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The November elections are shaping up to be a tough slog for Democrats in the New Hampshire House, and when they’re over, the caucus will have another battle brewing. Both Rep. Matt Wilhelm, (D-Manchester) and Rep. Steve Shurtleff, (D-Penacook) have announced they plan to run for House Democratic leader.

It is a contest that could once again crack the brittle facade covering tensions between the caucus’s disgruntled progressives and establishment members who currently hold the upper hand.

Shurtleff, a former Speaker of the House, is solidly aligned with his party’s establishment wing.

Wilhelm is not part of the hardcore progressive group, perhaps best represented by outgoing member Rep. Manny Espitia, but he is closer to them than Shurtleff. Wilhelm also has the advantage of handling the money members are counting on to help win re-election. He heads the New Hampshire Democratic Victory Campaign Committee, and he has also been named a NewDEAL Leader by the national pro-growth, progressive NewDEAL network. It is a group that includes Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacy Abrams, Wisconsin Senate candidate Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes, Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg.

Shurtleff was waiting in the wings to take over for the liberal Renny Cushing (D-Hampton) as he battled cancer. Cushing died in March from complications of cancer and COVID-19. But his ascent was blocked by progressives who kept him from taking even temporary leadership of the caucus. 

Instead, Nashua’s Rep. David Cote took over as Minority Leader, despite the fact he hadn’t been to Concord in years due to fears of COVID.

Shurtleff announced his candidacy via Twitter on Wednesday. Wilhelm announced his earlier this month. “I would like to publicly announce my candidacy for the next Speaker of the House. Tough times demand tough leadership. I would appreciate your support,” Shurtleff wrote.

Shurtleff’s announcement inspired immediate pushback from outgoing and outspoken Rep. Sherry Frost, (D-Dover.)

“Define ‘tough leadership’ please, because what I saw (and heard, from you) was that you saw your job as ‘protecting the minority’ when you were last Speaker,” Frost tweeted in response.

When contacted by NHJournal, Frost declined to clarify her statement saying she is not running for reelection. She refused to answer if she thought Shurtleff was the right person for the job, or who she would support in his stead.

“I would hope that my remaining colleagues would choose someone who understands and is comfortable with legislative strategy and has no patience for nonsense at the well,” Frost wrote. 

This is Wilhelm’s second run for House leadership. He put his hat in the ring ahead of the 2021 session, saying New Hampshire Democrats needed to change their message after losing control of the legislature even as Joe Biden was winning the state by nearly eight points. 

“After the setbacks of early November, we would be remiss if we did not re-examine our strategy and tactics for how we govern, how we campaign, and how we communicate with the working families of New Hampshire and those who feel like they don’t have a voice,” Wilhelm wrote in a letter to his House colleagues.

Shurtleff earned Cushing’s ire in the lead-up to the leadership election for the 2018 House session. Cushing accused Shurtleff of gaming the date of the party caucus in order to shut out potential rivals.

“As a loyal Democrat, it saddens me to realize that while the Republicans are having a robust contest to see who will emerge as the majority party’s candidate for Speaker, the incumbent leadership of the minority party apparently doesn’t feel the need to, or doesn’t want to, involve rank and file Democrats in the decision about who will be the party’s Speaker candidate and what policies, program and vision that nominee will bring to the contest,” Cushing wrote.

Monday was supposed to be the calm before the storm, but in New Hampshire politics, the day was muddled with confusion over the legality of towns’ rights to postpone Tuesday’s elections due to the impending blizzard.

The day started with Secretary of State William Gardner saying, “We don’t have snow days in the law for elections.”

Yet, town officials throughout the state were taking matters into their own hands and postponing the annual “second Tuesday in March” elections for later in the week after the snowstorm subsided. Reasons for postponement were mostly due to ensuring the safety of residents and first responders from hazardous road conditions. Some parts of the state are expected to receive between 10 to 20 inches on Tuesday.

The secretary of state’s office maintained its position that by state law, towns are required to hold elections regardless of the snow and expected blizzard conditions. If they don’t, there could be legal consequences. Town officials say a different state law allows them to change the day of the election in an emergency situation.

