Deadline for state property tax relief program looms

The program, which provided an average of $163 in aid for 2024, remains underutilized

By Kelly Burch, Granite State News Collaborative

The deadline for homeowners looking for 2025 tax relief through an underutilized state program is fast approaching – applications must be filed by Tuesday, June 30.

“This relief can make a difference by helping homeowners free up resources for other essential expenses,” said Lindsey Stepp, commissioner of the N.H. Department of Revenue Administration. 

Under the state’s Low & Moderate Property Tax Relief Program, eligible homeowners received an average amount of $163 in relief last year, according to a report from the N.H. Fiscal Policy Institute. The report noted the amount is “relatively limited compared to the amount of total property tax paid by homeowners.” 

Yet the relief “is meaningful for Granite Staters who need to pay for housing, childcare and other costs with limited resources,” said Phil Sletten, research director at the institute. 

• How to apply for property tax relief

  Homeowners can apply for relief online or by sending in a paper application that must be postmarked by the June 30 deadline.

  • Open the Granite Tax Connect website

  • Scroll to the box titled “Registration and Applications”

  • Click the link titled “Apply for Property Tax Relief”

  For more information, homeowners can call the Department of Revenue Administration at 603-230-5000

The program is available to individuals who earn less than $37,000 annually and couples or heads of households with an income of less than $47,000. It can only be used on properties that have an assessed value of $220,000 or less.

Homeowners with lower incomes pay a higher percentage of their income to property taxes, research shows. The relief program is particularly valuable for seniors and others living on fixed incomes, Stepp said, as it can “[help] them remain in their homes despite rising property tax costs.”

Nevertheless, the program remains underutilized, according to Sletten, largely due to lack of awareness. State law requires that some taxpayers — including seniors, veterans, and people with disabilities — receive a notice that they may be eligible for relief, but many others are likely unaware. 

“Many homeowners likely eligible for aid have not accessed it,” according to the N.H. Fiscal Policy Institute, which found in a study released in May that more than 42,000 New Hampshire homeowners had household incomes below $35,000. Many of those, and more, may be eligible for tax relief.

Participation in the program has dropped steeply since it was implemented in 2003, the study found. In 2003, 27,208 taxpayers utilized the program and received a total of $7.5 million in claims. By 2024, preliminary data showed 4,901 claims totaling $800,000 were granted – the lowest amount on record.

While income limits for the program were raised in 2021, they have not been adjusted for inflation or increased since then. 

In every legislative session since — except this year — the House has introduced measures to update the program, including “modifying eligibility requirements, making inflation adjustments, [and] mailing application forms to prior recipients,” Stepp said. However, none of those efforts have made it out of the House. 

The current round of eligibility is for 2025 tax bills — those typically mailed between October and December of 2025, according to the Department of Revenue Administration. People who apply are still required to pay their tax bills on time, though homeowners who have not paid can still apply for relief, according to the state. To apply, homeowners need their property tax bill and a copy of their federal tax returns. Approved relief funds are sent via a check that is typically issued within 120 days. 

These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. Don’t just read this. Share it with one person who doesn’t usually follow local news — that’s how we make an impact. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

New Hampshire 250: The Granite State’s role in America’s origin stories

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

Communities across the Granite State are planning to observe the nation’s 250th birthday with all kinds of events and activities, many of them focused on New Hampshire’s role in the American Revolution. Mary Adams, the N.H. Historical Society’s homeschool program developer and museum educator, who has been travelling around the state with a presentation called “Redcoats and Rebels,” provides a historical perspective.

Melanie Plenda:

Not everyone knows that New Hampshire was the first colony to declare independence from Britain. How did that come about?

Mary Adams:

In January of 1776, we had a problem on our hands from the previous August. John Wentworth, the royal governor, had abandoned the colony. He was under increasing threat from the patriots of Portsmouth, who had wheeled a cannon up to his front door and threatened to blow the door off his house if he did not comply with them.

By August of 1775 he had moved to Fort William and Mary on Newcastle Island, and eventually sailed to Britain and abandoned the colony. So the provincial congress steps into this void, and they take matters into their own hands and create a new form of government.  They called it a constitution, but it looks very, very different from the constitution that we have today. There's no separation of powers, there's no checks and balances at all, and there's actually even no governor — there's just a legislative system and a judicial system.

Melanie Plenda:

The Pine Tree Riot happened years before the first official battle of the revolution — what was it and why was it so important.

Mary Adams:

It’s one of my favorite things to talk about, because it sounds a little quirky. It's a “fight over trees,” is how I've kind of heard other people describe it. But I think it gets down to the heart of what the revolution is really about. Who has the authority over these gigantic pine trees? Is it the king, thousands of miles away across the ocean? Or is it the people who live on the land, work the land, and need the trees for their own homes, bridges and their livelihoods?

Essentially what happened is the people in Goffstown and in Weare were fined because they had been cutting up the king's pine trees in their mills. In Goffstown, the people were compliant — they paid their fines, they got on with life. But in Weare, the people really refused to pay those fines. So in comes the sheriff to enforce the law, and the people take it into their own hands. They riot into the sheriff's room where he was staying, early in the morning, and they beat him. The intention was to beat him one lash for every tree for which they were being fined, and that was about 270 pine trees. So they beat him, they took him outside, and they put him on his horse — had also done some things to the horse, like they had cut its tail and cropped its ears to make it not sellable or desirable, and they send him riding out of town.

Of course, the end of this is that when they do finally go before a judge, one of those judges is Meshech Weare, who ends up becoming the president of New Hampshire eventually. But the fine is just so extraordinarily light that it really sends this message through the communities that it's not just the people of our local communities that are feeling this strength of rebellion, that it really is also being supported even in a small way from our leaders in New Hampshire as well.

Melanie Plenda:

Let’s talk about the Battle of Bunker Hill and the role of New Hampshire residents in that.

