Portsmouth City Council
Tuesday, October 13, 2026

The Council is asked to accept the draft minutes of its September 28 meeting (Assistant Mayor Kelley absent). The main actions recorded:

• Housing Action Plan adopted 8-0 after a second public input session (four speakers). Councilor Tabor said he would bring ideas raised back to the Housing Committee; several councilors remarked on the slow timelines.
• Sherburne Project: the Portsmouth Housing Authority's development team presented an update and financing picture; councilors asked for more detail on financing. PHA's request for a sewer extension and reimbursement agreement was referred to Legal, Finance and Public Works for a report back.
• Stormwater utility: Raftelis Financial Consultants presented its evaluation; councilors focused on public communication. Staff told the Council that the utility could raise stormwater charges while lowering sewer bills for many customers.
• Ordinances passed on third reading: the appointments/tenure change to the Administrative Code (second and third reading the same night); zoning amendments on variance procedures and approval expirations; and the Fleet Street changes — parking moved from the west to the east side, and one-way from Congress to Hanover with a contra-flow bike lane.
• Downtown Workforce Parking Program eligibility expanded through March 1, 2027 to clerical, customer-service, administrative and support staff of businesses that previously took part (7-0, Councilor Hopkins abstaining because a family member works downtown), with a staff report due in October on off-peak parking options for downtown businesses.
• Natural burial: the City Manager was directed to assess whether any City-owned land is suitable for natural burials and to recommend FY2028 CIP funding (8-0).
• Prescott Park: report back requested on the April motion to work with the Prescott Park Arts Festival on a Festival-funded covered stage; Councilor Bagley also asked Legal how much is in the park trust and what the general budget contributes.
• Money: $9,500 released from the Lower State Street Pocket Park Trust; a $14,868 Byrne JAG grant to the Police Department; a $1,000 Sister Cities donation; Point of Graves wall donations.
• Three resignations/appointments to boards; the Shuttle Loop Working Group meets first on October 19; Household Hazardous Waste Collection Day is Saturday, October 24.

Sample motion: accept and approve the minutes of the September 28, 2026 meeting.

Public comment is a general session, separate from the two public hearings below, where speakers address the specific ordinance. Zoom participants need to register in advance; a unique meeting ID and password are sent on registration.

Today the Historic District along Middle Street generally extends 150 feet from the street, so the line cuts through lots and, in some cases, through buildings. The amendment to the zoning map redraws that stretch to follow parcel lines, and — in the City Manager's words — "reduces the Historic District boundary to properties that have frontage on Middle Street." The maps on packet pages 21–22 (dated September 14) show the existing boundary in gray, parcels coming out in orange and parcels going in whole in yellow.

Staff's breakdown of the 54 parcels leaving

• 38 have structures: on 20 of them the structure sits entirely inside today's district; on 18 the structure is bisected by the line.
• 16 are crossed by the line, but their structures are already outside the district, so those buildings were never under Historic District Commission review.
• No parcels are newly added. The 20 parcels going in whole are already partly in the district; the portions outside the 150-foot line would now be covered too.

Staff's case: a parcel-based line is easier to administer and understand, removes inconsistencies, and matches preservation guidance that favors defined, defensible boundaries over arbitrary distances. The Planning Board voted unanimously on August 20 to recommend first reading "as amended"; the Historic District Commission reviewed the boundary on July 8 and kept its earlier recommendation. The Planning Board's August memo also notes that two Austin Street parcels (43 and 53) were tabled in January until the Master Plan work is done, and that the owner of 670 Middle Street asked to be excluded.

Staff presentation, posted October 13

The slide deck for the hearing restates the case in four lines — property lines instead of an arbitrary distance, fewer split lots and split buildings, a boundary that is easier to administer — and sharpens the numbers: of the 54 parcels leaving, 20 sit entirely inside the district today but do not front on Middle Street (side-street lots within the 150-foot band), 18 are bisected by the line, and 16 are bisected with their structures already outside. The map in the deck is dated October 13; the parcel counts match the September 14 maps in the packet. Implementation dates given: Historic District Commission recommendation July 8, Planning Board recommendation August 20, Council hearing October 13.

Sample motion: pass second reading and schedule third and final reading for October 26, 2026.

Twenty-one pages of redline strike most of Article 11 (Off-Street Parking) plus the parking sections of the Character-Based, Gateway and Overlay articles. What remains in the Zoning Ordinance is a short set of rules for single- and two-family houses; the rest is to be "established and administered under the Site Plan Review Regulations."

Why the location of the rules matters

Zoning amendments need three readings and a public hearing before the City Council. Site Plan Review Regulations are adopted and changed by the Planning Board after its own public hearing. Relief changes too: today a developer who wants fewer spaces needs a conditional use permit from the Planning Board (with a demand analysis reviewed by the Technical Advisory Committee), or a variance from the Board of Adjustment. Under the Planning Board's draft regulations, "parking flexibility" requests are decided by the Planning Board with site plans, and the Planning Director can approve modifications for a change of use with no exterior site work. The Board of Adjustment's special-exception route for parking on a nearby lot is struck.

