The Cruel and Vindictive House Speaker O’Brien

State Rep. Tony Soltani has accused House Speaker Bill O’Brien of refusing to accommodate his physical disabilities as retribution for political differences.

The Epsom lawmaker, who suffered a broken pelvis and nerve damage to his left leg and thigh as the result of a bad fall in 2007 and a single-car accident last year, is not the first disabled House member to face the Speaker’s cruel vindictiveness.

After state Rep. Timothy Copeland voted against three gun bills promoted by the GOP House leadership earlier this year, the former law enforcement officer received a message from Speaker O’Brien that his seat on the House floor — which he received due to an injury sustained in the line of duty — had been moved from the aisle to the middle of the row.

Matthew Spolar reports Soltani is threatening legal action.

O’Brien assigned Soltani an inner seat in the last row. Soltani said his “left leg can not negotiate the obstacles between the seats, and my repeated falls and bruises are a mere gift from your offices.”

“It is no secret that I have suffered from several disabilities, which have caused me great pain, discomfort and sometimes rendered me unable to perform my duties as I see them fit,” Soltani said. “My limp and inability to walk quickly exclude me from participating in the parliamentary process.”

Soltani said 11 House members, including Republicans and Democrats, have offered to switch seats with him but those requests have been denied by O’Brien, a Mont Vernon Republican of whom Soltani has been openly critical.

“I trust my friends who have told me the speaker wants to see me suffer for political reasons. I readily admit that I seldom agree with the speaker, and his tactics,” Soltani said. “Political disagreement is no excuse for breaking the law.”

Cross-posted on Blue Hampshire

GOP Favors Local Control Except When They Don’t

Writing in the Concord Monitor, Matthew Spolar points out state GOP lawmakers’ support for local control by government falls away when they disagree with actions taken by the local governments.

Examples of the proposed dictates and mandates on local governments are varied and far-reaching. They range from prohibiting towns from hiring a lobbyist, to specifying the amount of time students must devote to math and English, to requiring towns to put money raised from land development taxes into their general fund, to requiring towns and cities to adopt specific regulations for hawkers and peddlers.

The rationalizations by Republican lawmakers are almost amusing.

“I don’t like telling towns what to do,” Sen. Jim Forsythe of Strafford said last week. “But when they’re imposing restrictions on the townspeople, I think it’s okay for the state to step in in that case.”

[Rep. JR Hoell] said he doesn’t believe his bills impacting school districts “run against the local control at all.”

“If what is being taught in a public education forum is contrary to the beliefs of a group of parents, those parents have the right to raise an objection to that,” he said.

Mark Joyce, executive director of the New Hampshire School Administrators Association, states the obvious.

“The legislative majority has always said local control is very important,” Joyce said. “If that is of value, then it seems contradictory to impose so many requirements on the communities themselves.