Mary Adams:

I love it because we think of it as a Massachusetts battle, but truly two-thirds of the soldiers that are fighting there are New Hampshire soldiers who have walked from New Hampshire.

I think of Isaac Wyman in Keene — we have his musket on display at the Historical Society. It’s the musket he carries from Keene down to Bunker Hill, and he's there along with about 1,000 other New Hampshire soldiers, many of them under the command of John Stark. The Massachusetts soldiers total about 500. They're also bringing down with them some gunpowder that they had raided from Fort William and Mary in December 1774, so they're adding to this fight in a huge way.

The Battle of Bunker Hill is so fascinating, it's this kind of first big mashup. It is such a surprise to the British. They know they have the upper hand with superior weaponry. So when they attack this left flank that John Stark and his men are behind, they are shocked because on the very first volley about 70 British soldiers were killed. The Americans repel them two more times, and finally John Stark decides it's time to exit the battlefield, but instead of his men just sort of abandoning the battlefield and running off, he has them very carefully, very methodically, leave, and they're providing covering fire for the rest of the battlefield as well.  This is where he loses 15 to 17 men in the fight.

This catches the eye of George Washington when he comes to visit the battlefield, and he hears about the battle and John Stark's decision not to just have his men willy-nilly abandon everything, but instead provide covering fire, and this is when he realizes that John Stark really needs to be in the Continental Army. 

Melanie Plenda:

Let’s talk more about Gen. John Stark — one of the most well known figures of the American Revolution. He coined the phrase “Live Free or Die.”: His story is kind of complicated.

Mary Adams:

He's born in New Hampshire, he's Scots-Irish — a group of people ll known for their resilience and hardworking spirit. John Stark ends up fighting with Rogers’ Rangers during the French and Indian War. It’s guerrilla-type warfare. They are not walking through an open field in straight, clean lines and bright clothing. They are hiding behind trees and stone walls, and they're circling around, attacking from behind.  So he ends up bringing all of this knowledge, this battlefield knowledge, when he arrives at Bunker Hill.

I think that what really resonates with so many people when they learn about John Stark is that he's actually not in the army for any kind of fame or fortune. He did not want to play the political game that was required of him to sort of maintain his rank and to achieve higher rank. He's really there because he just continues doing what he believes is the best thing to do. If something is not right, he is fair, he's honest, he's just, and he's going to try to right the wrongs, and so this is really so much of his heart behind fighting. 

There's an event that happens between his time in the Continental Army and the Battle of Bennington, which is when he comes back to New Hampshire. He's on a little bit of a respite trip, and he finds out that Enoch Poor, another man from New Hampshire, has been promoted above him to the rank of brigadier general, and this is pretty insulting to him, and he actually resigns from the Continental Army, and says that he will not answer to orders on the battlefield again from someone in the Continental Army.

But when the plea from Vermont comes, and they are asking for help — the British have sent British and Hessian soldiers to come to Bennington to raid storehouses, and there's this plea from Vermont to please help. So New Hampshire answers this call, and they call on John Stark. They give him the rank of brigadier general to command New Hampshire's militia.

Melanie Plenda:

On July 4th, the Historical Society will host an Independence Day open house. Can you tell us what visitors can expect?

Mary Adams:

You can expect short talks, crafts for kids, and there are guided tours. I'll point you to one of my favorite things in the building, which is that we actually have two of just 32 Revolutionary War flags left in the entire world. They're displayed on our grand staircase. They're remarkable for a few things. They are the only pair of flags left in the entire world from the Revolutionary War. As far as we knew in New Hampshire, the flags  had actually been burned with some boats in 1777. But in 1908, we got a letter saying they were hanging at Sandhurst, the military academy in Britain. It kind of sparks a series of events and we end up getting those flags purchased for us by our benefactor,  Edward Tuck, and they have been on display in our building ever since. 

Melanie Plenda:

For families and anyone looking to have an adventure this summer, the Historical Society is hosting the “603 History Hunt.” What is it and how can people participate?

Mary Adams:

I feel very attached to this event, because I have written all 200 clues. This event will be on an app. People can register, and then we give them all kinds of different things for them to do. So you can be celebrating a woman in Weare who heard that the British were coming,  so she made her kids eat all of their maple syrup products in one day because she didn't want the British to take them. You'll make a bowl of Count Rumford's soup, which saved Bavaria from a famine. There's an opportunity to take a hike to a remote New England glasswork site, which started in the 1780s but it's staffed by German POWs that were captured during the war. There's countless graveyards to explore, and tons of opportunities for selfies with different Revolutionary War heroes — so it's all going to be amazing fun.

Melanie Plenda:

Many  thanks to Mary Adams for this engaging conversation.  To learn more about New Hampshire in the American Revolution visit the NH Historical Society at nhhistory.org

To find Mary’s recorded New Hampshire History Minutes for NHPBS visit. To find a location for one of Mary’s upcoming “Redcoats and Rebels” presentations, visit nhhumanities.org

And New Hampshire Humanities, in partnership with NHPBS, is hosting “The Big Watch” in communities across the state where you can watch a short excerpt from “The American Revolution,” a new film directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Botstein and David Schmidt, followed by a community discussion. Learn more at nhhumanities.org

Finally, there are a couple of online calendars available to help you find New Hampshire 250 events near you. One website is visit.gov/250th and newhampshire250.org/.

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Open your eyes and stop looking away from the roots of our reality

.By Shamecca Brown-Granite State News Collaborative

I’ve spent years working in the trenches of advocacy, trying to fix the broken machinery of our social support systems. I’ve written the letters, sat in the meetings, and navigated the endless, soul-crushing bureaucracy that dictates who gets to survive and who gets discarded. I did everything "right." I played the game. And I am here to tell you, with the weight of my own grief and the clarity of someone who has seen the curtain pulled back: the system isn't broken. It’s working exactly as designed.