The Planning Board approved the companion Site Plan Review amendments on September 17; they take effect only when the Council adopts this ordinance, so there is no gap. The City Manager describes the goal as streamlining parking classifications, consolidating flexibility provisions and giving staff more administrative flexibility. The Planning Board's August memo traces the idea to Housing Committee recommendations the Council referred in September 2025.

What the new rules say (from the Planning Board's August draft)

The adopted text is not in the packet. The August 20 draft collapses the long use table into broad categories — office 1 space per 350 sq ft, medical 1 per 250, retail 1 per 300, restaurants 1 per 100, lodging 1.25 per room, industrial 1 per 750, warehouse 1 per 2,000 — keeps multifamily at 0.5 or 1 space per unit by size, keeps the Downtown Overlay rules as they are, and folds reductions, shared parking and off-site parking into one "Parking Flexibility" section. The version adopted on September 17 may differ in detail.

Staff presentation, posted October 13

The hearing deck frames the change as "retain, relocate, simplify" and adds the back-story: before 1982 downtown was generally exempt from off-street parking requirements; they were introduced between 1982 and 1995, with ZBA relief for projects over 50 spaces near public parking; a $500-per-space in-lieu fee arrived in 1997 and rose to $5,000 in the 2010 ordinance rewrite, which also exempted most nonresidential downtown uses; a 2010 Downtown Parking Focus Group recommended eliminating downtown requirements, repealing the fee and treating parking as public infrastructure under a "park once" approach. Under "what is not changing," staff list minimum parking requirements, the Downtown Overlay provisions, bicycle and accessible parking, lot design, pedestrian circulation and loading review. Under "changes to the site plan regulations": simplified parking categories, the shared-parking matrix eliminated, flexibility provisions consolidated, loading standards simplified, parking demand analysis expanded.

Sample motion: pass second reading and schedule third and final reading for October 26, 2026.

The Planning Board approved the subdivision on May 21, 2026. The lots front on Longmeadow Lane, a lawful but unbuilt City street that already carries City utilities. The developer will construct only the segment serving the three lots, running west from Farm Lane, and has asked to call it McMaster Drive; Public Works cleared the name with State E911, Police Dispatch and the Fire Department, and there are no duplicates in the zip code.

• Turnaround easement for emergency vehicles, which ends if Longmeadow Lane is ever extended through to Woodlawn Circle.
• Drainage easement letting City drainage discharge into features on two of the lots, with maintenance left to the owners.
• Additional right-of-way folded into the existing street layout.

The plan on page 50 lists Jeanette MacDonald as owner and Flippin Bergers, LLC as applicant; the easement deed is from Flippin Bergers, LLC.

Sample motion: authorize the City Manager to accept and record the drainage easement, turnaround easement and additional right-of-way in substantially the same form as in the packet, and approve McMaster Drive as the name of the new public street.

Attorney John Bosen of Donahue, Tucker & Ciandella writes for RPL Properties LLC, owner of Tax Map 229, Lot 7 — the Winchester Place apartments, roughly 150 units on about 15 acres, on the site since around 1970. The letter, dated August 19, asks the Council to start a zoning map amendment moving the parcel from its Garden Apartment/Mobile Home (GA/MH) designation into a Gateway Neighborhood Mixed Use district, which it calls "a logical extension" of nearby Gateway zoning.

The owner says it has no development plan now but wants to "preserve the opportunity to consider additional housing" on the site. Any future project, the letter notes, would still go through site plan review and any conditional use permits — Gateway zoning allows more than 24 units in a building and added density or height only by conditional use permit from the Planning Board.

What the motion does

Referral to the Planning Board for a recommendation and report back is the first step in a map amendment. If the Board recommends it, the rezoning returns to the Council for three readings and a public hearing of its own.

Sample motion: refer to the Planning Board for recommendation and report back.

The proposal recounts Revere's overnight ride from Boston with word that the British meant to secure the powder and arms at Fort William and Mary; he reached the Parade — today's Market Square — on the afternoon of December 13, 1774, and the fort was raided on December 14 and 15. The group asks to work with Public Works on a design and location that fits alongside the existing State House marker in the square.

• Timeline: approval to plan in October 2026; design work with DPW November–December; a full marker plan (design, costs, funding campaign, dedication plan) submitted in January 2027 for final approval; dedication in early spring 2027.
• Funding: Mr. Geanoulis, the NH Sons of the American Revolution, a grant application to the national SAR's George Washington Endowment Fund, and donations. The proposal states that no City funding is anticipated.
• The request letter itself (from Curtis Hermann of the NH SAR) is referenced on the agenda; the packet contains the five-page proposal.