“I don’t know what the consequences will be,” Paula Penney, elections assistant at the secretary of state’s office, told The Portsmouth Herald. “If they don’t have the election tomorrow, it may end up in superior court. But I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t have any indication that (the office’s) position will change.”

The two laws in question are RSA 669:1 and 40:4. RSA 669:1 is the law the secretary of state’s office was citing as requiring towns to hold the election, regardless of the snow. The law states:

“All towns shall hold an election annually for the election of town officers on the second Tuesday in March…”

RSA 40:4 is cited by the towns for giving them the flexibility to change the date of election in the event of an emergency. This law states:

“In the event a weather emergency occurs on or before the date of a deliberative session or voting day of a meeting in a town, which the moderator reasonably believes may cause the roads to be hazardous or unsafe, the moderator may, up to 2 hours prior to the scheduled session, postpone and reschedule the deliberative session or voting day of the meeting to another reasonable date, place, and time certain.”

So which interpretation is right? Some legal experts said it’s not exactly clear if that law refers to voting for races in elections or voting for budget and other town issues at traditional town hall meetings.

John Greabe, a law professor at the University of New Hampshire, told NH Journal that the specific rule would “govern over” the general rule.

“It’s not uncommon for there to be two statutes that seem to be at odds with each other,” he said. “It’s a traditional approach to the conflict of laws where there is a more specific rule and a more general rule. It’s common for courts to go with the more specific rule.”

Cordell Johnston, government affairs council with the New Hampshire Municipal Association, said the organization sides with the towns.

“I don’t think there is any inconsistency in the law,” he told NH Journal. “We believe it’s very clear that they [towns] could move the election.”

He mentioned that a group of municipal lawyers on a list-serv “overwhelmingly” agreed that the moderator has the clear authority to reschedule the election.

With significant confusion surrounding the issue, Gov. Chris Sununu weighed in on debate. He spoke with municipal leaders and Attorney General Joe Foster in a Monday afternoon conference call encouraging them to hold elections, but said the state would not mandate them to do it.

“It’s our understanding that a lot of towns have already made a choice to postpone their elections,” he told reporters. “There are some differing opinions at the state level as to whether that is a valid process for them to take. The best we can do is to strongly recommend that all towns stay open for voting tomorrow. We think that’s a very important part of the process. But given the differing opinions, I don’t think we’re in a position to mandate that towns stay open or change their direction if they choose not to.”

Sununu cautioned town officials that if they postpone Tuesday’s elections, they are doing so “at their risk,” suggesting the town could be open to lawsuits for voter suppression.

“It would create a lot of confusion if one town voted on a school issue and another town did not, and you get into an issue of do you release the results and how is that processed,” he said. “You never want someone to have their vote suppressed, or have someone not be able to participate in the process because of confusion at the local level.”

Johnston said he interpreted Sununu’s message that “the state would not challenge a town’s decision to reschedule,” but an individual voter could.

“What I imagine could happen, although unlikely, a voter who is not happy about how things played out, would go to court and claim that the moderator violated his or her authority in rescheduling the vote,” he said. “But because the law is really clear, I don’t think the challenge will go that far.”

In order to make the interpretation very clear, and to avoid confusion like this in the future, New Hampshire Democratic leaders are planning to introduce emergency legislation this week to ensure that results from any town elections postponed due to snow are enforceable.

Senate Democratic Leader Jeff Woodburn and House Democratic Leader Steve Shurtleff released a statement announcing their plan to introduce legislation Wednesday during the Senate Rules and Enrolled Bills Committee:

“As elected officials, we have a solemn duty to ensure the safety of our citizens and no election should require voters to risk their safety in order to participate. Our election workers and town moderators are well-trained and take the task of facilitating transparent and fair elections seriously. We should trust them to make the best decision for their communities and for the safety of their people. That’s why we will attempt to introduce emergency legislation at this week’s Senate Rules Committee meeting to ensure that results from any elections postponed due to public safety concerns are enforceable and so that our local officials can make the right decision for their communities without fear of a legal challenge.”