We are the "little people," but lately, that feels like a sanitized term for what we really are to the powers that be. We are the mangy dogs at the edge of the feast. We are expected to stand on the periphery, tail wagging, grateful for the crumbs of policy scraps they occasionally get tossed our way, all while they toast to their own prosperity behind closed doors.

But are you actually being fed, or are you just being kept in a state of constant, desperate hunger so that you’re too exhausted to bark at the truth?

The storm isn't coming; it’s already here, and it’s taking us out.

Every single day is a gauntlet. You wake up and face gas prices that make travel a luxury, rent that swallows your paycheck before it even hits your account, and energy and food bills that force you to choose between eating and keeping the lights on. They bleed us dry with taxes that vanish into a void, leaving us to fend for ourselves when we hit the inevitable wall of healthcare costs. They’ve turned basic survival into an extreme sport, and the house is rigged to make sure we lose.

And, as the economic floor falls out from under us, the air is getting thick with something else: a rising, ugly, and increasingly loud racism. It’s not hiding in the shadows anymore; it’s being shouted from the rooftops. This isn’t a coincidence. When the people in power want to keep the mangy dogs fighting each other over the few scraps left on the floor, they turn up the volume on hate. It’s a distraction – a tool to keep us from looking at who is actually holding the table.

They rely on our exhaustion. They rely on the fact that when you are grieving, when you are fighting for your family’s survival, and when you are busy trying to find the next meal or the next medical approval, you won't have the energy to demand the whole table.

I’m done with the polite discourse. I’m done with the "hopeful" calls to action that lead to dead ends. There is a profound, sickening corruption at the heart of this place we call the USA, and it survives because it relies on us looking away.

But look. Look at your bank account, your insurance denials, the empty spaces in your own home where loved ones used to be. The system didn’t just fail; it stood by and watched. It’s time we stop acting like we’re part of a society that cares about our existence. We are being managed, not governed.

It’s time to stop wagging our tails. It’s time to stop waiting for them to feed us. It’s time to open your eyes to the fact that we are the only ones who can save ourselves, because nobody in that marble building is coming to help.

So stop looking away. Start talking to each other about the real cost of living in this state, the rent, the food, the healthcare, the isolation. If we are going to survive this storm, it won’t be because the system finally decided to be kind. It will be because we stopped acting like dogs and started acting like a community.

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Child welfare in New Hampshire: when systems judge instead of understand

By Shamecca Brown-Granite State  News Collaborative 

In New Hampshire, children don’t just enter systems, they get pulled into them through delinquency cases, abuse and neglect proceedings, or CHINS (Children in Need of Services) cases.

On paper, these are different legal categories. In reality, they often reflect the same underlying conditions: trauma, instability, poverty and unmet needs, met with responses that come after the fact instead of addressing what caused them in the first place.

This isn’t just theory for me. I’ve lived parts of what it means to be misread by systems meant to “help.”

When my family first moved to New Hampshire from New York, my son experienced a major identity adjustment. In one situation, he was exposed to other children using the N-word. He responded in a way that reflected how our culture teaches us to react to racial disrespect.

Instead of that moment being understood in context, it was treated as a behavioral issue. He ended up in diversion and was required to complete anger-related programming for expressing his feelings.

That’s where the deeper issue shows up, because what was missed wasn’t just the incident, it was the context.

It wasn’t just behavior. It was identity, environment, and how Black children are often interpreted when they respond to racial harm. Instead of slowing down to understand that, the response focused on correction, anger management, compliance programs and structured interventions that never fully addressed what actually happened.

This is exactly the kind of systemic disconnect that Lisa Wolford has pointed to in her work through the Children’s Law Center of New Hampshire – that systems built to respond to behavior often fail to account for trauma, environment and lived experience. When that happens, families don’t feel understood. They feel processed.

Across New Hampshire, children and families are often funneled into systems designed to manage behavior rather than understand it. But behavior doesn’t exist in a vacuum. It’s shaped by environment, stress, trauma, identity, and survival. Yet families are often expected to complete programs, anger management, counseling, compliance plans, without anyone first asking the most basic questions:

 • Can this family realistically access these services?
• Do they have transportation?
• Do they have stable housing?
• Are their basic needs even being met?

When those questions go unanswered, compliance becomes unrealistic, and punishment becomes the outcome.

Breaking the cycle

In New Hampshire, a significant portion of children in foster care are placed in group homes or institutional settings – far above the national average. These placements are expensive and disruptive, often costing hundreds of dollars per day per child. But the true cost is not financial. It is relational.

Children lose connection to family, school, culture and community. And many age out of the system at 18 without stable housing, consistent support or a foundation to transition into adulthood. And then we act surprised when the cycle repeats.

The Children’s Law Center of New Hampshire works through legal representation, policy advocacy and systems training, but even their work points to a deeper truth: Real reform cannot begin in court. It has to begin before systems ever get involved.

That means investing earlier in families, expanding access to mental health care, strengthening schools and addressing poverty as a root cause, not a background factor.

Children who grow up in foster care, court involvement, or disrupted educational systems are more likely to re-enter those same systems later in life, and more likely to have families who experience them again. That is not coincidence. That is structure. And it continues when systems respond to behavior instead of cause, compliance instead of context, and punishment instead of understanding.

But the question is not whether New Hampshire’s child-serving systems need reform. The question is whether we are willing to admit they currently respond to families in ways that judge more than they understand.

Families need systems that actually see them, understand them – and respond to what is really happening beneath the surface.

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

State House wrap-up: A look at key bills that were under discussion in this year’s legislative session

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

The New Hampshire legislative session has ended. What bills passed? What didn’t? What comes next? Here to discuss what’s been going on in Concord is Anna Brown, executive director of Citizens Count, a nonprofit and nonpartisan organization dedicated to educating voters about the political process, as well as executive director of the Warren B. Rudman Center for Justice, Leadership and Public Service at the University of New Hampshire’s Franklin Pierce School of Law.

