State House Dome: Lively fight to come over 'primary caregiver' sentencing reform

Jan. 28—EXPECT A VIGOROUS debate over a New Hampshire legislative campaign aimed at ending incarceration of women and girls.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is holding the first hearing Wednesday on this legislation (SB 254), which is part of the national FreeHer Campaign.

The group's current focus is to change sentencing laws in the six New England states.

"These six states have the lowest incarceration populations of women in the country and we are working with local formerly incarcerated women leaders and our volunteer base, People Not Prisons, to de-carcerate, decriminalize, and close the women's prisons in the states," the campaign said.

This bill would permit a judge to decide to order non-incarceration for a "primary caregiver."

State Sen. Rebecca Perkins Kwoka, D-Portsmouth, is sponsoring the measure, with the support of four other veteran Senate Democrats and three House Democrats.

The group plans a Feb. 6 kickoff.

Featured on a flyer is Kristie Torbick, an ex-guidance counselor who in 2018 received a sentence of up to 30 months for sexually assaulting a 14-year-old student.

At the timing of her sentencing, Torbick apologized to the victim and family.

"I am sorry to the student for failing to set firm boundaries. In spite of my sincere intention to help, I confused and complicated that intent," Torbick said at the time.

"For my nine years as a school counselor and the 19 years I spent volunteering at the camp for children with cancer, I never engaged in inappropriate behavior with minors."

The NH Coalition Against Sexual and Domestic Violence opposes the measure.

"Instead of taking responsibility for her horrific sexual crimes against a child, Kristie Torbick is at the NH State House trying to reduce accountability for others who break the law. No elected officials should be siding with sexual offenders over the children and communities they harmed," said Amanda Grady Sexton, NHCSDV's public affairs director, in a statement.

Historic racing at a gallop

More charitable gaming casinos are getting into the historic racing business.

Last week, Dick Anagnost's Filotimo Company announced it would offer historic racing machines at Manchester and its three other locations.

The Brook in Seabrook was one of the first out of the gate, announcing last spring it would offer betting on these machines, which show past horse races.

Concord Casino has proposed to planners in the capital city a new complex with expanded HHR offerings.

It took more than year to adopt this program, which clearly slowed down the rollout.

The Legislature approved a three-year moratorium that prevented the state Lottery from awarding licenses near any of these 14 charity gaming locations so they could set up and build a market share for them.

State Sen. Denise Ricciardi, R-Bedford, introduced a bill (SB 112) to make that moratorium permanent, but she withdrew the language last week after several senators said that was a no-go for them.

The Senate is expected to support moving this moratorium out six months or so in recognition of delays.

Another reform in Ricciardi's bill with plenty of support would set aside about $70,000 a year in unclaimed winnings or breakage into a fund to support problem gamblers.

House shakedown cruise

The New Hampshire House holds its first business session this Thursday.

House Speaker Sherman Packard, R-Londonderry, and committee chairs have done their level best to create a smooth shakedown cruise in such a closely divided House.

The light agenda has only 35 bills in it, including eight on the regular calendar that could face debate.

The first real dispute will be over legislation (HB 295) that would require all local school board and selectmen's meetings to be video recorded and livestreamed.

GOP members on the House Municipal and County Government Committee considered this an unfunded mandate. They argued many small towns don't have the budget or infrastructure to meet the requirement.

The House Democrats on the panel wanted to retain the bill to do more work over the summer and fall.

The panel voted 10-9 to recommend killing it.

This is the warm-up. More conflict will begin when the House meets Feb. 14, the same day Gov. Chris Sununu presents his two-year state budget plan.

Housing chair sounds off

The chair of the new House Special Committee on Housing made clear his opposition to a raft of tenant rights bills the House Judiciary Committee took up last week.

"Everyone knows the housing crisis in New Hampshire is the result of a supply issue. Until we increase the supply of housing available in the state, we will not see any relief. The slew of bills we have seen this week attempt to solve the issue by increasing regulations on landlords," said Rep. Joe Alexander, R-Goffstown.

"It is completely illogical to institute laws such as not allowing newly renovated apartments to be put back on the market for a year, effectively leaving usable housing unoccupied. Encumbering landlords with increased regulations will only exacerbate the issue.

"We look forward to finding real solutions to a real problem without entertaining unreasonable proposals."

Private school aid fight

The state Senate played nice last week while having the first of many battles over whether to expand state support for private-school spending.

The Senate passed along party lines a bill (SB 77) to add private schools to the "manifest hardship" state law.

This would let a school board approve the assignment of a student to an alternative "private school" in the area.

Currently the assignment may only be made to other public schools or academies.

All 14 Senate Republicans endorsed it; 10 Democrats voted no.

OLS loses longtime staffers

House Speaker Packard went to the Senate on Thursday for a ceremony for two retiring staffers in the Office of Legislative Services.

