Public can weigh in on Pennichuck Corp. proxy

The public will get another opportunity to weigh in on Pennichuck Corp.’s 2013 proxy statement before the Nashua Board of Aldermen submits its vote as sole shareholder to the company. At 7 p.m. Monday, the board’s Pennichuck Water Special Committee will convene again to go over the statement issued by the corporate board in advance of the company’s annual shareholders meeting. The proxy deals with administrative changes to the company’s bylaws and four nominations for the board of directors, three of whom are sitting members who were first hired for one-year terms when the city acquired Pennichuck in 2012. The fourth nominee, Martha O’Neill, served as a Pennichuck director from 1998-2012, when the city bought the water company for $152 million; the city paid $29 a share for Pennichuck stock, for about 4.7 million shares totaling $137.8 million. The committee, which is voting to support the proxy as submitted by Pennichuck’s board of directors, will submit its recommendation to the full board for a final vote on Tuesday. The board will then mail in the proxy card to Pennichuck’s board of directors in advance of Pennichuck’s first shareholders meeting under city ownership, slated for 9 a.m. March 23 at the Nashua Radisson Hotel. The meeting will include an overview of the company’s financials and other updates.