Melanie Plenda:

In broad strokes, can you tell us about some of the things the Legislature tackled this session?

Anna Brown:

There was definitely a trend related to social issues. So, for example, the CHARLIE Act, named for Charlie Kirk, sought to restrict how schools address gender, sexuality and race. Well, that bill was defeated. But the Legislature passed several other bills looking to revise anti-discrimination laws to allow segregation based on biological sex. Now, those have faced vetoes from Governor Ayotte so far, but there's still another one making its way to her desk as of the time that I'm speaking.

There were also lots of debates about spending, particularly local school spending. Early in the session, the House rejected a bill that would establish a statewide cap on how much local school districts can increase their budgets, but by the end of the session, the Legislature did pass a bill that would require every city and town to vote on a local tax cap in both 2026 and 2028, at the general election.

Melanie Plenda:

Let’s start drilling down on a few bills. One that came up is the business enterprise tax. Can you tell us a bit about that?

Anna Brown:

House Republicans originally wanted an outright cut to the business tax. They had come in on this issue, said it was in the mix, but they were in a bit of an uncertain budget situation, and decided to wait until the next budget cycle. They instead proposed raising the threshold before a small business has to pay those taxes. So the final compromise bill does raise that threshold, and it sets up a trigger for future business tax cuts if there is a very large revenue surplus. It's enough of a big surplus trigger that I'm thinking probably Governor Ayotte will sign this bill, but we'll have to wait and see.

Melanie Plenda:

The Legislature also tackled some housing bills to address the state’s shortage. How did those bills fare?

Anna Brown:

The legislative session started with a lot of proposals to actually repeal housing changes from last year. Those didn't move forward. Legislators really wanted to stick with that forward progress — getting rid of red tape and limiting zoning at the state level. So we saw some changes that were sort of clarifying or expanding on what passed last year.

For example, there's a bill that clarifies the law about residential development in commercial zones. Another bill makes clear that you can build an accessory dwelling unit in an existing nonconforming structure — meaning that it's a building or a garage that's already not in compliance with zoning laws, but was probably grandfathered in. Now they're saying just because it was non-conforming doesn't mean you can't build an ADU there. 

Then there's House Bill 1681 which establishes statewide standards for “innovative housing” — so we're talking tiny houses, tiny houses on wheels and yurts. It passed, it's on its way to Governor Ayotte, and she's been very much in favor of all of the housing legislation that has come across her desk, so I suspect that this will become law.

 Melanie Plenda:

Another thing lawmakers tackled was what to do with the proceeds from the sale of the notorious Sununu Youth Services Center. What happened there? 

Anna Brown:

The  Sununu Youth Services Center is a youth detention center in Manchester, and there are huge lawsuits about child abuse that happened at this center, so the state wants to sell this center. They are already building an alternative somewhere else in the state, but it's a bit of an odd property, and we're not sure when the sale is going to go through or how much it will sell for. This is about what happens with the money when the sale does actually happen.

The House wanted any proceeds to go to the general fund of all tax dollars, basically an open pool of money that could be spent on just about anything the state needs to. The Senate was more interested in specifically putting the proceeds towards the settlement fund, paying for these victim lawsuits, and so on. So, ultimately in the compromise, the Senate agreed to the House position, and any money from the sale will go into the general fund of all tax dollars. That being said, the state will probably need to consider the settlement fund as part of next year's state budget anyway, because we know that there are still a lot of lawsuits that are moving through the courts.

Melanie Plenda:

Voting laws have come under scrutiny lately. What happened in that realm? 

Anna Brown:

Earlier in the spring, the governor signed HB 323, which requires a government-issued ID to vote. Really, the difference here is we're getting rid of student IDs as an allowable voter ID in New Hampshire. To be clear, you could never register alone with a student ID — you still had to have other documentation, but now you can't even just use that for your picture to say, “I am who I say I am.”

Arguably, the more significant developments related to voting happened outside the Legislature. A federal court recently struck down New Hampshire's new requirement for citizenship documents — a birth certificate or passport when you're registering to vote, instead of signing an affidavit or something similar. That court ruling is probably not the final word on that issue, so expect more debate in the courts and the Legislature about what documents you need when you're registering to vote.

Melanie Plenda:

There seemed to be a lot of bills related to education finance — mostly related to school budgets or transparency, not actually funding the state’s obligation to students. Can you tell us more about those and where they stand? 

Anna Brown:

When the legislative session started in January, there was a lot of attention on Claremont, in particular, which was facing a major school budget shortfall, so a few of these bills are in response to that. HB 1816 allows the Department of Education to intervene in the administration of a public school district if the state Board of Education finds that the school district is in a “financial emergency,” — basically additional state oversight in situations similar  to Claremont in the future. Also, Senate Bill 586 requires school districts to be audited by an independent public accountant at the end of the fiscal year, and for those results to be made public. 

Those bills, as I said, are in response to Claremont, and as you noted, aren't really changing the school-funding formula — that's a big issue. There was a court ruling last summer that said the state is not fulfilling its obligation, but the court ruling did not say how the legislature should resolve it or when they need to resolve it.

This session the Legislature actually pushed back and passed HB 1815, which has already been signed by Governor Ayotte. It specifically states that how the state and its local governmental entities choose to raise, allocate and spend financial resources to implement this integrated public education system is a political policy matter reserved to legislative and executive judgment and control. It's interesting because that's more or less a statement of opinion from the Legislature. It doesn't just negate the court ruling that happened, but it's a clear indicator that they want to push back on that court ruling and that they support the governor's actions to appeal that judgment.

Melanie Plenda:

There were also bills related to nuclear and renewable energy. Where do those bills stand? 

Anna Brown:

There were some interesting bills on the margin that I would love to note. There was a bill that adds portable solar devices to state law, so basically tiny little plug-in solar panels. Then there was a bill that adds energy storage systems — batteries — to the state net metering law. Those are always some interesting, innovative changes.