Sununu agreed that the Legislature should take action to resolve the conflicts in state law, but it’s unclear if he will support the Democrats’ bill when it is introduced.

Is your local election and town meeting postponed? Check out the rolling list here as town officials make the decision.

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A bill banning discrimination against gender identity appears to be in trouble in the New Hampshire House. Before the House votes, House Speaker Shawn Jasper is recommending that representatives table the bill.

“The bill is just not ready to move forward,” he told the Concord Monitor. “My concern is with those who are transitioning … going into restrooms, showers, locker rooms, anyplace where it may make someone uncomfortable for a whole myriad of reasons.”

House Bill 478 would prohibit discrimination based on gender identity in employment, housing, and public accommodations. At least 18 other states, including other New England states like Maine, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, have gender identity anti-discrimination laws on the books, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

New Hampshire already has a law prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation, but not gender identity. A previous version of this bill was defeated in 2009, but former Gov. Maggie Hassan signed an executive order banning gender identity discrimination in state government.

The current bill passed the House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee on a 15-2 vote, and includes sponsors from high-ranking Democrats and Republicans, including House Democratic Leader Steve Shurtleff and Senate Majority Leader Jeb Bradley.

Over the weekend, lawmakers’ email accounts were flooded with comments about the legislation. More than 800 emails since Friday appeared in representatives’ inboxes through the House-wide listserv, according to reports. The hard part is sifting through it all to determine who is writing and where its coming from.

Some of the emails were templates from people who didn’t give an address or full name, making it difficult to determine if they were state residents or not, and lawmakers said they were receiving more emails in opposition than in support of the bill, resulting in some representatives changing their support.

“The public is not ready,” wrote Rep. Jess Edwards, R-Auburn, in an email to all House members on Sunday. Edwards backed the bill in committee, but changed his mind after the influx in messages.

“The number of people who have written stating that this bill essentially offers their children up to sexual predators is outrunning by 5 to 1 the number of emails stating that it’s time to end the daily beatings of transgendered people,” he added. “The passionate are yelling past each other with worst case scenarios. I don’t think this is an environment in which the legislature should pick a side.”

Advocates of the bill turned out in overwhelming support for the bill when the committee heard public testimony on it in February, making it seem like it had the majority of public backing and would sail through the rest of the Republican-led Legislature. They say the protections are needed for transgender people, who testified they have been fired, harassed, or discriminated against because of their gender identity.

“I have experienced way too many instances of employment discrimination,” said Shana Aisenberg, a transgendered woman from Freedom who is a musician and music teacher, at the hearing. “Musicians with whom I play stopped calling me. Students cancelled lessons. A music camp where I taught for 10 years fired me because I changed my gender.”

However, opponents of the bill said it could lead to men entering women’s bathrooms to take advantage of them. The bill is not specifically about bathrooms, but it’s an example that’s been widely used throughout the country. Conservatives say it’s about protecting the rights of privacy and religious liberty for New Hampshire residents.

On the religious liberty front, Cornerstone Action is claiming that the bill would negatively impact churches and religious organizations. A lawsuit could potentially arise out of churches, faith-based charities, schools, and ministries who are protected by the state religious exemption, but it’s only applied to “persons of the same religioun or denomination.”

Law experts have argued that these faith-based organizations would have to check everyone at the door to determine if they are of the same religion or denomination in order to maintain separate gender bathrooms. Even if someone argues that they belong to the same religion, they could sue for discrimination against their rights, and the legal fees could be crippling for the faith-based groups. They point to an incident that happened in Massachusetts last year as an example.

Cornerstone Chairman Charlie McKinney wrote a letter to constituents asking them to sign on to a petition that would go to Jasper. The petition states the bill puts “the feelings of gender-confused individuals” over citizen privacy and safety.

“For centuries, we have had social mores, now dubbed ‘discriminatory,’ that are in truth loving, since they informally embraced a moral code that pointed to acceptance of how God created us,” he wrote in the letter. “Although most of the national press on this issue has focused on bathrooms, that’s not what is really at stake for us as Christians. At issue here, as with most other social issues, is the freedom to declare the Truth and conform our lives to the will and design of our Father and Creator.”

