Expect fireworks at the emergency meeting of the New Hampshire Executive Council on Wednesday, when Gov. Kelly Ayotte and councilors take up two hot-button issues: the state’s attempt to end the vehicle inspection mandate, and the performance of embattled Department of Natural and Cultural Resources Commissioner Sarah Stewart.
“We will have a ‘robust’ discussion,” Councilor Dave Wheeler (R-Milford) told NHJournal.
Ayotte didn’t announce she had called the meeting until Tuesday, simply saying the council would “consider an item relating to administration of the state vehicle inspection program” when it meets Wednesday at 2:00 p.m.
But the materials sent to the councilors indicate the agenda is the Department of Safety’s request to retroactively amend its plan to end its agreement with Gordon-Darby, pushing the termination date back from Jan. 31 to April 1.
Gordon-Darby provides the electronic emissions and safety inspection equipment for more than 2,000 licensed inspection stations across New Hampshire. It also manages the state’s inspection database, which handles roughly 1.3 million vehicle inspections annually.
The company sued after New Hampshire passed legislation ending state-mandated inspections, and U.S. District Judge Landya McCafferty, a progressive Obama appointee, granted a preliminary injunction prohibiting the state from ending the inspection-sticker program.
Many Granite State Republicans, including Councilor John Stephen (R-Manchester), were outraged by the lawsuit and its outcome. Stephen publicly called on Ayotte to hold an emergency session to address the Gordon-Darby issue.
“Gordon-Darby can wave their court order around all they want, but they cannot compel the council to authorize payment,” Stephen posted on social media. “The council needs to meet immediately so we can chart a course forward that protects New Hampshire taxpayers—not an out-of-state vendor that chose litigation over cooperation.”
“This company decided to drag New Hampshire into federal court rather than accept the legislature’s decision. Now they expect us to simply keep writing checks? The Executive Council will have something to say about that,” Stephen added.
The governor has also requested that Stewart appear at Wednesday’s council meeting to discuss the handling of information her office received from the Trump administration regarding the potential establishment of an ICE facility in Merrimack. The DNCR Commissioner has acknowledged that her office did not forward that high-profile information to Ayotte, though she blamed the division directors in her small agency.
Stephen isn’t happy about her performance, either.
“The ACLU knew exactly who to ask and what to ask for at the obscure Division of Historical Resources,” Stephen posted.
“It appears that someone inside DNCR made a deliberate choice to keep the governor in the dark here, but make sure the ACLU had everything it needed. If true, that is not a failure of process. That is a state employee—or state employees— leaking information to an advocacy group while keeping the governor in the dark. It is a gross dereliction of duty and a betrayal of the people of this state.
“Sarah Stewart must answer for this.”