On a larger scale.  I want to note HB 1775, which is on the way to Governor Ayotte. I’m not sure how she's going to fall on it, because this bill has been a little bit of a debate in the Legislature. It would allow utilities to invest in natural gas or nuclear power, so long as it was below a certain threshold — I think it was 10% of the total power that they're generating. It's small, but it is really a huge change from the decoupling we saw in the 1990s, when lawmakers said a utility can't own power plants and deliver electricity. This is going back on that, and supporters argue that this is an important way to bring more electricity to New Hampshire — more nuclear power, innovative energy development and to bring down electricity costs. Opponents are concerned that it's just going to be that vertical integration we saw in the past, where there's not as much competition.

Melanie Plenda:

Did anything else come up this session that you found surprising or interesting?

Anna Brown:

As a political nerd, one thing that was very interesting to me was how much the House and the Senate disagreed on some really big issues. I mentioned the CHARLIE Act, and that was also one of the most popular bills on the Citizens Count website, in terms of so many people going to read it and see what was happening with it. It was a huge priority for the House, but the Senate completely stripped it down, partly due to concerns about overreach or lawsuits.

There were two other notable issues that the House Republicans were really pushing for, and the Senate, even though it's also a Republican majority, said no thank you. One of those initiatives would remove immunization requirements for kids, and another one looked to end the refugee resettlement program in New Hampshire, and they were both rebuffed by the Senate. The moral of the story here to me is just because someone belongs to the Republican or Democratic party doesn't guarantee how they're going to vote on all issues, how they're going to govern. Yes, the parties are very polarized right now, but it is really important to get to know your local candidates.

Melanie Plenda:

Looking ahead, look into your crystal ball — is there anything you are looking at for next year?

Anna Brown:

One thing we haven't touched on was the concept of open enrollment. There was a big debate — should public school students be allowed to enroll in any public school in the state? Governor Ayotte was one of the reasons this bill didn't go forward. She said that it's not totally sorted out how this would work with funding and so on, but there were multiple attempts to push that forward. So I definitely expect that debate to continue.

Melanie Plenda:

Fascinating as always, thank you for joining us Anna Brown. 

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Learning from the fascinating astronomical wonders above us

What can the stars tell us about our past, present and future? More than you think. The skies are a fascinating place, full of many, many wonders. Sometimes those wonders even make their way to Earth, as we saw in the recent explosion of a meteor over New England. David McDonald, an astronomy teacher and Astronomy Club adviser – among many other things – at Belmont High School, has been studying the stars with his students and will share his insights with us.

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

Melanie Plenda:

Tell us about the astronomy program and the Astronomy Club at Belmont High.

David McDonald:

I have about five students in my astronomy class, and I have about five students in my Astronomy Club. The club meets after school, and then we also have special events that we put on in astronomy class. It is a study in astronomy, from the nucleus of an atom to stars, black holes, and everything in-between. The Astronomy Club puts on different events for the public so that they can come and look through telescopes or be educated in some way.

Melanie Plenda:

What sparked your own interest in astronomy?

David McDonald:

I became interested in astronomy when I was in the 7th grade and came across a book in the library called, “Point to the Stars.” I picked it up and started thumbing through the pages and some transparency paper, traced some of the information and star shapes and constellations that were in the book, and went out and tried to find these things. Then, in the 9th grade, for Christmas, my parents bought me a telescope, and so now I'm looking at the stars with my eyes, finding constellations and stars and I'm hooked. I've been interested in it ever since. 

Melanie Plenda:

The Astronomy Club recently did a project about stars 250 light years away, in celebration of our nation’s independence. First, explain what a light year is exactly.

David McDonald:

A light year is how far light travels in a year. The speed is 186,000 miles per second. So, if we could flatten out earth — and this is not to say I'm part of the Flat Earth Society — a light beam would go around the circumference of earth seven and a half times in one second. From here to the moon, it takes about one second and a quarter. In a year, a beam of light travels about 580 billion miles in a year.

Melanie Plenda:

Tell us more about that 250 light years project. What did it entail? 

David McDonald:

Our project was to find stars that are about 250 light years away. One of the things we want to do is to be able to bring those stars to your backyard. So you can actually find these stars — and we found several that are bright enough to be easily found. What that means is when you go out in June and July, and you look at these stars today — the photons that are reaching your eyes are registering the light that left those stars 250 years ago when we were declaring our independence. 

Melanie Plenda:

Was your club tracking the meteor that fell on May 30, or did that catch you all by surprise? 

David McDonald:

I think it caught everybody by surprise, for sure. There's a website that I recommend to visit called Spaceweather, and as you scroll down a couple or three pages worth, you'll come to a place where it talks about near asteroids and meteors, and this one, which was about five meters in diameter was not even on the list for Saturday. So it literally came out of nowhere, and I think it surprised everybody, including astronomers. This was going like 42,000 miles an hour — which is like 60 times the speed of sound — and when you break the sound barrier, that's where you get that sonic boom happening, which was heard for many miles around. And it broke up around 30 or so miles up in the atmosphere, fragmented. The good news is nobody got hurt, and it landed around Cape Cod. 

The bad news is nothing landed in New Hampshire, which is sad, because you may or may not know, there's never been a meteorite found in New Hampshire. So if this thing was maybe 60 miles or so further north, and went in the ocean off Hampton Beach — because again, we don't want anybody getting hurt — maybe a fragment or two might have landed on the beach or something, and we could see the first meteorite found in New Hampshire.

Melanie Plenda:

What can amateur astronomers look out for if they check out the stars this summer? 

David McDonald: 

It's a great summer sky to look at, and so visually we have what's called the summer triangle, which are three stars. Vega is kind of in the overhead position, very bright white and bluish. Then there's a star called Deneb and at the tail of Cygnus the Swan. Then there's another star called Altair, which is in the constellation of Aquila the Eagle, and those three bright stars make up what we call the summer triangle.

