NH Senate doings week of 22-26 April 2019

Ed Committee Hearing.  23 April.  Five bills were heard.  We started off with HB 383 “Relative to the prohibition on unlawful discrimination in public and non-public schools”.  Couple of interesting phrases in that title.  “Unlawful discrimination”, is there any other kind?  Does “lawful discrimination” really exist?  And “non-public schools”.  In plain English those are called private schools.   I asked the representative introducing the bill if “discrimination” included preventing boys from using girl’s restrooms, locker rooms and showers.  She said it did.  She also said preventing boys from competing in girl’s sports would be discrimination.  I plan to speak against and vote against this bill when it reaches the Senate floor.  Can you say stealth transgender?  The bill makes no attempt to define  discrimination, which means it could be anything.

    Now for HB 435, this is a harmless paperwork bill, changes a few names, but otherwise harmless. 

    And HB 447 “Relative to school calendar days”.  This bill merely states that local school boards can set the school calendar as they please just so long as they squeeze in 180 school days.  This is what the law is today. This bill is to kill off a Senate bill passed earlier, that required all schools to start AFTER Labor Day. Most NH schools now start in August.  Administrators and teachers like that.  Personally, I feel that starting school before Labor Day is child abuse.  But that’s just me. 

   And HB 448 another harmless paperwork bill of no consequence.

   And finally, HB 652 which would require two hours of suicide prevention training for everyone, teachers, administrators, bus drivers, secretaries, everybody except coaches.  No funding was provided.   Training could be merely watching some instructional video on the Internet.   No requirement for training students to recognize suicidal thoughts in their friends, or what to do should they feel a friend might be suicidal.   

Short Senate session today.  Started at the usual time, 10 AM and we had all the business on the calendar done by 11 AM.  Opened the show with the Fast Track (consent) calendar.  Ten bills were Fast Tracked.  All of them were harmless and no account.  One was amusing and makes you wonder how anyone does business in New Hampshire.  That was HB 259 that now requires that building inspectors writing up a building or job must quote chapter and verse of the fire code that has been violated when they write up a violation.  Dunno how we have gotten along without that all these years.  Anyhow one quick voice vote and ten more bills, already passed by the House, are passed by the Senate and off for the Governor’s signature. 

   Now for the regular calendar.  We killed (Inexpedient to Legislate, ITL in legitative speak) HB 309 which made complicated changes to the procedures about foreclosing a mortgage.  We passed HB 511 which subjected vaping to the same controls as ordinary cigarette smoking.  No vaping on school property, no vaping in no smoking areas.   Seemed reasonable to me.  Did not get into taxing vaping stuff as hard as we tax cigarettes.  And we voice voted HB 684, concerning rent disputes about “manufactured housing: Ought To Pass (OTP).  I asked the bill’s sponsor if “manufactured housing” was what ordinary people call house trailers.  He conceded that it was.  I then asked him why rent disputes over house trailer rentals deserved special protections at law that ordinary landlord tenant disputes don’t get.  Answer was so vague as to be no answer at all.

   And then HP 663 concerning some obscure language changes about the definition of agriculture and agricultural land use.  We used to call that farming and farms.  Dunno what the lawyers dreamed up to complicate life and raise their billable hours. 

   And HB 118 which would require notifying a child’s doctor of reports of abuse.  This could be a little touchy.  Down in Massachusetts they have a lot of doctors reporting ordinary child accident injury from falls and such as child abuse.  Anyhow HB 118 passed on a voice vote. Zap.

   And HB 396 requiring the bureaucracy to get the lead out and respond to right to know requests within 5 days.    OTP voice vote. 

   And HB 427 made some opaque change to the law about filing protective orders on behalf of minor children.  OTP voice vote.

    And HB 437 concerning “family alienation” was tabled on a voice vote.  This bill would have allowed divorced parents to sue each other for bad mouthing each other in front of the children.  Let’s leave it on the table forever. 

   And a weird one, HB 518 which allows the state to recover the costs of imprisoning someone from that someone.  Apparently we have a wealthy prisoner in slam right now and we want to sock it to him harder.  Senator Lou D’Alessandro spoke in favor of this.  I never heard of this before.  We send a guy to jail, he serves his sentence, or is a good little boy and gets parole, and he is out.  I never heard of a state dunning such a person for room and board in the big house before. 

   And we closed by passing HB 700 concerning taxes on utilities.  I did not understand just what the deal was in HB 700.  I do know New Hampshire utility rates are totally unreasonable, partly due to taxes on utilities, RGGI, another hidden utility tax and more such.