Remember the recent uproar over public employee unions in New Hampshire? The one about eliminating collective bargaining obligations when labor contracts end?
It was slipped into the House budget proposal, but the N.H. Senate has stripped the controversy from its version of the budget. And now, a Senate committee has reshaped House Bill 580, which also included a collective bargaining provision that organized labor strongly opposed.
Our midstream progress report continues today, checking up on the status of some featured legislation we’ve covered so far this session.
For more background on each bill, click the links to the corresponding dispatches in the bolded heading.
When it comes to the New Hampshire Retirement System (NHRS), Sen. Jeb Bradley (R-Wolfeboro) is ready for a major overhaul. He believes the situation demands prompt and decisive action.
“We need to get people off the dime,” Bradley told Front Door Politics shortly after he released details of his retirement system overhaul proposal late last week. “The problems are immense and the longer we wait, the worse it becomes.”
Sen. Jeb Bradley (R-Wolfeboro) will soon release his plan for a major overhaul of the NH Retirement System.
The measure will be known as Senate Bill 3. Bradley says it will be introduced within the next two weeks and it will require a detailed financial actuarial analysis by the NHRS. Bradley says it the bill is designed to stabilize and build up a retirement fund that is currently underfunded by an estimated $4.75 billion.
Be honest: How well do you really understand the New Hampshire’s budget? What’s the difference, for example, between the general fund and education fund budget lines? How much is the state debt? How is the ten-year highway plan funded?
Don’t feel discouraged if the answers elude you. Even an avowed budget expert like Charlie Arlinghaus, president of the Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy, admits he needs refresher points to keep up with budget developments. In an effort to help everyone — lawmakers, policy makers, the general public and media organizations such as Front Door Politics — better understand the mysteries of the state budget, The Josiah Bartlett Center for Public Policy is holding its annual “Budget 101” seminar Thursday at the State House.
Public employees and unions are keeping a close eye on big changes to the New Hampshire Retirement System that could be coming down the pike — and on a newly created House committee on pension reform.
When the recession hit, the state’s public employee pension system was already battered from a decade of chronic underfunding. Now, lawmakers are looking for ways to deal with more than $3 billion in unfunded liabilities for future retirees. The pension system serves over 75,000 active and retired teachers, fire fighters, police officers and public employees from more than 450 New Hampshire municipalities.
It was a landmark year for New Hampshire government in 2009—not only for the size of its budget deficit ($250 million) and the number of state layoffs it induced (200), but also for legislative action on some controversial social issues, like gay marriage, the death penalty and medical marijuana.
But these scores are far from settled, as evidenced in the new round of bills up for debate in Concord’s 2010 legislative session, which officially kicks off on Wednesday, Jan. 6
Fairness was in the eye of the beholder at the State House last Wednesday when the N.H. House and Senate grudgingly voted in the 2010-11 budget. House Bills 1 and 2 contain the state’s General Fund spending and revenue, respectively. Earning few cheers, the legislation has been called everything from a legitimate compromise doing the “least possible harm” to an illegal “dung heap” along the way.
New Hampshire is one step closer to its budget for the next two years, although it still may be a long way off.
The committees are made, bills introduced and seats assigned. The NH House and Senate took their formal start for 2009 on Wednesday, Jan. 7, one day before Gov. Lynch’s inauguration.
And there’s no time to waste, as public hearings start next week on the nearly 1000 bills up for debate this session.
House committees are scheduled to hear a total of 55 bills next week, while the Senate is looking at 12. Following is a short selection of bill titles with their prime sponsors, hearing dates, assigned committees and brief analyses.