It’s possible that a majority of Jasper’s emails are coming from people who signed the petition, which includes a pre-written text. But Freedom New Hampshire, a group that supports the bill, also has a similar message on its website for people to sign, click, and send to their representatives.

“This legislation is about leveling the playing field. Everyone deserves to work hard, put a roof over their head and participate in public life without constant fear of discrimination,” the note states. “But because there are no explicit protections for transgender people under state law in housing, employment, or public accommodations, they must live in fear every day of being wrongly fired, evicted, or denied service—just because of who they are.”

Yet, the possible defeat, or delay, of this bill could have been expected, according to a recent survey on the bill. The Citizens Count, NH’s Live Free or Die Alliance — a nonpartisan organization looking to give citizen’s a voice in their local government — conducted a Facebook survey of New Hampshire residents on their support for the bill in January.

Approximately 56 percent of respondents said they opposed the bill and 44 percent said they supported it. Of course, the methodology is not an exact science, but the results and testimony provide insight from people who might not be able to attend a public hearing at the State House in the middle of a work day.

The national debate on transgender rights comes at a difficult time in the community’s fight. It started last year when North Carolina passed a bill requiring people to use public restrooms that match the gender on their birth certificates. Texas is poised to take up a similar bill during the current legislative session.

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Yet again, the House voted Thursday to kill a right-to-work bill. Since the early 1980s, the New Hampshire House has rejected right to work 35 times and despite Republican control of the State House, they still couldn’t get it done this year.

The bill, which would have prevented unions from requiring nonmembers to pay the cost of representing them, failed by a 200-177 vote, with 32 Republicans joining every Democrat to oppose the bill. Fifteen Republicans and four Democrats did not vote. After the bill was voted down, the House brought up a measure, which passed, stating the right-to-work issue could not be brought up again until the next legislative session in 2019.

So why did it fail again? The Democrats argue that right-to-work is union busting, creates a “free rider” problem, and is wrong for the Granite State. If it had passed, New Hampshire would have been the first state in the northeast to have a right-to-work law on the books. However, the politics of the vote reveals confrontational rhetoric, deep wounds within the Republican Party, and the blame game of who’s at fault for letting it fail.

“STRONG-ARMING” VOTES

Gov. Chris Sununu made it clear throughout his campaign that he wanted to see right-to-work pass in New Hampshire. He even mentioned it in his inauguration speech in January, saying how the law would be an important economic benefit for the state and would encourage businesses to come here.

Before the vote, the governor said he was not “banging the walls” trying to get House Republicans to vote a certain way. However, behind closed doors, he reportedly told the House Republican caucus on Thursday that “you’re either with us or against us.”

“You’re either a Republican or a Democrat,” and he invited opponents of right-to-work to “go leave and vote with the Democrats.”

High-ranking supporters of the bill also told lawmakers that if they won’t vote in favor of the bill, then figure out a way not to vote against, meaning stay home or abstain.

Rep. Matthew Scruton, R-Rochester, said he was encouraged by his colleagues to stay home because “the roads were slick.”

“I did not listen to that advice,” he told the Fosters Daily Democrat. “This bill was being pushed by several out-of-state special interest groups and was not going to help New Hampshire workers.”

State Republican Party Chairman Jeanie Forrester also displayed some of her strength in her newly elected position at a Wednesday press conference, where she said “for those folks who support the governor,” they will be rewarded in the next election cycle with campaign funds.

Even for outside groups, like the state chapter of Americans for Prosperity, said they wouldn’t support lawmakers who broke their pledge. During each election, the group asks all legislators to sign a five-part pledge, which includes support for right-to-work.

Reps. David Miltz, of Derry, and Rio Tilton, of Seabrook, signed the pledge, but voted against the bill Thursday.

“Have I mentioned that we don’t treat pledge breakers well,” AFP state director Greg Moore told the Union Leader. “If we don’t do something when you break a pledge, the pledge doesn’t mean a whole lot, right?”

