On Thursday, HB 624 came before the House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee. The bill would require that state police provide notice to the public when they have been informed by federal agencies, such as Customs and Border Protection, of traffic checkpoints being set up for the purposes of immigration enforcement.

This notification procedure would be similar to the way that police in New Hampshire are required to notify the public of sobriety checkpoints. 

This bill was sponsored by Rep. Christine Seibert (D-Manchester) and co-sponsored by Keene Reps. Joe Schapiro and Jodi Newell. This legislation was considered last year as HB 579, which passed resoundingly in the House last year but failed in the Senate on a straight party-line vote.

Sebastian Fuentes, Movement Politics Director for Rights and Democracy, spoke in favor of the bill:

I am in front of you as one of the many US Citizens and NH residents stopped under no suspicion by Border Patrol in New Hampshire. I lived in Thornton, NH just miles away from the Woodstock / Thornton area where border patrols were set on Interstate 93 many times. I traveled that way to go to work, grab my children from school, do errands as simple as grocery shopping, etc.

CBP has authority over 100 miles of any border, that includes the coastline of NH. 100 miles from Canada going south, 100 miles from Portsmouth going West. 

To be more specific, Border Patrol can stop you while riding your motorcycle on your way to Laconia Bike week…. They can stop you in Nashua while going to your local Market Basket, they can stop you in Hanover while driving for medical care at Dartmouth Medical. They can stop you while grabbing a cup of coffee at your local Dunkin Donuts. 

Now I am a supporter of border security, reasonable and humane border security. It is a personal wish of mine to have these border checkpoints to be moved 10 to 15 miles from the border. That is reasonable. 100 miles from all US borders is an abuse of federal power. Two-thirds of US population live inside these 100 miles from any border line jurisdiction. 

Sebastian Fuentes described his experience during one of the incidents when he was stopped during one of these checkpoints:

During another stop I was stopped close to an hour with a couple of friends, one of them of Muslim origins wearing a hijab. We didn’t comply, following our fourth amendment rights. CBP officers told us to stay in our vehicles, windows up while they were ¨processing¨

Mind you, this was in the middle of summer, with the windows down it gets really hot inside a vehicle. I told the officer that I had breathing issues (asthma) and I needed to get some fresh air. My request was ignored.

Right before the hour, CBP office came back with a clipboard with the Facebook profile picture of the driver, my Muslim friend. A photo that she does not use for any office purpose as her driver’s license or citizenship forms. This was her Facebook profile picture.

Its worth remembering that, not long ago, our country had a rogue Department of Homeland Security, headed by an Acting Secretary, never approved by the Senate and accountable to no one but Donald Trump.

These traffic checkpoints in NH have not been happening since the pandemic, but one can expect that if Republicans get back into White House in 2024, regular violations of people's Fourth Amendment rights will be back on the menu. If and when that happens, HB 624 can provide some minor respite.

It’s time to vote! It’s not November. Yet, thank goodness. No, it is time to vote with your dollar. 

Every Day is a trip to the ballot box!

You, like me, probably spend a dollar every day; but I wonder, do you think about it? 

Do you think about how when you buy a dollar’s worth of gas you are voting to support a handful of extraordinarily wealthy people who rape the future for their own short-term gain? I didn’t before. But I do now.  

Do you think about how when you buy a dollar’s worth of coffee at Dunks you are voting to support a handful of huge shareholders and executives who pay growers a pittance for the cup of joe they sold you? I didn’t. But I do now.

Do you think about how when you buy a dollar’s worth of cheap art supplies from Hobby Lobby you are voting to support a company that wants to ensure that the separation of church and state applies to all churches except theirs? And that you are voting to support a business model that relies on cheap labor and catastrophic environmental destruction to make you a “Live, Laugh Love” sign that is unique … just like everyone else’s? Okay, that one I knew. 

Your Vote Matters!

I know that we all must survive in the world in order to change it. While this is indeed a fact, it can quickly become an excuse. 

“But I need to buy a gallon of gas to get to work.” 

This may be true, though electric vehicles, bikes, feet, and the internet make this “need” a bit more of a want for a lot of us. And even if there is no other option, that dollar you put into your tank to go to work has company. It is joined by the dollar you spent idling in the McDonald’s drive-through, the one you spent treating Main Street as your own personal quarter-mile track, and the one you spent just because you “couldn’t possibly drive a small car.”

