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Chamber Insight 2-18-11
A busy week in Concord was highlighted by several key issues on the Chamber's legislative radar. Here is a rundown of the action...
House Transportation Vote "Railroaded"?
On Wednesday of this week House Transportation committee voted 11 to 5 in favor of HB 218, a bill that repeals the volunteer New Hampshire Rail Transit Authority. The Chamber opposes this bill along with several other groups like Greater Nashua Chamber, Nashua Regional Planning Commission, Southern New Hampshire Planning Commission, and NH Businesses for Transportation & Infrastructure.
The Chamber believes HB 218 is shortsighted and deprives policymakers and the public from the information they need to make informed policy decisions about the future of our transportation infrastructure. The role of the New Hampshire Rail Transit Authority is to plan and study the feasibility of expanding passenger and freight rail in New Hampshire. In its few short years of existence, all the Rail Authority has done is secure over $4 million in federal grants to study rail expansion in New Hampshire without costing taxpayers a single dime. The business community uniformly recognizes that's a great deal for New Hampshire. Unfortunately, some legislators have not gotten the message yet.
The outcome of vote on HB 218 was only part of the story, however. Of much great interest and controversy was the process that surrounded the House Transportation Committee's vote on HB 218. Earlier this week, the Chamber had intel suggesting the vote on HB 218 was going to be close and perhaps even see the bill defeated. That all changed on Wednesday, however, after House Speaker Bill O'Brien took the unusual step of personally caucusing with the committee moments before the committee voted on HB 218. In addition to caucusing with the committee, House Leadership also replaced absent members of the committee with 5 Republican legislators. This was supposedly done because additional bodies were needed to reach a quorum. Personal accounts relayed to the Chamber, however, state a quorum was already present. Following these extraordinary steps, the outcome was far from in doubt and the committee voted the bill ought to pass 11 to 5. One wonders what the outcome of this bill would have been without House Leadership's involvement.
Why did this happen? Clearly, House Leadership made it a priority to see HB 218 pass. Leadership did testify in support of HB 218 at its public hearing, but the steps taken leading up to the committee vote on this bill (Speaker personally lobbying the committee and stacking of the committee) are highly unusual steps. While everything House Leadership did is technically within the rules of the legislature, the Chamber does not support such tactics being used to sway the outcome of a committee vote. As the Chamber has said all along, we recognize that many legislators are skeptical about feasibility of expanding passenger and freight rail. That why we want to ensure policymakers have all the data and information they need when considering this issue. The only way to ensure they have that information is study rail and all the other transportation alternatives available to New Hampshire. HB 218 would throw up another roadblock in providing that information to policymakers. HB 218 now heads to the House floor and assuming passage will then go on to the Senate. The Chamber and its partners in the business community will continue to oppose this bill to ensure New Hampshire is making informed decisions about the future of our transportation infrastructure.
Business Take on Governor's Budget
The Governor's State of the State address and budget presentation was the focus of most legislators' attention this week and, as detailed above in Sponsor Insight, drew a variety of reactions from various corners of the political spectrum. What did the Governor's budget mean for the business community? First and foremost, as the Governor first announced at the Chamber State of the State event, no new or increased taxes were included in the budget. This is great news for the business community as recent budget debates have included possible business tax increases. Clearly, the Governor and legislature are on the same page this session and have both set the tone in taking business taxes and any new or increased taxes of the table. The House and Senate will now begin the process of each crafting their own proposals, with the House being first to act. The Chamber will be closely watching these deliberations. While taxes may be off the table, we must keep in mind the impact of downshifting state costs to the municipal taxes can have on property tax rates. Stay tuned, this issue budget will still be up in the air long after the snow banks melt.
Retail Development Bill in Focus
The House Municipal & County Government committee heard HB 639 this week and hopefully will dismiss the proposal shortly. The bill adds a state mandate to the local development review process by requiring impact studies for large scale retail developments. This type of requirement is unnecessary and duplicative as communities already have the proper regulatory process in place to study the impact of new developments. The bill will add additional costs (it charges developers a $40,000 fee) and time to a development review process that in many municipalities is already too slow. The bill did not receive much support at the committee and was opposed by several different groups. State Infrastructure Bank Proposed
Meanwhile over in Senate Transportation, the Department of Transportation presented a proposal to create a State Infrastructure Bank. SB 159 would create a new mechanism, called a State Infrastructure Bank or SIB, to loan funds to municipalities to complete local road and infrastructure projects. The key concern voiced by the committee was over how the state would capitalize or fund the bank. Redirecting existing highway funds was not something committee members seemed to be in favor of. While the capitalization of the fund needs to be studied and carefully considered, the committee would be wise to strongly consider this proposal as local communities desperately need new tools to fund infrastructure needs. Infrastructure is the key to business growth and economic development and the Chamber believes the state needs to do a better job planning how we invest in our various infrastructure systems.
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