NEA-NH’s series of interviews and conversations with candidates continues with Executive Councilor Andru Volinsky.
NEA-NH President Megan Tuttle and NEA-NH Government Relations Director Brendon Browne sat down with Executive Councilor Andru Volinksy for a conversation on school funding, the role of the Executive Council and political district gerrymandering in New Hampshire.
“Education should not be an accident of geography,” states Volinsky. “In my professional capacity as a lawyer, I have represented communities fighting to protect public funding for schools including in the Claremont School Funding suit and on behalf of the City of Dover. As a first-term (actually first month) Executive Councilor, I led the challenge to the Governor’s appointment of an unqualified Education Commissioner. We lost; however, the concerns I raised about Commissioner Edelblut have, unfortunately, proven true and I continue to be a vigilant opponent of his efforts to dismantle our state’s education system. I believe that it is our duty to provide all of New Hampshire’s children with the tools they need to compete in the marketplace of ideas, no matter where they live.”
Volinsky and retired head of New Hampshire Legal Assistance John Tobin, two of the Claremont lawsuit attorneys, are traveling the State holding forums in which they educate citizens and local leadership about how the combination of local property taxes with a little additional state and federal funding finances our schools. They make the funding system as it exists today understandable and show how it is not fair to New Hampshire’s property poor towns and taxpayers.
To view the forum held in Newport, click here.
Andru Volinsky is recommended by NEA-NH for his pro-public education record.
