Updates

Thanks to Gov. Sununu’s veto (not an uncommon occurrence these days) New Hampshire is now entering its third week without a budget for the 2019-2020 biennium. The good news? There appears to be some movement towards a compromise. The bad news? If posturing and gamesmanship emanating from the governor’s office could somehow be converted into snow, we’d by plowing six foot drifts of the stuff in 100 degree heat.

Over the past few months, images of children caged in filthy, inhuman conditions have shocked many Americans and have triggered protests at Border Patrol and ICE detention facilities across the country. When I heard we had our own ICE adult detention facility just a few miles away from Portsmouth in Dover, NH, I jumped at the chance to take a tour. Here’s what I found.

Last week was one of the more eventful weeks of 2019 in Concord. On Thursday, a flurry of controversial legislation was sent on to the governor for signature, including the state budget and bills to establish a state minimum wage, change the Medicaid work requirement, clean up surface water contamination at Coakley Landfill, and ban carrying firearms onto public school property. A day later we saw the state budget vetoed and NH DES issue tough new water quality standards for PFAS.

The EPA provided an update—and a genuine head-shaking moment—Tuesday night at Bethany Church in Greenland on the status of the Coakley Landfill.

June is Pride Month. It’s a time to celebrate lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people as well as to acknowledge their 50 year struggle to win equality. On Saturday, Portsmouth will celebrate with a noontime rainbow march from Market Square to Strawbery Banke, where Seacoast Outright will be sponsoring a full day of entertainment and activities.

Of the many violations of social, legal, ethical, and moral norms committed over the last 2.5 years by the Trump administration, none is worse than the separation of child refugees from their parents and the imprisonment of those children in for-profit detention facilities where education is no longer available and sexual abuse is common.

In a week where the governor once again chose to wield his veto pen to kill much-needed legislation, the legislature moved dozens of additional bills forward. Here’s a quick recap.

This was a busy week in the legislature with two session days coming smack in the middle of a week-long celebration of the 200th anniversary of the New Hampshire State House which also included a reunion of former legislators. It was also one of the “newsier” weeks of 2019–especially when it came to events taking place outside the House of Representatives. Here’s a quick recap.

The saying “every vote matters” was never more applicable than Thursday in the New Hampshire House of Representatives. With a 2/3 majority needed to override Governor Sununu’s veto of the death penalty repeal bill, the final vote was 247-123–a victory margin of precisely one vote.

Decades of neglect combined with an economic downturn that led to chronic under-funding, have created a situation where New Hampshire has fallen from being a leader in providing community-based mental health care to being a state in crisis.

Wednesday was a long, but productive day in the New Hampshire House of Representatives as we voted on dozens of bills passed earlier in the Senate. Here’s a quick recap.

It’s been a busy two weeks in the New Hampshire House of Representatives. Bills that originated in the Senate (you can identify them by the “SB” prefix instead of the usual “HB”) continue to receive public hearings in House committees. On Thursday, the House met as a body to start voting on them. During this session, we also voted to “concur” with several bills that originated in the House, but were approved with amendments in the Senate. Here’s a quick recap

If you follow the news—or the New Hampshire state legislature—at some point you’ve probably heard about the state’s public school funding crisis. If you live in a community like Portsmouth, you’re probably asking “What crisis?”. But if you live in a community more dependent on state education funding, like Berlin or Claremont, you live in crisis mode every day.

On Thursday, the New Hampshire House of Representatives approved a $12.9 billion state budget along party lines. To make a long story short, it’s a balanced and responsible budget that addresses pressing problems, like mental health and public school funding, while avoiding both a sales tax and an income tax AND providing property tax relief. But it does include a 5% tax on capital gains. Learn more about how it works, who would be affected, and why it’s an idea whose time has come.

On Thursday, the New Hampshire House of Representatives votes on a state new budget. As expected, it differs greatly from the budget proposed in February by Gov. Chris Sununu. Here are ten things to know about the House budget we’ll be voting on.

On Thursday, several bills passed by the New Hampshire House of Representatives earlier in this session, but referred back to a second House committee for additional review, made the trip back the House floor for new votes. With the deadline to act on all non-budget bills also falling on Thursday, we knew we were in for a long day. Here are the highlights.

This coming Thursday, April 4, is the deadline for the New Hampshire House of Representatives to act on non-budget bills originating in the House. If some of them sound familiar, there’s a reason for that. Several have already been voted on—and passed—by the full House. But once passed, they were referred to an additional committee for more work. On Thursday, these bills boomerang back onto the House floor with new committee recommendation and the full House must vote on them once

After a long day of contentious public hearings on Tuesday, the Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee voted by identical 12-8 margins on Wednesday to approve bills enforcing gun-free school zones and other protecting vulnerable adults. A third bill, approved 18-2, raises the fines for violations by off-road recreational vehicles and snowmobiles. All three bills now head to the full House for a vote before moving on to the Senate.

As we move past the one year anniversary of the March for Our Lives, it’s encouraging to know that the outrage felt by so many people had a genuine impact on gun laws in states across the country. But there is still much work to do—especially in New Hampshire.

This week, the New Hampshire House of Representatives acted on hundreds of bills. Here’s a quick summary of some of the key votes.