January 30, 2021 ~ Bow, NH

“There’s virtually no transparency or accountability of how the money would be spent or used.  It would also include sectarian [religious] schools, and I would strongly oppose that.” Ley . . . said that it will force local governments to raise property taxes to make up for the loss of state education funding “because it will siphon away money from the public schools, which serve the vast majority of New Hampshire students.”

- “New Hampshire Republicans Pushing to Expand School Vouchers,” 1/27/21, To read the full article, please go to Center Square. Your urgent action needed to stop vouchers.  The above statement by AFT-NH President Doug Ley pretty well summarizes the major problems with House Bill 20, the deeply-flawed proposal to establish an education voucher program here in New Hampshire.  The bill, which will have its initial hearing before the NH House Education Committee on Tuesday, Feb. 2 at 1:15pm, proposes to establish “education freedom accounts,” a subterfuge to launder public monies by passing the funds through a private scholarship organization first before distributing the funds to individual ‘education freedom accounts.’  By doing so, sponsors seek to circumvent the NH Constitution’s explicit ban on using public funds to pay for religious/sectarian schools.  But this is only the tip of the iceberg in regards to what is wrong with HB 20.

January 23, 2021 ~ Bow, NH

“Teacher unions.”  A phrase often heard in NH news this week.  Why?  Governor Sununu has come under strong criticism for omitting educators from the top tier categories for COVID vaccinations.  Forty-eight of the fifty states have put educators in the top tier, understanding that if they are vaccinated, then there will be fewer positives, fewer quarantines due to potential exposure, etc. Here in NH, there is a severe shortage of substitute teachers and para-educators to replace those required to quarantine.  If educators were vaccinated, the quarantine problem would begin to subside, the substitute shortage would be ameliorated, and more schools would begin returning to full-scale in-person learning.  Once that happens, parents can then return to work and a more normal life.  End result?  A quicker return to something resembling pre-COVID life in NH.  Now isn’t that something we are all waiting and hoping for this year? 

January 17, 2021 ~ Bow, NH

Slowly but surely, the wheels are beginning to turn in the NH Legislature.  The Senate has already held a small number of online committee hearings, in essence testing out the system for remote access public testimony and working out any glitches.  The NH House is moving more slowly, with committees holding online orientation meetings for their members. 

The schedule for these meetings is in the House Calendar which can be found on the NH General Court website at http://gencourt.state.nh.us/house/caljourns/default.aspx).  If you seek to know when specific bills are scheduled for hearings you can check the Calendar which is published weekly or go to the bill search site if you know the bill number (for example, budget bill is always HB1).  The search page is http://gencourt.state.nh.us/bill_Status/.

January 10, 2021

Bow, NH

To say the first full week of 2021 was eventful is a gross understatement. The shocking attempt at a coup in Washington DC will be memorialized by historians but should not surprise anyone following politics the past twenty years.  Commentary is already flowing fast and furious, and there is little need to add to it.  Suffice to say, the attempted coup bears witness to the continued power and stridency of white supremacist thinking and rhetoric and its deep roots in American history and culture.  Sadly, lives were lost, including police officer, Brian Sicknick, who died from injuries incurred in the line of duty.  Unsurprisingly, Governor Sununu has not ordered flags flown at half-staff in honor of Officer Sicknick. One can only suspect our dear governor is still holding his finger in the air, trying to determine the direction of the political winds before he considers acting or taking a stand in regards to the coup and his party leader, President Trump.

January 1, 2021 ~ Bow, NH

Happy New Year!  It is time to wave a not-so-fond farewell to 2020!  One can only hope that 2021 is an improvement upon the year we all just endured.  Educators are exhausted, students are tired, health care workers are burning out, and NH’s COVID infection rates and the number of deaths continues to rise with unprecedented rapidity.  Meanwhile, as the NH Legislature prepares to resume its work in some sort of fashion, the Republican majority and the governor are preparing an unprecedented assault upon public education and upon labor unions.  So gird up, the next few months are going to be busy.  We will try to keep you informed as things develop and we will be asking for your aid and involvement as we work to prevent the gutting of public education and its privatization.  But first, let’s take a look at the context and setting, as the political circus prepares to open for the 2021 session.

The NH Legislature is in a momentary lull, having just survived “crossover,” the deadline date by which bills must be acted on in order to move across to the other branch of the legislature.  On Tuesday and Wednesday of last week, the House considered over 150 bills.  Approximately one-half were on the Consent Calendar with unanimous or almost unanimous bipartisan committee recommendations to pass or defeat.  Unless a bill is removed from the Consent Calendar, the House then takes one vote to “approve the Consent Calendar,” after which all the bills still on it are passed or defeated as recommended.  So, it is a short-cut, avoiding unnecessary delay in considering what are often minor or duplicative bills.