Vega is in the constellation of Lyra the Harp, and there's like a quadrilateral there that you can see. Vega’s the brightest star, but right nearby, right near to the bottom two stars in the middle, what's called the Ring Nebula, and it is the remnants of a star that exploded a lot of years ago. With a large enough telescope, you can see in the middle there's a faint little dot, which is the white dwarf — the remnants of the star that exploded. 

Then watch out for the Perseid meteor shower, and Aug. 12 and 13 are generally the high points. You want to go out at night — the better time is after midnight — and one thing you have to do is get your eyes adjusted, because a lot of people, they go out in their porch, they go out of their driveway, they look up for 10 minutes, don't see anything and they go back inside. Your eyes aren't even adjusted yet to the darkness, so you want to go out for at least a half-hour. Somewhere between midnight and 4 o'clock in the morning, I would suggest you get your lawn chair out and sit back, look up and tell your neighbors to turn their lights out and enjoy the show, because the Perseid is generally a very active shower, where you may see 1520 meteors in the course of an hour.

Melanie Plenda:

David McDonald, astronomy teacher and club adviser at Belmont High, thank you for joining us today. 

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Why Local News Deserves Your Support This NH Gives

Today marks the start of NH Gives, New Hampshire's statewide day of giving.

Across the state, people are supporting causes they care about. They'll donate to organizations working on education, housing, healthcare, the arts, environmental protection, youth programs, food security, and countless other efforts that make our communities stronger.

We hope they'll consider local news as well.

At first glance, journalism may seem different from many of the causes that participate in NH Gives. But local news is deeply connected to all of them.

Whether you care about schools, housing, healthcare, public safety, economic opportunity, the environment, or local government, progress begins with information.

People need to know what's happening in their communities. They need access to trustworthy reporting, reliable information, and stories that help them understand the challenges and opportunities shaping the places they call home.

That's where local news comes in.

Local journalism helps residents stay informed about decisions that affect their daily lives. It shines a light on issues that need attention, highlights organizations making a difference, and helps communities have informed conversations about their future.

Strong local news helps build strong communities.

But local news is facing real challenges. Across the country, newsrooms have closed, reporting resources have shrunk, and many communities have become "news deserts" with little or no local coverage.

New Hampshire has chosen a different path.

Rather than working in isolation, local news organizations across our state have increasingly found ways to collaborate, share resources, develop new tools, mentor future journalists, and better serve their communities.

The Granite State News Collaborative was created to help make that possible.

Today, more than 30 news, education, and community organizations are working together to strengthen local journalism and expand access to trusted information across New Hampshire.

We believe local news is more than a business. It is community infrastructure.

It helps residents participate in civic life. It helps organizations connect with the people they serve. It helps communities solve problems together.

That's why local news deserves a place among the causes we champion during NH Gives.

This year, supporters can choose how they want to help. They can donate to the Granite State News Collaborative. They can support participating local news organizations directly. Or they can contribute to the Community News Fund, a statewide effort that invests in reporting, training, innovation, and community engagement.

Each choice strengthens local news.

Each choice helps ensure that people have access to the information they need to participate in their communities.

Each choice is an investment in a stronger New Hampshire.

As you consider the causes that matter most to you during NH Gives, we hope you'll remember that every cause benefits when people have access to reliable information.

Because informed communities are stronger communities.

And local news helps make that possible.

Learn more or donate at: [LINK]

The Granite State’s new motto: Live free, then pay the hospital bill

By Shamecca Brown-Granite State News Collaborative

Let’s stop pretending.

New Hampshire’s motto is “Live Free or Die.” But if you’ve been to an ER in Manchester lately, you know there’s a third option they don’t put on the license plates: Live free, then pay the hospital bill for the next 20 years.

Here’s the part politicians don’t want to say out loud: Health care is now the #1 problem in America. Not inflation. Not immigration. Not crime. Health care. So what does “very big problem” actually mean when you live in Concord, Keene, Berlin – or anywhere else in this country?

It means families putting off care because they can’t afford it. It means people choosing between prescriptions and groceries. It means working Americans carrying insurance cards but still fearing the bill that comes after treatment.

That’s not freedom. That’s a hostage situation with a billing department.

Who’s actually in charge of your body?

Dr. Elizabeth Potter is a surgeon in Texas. Last year, UnitedHealthcare called her in the middle of a mastectomy. The patient was under anesthesia, chest open on the table, and someone from the insurance company called, wanting Dr. Potter to justify why the woman needed to stay overnight after the surgery.

Read that again: Your surgeon has your life in her hands, and your insurance company thinks that’s a good time to haggle.

Dr. Potter has spoken publicly about the experience and has since advocated for reforms that would give doctors more freedom to challenge insurance practices without fear of retaliation after United HealthCare after the company threatened her with a defamation lawsuit.

Think that can’t happen at Dartmouth-Hitchcock? At CMC? At Elliot? Ask your doctor how much time they spend on the phone with insurers instead of with you.

The math is rigged. Premiums go up. Deductibles go up. Out-of-pocket costs go up. And the “New Hampshire Advantage” doesn’t mean much when one unexpected medical emergency can wipe out a family’s savings.

You want to know what your tax dollars are doing while you’re choosing between your blood pressure medication and your electric bill? Every year, politicians tell us there isn’t enough money for affordable health care, mental health services, addiction treatment or food assistance. Somehow, there always seems to be money for everything else.

Today, Americans are bombarded with political theater while families struggle to afford insulin, chemotherapy and basic medical care.This is the “bread and circuses” part of the story –  Roman emperors distracted people with entertainment while deeper problems went ignored.

Granite Staters hate being told what to do. I get it. We don’t like mandates. We don’t like lectures. We like to mind our own business. So here’s your business: You’re getting robbed.

