Weber looking to win challenge from Winter in Surry, Walpole House district

Nov. 2—Surry and Walpole, in the N.H. House's Cheshire County District 5, are seeing a longtime incumbent challenged by a newcomer.

Republican John William Winter, 19, is going up against Democrat Lucy McVitty Weber, 70, in next Tuesday's general election, with the two Walpole residents "very friendly towards each other," Winter said.

"I think it's about that time where we start passing on the torch to the younger generations," Winter said. "If I do win, I still believe it's polite and respectful ... to seek [Weber's] advice and get her input on things because she has more experience."

Winter served as field director for a portion of retired Army Brig. Gen. Don Bolduc's latest U.S. Senate campaign, in which he coordinated county chairs and volunteers. He held a sales position for Verizon before focusing on his own Statehouse race and said he previously volunteered for Donald Trump's presidential campaign in 2020 as a field organizer.

After he said he's knocked on more than 1,000 doors in Cheshire District 5, Winter named the economy, energy and inflation as top issues he'd focus on if elected. He said he's heard concerns from both Democratic and Republican voters on heating costs this winter and wants to "get the floor running immediately" to help reduce prices, though he didn't name any specific actions.

He stated several times that if it's the will of Surry and Walpole constituents, he'd want to work across the aisle even on issues where Republicans remain sharply at odds with Democrats.

"If the people in Walpole elect me and they're all out in six months saying we need to address climate change, I will be out there fighting for them even though I'm a Republican," he said. "I don't think we should completely get rid of fossil-fuel energy. But the markets and consumers are looking towards greener and carbon-neutral alternatives."

Winter said he supports incentivizing solar power adoption by consumers and believes steps could be taken to introduce relief in the first six to 12 months of the next legislative session.

"If you want solar panels, not only should you get tax credits for those but maybe not have it count towards your property tax," Winter said. "We shouldn't enforce green energy; we should incentivize it."

Following the U.S. Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade in June, Winter said he favors retaining existing state legislation on reproductive health care and is not interested in further restrictions.

Current state law bans abortions, in most cases, after 24 weeks into pregnancy.

"It was a compromise and I respect compromise and bipartisanship," Winter said. "Also, blatantly honest, abortion isn't really affecting me as a guy; however, it may affect my constituents, so that's where I'd have to represent their interests."

On the flip side, the seven-term Weber said reproductive rights are a cornerstone of her push for re-election.

"It's very important to me that I don't leave women in this state with fewer rights than they had when I started," Weber said. "This state has always, under Republicans and under Democrats, been a state that kept the government out of people's bedrooms and medical and reproductive decisions. I think it ought to stay that way."

Before her first election in 2006, Weber was a retired schoolteacher. In a survey by the New Hampshire-focused nonpartisan nonprofit Citizens Count, she indicated she's opposed to public school funding being determined by local property taxes.

"Educational opportunity should not depend on the town you come from; we ought to be giving every student in New Hampshire the same kinds of educational opportunity," she told The Sentinel.

A member of the N.H. House's Committee on Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs, Weber homed in on the need to reauthorize and expand the state's Medicaid program. She noted she supported a bill sponsored by N.H. Rep. Joe Schapiro, D-Keene, that established a dental benefit for Medicaid.

"Preventive dentistry is a lot cheaper than treating the systemic infections that people get that take them to emergency rooms when their teeth have not been properly looked after," Weber said.

Energy, as with many candidates, is also on Weber's mind. Like Winter, she said she's interested in net-metering programs that encourage consumers to generate solar power locally. She said the state should divert and diversify energy sources to renewable options.

On taxes, Weber said she's worried corporations have received significant tax breaks that burden residents of low income with higher property taxes. She also stated that at one point during her time in office she was in favor of a broad-based income tax but that her position has shifted.

"The only way I would vote for an income tax is if it was guaranteed to reduce property taxes significantly for ordinary citizens," Weber said. "I actually did have discussions at one point about an income tax that ... would go directly for education."

Also in the Citizens Count survey, Weber said she was less favorable toward broad-based sales taxes, which she said "... tend to be regressive, imposing the heaviest burden on the neediest citizens."

But she said her primary force behind seeking re-election is concern about the status of democracy. She expressed a desire to help the state Democratic Party restore its majority in the Statehouse.

"When Democrats were in the majority the last time, they returned money to cities and towns, they raised payments to schools ... and both of those initiatives helped with ordinary peoples' tax rates," she said.

Find information about the candidates, voting, sample ballots and more for the upcoming election at www.sentinelsource.com/vote/

Trisha Nail can be reached at 352-1234, extension 1436, or tnail@keenesentinel.com. Follow her on Twitter

@byTrishaNail.