I know that our economy is built on fossil fuels. But I also know that that economy is killing us and all of the species we share this little blue marble with.

Stop voting against your own self-interest!

Whether you are standing at the ballot box, the cash register, or the gas pump your vote counts. I know that it can be difficult to believe that sometimes but it is true.  Here are a few easy things that you can do to vote in your own self-interest:

1. Vote Local! The fastest way to make a difference is to vote your hard-earned dollar to one of your grateful, hard-working neighbors instead of to a Manhattan balance sheet (AKA a big box chain) that won’t even know it’s there.  
2. Vote Creative! This is New England, you can’t throw a rock without hitting an antique store or a thrift shop. Buy an old window and paint “Live Laugh Love” on it if you must. At least then your sign will be unique. And bonus! Creativity is fun! (And don’t throw rocks).
3. Vote Small! Making change can be daunting. It can be overwhelming. So start small. Walk downtown instead of driving once. Have lunch at Local Burger instead of the global chain once. Buy an apple and a head of cabbage from the co-op once. Then turn once into twice and see the difference you start to make.  

We are in trouble. We are killing ourselves with convenience and apathy. But we all have the power to vote for change. With every single dollar that we spend. 

Respect to the people of Milford, who turned out in numbers to a school board meeting on Monday night to oppose an attempt to deny transgender students their right to use the bathroom.

Milford currently has policy of allowing students who identify as transgender to use whichever bathroom and locker room they find appropriate. This is a humane policy that supports, rather than ostracizes, transgender teens. Naturally conservatives hate it.

In January, the school board's vice chair proposed to roll back this policy. Lest this be seen as an isolated incident, recognize that this is part of a broad, nationwide Republican strategy of building themselves up by demonizing the LGBTQ+ community.

Across the country and in New Hampshire, concerned so-called "parents" groups have been attacking the rights of transgender students - banning books from libraries, banning the use of pronouns, and making sure the trans kid can't play on the field hockey team. 

These actions cross the line from "malicious" to "downright evil" when you consider that transgender teens have the highest rate of suicide in America. Its certainly hard enough being transgender and a teenager without national political groups pushing your school to stigmatize your existence and alienate you from your peers. These groups have blood on their hands.

And now these demagogues are in Milford trying to make it difficult for trans kids to the bathroom. 

One student described her experience having to plan her day around having access to the few single-stalled bathrooms in a school building: "I just want to use the bathroom. It should take no more than thee minutes but I am forced to wait in line in the hall for five minutes to go to the bathroom." If you want to hear what else she had to say, skip ahead to 1:30:55 in this video.

I wish I could say the School Board covered themselves in glory shooting down this bad idea, but instead they voting 4-1 to move forward a compromise that still entertains the right's desire to attach further stigma to trans students.

While the original proposal of revoking bathroom rights for trans kids was pulled from consideration, it was replaced with a measure to limit the number of kids allowed in a restroom to the number of stalls available. The rule change also prohibits public changing areas and, for some reason, the use of urinals.

The cost of the related urinal-removal project was estimated at well north of $30,000.

Update: Urinals at Milford schools have now been covered in trash bags. 

Local election time is coming again in New Hampshire. Some towns vote on the second Tuesday of March at what is known as “town meetings.” Other larger cities use the ballot box. This is when towns elect their local officials to different boards, such as planning, zoning and/or school boards, to name a few. This is also where the annual town budgets are debated and voted on. 

In Keene, we will head to the polls on Tuesday, March 14. One of the items on the ballot is the election of school board members. There are four seats available on the school board with incumbents Jaclyn Headings and Raleigh Omerod running for re-election. The other two seats have Carter Chamberlin and Jennifer Friedman seeking to fill them.

As a matter of interest, I wanted to include the following article from “Granite State Matters.” This seems to be an issue of great concern throughout New Hampshire. 

EXTREMIST ALERT! Be on the lookout for Free Staters and Liberty Alliance affiliates running for local office in your town elections. Granite State Matters is helping to identify such candidates. They often try to mask their affiliations. If you know of any such candidates, please notify admin@granitestatematters.org. To learn more about Free Staters, please read this Boston Globe article "Free Staters Seek to Undo NH Government from Within."

Gov. Chris Sununu is probably a smart man but you would never know it from his penchant for embracing whatever stupid talking point is in circulation on FOX News that week.  

