Nashua Mayor James Donchess

NASHUA – Reiterating his concerns that rapidly-rising health care costs for city employees threaten to raise property taxes beyond many Nashuans’ means, Mayor Jim Donchess on Monday vetoed the so-called “high deductible health plan” provision that was part of the proposed firefighters’ contract that aldermen passed last week.

Donchess is allowed by city charter to exercise a “line item veto” on such collective bargaining agreements, which he noted in a Monday statement announcing the veto.

Aldermen at last Tuesday’s meeting approved the new agreement with the International Association of Fire Fighters Local 789, which covers Nashua firefighters, by a 12-2 vote, with one abstention.

Donchess hinted at the time that he was likely to at least consider vetoing certain provisions of the new contract, which runs from July 1, 2019 to June 30, 2023. It includes a nearly 4% retroactive pay increase for the first year, and provides increases in salary and benefits totaling roughly 14.5% over the course of four years.

Even with the veto, Donchess said, “the contract is … a very generous one.”

The veto targets Article 32 under the insurance section of the contract, which is titled “High Deductible Health Plan with Health Savings Account.”

If allowed to stand, Donchess said the provision “would have increased city health care costs when the city is undertaking a city-wide plan to reduce the rapidly rising costs of health care.”

He added that city health care costs have risen by $6.3 million, or about 20%, over two years,

Donchess also noted that the cost-saving plan the city is working on is now in effect for several classifications of city employees, which include a mix of unaffiliated (non-union) and union employees.

Donchess has said in the past that dealing with the rapidly-rising city health care costs is one of the few topics on which he and the aldermen don’t see eye to eye.

He also said he feels strongly that the health care cost-reduction plan he and members of the Administrative Services department came up with “needs to apply to all city employees, and to be included in all collective bargaining agreements – no exceptions, no excuses,” he said.

The provision that he vetoed, Donchess added, would have put the firefighters’ union under a different plan than the one that other city employees adopted.

Aldermen will now take up Donchess’s veto and decide whether to uphold or override it.

Donchess urged aldermen to “reconsider the provisions I have vetoed,” and assured them that if “we work together on health care costs, we can greatly reduce the costs to our residents and taxpayers.”

Dean Shalhoup may be reached at 594-1256 or dshalhoup@nashuatelegraph.com.

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