cooljeanius’s avatarcooljeanius’s Twitter Archive—№ 49,655

                        1. Time for another M&CG committee hearing today; it’s still the crossover period, so that means we’re still hearing bills the state Senate has sent us. We’ll also be exec-ing the bills from last week (as well as this week) after. My livetweet thread for it starts here. #NHPolitics
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                        We have a number of substitutes on our committee today, including @SuzanneVailNH @cwgrassie and Paul Berch.
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                      getting started now
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                    First up is Sen. Kevin Avard @SaxSinger63 @avard_kevin to introduce SB52 to us, on Nashua’s spending cap. He wants to make if harder for municipal spending caps to be overridden.
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                  It’d require a supermajority vote to override spending caps. Seems odd to be talking about the “will of the people” when instituting a rule to institute a supermajority requirement, which is inherently anti-majoritarian.
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                Time for the requisite Cordell Johnston testimony… which he’s yielding, so never mind.
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              Next up is Fred Teebom to testify in favor of SB52. Apparently he was one of the original proponents of Nashua’s spending cap back in 1993.
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            Mr. Teebom is attacking unions in his testimony. As a strong supporter of unions, his arguments are not going over well with me. #1u #NHPolitics
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          oops typo; I think it might actually be “Teeboom” instead of “Teebom”
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        Chair is asking the testifier to wrap it up; finally!
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      Next is Timothy Twombly testifying in favor of SB52; apparently he used to be a state rep.
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    Mayor @JimDonchess is now testifying against SB52, and Fred Teeboom was still unmuted and tried to interrupt him…
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      Blue sheet numbers are 23 in support, 35 opposed, 1 neutral for SB52, for reference.
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        Jennifer Wolf has called in because apparently Dan Moriarty has called in from a number that no one recognized, so he had remained muted; she’s requesting an unmute for him.
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          Mayor Donchess is correcting the record about who sued whom in the judicial history of this issue; apparently it was Fred Teeboom and Dan Moriarty who did the suing, not the city of Nashua.
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            ok now Dan Moriarty is testifying in favor of SB52; the issue with him being muted got worked out…
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              the Twitter account I’ve found for him is outdated, apparently: @danieltmoriarty/915684813335654403?s=20
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                He was addressed as “Doctor” previously; I wonder if he’s actually a Doctor, or if that’s just a Sherlock Holmes reference?
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                  There goes the chair getting hand-raises for questions mixed up with hand-raises for testimony again
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                    Alicia Houston is now testifying in favor of SB52
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                      hey it’s another person who uses “fallacy” to mean “argument I disagree with”
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                        ok hearing on SB52 is closed now; onto the next bill…
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                          Next is SB87, another one of the Senate’s omnibusses… (omnibi? Not sure the plural of “omnibus”…)
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                            Sen. Sharon Carson is here to testify to her part of the bill, but that’s not first, so we’re looking for Sen. Birdsell, but apparently she isn’t here…
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                              Part II of SB87 seems like a pretty simple cleanup; I don’t see much of an issue with it. The other 2 parts, though… well, we’ll see.
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                                Look like Sen. Carson’s handle is @SharonCarsonNH; she doesn’t appear to use it, though…
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                                  Since Sen. Birdsell isn’t here to introduce Part I of the bill for us, Dave Caron of Derry is doing that part instead. Derry apparently gets a lot of water payments from surrounding communities, and wants to be able to use that water money for other stuff.
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                                    So, apparently the term “water wheeling charge” doesn’t actually have anything to do with water wheels… huh!
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                                      Yeah Dave Caron is the Town Manager for Derry apparently
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                                        Blue Sheet numbers for SB87 are 9 in favor, 0 opposed, for reference.
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                                          There’s some apprehension here about water funds being spent for non-water purposes here… I dunno…
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                                            .@SenJeb is here to introduce Part III of SB87 to us; he says @grantbosse is here to fill in for Sen. Birdsell’s missing testimony on Part I… but instead we’re giving Cordell a turn first. Cordell says the NHMA supports all 3 parts of SB87.
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                                              Cordell is reassuring us that Part I of SB87 will really only affect Derry. Also Part III is primarily for the benefit of the town of Sandwich.