Sharon Simon worked for 38 years in OLS, much of it as support office manager.

"I'll miss all of you but I won't miss the late nights with the state budget," she said.

Anthony Dangelantonio worked for 26 years as a senior attorney in the legal and bill drafting division. He said he received several well-wishes from lawmakers and staff who appreciated his work.

"Sometimes you don't realize when you do something, there are people out there who notice and appreciate it," he said.

Simon has been around even longer than Packard, who's beginning his 17th two-year term.

"Please don't be strangers. You are both welcome back here any time," said Senate President Jeb Bradley, R-Wolfeboro.

Packard said it was the first time he had ever spoken from the Senate president's podium; his dad was Senate president in 1959-60.

Sununu off to DC

While New Hampshire Republicans were deciding on their next leader and former President Donald Trump was making his return to the Granite State Thursday, Gov. Chris Sununu was in D.C. as an invited guest at the meeting of the Alfalfa Club, an exclusive gathering of the politically rich and famous.

Sununu left the state Friday afternoon and planned to return home Sunday. The trip was not covered by taxpayers.

"In light of yesterday's NH Republican presidential primary poll from UNH, Sununu might want to spend more time winning over NH voters instead of DC insiders," said Craig Brown with AmplifyNH, a Democratic special interest group.

Abortion rights fight

On Tuesday afternoon, the Senate Judiciary Committee has before it legislation to codify the Roe v. Wade protections in state law (SB 181).

All 10 Senate Democrats and the House Democratic leadership team are on the bill.

Last week, the House Judiciary Committee took testimony on requiring the keeping of statistics on abortions in New Hampshire (HB 582) and independent audits of abortion clinics (HB 615).

Firearms group fired up

The New Hampshire Firearms Coalition is lobbying its friends to shoot down legislation to outlaw armor-piercing ammunition (HB 158). A House committee took up the bill last Friday.

"This bill, euphemistically titled a bill 'relative to armor piercing ammunition,' is likely INTENTIONALLY written vaguely so that anyone like yourself who even owned a hunting rifle with 'high velocity' ammunition could easily be classified a Class B Felon!" the NHFC said in its email blast. "I think you would agree with me that this is just plain, wrong!"

Jones study clears Senate

First-term state Sen. Keith Murphy, R-Manchester, got speedy approval last week for his plan (SB 102) to have the state to study the impact of the federal Jones Act on energy markets in New Hampshire.

"I ask the Biden Administration to listen to the bipartisan pleas to issue a waiver to the Jones Act to bring immediate relief to Granite Staters facing high energy prices," Murphy said.

U.S. Rep. Chris Pappas, D-N.H., has been pushing in Congress for a change in this policy.

Fenton aims high

New state Sen. and ex-Rep. Donovan Fenton, D-Keene, is getting started on some tough fights of his own.

Last week, he pushed for two of his bills, one of which would require that any child two or under be placed in a rear-facing safety seat (SB (SB 118).

The time for this bipartisan bill may have arrived. For several years the House fought over this mandate, but a study commission has built some bipartisan support for the change, which has the backing of national highway safety groups.

The other bill (SB 117) would further tighten laws regarding the safe storage of guns in homes with children under 18; the present limit is children under 16.

Some gun owner groups already have come out against that one.

Charging bill revs up

A bipartisan team of state senators is gathering support for its push (SB 52) to create more robust infrastructure for charging stations that electric vehicle owners can use across New Hampshire.

State Sens. Tim Lang, R-Sanbornton and David Watters, D-Dover, both argue that New Hampshire needs to quickly upgrade its network if it's going to continue to attract tourists to the region.

Sununu and the Executive Council have approved using millions from the Volkswagen Mitigation Trust (VW Trust) and National Electric Vehicle Infrastructure (NEVI) program to set up and support charging stations.

Backers said this bill would make sure this infrastructure is available and affordable not only along the state's major roads, but throughout rural areas as well.

Quote of the week

"New Hampshire has historically been second in the nation behind Iowa. That has been its role."

"Let's be real ... it has been viewed as the second-in-the nation contest. Based on our proposal, it is still the second-in-the nation contest. We have maintained the tradition that New Hampshire has asked us to maintain." — Mo Elleithee, District of Columbia representative of the Democratic National Committee's Rules and Bylaws Committee, which has recommended New Hampshire and Nevada go second in 2024, three days after South Carolina.

None of the four presidential campaigns that Elleithee worked on, including Hillary Clinton's in 2008, ever referred to New Hampshire's primary as the "second-in-the-nation" contest.

Elleithee is the founding executive director of Georgetown University's Institute of Politics and Public Service.

Kevin Landrigan is State House Bureau Chief for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News. Reach him at klandrigan@unionleader.com.