The Concord Monitor

New Hampshire is set to receive more than $1.25 billion dollars this year as a result of a federal COVID-19 stimulus package – the most in the state’s history.

To put that in perspective that’s about 10 percent of the state’s two-year total budget.

How state officials plan to dole out this federal money and who in Concord has authority to decide who gets what has touched off a profound legal dispute.

New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu (right) and House speaker Steve Shurtleff after the governor's State of the State address on Thursday, February 13, 2020. GEOFF FORESTER

Democrats, who control the House and the Senate, say any spending of the money must go through the Legislature, and specifically the powerful fiscal committee that approves all major state financial requests.

“The swiftest means of effectively and constitutionally spending federal stimulus funds is through the Joint Legislative Fiscal Committee,” wrote House Speaker Steve Shurtleff and Senate President Donna Soucy, both Democrats, in a letter to Gov. Chris Sununu Tuesday.

Sununu, a Republican, says otherwise. That money, accepted under a state of emergency, may be spent without the Legislature’s sign off, he said, pointing to other different areas of statute.

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