Legislative Update Report

It’s a busy week ahead again with upcoming hearings and votes. This week we will start with key action items first before we get to a recap of what happened this past week. Action Items For Next Week! 2 Bills to Strengthen the Educator Pipeline and Support for Early Educators ACTION ITEM: Please sign in, write in, or testify in SUPPORT of SB 217, which will be before the Senate Education Committee on Tuesday, February 14th at 9:00 am in the Legislative Office Building, Room 101. You can sign in remotely here. ACTION ITEM: Please sign in, write in, or […]

February 4, 2023 By Brian Hawkins, NEA-NH Government Relations Director First School Voucher Expansion Bill Headed to House Floor This week the House Education voted on the first of 2 bills they have heard proposing to greatly expand the school voucher program. NEA-NH opposes both bills. You can see our written testimony against both bills by going to our legislative tracker and search for HB 464 or 367. HB 367 would simply expand the income eligibility of the program to 500% of the Federal Poverty Level, which for a family of 4 in 2023 is $150,000. The committee vote was […]

Week in Review – Repeal and Replace of Banned Concepts Leads off the Year! This week hearings began on proposed legislation in House and Senate committees. While there were a number of bills heard this week the biggest bill was HB 61, legislation that would repeal the “banned concepts” law passed in 2021. The bill was sponsored by Rep. Peter Petrigno, a retired NEA-NH member and former NH Teacher of the Year. As a reminder, the legislation would: Turnout was strong from educators, students and the public in support of this bill. We heard powerful testimony in support from current […]

Legislative Session Begins – Updated Lay of the Land in the House The legislature has begun their work as they held their convening day this past week, each chamber adopted their rules and the remaining House Committee assignments were announced. In the House, all the policy committees will be tied in their partisan makeup, 10 Republicans and 10 Democrats. This means that there will be many votes that will come out of committee to the House floor tied and without a recommendation or many may be retained and studied over the summer. Under the rules of the House this means […]

New Legislature LandscapeOn December 7th, the new legislature was sworn in and organized themselves. The Senate with a 14 – 10 Republican majority elected Sen. Jeb Bradley as the new Senate President and also named Sharon Carson the Republican leader and Sen. Donna Soucy will once again be the Democratic leader. The Senate has also announced their committee assignments as well which you can find here. The House will be historically close. While Sherm Packard (R) was once again elected speaker, the partisan divide is now down to 201 (R) – 198 (D) and 1 race which ended in a […]