AFT-NH Legislative Bulletin (February 28, 2025)

Busy Week Ahead

Priority Education Bills Front and Center

It was a mostly quiet week in Concord as many legislative committees were on February break, just like our public schools. One big development this week was that anti- public education politicians, very angry that voters in most school districts steadfastly support their public schools and refuse to set artificial and harmful spending caps, brought forward an amendment that would mandate, through state law, a budget cap on local school budgets. School districts already have spending controls—they are called voters, who must choose to approve or vote down every budget and change in local property taxes. It is not up to the extremist majority in Concord to impose a decision on local voters to automatically limit local spending.  It would do well for the current anti-public education politicians in Concord to recognize they should work to meet their constitutional obligation to all Granite State students to fund robust public education in all school districts instead of passing the property tax burden onto Granite Staters at the local level. You can read more about the amendment here. It will be discussed in committee on Tuesday.

Next week we have a lot of priorities that will be voted on in Executive Sessions. As a reminder Executive Session is when the committee votes on bills, after they have already had their public hearing. There are dozens of bills that will receive a committee vote this week—none bigger than HB 115, the House version of the universal school voucher bill. It is also possible the Senate version of universal school vouchers will be voted on this week so stay tuned here for updates.

In addition to the numerous committee votes this week, we will also have three big bills that we will need you to weigh in on.  This week the House and Senate will hear:

HB 748—This enables towns to adopt local school vouchers. What are local school vouchers? Essentially if your town adopted the program, it would then be responsible paying for a local school voucher that is 2 times the cost of state per pupil adequacy plus any differentiated aid. That could be over $10,000 per student. Any child who lives in town and was old enough to attend public school would be eligible. As we have seen with the current school vouchers, it is likely that more than 85% of the families using them would be children who are already attending private schools or being home schooled. This would require a huge increase to your local school budget and therefore your local property taxes.  Because this bill has no income cap it means hard working Granite State families could be paying higher property taxes to send the wealthiest people in their town to a private school. This bill is a tax increase, pure and simple. Monday, March 3^rd at 9:30 a.m at House Education Policy and Administration Committee.

SB 96—A bill we have seen before. This bill says that if a parent asks something about a student the teacher must respond “honestly and completely.” We want to be clear—teachers do not lie to parents. It does not help the parent- teacher or the teacher-student relationship. Schools work best when everyone from educators to parents to students to administrators have open and clear communication. The vagueness of this bill is the problem. Does a “complete” answer to a parent mean anything an educator might have overheard or think they have overheard? Are they supposed to write everything down in case they are asked later? Schools will not be able to function if teachers are supposed to enforce a surveillance state and kids will not learn if they feel every word and move is being scrutinized, judged and reported.  Tuesday, March 4th at 9:00 a.m. at Senate Education Committee.

HB 520—This bill would give Commissioner of Education Frank Edelblut subpoena power. Two very important things here. This is the third year this bill has come forward and they have never been able to provide a reason why it is necessary. The second is that we just cannot trust Frank Edelblut with subpoena power. This commissioner has gone out of his way to create a negative relationship with New Hampshire public school educators. He has produced editorials filled with distortions and half-truths without any concern shown about how that might impact educators across this state. He uses information he gathers in his role as commissioner to advance a political agenda. We simply do not trust him with the power of a subpoena—especially with the limited checks contained in this bill.  Wednesday, March 5^th at 9:00 a.m. at the House Judiciary Committee.

And now we see a sneak attack on a positive piece of legislation that would repeal the current Divisive Concepts law.

HB 50 – This is a good bill to repeal the unconstitutional law banning teaching so-called Divisive Concepts, but extremist lawmakers are trying to rewrite it to do the opposite. The House Education Policy Committee will hold a hearing on Wednesday on an amendment to replace the language repealing the law with language that KEEPS the law in place and adds a civil penalty for any school, school district or educator who knowingly violates it.

As you may recall, AFT and AFT-NH won a lawsuit finding that the Divisive Concepts law was unconstitutionally vague because it impossible to know exactly what is permissible to teach, discuss or display in the classroom without violating that law. (ACLU-NH and other plaintiffs brought a related lawsuit that was heard at the same time. Both were victorious.) Our students deserve a robust and engaging curriculum, and our members deserve to be able to do their jobs without constant threat of punishment. The State of NH is appealing their loss in the US Court of Appeals, meanwhile the Divisive Concepts law cannot be enforced due to the Federal Court Ruling that it is unconstitutional.

Please sign in to oppose the non-germane amendment to HB 50. Please note there is an additional box to check after you click oppose. Click the box by the following, “Testimony is for non-germane amendment.”  Wednesday, March 5^th at 1:00 p.m. at the House Education Policy and Administration Committee

Also, please take a moment and sign in opposed to the three bills listed above: HB 748, SB 96, and HB 520. For the other bills on the trackers, please remember if they are scheduled for executive session, you will be unable to submit your position.

Please do register your position by using the links below. Easy instructions on how to submit your testimony or position is provided below.

We appreciate your participation in this very important legislative session.  Please do share our bulletin with others.

Submitting Your Position and Testimony

Here is easy access to submit your position on bills before House and Senate Committees.

Remember, if a bill is already scheduled for an Executive Session, you will not be able to submit your position.

To submit your position, click SUBMIT YOUR POSITION TO A HOUSE COMMITTEE HERE.

To submit your position, click SUBMIT YOUR POSITION TO A SENATE COMMITTEE HERE.

Instructions for registering your position on a bill.

• Fill in your Personal Information
• Select the relevant date and committee for the hearing by clicking on it in the Meeting Schedule Calendar (make sure you are on the right week!). [Select Bill # and select the date].
• In the dropbox below "Select the Committee," select committee.
• In the dropbox below "Choose the Bill," select the appropriate time and bill number.
• Select the appropriate option for the "I am" dropbox (likely "Member of the Public").
• Fill in the content box under "I'm Representing" with the business, organization, or group you are representing. If you are representing yourself only, write "myself."
• Under the “Indicate Your Position on this Bill,” check the circle stating your position on the bill. “I Oppose this Bill” or “I Support this Bill”
• After filling in all of the appropriate dropboxes, click “Submit.”
• After clicking submit, you will be brought to the next page, where you will fill in the content boxes with your first and last name, as well as your town, state, and email address.
• Press “Continue.”
• If you wish to speak during the hearing to present your testimony, you will need to attend in person at the State House, but you upload your testimony if you cannot attend.
• If you wish to submit testimony on the bill, email the relevant committee and upload the testimony file from your computer (if you need assistance in this, we are happy to help).

For breaking news and other legislative information, please be sure to like us on Facebook at AFT New Hampshire or follow us on Bluesky at aftnh.bsky.social.  Please share this with friends so they can sign up for this bulletin at http://nh.aft.org/.

Upcoming Legislative Hearings

Week of March 3, 2025