Sample motion: refer to the City Manager with authority to act.

Sample motion: accept and place on file.

14.A Resignation

MC (Mary Claire) Rodriguez-Abbott withdraws from the Portsmouth Energy Advisory Committee; her family is moving to Sacramento earlier than planned for her husband's job. The motion accepts with regret and sends a letter of thanks.

14.B Appointments to be considered (vote at a later meeting)

• Zachary (Zach) Dombrowski, full member, Economic Development Commission — investment banker with William Blair & Company advising on IPOs; four-year resident; no prior municipal board experience; references Christer Ericsson and Peter Whelan.
• Matthew Jeffers, alternate, Economic Development Commission — general manager at a laser systems manufacturer, formerly director of engineering in semiconductor equipment; 15-month resident; Middle Hill Condominium Association; references Christopher Ledoux and Jason Lenk.

14.C Appointments to be voted

• Alanna Lang — appointment to the Behavioral Health Task Force
• Meganne Fabrega — reappointment to the Library Board of Trustees
• Alice Carey — reappointment to the Conservation Commission

Sample motion (14.C): appoint as presented.

What began as a stand-alone police facility became a campus-wide project: renovate and expand the Junkins Avenue complex rather than build elsewhere. Concept C adds about 9,410 sq ft on the main level plus 6,830 sq ft of basement beneath the additions, puts a one-story sally port in front of the police station (now to be finished in brick to match the 1963 building), and reorganizes City Hall around a new accessible entrance with a public elevator and a "point of service" where Tax, City Clerk and Assessing sit by the door. Water & Sewer Billing would move to the DPW site on Peverly Hill Road; most School Department central administration is contemplated to move to the high school. Everything else stays, with departments relocating once, into permanent space.

Phasing and cost (JSA estimate dated September 25)

Staff's comparison, from the project FAQ: a police-only expansion was estimated at about $42 million, and City Hall needs $10–11 million of HVAC work regardless — roughly $52–53 million that would leave City Hall's space and accessibility problems unaddressed. On that framing the comprehensive project costs an additional $5.6–6.6 million. To hold the total at $58.6 million, the third- and fourth-floor work was cut back from earlier versions.

What it would mean for tax bills (City staff's preliminary estimate)

About $1.4 million of early design work was bonded between 2023 and 2026 and is already in tax bills; the figures below cover the remaining $57.2 million. Staff assume six annual borrowings, fiscal years 2028 through 2033, each repaid over 20 years at 4.25%, which adds $25.5 million of interest over 25 years. Payments would peak at $4.98 million in fiscal 2034 and decline every year after, with the last payment in fiscal 2053.

Staff's caveat: these numbers show the new borrowing on its own. Existing City debt retires during the same years, which could leave room in the tax rate depending on what other capital needs the City takes on, and new construction would widen the tax base; neither is assumed.

Schedule if approved

Design contract executed November 2026; schematic design through February 2027, with a construction manager hired for pre-construction pricing in spring 2027 and early reviews by the Conservation Commission, TAC, Historic District Commission and Planning Board; design development May–August 2027; construction documents through January 2028; bidding and a guaranteed maximum price February–May 2028; construction June 2028 to 2032. DPW swing space would be assessed, designed and fitted out between October 2026 and August 2027.

Sample motion: accept the Municipal Building Blue Ribbon Committee's recommendation of Final Concept C, including the revised third and fourth floors and HVAC and electrical upgrades, as the preferred design concept for the Municipal Complex Upgrade, consistent with the revised cost estimate and phasing plan, for a total project cost estimate of $58.6 million, and update the existing CIP element sheet in the FY28–33 CIP.

The subcommittee screens capital requests submitted by residents for the Capital Improvement Plan. The Planning Board is scheduled to vote on its CIP recommendation on November 19, with Council adoption on December 7. Nothing in the packet previews what the subcommittee will say.

The premise: a homeowner who adds an ADU raises the assessed value of the property and pays more tax on it for as long as the unit stands, which works against the housing the state and city say they want. New Hampshire municipalities cannot create their own exemptions, so the first step is a state law — modeled on the solar exemption in RSA 72:62, where the state creates the option and each town decides whether to use it.

How the proposed exemption would work

• Applies only to ADUs (attached or detached, including conversions) with a certificate of occupancy issued after the law takes effect.
• Exempts only the added assessed value attributable to the unit; the existing home is assessed as before.
• Each city or town chooses whether to adopt it, sets the length (up to 20 consecutive tax years) and may cap the dollar amount.
• The unit must be someone's primary residence — owner, family member or long-term tenant; short-term rental use ends the exemption the following tax year.
• No family-relationship test. A 2020 bill (HB 1510) that tied the break to leasing outside the family died in committee 19–1 after the Municipal Association questioned how towns would verify relationships.