In the past, he's gone deep on spouting racist, right-wing conspiracy theories about "CRT" in public education. 

And remember that time he was all "we should make sure unvaccinated people are able to work in nursing homes" because he wanted to mollify all the covid-encouraging anger bears in his party? 

In this week's episode of "Sununu Performs Conservative Outrage", our Fearless Governor is on a national Sunday-morning talk show claiming he would have shot down the Chinese spy balloon much better than that silly old Joe Biden did.

At this point in a post, a better blogger might draw a metaphor between the Chinese spy balloon getting shot down and the eventual fate of Chris Sununu's aspirations at running for president.  Honestly, I can't be bothered.

All I can say is, get ready for a lot more of this kind of silliness from our Governor as primary season gets into gear.

Here in New Hampshire, it is the Independent “party” (if you will) who are and have been in the majority, followed by Democrats and then Republicans. The House chamber seats 400 members with Republicans right now in a very slim majority holding 201 seats. One seat is still up for grabs as that election ended in a tie after all the votes were tallied in November, 2022. 

Incumbent Democratic state Representative Chuck Grassie and his Republican challenger, David Walker, both of Strafford District 8 will be heading towards a special election on Feb. 21. 

At the first vote count, Walker was the winner by one vote, 971-970. A recount was held on Nov. 16 resulting in a tie between the two men, 970-970. 

Grassie’s political career dates back to the 1970’s when he sponsored a bill to decriminalize marijuana (talk about being ahead of your time!). Some of his sponsored bills were to raise the minimum age of marriage and to establish the solid waste management fund and grant program. He’s been a strong advocate for women’s reproductive rights and helped bills such as a cap on the cost of insulin to pass, among other legislation. He also served as head of the House Progressive Caucus. 

Walker is a former mayor of Rochester, who is being endorsed by the anti-choice organization “New Hampshire Right to Life”. 

If you would like to see New Hampshire legislate with the good of the people in mind, please help Chuck Grassie keep his seat so he can continue to do just that. Please go here to donate to help Democrats keep a key seat in the New Hampshire House blue!

As an advocate for both housing and environmental preservation, the proposal before the Keene City Council to reduce the minimum lot sizes in our rural zone from 5 acres to 2 acres has my heart divided. And as a City Councilor, I'll have to make up my mind at some point.

As I have pointed out repeatedly to anyone who will listen, there is a housing crisis going on and we need all the housing capacity we can get. But my primary concern is for those at the low end of the housing latter, and this change seems aimed squarely at the top. 

Will the benefits trickle down? Maybe a little, but of all the housing policy changes we could make, I think that making it easier to build McMansions in the outer parts of Keene ranks pretty low on the list of priorities. 

It concerns me that every house that gets built far out of town is car dependent and comes with a cost that we will have to pay in traffic, and all of those drivers are going to expect parking spots when they come into the city. And every house built out in the woods, every forest that's knocked over to plant a lawn, has an effect on the local ecosystem that extends well beyond the borders of its property.

On the other hand, if there aren't places to build houses in rural Keene, people will got farther out - to Sullivan or Westmoreland or Surry or Swanzey. None of our surrounding towns require lot sizes as big as five-acres, so its creating an incentive for people to go even farther out of Keene, commute a bit longer, and not pay taxes in our city.

And the City Council has already approved some expansion of housing in the rural area. Back in November, we passed a changed that enables "Conservation Residential Development" districts, which allows for development of clustered housing in the rural district on smaller lots, providing that certain conservation measures are met, such as the preservation of open space. I think that was a good approach that balanced housing need with ecological protection.

Where I'm coming down is on all this is that, I'm amenable to making this change from five acres to two, but only within the context of a broader effort toward conservation. There are some highly sensitive wildlife areas in Keene, especially to the north of town, and opening up those places to residential development would come with an environmental cost that I don't want to pay. 

We need a plan to preserve what ought to be preserved, and to build where its appropriate to build. Recently, the Conservation Commission has been discussing the idea of a 30x30 program, in line with national and global efforts to ensure that 30% of habitat is under conservation by 2030. 

There is still a lot to be figured out as far as what a 30x30 program might entail here in Keene, but one thing it would provide is a framework can be used to understand our local wildlife habitat conservation needs and have them integrated into the Master Plan update that we are due for in the next few years.

