The Legislature is approaching what could be called Hell Week in the House and Senate, where there’s a flurry of action, but not a lot gets done. House and Senate leaders, like two raging bulls, mark their territory in advance of financial negotiations on key bills.
— Kevin Landrigan, Nashua Telegraph
#NHSenate + #NHHouse AGREE. Resolution making Miss NH the state’s honorary hostess passes. Not sure if she must have gun permit.#nhpolitics
— Annmarie Timmins (@annmarietimmins) May 9, 2012
In a letter to the editor published in the Concord Monitor, Marina Baldasaro accused her husband, GOP Rep. AL Baldasaro, of lying when he testified before a Senate committee:
The Monitor reported that at a Senate committee hearing my ex-husband, Rep. Al Baldasaro, “testified about the ‘mental torture’ men experience when a woman aborts a baby, as his wife did before she met him.”
This is false. I would like him to apologize in writing to me — not only as a human being but as a wife for over 24 years who dedicated her life for his career and also as the mother of our three grown children. This is an outrage. I have to constantly read in papers his comments concerning me or our marriage. The constant lies I read are a disgrace.
Her husband’s testimony came before the Senate Health and Human Services Committee in support of House Bill 1659, which would have mandated a 24-hour waiting period before an abortion.
Rep. Al Baldasaro, R-Londonderry, said men like him have to deal with the “mental torture” from women such as his wife who had an abortion before they were together.
“This is to make sure women have a right to know what to expect,” Baldasaro said of the waiting period.
“You show up. You are on the table It’s like a meat market.”
A Portsmouth Herald editorial applauds the state Senate for defeating legislation approved by the House that would have removed “reasonable restrictions” on firearms.
The New Hampshire House went ballistic with gun legislation this past session. … All the bills are aimed at removing reasonable restrictions on where and when people can own, carry and discharge firearms. We think it’s reasonable:
- To restrict convicted felons from possessing firearms.
- To require a permit including a criminal background check to buy a weapon and carry a concealed weapon. Currently, private dealers can sell you a gun at a gun show without doing a background check.
- To allow public institutions such as colleges and universities to ban weapons from campus.
- To allow officers to stop people from bringing weapons into a courthouse.
- To prohibit carrying a loaded firearm or crossbow in a motor vehicle.
- To prohibit bringing a gun to school or to discharge a firearm near a school.
- To allow cities and towns to enforce no-fire zones in densely populated residential and recreational areas known as compact zones.
- To ban gun possession from someone under an active restraining order.
- To ban guns in the Statehouse visitors gallery.
There were bills on nearly all of these issues this past legislative session and, fortunately, the Senate rejected almost all of them.
The always informative email update from Bill Duncan at Defending New Hampshire Public Education has the latest details on the New Hampshire GOP’s War on Education. Here are some excerpts. If you care about the future of public education in the state, I strongly recommend you read the entire report and subscribe to the updates.
CACR 12 — The education funding amendment gets (secret) new language
You may have read about the new language House Republican leadership is circulating. Here is Saturday’s Union Leader report on it. This language is just as bad as all the previous attempts, if not worse. This new proposed amendment gives the Legislature sole discretion over all funding and how it will be raised — effectively taking the Courts out of protecting the rights of every child. The New Hampshire Constitution promises to educate every child. This amendment breaks the promise of public education to all our children.
HB 1403 — The anti-International Baccalaureate bill gets hammered
You can’t be sure the adults in the Legislature will prevail and kill a silly bill like this. So students, parents, teachers and administrators … have spent weeks opposing the bill…. It all became visible at Tuesday’s hearing. Here is great, detailed post from Ryan O’Connor in the Bedford Patch and coverage in the Union Leader and on NPR.
But if you click on nothing else, watch this video of the testimony of Wolfeboro resident John R. White who came down to testify apparently because he just couldn’t believe what he was reading in the paper.
It’s hard to see how HB 1403 survives this assault….
The plot thicken on the voucher bills — SB 372 / HB 1607
The House Ways and Means SB 372 Subcommittee met today, Wednesday, May 2. … [T]hey voted to recommend the SB 372 be sent to Interim Study. The meeting was short and very interesting. Here is the video.
At virtually the same moment today, the Senate voted 17-7 in favor of the sister bill, HB 1607, and sent it to the Senate Finance Committee, which will make a recommendation before the full Senate takes a final vote.
All this amounts to a dramatic turn of events. The voucher plan will probably be voted on several more times by both bodies before it’s over. At this point, the plan is defeatable, but the detailed steps will not be clear for several days.
Sen Sanborn draws laughs from colleagues when he asks them to “trust leadership of the #nhhouse.” Maybe that wasn’t appropriate,” he adds.
— Josh Rogers (@joshrogersNHPR) May 2, 2012
It seems to me this has become a game of “King of the Hill,” but with the best interests of the state and its citizens at stake. Folks in the know told me my skills as an early childhood teacher would serve me well as a member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives. They were right.
— State Rep. Marjorie Porter, on the ideological game of chicken being fought between the Republican-led House and the Republican-led Senate.
Last week, after the Senate had dismissed numerous House bills seeking to advance its radical social agenda, Speaker Bill O’Brien and his minions retaliated. The response was to table six Senate bills the House had just passed, and to attach the defeated House bills as non-germane amendments to Senate legislation under consideration.
In a letter to the editor, Portsmouth state Rep. Rich DiPentima reviews this obstructionist warfare and declares, “The people of New Hampshire deserve and should demand much better.”
