Monday, Milner provided a timeline of setting a date for a public hearing at the August meeting, which would mean the bond would come before the council in September.

Public input

Next month, when the Franklin City Council gathers for its August meeting, it won’t be in the Opera House on Central Street. As paint chipped from the ceiling, and water stains marked years of neglected maintenance, the council has held its last meeting in the space for now.

Without necessary repairs made, Michael Foss, the city’s fire chief, will be issuing a notice of hazardous conditions on July 25 – a deadline that was set a year prior, for repairs to be made for the building.

The last sentence of the notice is, “Failure to comply may result in injury or death.” Come the end of the month, any assembly held in the Opera House will be at their own liability.

As David Bedard stood in the Opera House Monday, he asked city councilors to consider the space they currently occupied.

“When I heard that there was a plan to invest in this building. I was very encouraged,” he said in public comment. “When I heard it was lumped in with other projects, I became very discouraged.”

For Bedard, the Opera House is vital to Franklin’s downtown. It’s a place where hundreds of kids learned to perform, taking the stage in the building’s main room, gathering family, friends and strangers together to see their shows.

And given the importance of the Opera House’s history on Central Street, and the clear order to fix the building or risk losing the space, Bedard urged councilors to support investments in the space.

“Of all the projects in consideration this is the only one that we stand to lose by doing nothing in the moment,” he said.

Kathy Rago agrees with Bedard – there’s a need to fix the Opera House, which also functions as City Hall. But to her, there’s a difference between “life safety issues” and a wishlist of items.

What the economic development team has proposed, she said, is a wish list.

And there’s one part of the proposal in particular that she doesn’t support – Mill City Park.

“The water park is the stickiest one. I don’t support the water park,” she said. “It’s a nonprofit. They told us years ago at the beginning that it would not be funded by city taxpayers. And now they’re saying they need money.”

The first phase of Mill City Park opened in 2021, with a standing wave for kayakers to paddle against. The second phase will add another wave for beginners and surfers, while phase three will introduce an Olympic-style slalom course.

After initial success with grant funding at the park’s inception, Mill City Park has seen fewer dollars of support as construction continues. A proposal to Sen. Jeanne Shaheen’s office could yield additional funding, but the city does not have a timeline for these awards, according to Milner.

Milner and the economic development team argue that the white water park is the one piece of the bond proposal that has a direct reinvestment for residents – with visitors coming to Franklin to paddle, spectate and spend dollars downtown.

But with the bond proposing a tax increase of $494 for a home that’s valued at $200,000 – the median value in Franklin – residents like Rago and Auger feel it’s not on taxpayers to take on these costs.

“A lot of the elderly, a lot of people are barely making their taxes. Now they’re going to go up big time,” said Auger. “If somebody says, ‘Can I borrow money from you?’ they’ve got to tell me what it’s for and that it’s a good reason. To me, they haven’t done that.”

Upcoming Meetings 

Dates: Thursday, July 13 and July 27

Time: 4 – 5:30 pm 

Location: Waterhorse Pub, 361 Central Street

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