This pressure from House leadership, the governor’s office, state party, and outside groups might not have convinced “on-the fence” Republicans who are current or former union members, or know people who are in a union. Rep. Tim Josephson, D-Canaan, said strong-arming the House Republican caucus into voting in favor of something they don’t agree with alienates them.

When you tell your caucus "you're w/us or against us" you alienate those who actually rep THE PEOPLE. #nhpolitics https://t.co/BgpOoaWfpc

— Tim Josephson (@TimJosephsonNH) February 16, 2017

For some lawmakers, they are concerned about how their vote might play in their home district come election time next year or if they choose to run for local office.

That happened to House Speaker Shawn Jasper in 2012. He lost an election to serve as Hudson selectman, even though he served on the board for years and was the incumbent chair. He blamed his loss on his support for right to work, which failed by one vote in the House in 2011.

THE JASPER BLAME GAME

Jasper’s role in the vote is also being questioned by the more zealous right-to-work lawmakers. Some say he didn’t try hard enough to convince people to vote for it and are blaming him for the bill’s failure. Jasper is pushing back saying that’s not true, he supports right-to-work, but it was always going to be a tough sell in the House. Jasper was also endorsed this past election by the SEIU Local 1984, State Employees Association. That endorsement probably didn’t help his cause either.

The speaker barely won his gavel for a second term after defeating a fervent right-to-work supporter in Rep. Laurie Sanborn, R-Bedford. After the December vote, Jasper said he recognized that his party was fractured, but he hoped to move forward and work with all Republicans.

“I think we’d all like to move beyond the issues of the past,” he told reporters at the time. “I’m certainly going to be working with the people who were not in favor of me being re-elected.”

To prove he stood with the governor, Jasper stepped down from the speaker’s podium, went to his seat, and cast a vote in favor of right-to-work. After the vote, he echoed a similar message as he did in December.

“What I’m trying to do, and not everyone appreciates this, is to avoid tearing my caucus apart,” he said.

Despite his sentiments, some Republicans still think his support his disingenuous. Some say he “stacked” the House Labor, Industrial and Rehabilitative Services Committee with anti-right-to-work Republicans.

“There has been an ongoing attempt by a number of Right-to-Work supporters, who facing the possibility that SB 11 will be defeated in the House on Thursday, are attempting to portray me as the reason for such a defeat, alleging that I had ‘stacked’ the Labor Committee,” Jasper said in an email to House Republicans on Wednesday before the vote. “Nothing could be further from the truth.”

At the press conference with Forrester, Jasper pushed back against making right-to-work a “litmus test.”

“I’ve said all along that this is a difficult issue,” he said. “I don’t think this is an issue that should define a good Republican versus a bad Republican. I would not characterize anyone who votes against this as a bad Republican.”

Jasper was then criticized by former NHGOP Chairman Jennifer Horn on Facebook, saying he sent “a clear and consistent message against this legislation.”

“Speaker Jasper has failed the governor and he has failed our party,” she said. “Worst of all, he has failed New Hampshire.

Jasper quickly shot back, saying “her comments shows a lack of understanding of the legislative process and a lack of understanding of the individuality of House members. Republicans are not just mind-numbed robots who do what they are told.”

LACK OF UNIFIED CAUCUS OR MESSAGE

Jasper is right in that the New Hampshire Republican Party is fractured and this right-to-work bill further exposed the wounds that have yet to be bandaged. Among the 32 Republicans who voted against the legislation, several of them were from Jasper’s leadership team.

Twenty of the 32 Republicans were from Rockingham County and out of 10 representatives from Derry’s delegation, seven of them opposed it.

The vote also split former allies, including President Donald Trump supporters. Rep. Fred Doucette, R-Salem, a former co-chair of Trump’s campaign and a member of the labor committee, voted against right-to-work. Doucette is also a former union member and said many of his constituents are also union members.

Rep. Al Baldasaro, R-Londonderry, chair of Trump’s state campaign veterans’ coalition, supported the bill, saying “union members in the Republican Party failed us.”

