AFT-NH Legislative Bulletin (2024-08)

Right to Work (for less) Soundly Defeated

SO CALLED RIGHT TO WORK has been beaten back again. Union allies banded together to once again defeat this legislation designed to weaken our collective bargaining rights. The final vote was 212-168, a stunning rebuke of this awful legislation considering the makeup of the NH House. Thank you all for reaching out and making your voices heard in opposing this regressive bill that would have resulted in lower wages and less safe working conditions for Granite Staters.

In addition, this week the House took small steps in better funding education for our public school students by passing two bills (HB 1583 and HB 1686) that would result in an additional $130 million to our local neighborhood public schools. HB 1583 increases base adequacy per pupil funding by $222 to $4,404, establishes grants for districts with low equalized property values, as well as increased grants for districts serving students experiencing poverty. HB 1686 changes differentiated aid for Special Education students from a flat $2,142 per student to a range of $2,642 for Special Education students who receive most of their education in the regular education classroom up to $7,927 for students who need a large number of specialized services, programming, and equipment. These bills will head to the finance committee and then will go to the full House again. We know that $130 million is not enough to fully meet students’ needs and that this same week the superior court upheld their ruling that the state must do much more to adequately fund our schools and support the over 160,000 Granite State students that use them. We consider this a good faith short term effort but continue to urge our legislators to work on a permanent solution and fulfill their constitutional obligation to fund our schools.

As many schools look forward to their winter break, so does the New Hampshire legislature. There will be no committee work next week and no full House sessions. We know we have asked a lot from all of you this year and that it is in addition to your daily work and already busy lives. We hope that those who have the week off that you are able to relax and recharge.

When the break is done, we will quickly be back in business. We have committee votes right away. These bills range from granting an almost unlimited subpoena power to the Commissioner of Education to radically weakening our local neighborhood public schools by virtually eliminating a need for certified teachers in the classroom. We will keep you informed on the status of these bills and ask for you to contact their representatives when it is most pressing.

Thank you for your work, and for those that have it, enjoy your break!

Legislative Action Toolkit

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You can also read written testimony submitted to the legislature at STATE HOUSE NEWS.

We will post next week’s schedule of bills we are monitoring at the end of the weekly bulletin. If you want to find out more information about any bill, you can simply enter the bill at the following link:  FIND A BILL.

We encourage you to take action on other bills. Please note our position is not noted on the current tracker for bills that have already been heard and are now pending executive session action in committee since the period for testimony has passed.

For any of the bills scheduled for a hearing you can register your position on any bill scheduled for a public hearing at the following link: SUBMIT YOUR POSITION ON A BILL.

Legislative Tracker – Week of March 4^th  

A significant number of bills are scheduled for Executive Session thus no public testimony would be accepted.