A new paper, “All Politics, No Longer Local? A Study of the New Hampshire House of Representatives, 2001-2021” by UNH’s Dante J Scala and J. Mitchell Scacchi takes a look at the evolving composition of our 400-seat House, the third-largest parliamentary body in the English-speaking world.
By combing through years of biographical data for the many State Reps that served over the course of two decades, the researches found that, over time, legislators have become less likely to have had previous experience at the local level of government.
The study notes in its conclusion that:
Historically, members of the New Hampshire legislature were often the people who volunteered at local food pantries and served on town committees. But the significant declines we detect in both local governing and civic experience among new members of the New Hampshire House suggest the composition of the New Hampshire legislature may be in the midst of important changes. More specifically, while it is still safe to say that the typical Granite State legislator still has local roots, it is fair to point out that the root structure of the legislature is not as strong as it once was. If we take it that legislators’ backgrounds, at least in part, inform their political opinions and policy preferences, then the general decline in local governing and civic experience among new members of the New Hampshire House may have had an effect on the type of legislation coming out of the New Hampshire General Court.
As a locally-elected official myself, it concerns me that fewer legislators are coming to the job with experience considering the types of issue that we deal with at the municipal level. I guess that just means us local types will have to work all the more harder to keep them informed.