GOFFSTOWN, NH – Manchester Mayor Jay Ruais gave his 2026 State of the City Address on Tuesday to an audience of dozens of local community leaders present – and with many more in mind, those living in Manchester hundreds of years from now.
Presented by the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce, the mayor’s annual overview of the city government’s priorities and accomplishments was encapsulated in the context of State of the City addresses from Manchester’s past and how our descendants may look back to this time in the city’s history, just after the quarter-way mark of the 21st century.
Ruais joked that unlike in former Manchester Mayor Frederick Smyth’s 1853 speech, where he discussed annexing portions of Bedford and Goffstown, Ruais’ agenda would not include any invasions of other communities. Instead, he looked back to moments such as the establishment of the city’s first housing by the Amoskeag Corporation and former Manchester Mayor James Weston’s efforts in 1872 that led to a hydraulic plant that continues to be used today. Ruais stated that the accomplishments made today will be the things remembered, not the petty arguments or rivalries or controversies that take up so much attention.
“Some of the best decisions in our city’s history weren’t immediately popular, but decades later they defined the city we are proud of today,” he said.
The full speech and subsequent discussion with Scott Spradling will be available on Manchester Public Access Television. Here is a recap of what he talked about, divided by subject.
Homelessness
Ruais’ plan on addressing the issue of homelessness in Manchester has focused on dividing the overall homeless population into smaller segments and then focusing on their specific needs to help them escape from the cycle of homelessness.
He said a total of 103 homeless veterans identified have been provided with housing. Homeless facilities are expected to soon have a new building co-funded by the Singer Foundation, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Manchester, Family Promise and $500,000 of U.S. Housing and Urban Development community development block grants.
Aged and infirm members of the city’s homeless population will soon be served by a new city-run facility on Elm Street that will also be used as a winter emergency warming shelter and a daytime engagement center. While the Elm Street facility is currently funded until the end of February 2027, he said that he will soon be providing a plan continual three-year-cycle budgeting plans for the facility to end impromptu approaches toward addressing homelessness moving forward.
He also mentioned 100 other identified homeless individuals and 29 that obtained jobs and hopes an permanent presence on the first floor of the Elm Street facility where local non-profit agencies can work in tandem with the city to continue this trend.
Ruais said that there has been a 28 percent drop in homeless encampments and a 54 percent drop in opioid overdoses although half of all overdoses still come from the city’s homeless population.
Housing
Ruais mentioned several recent additions to the city’s housing stock such as the former Hallsville School, the Lamont-Hanley Building, housing planned on Hackett Hill, recently opened affordable housing near the intersection of Merrimack and Chestnut Streets and the complex planned for the Pearl Street lot.
One of the key focuses going forward will be what is done with the former Sununu Youth Detention Center property. While he acknowledged that the decision on what happens there is going to be determined by the state rather than the city, that decision should have input from Manchester residents, particularly those living nearby the property.
He said that creating a regional attraction that would draw large traffic down River Road would be likely, he also noted that during the Ward 1 meeting for what was then the city’s proposed zoning ordinance, a significant number of neighborhood residents sought mixed use development.
Public Works
In addition to celebrating the progress of the Cemetery Brook combined sewer overflow project, a set of tunnels required by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency mandates that will improve water quality and reduce flooding, the mayor also praised the work of the Department of Public Works.
Ruais said that in 2025, the department sealed 42 miles of roadway, striped 385 miles of roadway, installed over 3,000 signs, fixed 7,000 potholes, completed 3,065 feet of curve improvements, completed 32 public/private sidewalk upgrades and oversaw 38 major sewer repairs. Plus, they did all those things while overseeing snow removal from the city’s roads after storms.
The downtown street cleaning team has also played a vital role in maintaining the cleanliness of the city, removing 125,000 pounds of trash, removing 2000 stickers and spending a total of 450 hours on snow and leaf removal.
Children and Elderly
Ruais noted the recently established child care commission, which will gather various stakeholders to improve the city’s childcare capabilities, a key component toward attracting qualified employees to the city. However, work still remains on how improving the city’s childcare infrastructure will be paid for.
Regarding the Manchester School District Ruais acknowledged the 40 Manchester high school students who were recently honored with a seal of bi-literacy from the State of New Hampshire and efforts of the dual-language immersion schools now teaching elementary school students in a manner that is expected to give them complete fluency in a second language by the time they graduate.
The upcoming Fiscal Year 2026 Manchester School District budget will hold several difficult decisions, with an expected 14-to-15 million dollar funding gap to overcome as of this month and only approximately $3 million in city government funds that can be transferred to shore up the department’s budget.
This problem will become significantly worse if the state government does not pass HB 1831, a piece of legislation designed to remove $10 million in cuts to state-level differentiated aid to the school district.
Other
Ruais said that violent crime, property crime and total crime fell in 2025 and that fair contracts for the city’s two police unions are a priority to find new officers to fill the city’s police department roster shortfall.
He also praised the Manchester Fire Department for their work in 2025 as they responded to 29,105 calls that included 7,143 calls related to fires and 21,961 calls that held some sort of medical emergency.
“We simply could not function well without their efforts,” said Ruais. “A safe city is a prosperous city and they are our backbone.”
Beautification efforts are also expected, with select but unspecified locations receiving changing colored light displays and light displays being added to the gateways on Elm Street, the Gaslight District and the Rock Rimmon gate on Kelly Street.
