Last week, we reported that the House Health and Human Services Committee voted 17 - 1 to recommend the passage of HB 1696, the bill supported by the Chamber which reauthorizes the New Hampshire Health Protection Program. On Wednesday, the full House voted by a margin of 186-116 to pass the bill.
Interestingly, the vote came on a day when the electronic voting system in the House was broken, and so the count was made by means of an old-fashioned standing vote. On some of the amendments that were subsequently proposed for HB 1696, the votes were done through real life roll calls, which required the Clerk of the House to call out the names of each of the 400 members of the House, who had to announce their votes out loud (perhaps an appropriate throw-back on the day after the 100th anniversary of the First In The Nation Primary).
This does not mean that the bill is done in the House. HB 1696 now goes to the House Finance Committee, which will conduct its own review and issue a recommendation to the full House. This next House vote will be decisive, as that will be the vote which determines whether the bill is going to be sent along to the Senate.
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