The second half of the motion asks the City Attorney whether the 2026 amendments to RSA 79-E (HB 1103, effective August 31) — which allow tax relief for new housing in a designated Housing Opportunity Zone for up to 7 years, or 15 for workforce housing — could already apply to a single ADU, and whether Portsmouth would first need to adopt RSA 79-E:4-c and designate a zone.

Fiscal effect

The memo is candid that the levy is set by the budget, not the exemption: exempted ADU value simply would not widen the tax base during the exemption period, so other taxpayers would forgo a small rate reduction. It says the size could be estimated from ADU permits issued since 2017 but does not offer a number.

Sample motion: request that Portsmouth's delegation to the General Court file legislation for the 2027 session authorizing a local-option exemption on the added assessed value of newly created ADUs for up to 20 years; and request a City Attorney report on whether relief under RSA 79-E:4-c, as amended in 2026, could apply to newly created ADUs.

Valet licenses (Council vote required)

LAZ Parking Limited, LLC would renew two one-year revocable licenses, each for three designated spaces on Portwalk Place — a private street — at $1,500 a year: one for Portwalk HI LLC (Hampton Inn & Suites) and one for Parade Residence Hotel LLC (Residence Inn and the Harbor Events & Conference Center). Valet runs 24/7; valet cars may not be stored in metered or municipal spaces or garages, and may not be stacked on Portwalk Place; the operator carries $1 million in liability and $300,000 in garage-keepers insurance naming the City; the City or owner can end a license on 72 hours' notice. The committee approved both unanimously.

Other September 3 committee actions (no Council vote needed)

• Handicap spaces approved at 30 Dearborn Street (temporary, tied to the resident's placard) and on Daniel Street at Penhallow Street (permanent).
• "No Parking Here to Corner" signs on Richards Avenue at Rockland Street, after stop-sign non-compliance complaints; no-parking area on the south side of Cass Street at Chevrolet Avenue extended 20 feet each side of the intersection as traffic calming.
• Placed on file: a request to modify the Marcy Street no-parking area between New Castle Avenue and Walden Street (already no-parking by ordinance), and a request for added enhancements at the State Street crosswalk by the African Burial Ground (Mary Lou McElwain voted no, citing a close call).
• Public comment covered crosswalk safety at Maplewood and Dennett, a utility trailer parked on Miller Avenue, and West End crosswalks; informational updates covered South Street traffic calming, the Complete Streets report, Fleet Street's one-way conversion, Daniel Street parking near Market Square, Middle Street paving, Congress Street construction restarting, and a request to add Sudbury Street to the RAPP zone.

Sample motions: approve the annual renewal of the valet license agreements with LAZ Parking Limited, LLC for Portwalk HI, LLC and for Parade Residence Hotel, LLC; approve and accept the action sheet and minutes of the September 3, 2026 meeting.

16.B Granite United Way — Opioid Abatement Responsive Grant, Round 4: $13,000

The grant converts an existing City-owned vehicle into a dedicated outreach unit for the Police Department's Portsmouth CARES social worker, for field contact with people affected by opioid use disorder, homelessness and behavioral-health challenges, and may also support School Department social workers and the Welfare Department. The money comes from the New Hampshire Opioid Abatement Trust Fund; the grant period runs October 2026 to September 2027; unspent funds go back within 30 days; funds must be kept separate from federal dollars; a completion report is required.

16.A Senior Activity Center Luncheon Fund: $1,000

From Charlotte Dura and Robbin DiPierre of Rye, Senior Center members, "in thanks to the programming of the Senior Activity Center."

16.C Point of Graves Cemetery Wall Replacement: $800

Sharon Fulton $100; Patricia and Richard Bagley $200; Dan Corcoran $250; Kathryn Lynch $250. A first batch of donations to the wall project was accepted on September 28.

Sample motions: accept with thanks the $1,000 donation to the Senior Activity Center Luncheon Fund; accept the $13,000 Round 4 Opioid Abatement Response Grant from Granite United Way and authorize the City Manager to execute the agreement; accept with thanks the Point of Graves donations as presented.

City Council Policy 2026-01 charges non-residents to park on a set of streets near downtown — Parrott Avenue (Rogers Street to Junkins Avenue), Hanover Street (Bridge to Brewster), Rock, Pearl, Tanner Street and Tanner Court, Gates, Hancock, Washington (Court to Hancock) and the Parrott Avenue Lot — while residents and School, Recreation and Library employees with registered plates park free. Registered downtown workers may use Parrott Avenue at $0.30 an hour with no transaction fee (the Rogers-to-Richards stretch stays free with a four-hour limit) and buy up to 26 Foundry Garage stickers a month at $3 for up to 12 hours each. The program began July 1; the amendments took effect October 1.