In general, I would be a lot more comfortable supporting the proposed change to Keene's rural lot sizes if I knew it came coupled with a solid plan for preserving the area's ecology. That might take longer than people would prefer, but I think we should take the time to get it right.  

When I was on the campaign trail running for State Senate last year, and Nick Germana was running for State Rep, I used to love getting voters to ask him about child care. Like me, Nick has family in the industry. He can speak with knowledge and passion about the value of early childhood education and on the importance of having decent salaries for workers in that field.

I was less happy when Donovan Fenton would talk about about child care, because I was running against him. The man has two small children and is well versed in the gross financial burden our current system places upon young families. I think it was pretty smart to make child care a key issue in his campaign messaging. While I still claim that my ideas about early childhood education were better than his (put kids first not business!), I guess the voters saw it his way because Donovan is a Senator now and I'm blogging.

All of this is to say that I'm very pleased that Nick and Donovan, in their new esteemed and honorable roles as legislators, are diving head-first into addressing our state's child care workforce shortage. Together, they have introduced House Bill 566 that would bring in some much needed funding to make sure that early childhood educators can at least get paid enough to stay in the industry.

Watch Nick and then Donovan in the hearing before the House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee, and then watch the rest of the hearing:

Its worth watching some of the later testimony, which features child care center administrators explaining how challenging it is to retain teachers when they can pay only $15 an hour at a time when Target will pay $20

Here is some of Rep. Nick Germana's statement:

When we talk about the issues facing our state around childcare, we talk about affordability and accessibility. All too often, however, these two desirables are at odds with each other. Achieving the goal of affordability requires that we keep the cost of childcare down, ideally at 7% of a family’s income or less. The way this is usually achieved is by paying low wages to the women and men who deliver this vital service. 

In my region of the state, the average preschool educator enters the field making $13.51/hr, and an experienced early childhood educator makes, on average, $17.51/hr. That works out to a little over $28,000/year and just over $36,000/year, respectively, in a state with an average cost of living of around $52,000/year (as of December 2021, doubtless considerably higher now). 

To give a more personal example, my wife has been working as an early childhood educator for more than 25 years, and she has two college degrees – an associate’s in early childhood development and a bachelor’s in developmental psychology. She recently became a co-director of a center in Brattleboro, and for the first time in her life she is making just over $40,000. 

Twenty-five years of working in the profession with two college degrees, and she is still earning about $10,000 less per year than the average cost of living in the state. Our 19-year-old son, who has taken time off from college to learn business from the inside, is currently the manager of the Jersey Mike’s restaurant in Manchester, and last year he made almost twice as much as his mother. 

We certainly do not begrudge him that pay – we works extremely hard and has proven himself to be immensely valuable to his employers, but what does this say about how much we value the people who help nurture our children and keep them safe every day? The people who comfort them when we cannot, and prepare them for the academic and emotional challenges of the early school years?

You can see why I always loved to get Nick started talking about that.

Public Service Announcement to my fellow white people: if you make the mistake of overlooking the contribution of a Latina State Representative on the legislative committee you chair, just apologize and move on. Do not compound the insult by joking that she was speaking to you in Spanish.

Republican NH State Rep Mark Pearson forgets to give credit to an Hispanic woman (@mariapz1974) and then proceeds to pretend she wasn’t speaking to him in English. 

Video speaks for itself. #Dobetter Rep Pearson. #NHpolitics pic.twitter.com/nMvyjPAPbL

— Kathleen Cavalaro (@KCavalaro) January 31, 2023

I first got to know my neighbor and NH State Representative, Joe Schapiro (D-Keene), from our work together on Project Home, helping asylum seekers become part of our community. Building humanity into our immigration system is a cause that Joe and I both care deeply about.

Now Joe has a bill before committee that would enable the children of asylum seekers to be eligible for health insurance coverage. It would also provide coverage to asylum seekers who are pregnant.  

HR 282, co-sponsored by Reps Amanda Toll (D-Keene), Jonah Wheeler (D-Peterborough), and others, "directs the department of health and human services to submit state plan amendments under Medicaid and CHIP to provide coverage to children and pregnant women lawfully residing in the United States."

Things you can do:

• Attend the hearing: Wednesday, February 1 at 1:00 p.m. in Legislative Office Building, Room 210-211

• Sign in remotely on the day of the hearing to Support this bill: Online Testimony Submission

• Email the Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee: HHSEA@leg.state.nh.us