AFSC’s New Hampshire State House Watch newsletter is published weekly during legislative sessions to bring you information about matters being discussed in Concord including housing, the death penalty, immigration, and labor rights.  We also follow the state budget and tax system, voting rights, corrections policy, and more.

Coming up in House Committees

Monday, February 5

12:00 PM Fish and Game and Marine Resources: Tour of the Sig Sauer Academy in Epping. The tour will include a Sig Sauer air rifle demo. Company experts will be on hand to answer questions. Sorry, this is for Fish & Game Committee members only.

Tuesday, February 6

Finance, Division II, Room 209 LOB

1:00 PM Division II work session on SB 193, the school voucher bill. This piece in the Concord Monitor gives some insight into the work of the committee, and its findings thus far about the fiscal impact of the bill.

Municipal and County Government, Room 301, LOB

2:00 PM CACR 19, relating to the right to govern. Providing that the people of the state may enact local laws that protect health, safety, and welfare, even when this impinges on the interests of “corporate persons.” This will be followed by a 2:30 PM subcommittee work session on the bill. Additional subcommittee work sessions will be held February 13 at 9:00 AM and February 14 at 9:00 AM, with an executive session set for February 14 at 11:00 AM.

Science, Technology, and Energy, Room 304, LOB

11:00 AM Full committee work session on HB 1515, relative to an exemption from the combustion ban on construction and demolition debris.

Coming up in Senate Committees (No Senate sessions are currently scheduled.)

Tuesday, February 6

Commerce, Room 100, SH

1:30 PM SB 422, relative to advance notice of work schedules. This would require employers to give workers 14 days advance notice of their work schedule.

Health and Human Services, Room 101, LOB

1:15 PM SB 476, establishing a committee to study reinstituting the unemployed parent program, a program administered by DHHS that provided assistance to unemployed parents. We support bringing the program back.

Judiciary, Room 100, SH

9:00 AM CACR 22, providing that crime victims shall be afforded constitutional rights. This is the proposal described as “Marsy’s Law,” which has the effect of putting what are now statutory provisions into the Constitution. The NH Coalition Against Domestic and Sexual Violence is campaigning for it. The ACLU of NH has serious concerns about its impact on due process.

Wednesday, February 7

Ways and Means, Room 100, SH

9:20 AM SB 586, relative to casino gambling. It’s back! The annual bill to create two casinos.

9:40 AM SB 404, phasing out the tax on interest and dividends. The phasing would be annual, beginning in 2020 and completed by 2025, by which time the state would be losing over $100 million a year in revenue. What would you say are the odds that this proposal’s backers will argue that elimination of this tax will spur investment, create jobs, and generate so much prosperity that we won’t even miss the $100 million?

Thursday, February 8

Health and Human Services, Room 101, LOB

1:15 PM SB 490, establishing a commission to study end-of-life choices.

ENVIRONMENT FUND SUPPORTS PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT ACROSS THE REGION

Lebanon, NH—With a grant from The New England Grassroots Environment Fund, the NH Upper Valley Democratic Committee (known locally as the Upper Valley Democrats), will expand its ongoing series of public lectures on issues of concern to area voters. Since November 2017, the group’s potlucks and panel discussions have drawn hundreds of Upper Valley residents from dozens of towns across the region. In announcing the $1,000 Seed Grant, The New England Grassroots Environment Fund expressed a strong interest in building a partnership that will provide training, project outreach assistance, resources, and other opportunities.

“This is a different kind of political outreach initiative,” says Ann Garland, Co-chair of the NH Upper Valley Democrats Executive Board. “We want to engage with voters regardless of party affiliation, to provide discussion around critical issues that affect all our communities.”

The funding will support the group’s popular lecture series on topics suggested by residents of the Upper Valley’s fourteen towns.  In 2017, sessions focused on NH governance, “fake news,” healthcare, and education. “This grant will make it possible to expand on our core work,” notes Garland, “engaging more New Hampshire voters who share a desire for change and progress.”

The 2018 lecture series began on January 23 when a panel of State legislators addressed  “Education Legislation in the New Hampshire House,” a conversation about current bills that will have far-ranging effects on public education. The second event in the series, a February 26 Grassroots Lobbying Workshop, will take place from 6 PM – 8 PM. All events will be held at the Upper Valley Senior Center on Campbell Street in Lebanon, NH. For more information contact uvdems@uppervalleydemocrats.com.

The New England Grassroots Environment Fund energizes and nurtures long-term civic engagement in local initiatives that create and maintain healthy, just, safe and sustainable communities using stories, tools and dollars to fuel local activism and social change. Since 1996, the Grassroots Fund’s core grant-making program funds nearly 150 grants annually, giving more than $4 million in 20 years to more than 2,000 community groups and initiatives covering more than 60 percent of New England’s cities and towns.

The NH Upper Valley Democratic Committee promotes the development of an engaged, informed electorate through constructive public dialogue.