You pay taxes. You pay premiums. You pay deductibles. You pay co-pays. Then you get a “surprise bill” because someone involved in your care was “out of network.” Then you spend months fighting charges you never saw coming – even though a federal law was supposed to get rid of the "surprise billing” practice.. That’s not a free market. That’s a racket. And while Republicans blame Democrats and Democrats blame Republicans, working families are left holding the bill.

So what do we do?

First, we stop letting insurance companies practice medicine. Doctors — not insurance executives — should decide what patients need.

Second, we end surprise billing for good. No family should be punished because of paperwork they never saw and choices they never had the ability to make.

Third, we start asking tougher questions of the people we elect. If politicians can find money for their priorities, why can’t they find solutions for the families choosing between healthcare and keeping the lights on?

The Granite State didn’t get its reputation by taking nonsense from anyone. We fought at Bunker Hill. We wrote one of the nation’s earliest constitutions. We pride ourselves on independence and common sense. We can certainly tell insurance companies that patient care comes before profits. 

Until then, we have to endure our new motto: Live free. then pay the hospital bill. That’s not the New Hampshire I know. Is it the one you want?

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visitcollaborativenh.org.

Before AI destroys trust completely, we need to have a serious conversation

By Shamecca Brown-Granite State News Collaborative

Artificial intelligence is changing the internet faster than many people can emotionally process it, and honestly, that should concern all of us. What started as advanced technology designed to help society has also opened the door to deception, emotional manipulation and dangerous online behavior.

I remember scrolling online when a video suddenly appeared on my screen. It showed disturbing and violent scenes involving different racial groups, and for a moment my mouth dropped because it looked completely real. Before I could even react fully, my 13-year-old looked at me and said, “Mommy, don’t watch that. That’s fake.”

That moment stayed with me. Not just because the video was disturbing, but because artificial intelligence has become so advanced that many adults can no longer immediately tell the difference between reality and manipulation. At the same time, children growing up online are learning to question everything they see. Think about that for a second.

Social media was already a place where filters, edited lifestyles and online bullying affected mental health. Now artificial intelligence has added another layer of confusion and fear. People are beginning to question everything online. Is the video real? Is the voice real? Did that person actually say that? Was that image created to embarrass, manipulate or destroy someone?

What makes this even more disturbing is how some people are using artificial intelligence in violent and abusive ways. AI-generated sexual content, fake intimate images, online humiliation, harassment and manipulated videos are causing real emotional damage to real people. Women, teenagers and even children are being targeted, exposed and violated online.

Families are being scammed by fake voices cloned to sound like loved ones. Teenagers are being bullied with AI-generated images. Misinformation spreads online faster than many people can fact-check it. Some people are even becoming emotionally attached to artificial intelligence digital companions because loneliness and isolation have become so common in society.

Children are also growing up in a digital world where reality itself feels blurred. Many young people are constantly exposed to unrealistic beauty standards, fake influencers and manipulated content that can affect their self-esteem and understanding of truth. The pressure to keep up online is already damaging enough without artificial intelligence making deception even easier to create.

Artificial intelligence itself is not the enemy. AI has the potential to help people through education, accessibility, medicine, creativity and innovation. The real problem is what happens when human beings use powerful technology without ethics, accountability or compassion.

We are entering a dangerous time when technology is moving faster than human trust can keep up. If society does not start having serious conversations now about safety, consent, truth and responsibility online, we risk creating a world where nobody knows what is real anymore. Artificial intelligence may not have emotions, but the people being harmed by it do.

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Education Scorecard gives a detailed look at eroding progress in students’ skills

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

Elementary school students’ progress in reading and math has been quietly stagnating and even eroding for more than a decade across the nation. What’s going on and how can we fix it? Dr. Douglas O. Staiger,  a professor at Dartmouth College who focuses on the economics of education and healthcare and one of the authors of the recently released Education Scorecard, discusses education outcomes across the nation and in New Hampshire.

Rosemary Ford:

What is the Education Scorecard?

Douglas O. Staiger:

This is a collaboration with the Harvard Center for Education Policy Research, the Stanford Equal Opportunity Project and me here at Dartmouth. We're trying to address a need for timely and comparable evidence on achievement across states and over time. Part of the problem is that every state has a different test; they have different standards for what's proficient. And we've used the nation's report card, the National Assessment of Educational Progress to kind of calibrate and put all the states on the same scale.

The goal of this project was to really get down to the level where we would be able to show people how their district has been doing, and every year since the pandemic, since 2022 we've been releasing the new annual data. Now the 2025 spring test is out, so people can look and see how they are doing. You can pull up your own district and a district report and see how you're doing relative to similar districts. For each district, we find four or five similar districts within the state, and relative to your state average.

We had 40 something states last year, but a few states we had to drop because of changes in their tests and we couldn't quite use their new data yet, so we have 37 states now. But it's pretty representative of the country. 

Rosemary Ford:

What are some of the key findings? 

Douglas O. Staiger:

The big picture is that many people don't know that we had an incredible growth in student achievement based on the nation's report card in the last two decades. Leading up to about 2013, many people have attributed that to the accountability in No Child Left Behind and similar state programs, and average achievement rates across the nation increased about two grade levels. So that means if students in the state were averaging about fourth grade level, if their fourth grade students were at that level in 1993 by 2013 on average they were at about a sixth grade level, an unbelievable improvement. Nobody would have guessed that was possible, but then starting around 2013 it's turned around. 

The increases were two grade levels in math and about one grade level in reading over that time period, but since 2013 both math and reading have steadily declined by about a grade level. So in math, we've lost half of the gains that we had in the prior two decades, and in reading we're back to where we were in the early ‘90s on reading scores. I think people haven't fully appreciated that there was this turnaround — that’s what we're calling the “education recession,” or the “learning recession,” and it was accelerated during the pandemic. We had some reports on what happened during the pandemic, but especially in math it had started before the pandemic. Since the pandemic, math has recovered a bit, reading has not — it's been flat or even declining. 