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                                                ok @grantbosse’s turn to testify now
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                                                  William Herman (displayed as “Bill Herman”) of Auburn is now testifying in favor of SB87
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                                                    Chris Boldt of Sandwich supports SB87. He’s a lawyer.
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                                                      ok onto SB102 now
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                                                        .@TeamRebeccaNH was supposed to introduce this bill (SB102) but we can’t seem to find her, so instead Clifton Below is testifying in favor of it. (Blue Sheet numbers are 40 in favor, 1 opposed, 1 neutral, btw)
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                                                          Is Clifton Below’s handle @ccbelow? I can’t quite tell… anyways this bill (SB102) seems like it’d be good for renewable energy.
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                                                            ok Sen. Perkins-Kwoka is here now to testify about SB102 for us; apparently it’s something the city of Portsmouth has been asking for. It’s supposed to deal with property taxes being inflated by the pandemic.
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                                                              Next @PrentissSuzanne is testifying in favor of SB102; apparently the renewable energy portions are something that city of Lebanon has been asking for.
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                                                                Cordell’s turn; apparently there’s some confusion over the number of parts here, since the Senate amended this bill from how it was originally drafted…
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                                                                  apparently I say “apparently” a lot
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                                                                    comparison w/HB341 from previously here; the difference is that was a housing and zoning bill, while this is a tax relief bill
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                                                                      .@kahnjay gets a turn to testify in favor of SB102
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                                                                        Lunchbreak time; we’ll be back around 12:45 for executive session
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                                                                          Reminder to subscribe to my “Committee Testifiers” list to get an idea of who’s trying to influence us: twitter.com/i/lists/1356423245092823042
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                                                                            ok time to come back for executive session now
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                                                                              we’ll be exec-ing the bills in the order we heard them, starting with the ones we heard last week
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                                                                                First up is SB84; since the “purple paint” amendment got ruled non-germane, I can’t introduce it, and thus we’re just voting on the “village district public bodies” portion.
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                                                                                  SB84 passes 17-2; with no objection it gets put on the consent calendar.
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                                                                                    onto SB86; some confusion about the amendment process for this one
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                                                                                      Rep. Stavis is introducing an amendment; it replaces the language preventing municipalities from banning certain fuel types with language requiring such municipal ordinances to grandfather in old buildings instead.
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                                                                                        Rep. Stavis’s amendment fails along party lines, 10-9. Oh well.
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                                                                                          Next up the Republicans want to introduce their own amendment to SB86, to remove Part II of it (the housing part), which is like the only good part of the bill. If this amendment goes thru, it’ll be a much easier decision to vote against the bill as a whole.
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                                                                                            The Republicans really don’t have any defense for this amendment; they’re just doing it because they hate the possibility of helping people find housing. #NHPolitics
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                                                                                              Their amendment to remove the only good part of SB86 goes thru on a party-line vote, 10-9. Oh well, guess that just makes it more certain that I’m a “no” on the bill as a whole now.
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                                                                                                Reminder for next election: Republicans would rather do giveaways to fossil fuel companies than help people find housing. If you disagree with their preferences here, vote them out next chance you get. #NHPolitics
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                                                                                                  SB86 as a whole OTPs along party lines, 10-9. Boo.
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                                                                                                    Next up is SB88. This is the broadband one.
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                                                                                                      SB88 OTPs unanimously, 19-0; it goes on the consent calendar. Phew!
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                                                                                                        Onto the bills we heard earlier today. First up is SB52 from the cranks in Nashua about their spending cap.
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                                                                                                          SB52 OTPs along party lines, 10-9. Boo.
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                                                                                                            Next up is SB87, about using water fees for other purposes. I don’t really have strong feelings about this one…
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                                                                                                              SB87 OTPs unanimously, 19-0. Finally, we’ll close off with SB102.
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                                                                                                                SB102 is the one about property taxes and renewable energy. A bipartisan motion + seconding, so maybe this one will go well?
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                                                                                                                  plenty of discussion here; seems like we might get some GOP support?
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                                                                                                                    SB102 OTPs 15-4; the 4 opposing were all Republicans, while the 15 included all of the Democrats plus some of the Republicans. So it passed with bipartisan support! Yay! That was good at least.
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                                                                                                                      hearing is done now; time for a break…