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NASHUA BULLETIN March 23, 2016
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Bulletin No. 10
Welcome to the Chamber's weekly legislative newsletter, The Advocate! This newsletter is our recap of what happened in Concord each week during the legislative session, and a preview of what is coming up in the following week that pertains to various business interests. Although we will be letting you know about legislation that we think is of note, don't hesitate to tell us about bills that you may be familiar with and which you think are worth our review. We exist to serve you, our members.
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Good News On Electric Transmission Corridors (HB 626)
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Chamber members had reason to celebrate last week at the news that came out of the House Finance Committee on Wednesday. The Committee voted 22-3 to pass an amended version of HB 626, the electrical transmission corridor bill. The amendment expressly provides that burial of lines in designated corridors is only optional, which is a crucial change, because the prior version of the bill as it first landed in the Finance Committee effectively (although not expressly) set up a mandate that the lines be buried in the designated corridors.
Our concerns about this bill were associated with this mandate, because the evidence produced by Eversource showed that the bill would result in hundreds of millions of dollars of additional costs to New Hampshire electric ratepayers. Along with the sobering news that that additional cost would have to be paid for entirely by New Hampshire ratepayers, rather than being spread out amongst all users of the New England energy grid, it seemed to be beyond dispute that the passage of HB 626 in its original form would have been a huge blow to ratepayers. We are grateful that the Committee turned to the Chamber for our perspectives on the bill and that the Committee came up with a good resolution.
The bill is on the floor this week.
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This week brings the annual day of destiny in the New Hampshire House and Senate: the day by which all bills that are going to be passed out of that body must be voted on and sent over to the other body. "Crossover" is always a challenging time because of the sheer volume of bills that need to be acted upon.
Some bills already have "crossed over," and one of the biggies is HB 1696, the bill supported by the Chamber that would reauthorize the NH Health Protection Program. The Senate Finance Committee holds a hearing on the bill at high noon on Tuesday. We anticipate that the bill could be voted on and get to the floor quickly. Next week, we'll give you a rundown of how that goes, and we will also give you our annual retrospective of the first half of the session.
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| Mark Your Calendars . . . |
Next Monday, March 28th, at 5:30 p.m. at the Crowne Plaza in Nashua, we will be holding our annual Legislative Crossover Reception. This is always a great opportunity for the business community and the ever-faithful Nashua delegation to get together in an informal fashion and share some fellowship and some laughs. This year, we are going to keep it light on policy and long on conversation and conviviality (so you know we won't be talking about national politics.) Please join us as we thank our legislators for their dedication and their service to us.
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Tracy Hatch
President & CEO
Greater Nashua Chamber of Commerce
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