The Senate Republicans understand that the House Republicans are fixated on a radical social and anti-labor agenda that is straight out of the American Legislative Exchange Council playbook. … The Senate Republicans also understand that the public has a very negative opinion of the House, and they are trying to distance themselves from the House Republicans as much as possible to save their political hides come November.
Unfortunately, the big losers in this Republican in-fighting are the people of New Hampshire. Instead of spending the time and energy to create jobs and strengthen education and the economy of our state, they are playing ideological games of chicken. If Republicans cannot even work among themselves, how can we expect them to govern the state? This is government at its worst, and they should be ashamed.
The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is a market-based program to reduce carbon pollution. It essentially charges power plants for their emissions and invests the proceeds in local energy efficiency initiatives.
Writing in the Portsmouth Herald, the CEO of Foss Manufacturing, a Hampton-based manufacturer of advanced fibers and fabrics, explains why RGGI is good for business, and good for New Hampshire.
New Hampshire faces numerous energy challenges, from leaky buildings to energy insecurity — placing a heavy burden on our business owners and homeowners. It’s time to switch gears and put our hard work and innovation into reducing energy waste.
In New Hampshire, [RGGI] has meant $33 million invested in critical, waste-eliminating energy measures, education and job training programs, and the likes. The result has been economic growth, reduced energy costs and greater independence from volatile out-of-state energy sources.
Furthermore, Granite Staters have seen, and will continue to see, reductions in energy bills due to the new energy-efficiency programs. Simply put, this means more money for us to invest into our local economies and communities.
When push comes to shove, we simply cannot afford to lose these benefits. We must stick to our roots — growing our economy through innovation and smart thinking, while avoiding needless waste.
Last year, the House and Senate voted to withdraw from RGGI, but the Senate failed to override Gov. Lynch’s veto. In March, the House again passed a similar bill, House Bill 1490, which would have the state withdraw by January 1, 2015. Gov. Lynch has stated his opposition and Senate Majority Leader Jeb Bradley says he does not expect any Senators to change their vote.
With that backdrop, the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee approved an amendment to HB 1490 that would make repeal contingent upon two other New England states also withdrawing from the initiative (or the withdrawal of a single state with 10% or more of the total load). The bill now moves to the full Senate.
Wednesday, we witnessed an extraordinary House session in which the GOP-dominated House retaliated against the GOP-dominated Senate for defeating many of the more extreme bills sent its way by the House.
The retaliation included tabling six Senate bills it had just passed unanimously and attaching language from the defeated House bills as non-germane amendments to Senate legislation under consideration.
GOP state Rep. Steve Vaillancourt writes that the events of the day prove the super majority GOP can’t govern.
The power play involves sending a message to the Senate—hey you guys kill (either by outright no votes or by interim study) our bills and we’ll kill yours. This “mine is bigger than yours mentality” is fit for a back alley brawl, but it’s hardly the kind of responsible government people have a right to expect from their leaders.
This is a legislature totally out of control, and even level-headed Republicans, who in past years would never have acted so irresponsibly, have now had their senses ground out of them by the bully at the podium….
Vaillancourt wrote that the House strategy of attaching non-germane amendments to Senate bills could backfire and lead to their defeat. “But, he asks, “who cares about that?”
After all, we’ve got a radical right wing social agenda to pre-empt the fiscally prudent agenda we promised to enact!
The House and Senate sessions in Concord today were extraordinary. The Senate picked up where it left off swatting away the frivolous, the extreme and the downright wacky legislation sent its way by the House.
The House retaliated by attaching the language from the defeated bills as non-germane amendments to Senate bills on which they were already voting and tabling six noncontroversial Senate bills as hostages. Wow.
Today, the state Senate killed four House-passed bills, preserving funding for comprehensive preventive care for women and rejecting government interference in reproductive health services, including access to contraception and abortion.
House Bill 228
The Senate tabled, and effectively killed, HB 228 by a 17 - 6 vote. The bill would have eliminated funding for Planned Parenthood of Northern New England, impacting more than 16,000 Granite State men, women and teens who receive health care from Planned Parenthood each year.
House Bill 1546
By a vote of 19 – 4, the Senate sent HB 1546 to interim study. The legislation would have allowed employers to exclude birth control from prescription drug coverage, reversing regulations that have been in effect in the state without objection for nearly 12 years.
House Bill 1659
By a narrow 12-11 vote, the Senate defeated HB 1659, which would have made it more difficult for women to access abortion care by mandating a 24-hour waiting period.
House Bill 1660
HB 1660, which would have prohibited abortions at or after 20-weeks gestation, was sent to interim study by a 15 - 8 vote. The vote effectively kills the legislation.
Reactions
“New Hampshire has a 40 year bipartisan history of supporting publicly-funded family planning services and working to reduce abortion by ensuring access to birth control and preventive care, rather than by government imposed restrictions. The actions of the NH Senate today continue this tradition and bring to a halt the comprehensive anti-women’s health agenda that was pushed by Speaker Bill O’Brien and NH House leadership.”
— Jennifer Frizzell, Planned Parenthood of Northern New England
“Today’s votes are a clear rejection of the foolish crusade Speaker O’Brien has led this legislative session to restrict women’s reproductive healthcare. … This legislative session has been marred by attacks on women’s health and privacy, but today’s votes signify a return to the Granite State’s long, proud tradition of trusting women to make their own personal, private healthcare decisions in consultation with their doctors, family, and clergy.”
— Elizabeth Hagar, NARAL Pro-Choice New Hampshire
A progressive perspective on New Hampshire politics and other oddities.
William Tucker is an architect in Portsmouth.