House Democratic Leader Steve Shurtleff told WMUR that the GOP leadership “is trying to paint it as being Democrat versus Republican, but it is bipartisan. I don’t think it plays well to tell Republicans who disagree with this that they will be ostracized by the party going forward. I’ve always told my caucus they are free to vote their consciences.”

It remains to be seen how Jasper and the House leadership plan to unify the Republican caucus, but if another controversial vote comes up, expect to see some divide in the party again.

Rep. Sean Morrison, R-Epping, also voted against the bill and said the right-to-work fight was more of “a matter of message than substance.”

“I too believe this is about freedom … freedom of businesses to conduct themselves as they see fit, and freedom from overreach by government in private business matters,” he told the Union Leader. So let’s lower energy costs, lower business taxes, less red tape and less government interference in employee/employer relationships, as we should in the Live Free or Die state.”

Sununu said he was “deeply disappointed” in the result of the vote, but isn’t going to let this failure define his term.

“It is clear that some House members did not understand this opportunity to unleash the untapped potential of our economy,” he said in a statement. “I know that we can continue to work collaboratively on initiatives that will drive new business into the state. Right-to-work, though important, is just one piece of a broader effort to promote economic development, signaling to our nation’s business community that New Hampshire is open for business.”

WHAT COMES NEXT?

Expect to see a push on further cutting business taxes in the state. Former state Rep. Joe Sweeney also hopes that becomes a focus of the administration.

#NHHouse should accelerate business tax cuts to appeal for new businesses to move here. Need to make up for #RTW failure. #nhpolitics

— Joe Sweeney (@JoeSweeneyNH) February 16, 2017

There’s also a national right-to-work bill that has been introduced in Congress. If that passes and Trump signs it, New Hampshire will have to comply with it. It has a possibility of making it through, since Republicans hold majorities in the House and Senate, but it’s almost certain that Democrats would filibuster the bill if it reaches the Senate floor.

It’ll also be important to keep an eye on the 32 House Republicans that voted against right-to-work next year if they seek reelection. Will the NHGOP find someone to challenge those representatives in a primary fight? Will they see any funds from the party for reelection?

However, don’t expect right-to-work to be gone for good. If the GOP can hold on to the State House in 2018, it can push the legislation again.

“It’s always been a heavy lift,” Moore told the Union Leader. “This cause can succeed but only if you make it a prolonged message which galvanizes the support for free enterprise that is out there across this state. We’re bowed but not beaten.”

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As expected, it didn’t take long for Democrats in New Hampshire to point out what proposals they didn’t like in Gov. Chris Sununu’s budget speech last week.

“I am encouraged by statements of Governor Sununu in support of full-day kindergarten and funding for the developmentally disabled, but as we all know, the devil is in the details,” said House Democratic Leader Steve Shurtleff in a statement. “The Governor’s budget address made no mention of the successful NH Health Protection Program, leaving serious unanswered questions for the 50,000 Granite Staters who rely on the program for their health care coverage.”

But the more divisive statements came from the Senate Democratic Caucus and New Hampshire Democratic Party (NHDP). While they applauded Sununu for keeping several initiatives put in place by former Gov. Maggie Hassan, they criticized him for not fully funding the Alcohol Fund to combat the opioid crisis.

“And in the midst of a substance abuse crisis, we need to find out why Governor Sununu chose not to fully fund the Alcohol Fund, which supports our effort to combat this crisis,” said Senate Minority Leader Jeff Woodburn in a statement.

NHDP Chairman Ray Buckley echoed Woodburn’s sentiments saying he was “disheartened to see that the governor did not fully fund the state’s alcohol fund, which would provide key resources to combat this epidemic.”

The Alcohol Abuse Prevention and Treatment Fund was created in 2000 by the Legislature, and it’s a mechanism that takes 5 percent of the gross profits from the sale of alcohol to support education, prevention, treatment, and recovery programs for alcohol and drugs. The fund has only been fully financed one time since its inception, which was in the 2003-2004 biennium — the first year it began. In his budget speech, Sununu proposed increasing the funds to 3.4 percent, double the 1.7 percent rate the previous budget had set.

