“Rebuilding a Stronger NH” focuses on the lessons learned from 2020
CONCORD, NH – Senate Republicans issued their agenda for 2021 today with an emphasis on pandemic relief, helping working families, supporting Main Street businesses, protecting taxpayers, improving education, keeping New Hampshire streets and homes safe, and ensuring honest elections.
Commenting on the agenda, Senate President Chuck Morse (R-Salem) said, “We have an opportunity to bring New Hampshire back from the pandemic in better shape than ever – that means building a stronger economy and creating more opportunities for all Granite Staters.”
“First and foremost, we need to keep our families healthy and safe during the pandemic. This means partnering with Governor Sununu on distribution of future federal relief money for working families and Main Street businesses. We are going to lower the tax burden and bureaucratic red tape for struggling small businesses and work to lower property taxes. We will never, ever allow and income or sales tax to pass in New Hampshire,” Morse said.
“New Hampshire citizens expect us to solve the problems facing our state and that’s exactly what we are going to do,” said Majority Leader Jeb Bradley (R-Wolfeboro). “We intend to be successful by taking the lessons we learned from 2020 and use them to rebuild a stronger state resulting in a positive impact on the lives of Granite Staters.”
The Republican agenda includes seven key points:
Keep NH families healthy and safe during the COVID-19 pandemic
• Partner with Governor Sununu on distribution of future federal relief money for working families and Main Street businesses.
• Work with hospitals and HHS to ensure enough COVID-19 bed capacity, protective equipment for healthcare workers and testing capacity/access in all NH communities.
• Increase resources for mental health and substance abuse treatment and recovery.
Help NH working families
• Increase funding for affordable housing.
• Lower electric rates and improve broadband across the state and
• Establish a voluntary family and medical leave program.
Support Main Street businesses
• Lower the tax burden for small businesses struggling to survive.
• Reduce the regulatory burden on Main Street businesses.
• Lower health insurance costs through associated health plans.
Protect NH taxpayers and property taxpayers
• No income tax, no sales tax and no capital gains tax.
• Create a state budget that will help grow the economy while dedicating the resources to those programs that need it most.
• Help property taxpayers by providing local aid to municipalities for property tax relief and stop the downshifting of state obligations to local municipalities.
• Oppose efforts to return to a donor town system.
• Restore the strong economy NH enjoyed prior to the pandemic.
Improve NH student’s education
• Ensure education adequacy funding
• Fund public charter schools.
• Establish Education Savings Accounts.
• Provide adequacy funding for home-schooled students.
• Provide targeted aid for special education students in small school districts.
• Provide grants for kindergarten.
Keep NH streets and homes safe
• Ensure police departments have the resources they need to protect communities.
• Ensure NH’s bail system prevents violent criminals from further harming the public and ensures people who have received bail actually show up for their judicial proceeding.
• Provide funding for clean water projects and wastewater projects.
• Address the growing homelessness crisis that is taking over many NH cities.
Ensure honest elections
• Ensure only NH residents vote in NH elections.
• Ensure absentee voting has a process for signature verification.
• No mail in voting without a resident requesting an absentee ballot.
• Continue to ensure inspectors of elections and poll watchers have full access to the election process.
• Ensure there is a standard process used to verify/audit the final vote count to confirm that the system used to tabulate the votes was accurate.
• Ensure NH voting machines are secure.