My votes in the NH House session
of March 6, 2025

HR 17

HR 17 comprises the revenue estimates—the income side of the budget. We voted to approve the estimates and then voted to Table so that the House could hold onto them. That way, if they change later on, we can revisit the resolution. This odd way of voting for the revenue estimates and then tabling is standard practice.

HB 503-FN

This bill would increase the Business Enterprise Tax, the Business Profits Tax, and the Meals and Rooms Tax. It would also reinstate the Interest and Dividends Tax and change how funds are allocated between the general fund and the education trust fund. We were told that anyone voting for it could become vulnerable to the charge of being a “tax and spend Democrat.” On the other hand, increasing these revenue sources would provide relief from property taxes, and property taxes was by far the number one issue I heard from my constituents when I canvassed over 1000 doors in Ward 3 last summer and fall. I voted against my caucus for the interests of my constituents, and I have no regrets. Yes, the vote was overwhelmingly against me, but I stood up for the residents of Ward 3.

HB 583-FN-LOCAL

A “feed the kids” bill. It would have Medicaid-enrolled public-school students automatically enrolled in the USDA school meal program without having to complete paperwork. The Democrats had an amendment to make the bill budget-neutral, but the bill was tabled.

HB 94-FN

This bill removes state Medicaid coverage for circumcision. We received a ton of astroturf emails against it from all corners of the US in the 24 hours before before the vote. There are good reasons to not cover circumcision by Medicaid. But I was concerned that this bill would discriminate against Jews and Muslims, so I voted against it. The OTP motion passed by one vote.

HB 524-FN

This bill repeals the New Hampshire Vaccine Association, which helps healthcare providers to procure vaccines. It purchases vaccines in bulk, saving 30%. The repeal will result in many providers having to buy vaccines up front, at higher prices, and then billing insurers to recover costs later on. Yet, the anti-vax contingent prevailed.

HB 224-FN

The best way for me to describe this bill is to point you to my floor speech. Or, if you’re like me, and would rather save time by reading, here’s a transcript:

This bill is about something called the Renewable Energy Fund. What is that? It is a dedicated, non-lapsing fund. It’s funded by the utilities when they fall short of the goals of the Renewable Portfolio Standard. By statute, the Renewable Energy Fund is intended to support—guess what?—renewable energy initiatives. This bill would reallocate the Renewable Energy Fund including rebates to ratepayers. That sounds pretty good, but I’m going to give you three good reasons to vote against this bill. Any one of these three should be enough to get you to press the red button, but I’m going to give you all three.

Number one: Because it’s a dedicated, non-lapsing fund, that’s not what’s supposed to happen to it. It’s not supposed to be reallocated. It’s supposed to be used for the purpose that it’s intended for. The current balance is $10 million, and the bill would make 100% of these funds go to purposes that the fund was not intended for. Not only that, this is a really good use of money. Every dollar that’s invested from the Renewable Energy Fund actually generates $8 of private investment. That is a pretty darn good leverage I’d say. We’ve seen $416 million in private investment from the Renewable Energy Fund program to date. Moreover, remember that renewable energy keeps money in the state. On the other hand, every dollar that we spend on fossil fuels is a dollar going to Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma—not staying in the state. So that’s number one.

Number two: If you look at the bill, it’s unclear how these funds would get redistributed. The bill says that the funds go to administrative costs, to the Office of Offshore Wind and Energy Innovation, and incentive payments. And whatever is left over, that’s what goes to the ratepayer rebates. The bill doesn’t say how these things get distributed, and I have no idea what incentive payments are. That is just undefined. So what does this work out to? Well, I looked at my December 2024 bill from Liberty Utilities, which by a bill that we passed a couple of years ago, tells us how much we paid into the Renewable Energy Fund, or actually the cost of RPS compliance—Renewable Portfolio Standard compliance. In 2023, the average ratepayer spent $24.75 for the year on compliance with the Renewable Portfolio Standard. Only some of that went into the Renewable Energy Fund. So when you take out the administrative costs, funding the Office of Offshore Wind and Energy Innovation, and whatever incentive payments are—I have no idea—what’s left over as a rebate for the average customer would end up buying about one latte from Starbucks per year. So if you think it’s a really good idea to tell your constituents, yeah, I decided to keep money flowing to Texas and Oklahoma for fossil fuels so you could have one latte from Starbucks this year, go for it.

Final thing, number three, and this is the best one: If you look at the trailer bill, HB 2, and I refer you to page 73, section 188 of the bill, it says that it’s going to sweep the $10 million that are in the Renewable Energy Fund into the General Fund. So which is it? Are we going to use the Renewable Energy Fund to sweep into the General Fund? Are we going to have it go to the ratepayers and these other purposes? It can’t be both. It seems that someone’s left hand doesn’t know what someone’s right hand is doing.

So this is just a plain bad bill. I’ve given you three good reasons to vote against it. So I ask you to press the red button on the motion three times.

Ahh, but the bill passed on a straight party-line vote. I have a good relationship with prominent Republican on the Finance Committee. I look forward to his explanation of how the Renewable Energy Fund will be disbursed to rebates and swept into the General Fund.

HB 654-FN

I was the prime sponsor for this bill, which says that if a utility customer also generates electricity (typically with solar panels) that is sold back to the grid, then they should also be allowed to be an off-taker in group net metering. I was absent when this bill was introduced in committee, because I was quarantining with COVID. I really couldn’t make a good case for the bill, and I was prepared for the committee’s ITL motion to go to a voice vote. To my surprise, Minority Leader Jason Osborne moved to Table the bill. Tabling at least keeps the bill alive, so Ranking Member Kat McGhee and I told the caucus to vote to Table. After we adjourned, I asked Rep. Osborne why he moved to Table when he had the votes to ITL the bill. He said that he didn’t want to hear the debate. (It was getting late in the day, and nothing puts representatives to sleep like a debate on net metering.) I told him that we were just going to do parliamentary inquiries. He made what passes for an apology.

HB 723-FN and HB 681-FN

These bill are about the New Hampshire energy data platform. This project has been in the works for a few years, and is (was) about to go out for a request for proposals. The system would automate our energy data to provide information that utility customers, the utilities, power suppliers, and agencies could use to use electricity efficiently.

HB 723-FN repeals the data platform, and it passed. HB 681-FN would have updated the data platform, and because we voted on it after HB 723-FN passed, we allowed the ITL to go to voice vote.

HB 649-FN

This bill eliminates state safety and emissions inspections for passenger vehicles. There was a massive astroturf email campaign for this bill, with emails arriving from all corners of the state, with the overwhelming majority supporting the bill. The conclusion I drew from the email is that there are a lot of dishonest auto mechanics in the state. There are actually reasonable arguments to make to eliminate the inspections, but the state stands to lose up to $250 million in highway funds if we eliminate emissions testing.