In each budget after that, the governor or Legislature transferred the revenue to the general fund and only appropriated a small amount to the Alcohol Fund, which means Republican Gov. Craig Benson and Democratic Govs. John Lynch and Maggie Hassan suspended funding during their terms.

In the most recent budget, for the 2016-2017 budget biennium, Hassan and the House proposed suspending the funding formula. Hassan proposed giving the fund $9.6 million over the two-year period, but the Republican-controlled House dropped that figure to $3.6 million. Senators proposed bringing the formula back and lowering the cap to 1.7 percent, which would give the fund $6.7 million.

If the fund was fully financed for the whole biennium, it would have received approximately $19 million, still nearly $10 million less than what Hassan suggested. After the Senate put forward its recommendation for the budget, the NHDP called their budget “unbalanced and partisan” with “irresponsible gimmicks.”

It’s interesting that the NHDP would criticize Sununu for not fully funding the Alcohol Fund, when previous Democratic governors did not fully fund it either.

“We haven’t had a Democratic governor who has fought as hard as Sununu is fighting for it [the Alcohol Fund] right now,” said former state Rep. Joe Hannon, R-Lee, who made his mark in the Legislature by focusing on the opioid crisis.

“No one has taken the leadership on this, and the battle will be in the House and Senate Finance Committees,” he told NH Journal. “I’m always happy when the governor speaks about how he is addressing substance abuse treatment. He gets it, and that’s something I haven’t seen in awhile from leadership in the state.”

New Futures, a nonprofit group looking to curb substance abuse in the state, is a fervent supporter of fully funding the Alcohol Fund at 5 percent. They believe the money from the non-lapsing, flexible fund could be used for creative and innovative solutions to stop the opioid epidemic.

“We are encouraged by the fact that Gov. Sununu has increased the funding for the Alcohol Fund by doubling the current amount,” said Linda Paquette, president and CEO of New Futures. “However, we anxiously await the release of House Bill 2 in order to clarify the support in the budget for addressing New Hampshire’s substance abuse epidemic.”

Paquette said she was “very curious” what Sununu meant when he talked about “incentives” with the Alcohol Fund.

“First, I propose we double the Alcohol Fund, increasing these important resources by more than $3 million and creating incentives to ensure that those funds are truly spent,” he said in his Thursday speech.

Pacquette said she is hopeful that the Alcohol Fund will be a priority for the Republican-controlled State House because the funds are “not restricted.” New Hampshire is expected to receive federal money from grants and the 21st Century Cures Act, legislation approved by Congress and former President Barack Obama in December 2016, which gives $6.3 billion in funding to circumvent the opioid crisis and enhance medical research and development.

“The Alcohol Fund can be used to fill gaps where grant money and federal funds are restricted for certain uses,” Paquette told NH Journal. “It can be used for supporting recovery housing and investing in early childcare as a substance abuse prevention strategy. He [Sununu] clearly has made the opioid crisis a priority of his administration.”

Sununu presented his budget to the House and Senate Finance Committee in a Tuesday joint committee meeting. The House Finance Committee will take a look at his budget first and put forward recommendations to the full House later in the spring. After passage in the House, the Senate Finance Committee will review that budget and put it up for a vote to the full Senate, before returning to the governor’s desk for his signature or veto.

“We’re going to double that fund and get the money where we can have a lot of impact,” he said in the meeting. “Not just in the high-density areas, but really all across the state. None of our communities have been immune to that.”

The Senate Finance Committee recommended passage of Senate Bill 196 on Tuesday, which was amended to increase the Alcohol Fund to the 3.4 percent rate proposed by Sununu. If the House changes the formula or suspends it in its budget recommendations, this bill could override it and fund it at the rate Sununu proposed.

“This is a sound proposal that I and a majority of the Senate Finance Committee supported today by recommending a bill to do just that,” said Senate Finance Chair Gary Daniels, R-Milford, in a statement. “We have established a number of initiatives that serve to stem substance abuse, including the heroin crisis, and I know we can do more with the funding Governor Sununu has proposed as part of his budget.”

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