Of all the people who are supporting rail service from Nashua to Concord, there probably are few who have more cause to want to get that service into place than Chamber President Tracy Hatch, who traveled up to Concord yet again this week for another transportation-related legislative meeting, this one a House Public Works Committee work session on Tuesday to discuss SB 519, the bill sponsored by Senator Regina Birdsell relative to highway signs. This legislation would allow "motorist service signs" promoting specific restaurants, as well as fuel, lodging and camping, to be placed on our highways in advance of exits between the Massachusetts border and Concord. Currently, they are allowed only on the exit ramps - meaning that motorists aren't aware of what's nearby until they are at best past the exit, and often simply unaware because the sign isn't placed where they can read it easily.

 

We believe this is a positive option for our great restaurants and hotels and we were pleased at the unanimous support this bill received at the Committee hearing.

On Wednesday, the Executive Council voted 3-2 to confirm the nomination of Senator Jerry Little of New London as the next Banking Commissioner.  Senator Little will assume his new office on June 2nd, when the current legislative session is slated to end.

 

Executive Councilors Chris Pappas and Colin Van Ostern voted against the nomination, citing Senator Little's prior work as the Executive Director of the New Hampshire Bankers Association.  His experience in that regard, however, seems to us to be a big plus (obviously Governor Hassan thought it was).  If people are going to be disqualified from holding executive branch offices just because they previously worked for or advocated for portions of the industry that they will be regulating, then the State is going to be disqualifying some of the most talented and knowledgeable people for the jobs.

 

Now you can add a third Senate seat to the line of political dominoes that we reported on last week (the other two being Senator Forrester and Senator Prescott, who are running for Governor and Executive Councilor, respectively).  If history is any indicator, there may well be other Senators who decide to pack it in and not seek another term. We'll know all that by June.

Next week, the Senate Energy Committee takes its turn at reviewing HB 626.  As readers of The Advocate will remember, this was the bill that would have created mandatory energy corridors where energy transmission lines needed to be buried.  The House made the use of the corridors optional, and that removed the central problem with the bill, from our perspective.  We will be keeping an eye on this one to make sure that no problematic changes creep back into this one.