We've been looking at what's associated with these declines — especially since 2019 the pandemic and post-pandemic period — and we tend to see some things that maybe aren't surprising. Districts that spent more time in remote or hybrid learning during the pandemic had larger declines, and that was especially true in high-poverty districts. There were really two main things that seemed to be associated with which districts had the fastest recovery. One was all the money from the pandemic relief, the ESSER [the federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund] money, some especially high-poverty districts were getting on average about $8,000 per student in recovery money — so real money that could be used for academic recovery. And what we see from 2022 in the recovery period until 2025 is actually fast recovery in the poorest districts. I think the wealthy districts have their own resources. The poorest districts got the pandemic relief, and it's the middle-range districts, the middle-income districts, that are still quite a bit behind and have had a very slow recovery from the pandemic.

Rosemary Ford:

How is New Hampshire doing?

Douglas O. Staiger:

New Hampshire has been in the middle of the pack for states across the country. They had a similar decline since 2013 and a similar decline over the pandemic since 2019. One interesting thing is at this point — both math and reading in New Hampshire have declined a similar amount since 2019 about four-tenths of a grade level., but they got there in different ways.

Math fell more during the pandemic, so by 2022 we were down about six-tenths of a grade level in math, and then it's recovered about two- tenths of a grade level in the last three years. Reading fell a little less, and then continued to decline. So now they're kind of both about four-tenths of a grade level behind where they were in 2019. So there's still a lot to do both in math and reading.

Rosemary Ford:

Based on your research, what would make a difference when it comes to education outcomes here in New Hampshire? For example, what advice would you give to policymakers?

Douglas O. Staiger:

There are a couple of things that jumped out. One is that I mentioned the ESSER money. That money, if spent wisely, can really matter, and right now those middle-income districts that didn't get a lot of ESSER money and didn't have their own resources have not recovered so well. Spending wisely at the state level — the state has limited resources, but the ability to somehow support those districts to improve, whether it's through resources or connections to other districts,

What is it that will make the most difference for your kids' achievement? Looking at evidence, looking at what other districts have done that seem to work, thinking about teachers are so critical. Thinking about what you can do to support your teachers to help them. My mantra is always, “A better teacher for less time.” They're being really heroic in the amount of time they put in teaching, so you can't expect them to put in more and more hours, you have to make them better teachers for the time they have.

Another thing that came out of our research is that it's very clear that absences went way up during the pandemic. Chronic absences about doubled from 2019 to 2022. They've come down a bit since, but they're still elevated. We found that with higher absence rates your students' test scores are more likely to be declining. Our estimates were roughly that if a student misses 10% of the days, which is chronic absence, they lose about 10% of a grade level. Now we found that if people got back to their old absence rates, where they were in 2019, it would make a noticeable difference. It wouldn't get you all the way back, but it would definitely have made a difference. So that's something I think many districts are focused on. There’s no magic bullet anyone's found on absences. A lot of things can make a small difference, and you have to kind of keep whittling away at it. 

Rosemary Ford:

Let’s talk a bit about the economic impact of some of these outcomes. There are people who may think, “I don’t have a kid or grandkid in the schools, why should this concern me?” How would you explain why this is important for everyone?

Douglas O. Staiger:

This is an investment. Economists call this an investment in human capital. There's good evidence that investments you make when kids are in school pay off later in life. You see their longer-term outcomes — not just things like earnings and working, which benefit the entire community, but also things like teen childbearing, crime and being in prison, being on income support. All those things people have found that when the test scores are rising in the state, — like for example that period where test scores increased so much from in the late in the ‘90s and 2000s — you could see the cohorts of kids who went through those schools later in life, and you really saw aligned changes in their life outcomes. People who are going to be adults, and these are going to be adults living in the community in 10 years. You want them to be successful, right? So, I think it will pay off for everybody in every dimension — not just earnings but there's a lot of other things, and all those things will be better if we make the investment now.

Rosemary Ford:

What’s next for the Education Scorecard?

Douglas O. Staiger:

We'll have more test scores. We'll be able to bring more states in for a variety of reasons. Each year we try to focus on some causes, what might be behind, and what are the current likely things that are causing the decline, or why some districts are rising. 

One of the next things is social media. The rise of cell phones and social media use in schools and by young people has gone way up, and that timing is right around when test scores started declining. So many people are concerned that maybe that is part of the cause. Like in New Hampshire, about half the states have some form of a ban on cell phones in public schools. Many others are working 24/7 trying to get evidence on this, because we don't really know about the effect of cell phones — there's met a lot of anecdotal evidence about how disruptive they are in the classroom and how they affect students' mental well-being, but there's not great evidence on whether these policies of banning cell phones have been able to reverse those effects. 

Rosemary Ford:

Thank you for joining us. 

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visitcollaborativenh.org.

Rape is not a ‘culture’ – it is predatory, life-altering violence

The internet didn’t create monsters, but it did give them a meeting place

By Shamecca Brown -Granite State News Collaborative

I was scrolling CNN online, just trying to see what was going on in the world and looking for something meaningful to write about, when this story hit me hard. I literally sat there disgusted, thinking, “What the hell is wrong with people?” Because the story was all kinds of disturbing.

As a woman, mother, advocate and someone who works around issues involving trauma and violence, I am beyond disgusted reading reports about what people are calling an online “rape academy.” Not just because sexual violence exists – sadly, women have been fighting this battle forever – but because people are allegedly organizing it, teaching it, sharing it online and normalizing it like it is entertainment.

I’m not going to sugarcoat this article to make people comfortable. There is nothing funny, masculine, edgy or powerful about violating another human being. Nothing.

Women and girls already grow up learning survival before freedom. We are taught to watch our drinks, carry keys between our fingers, stay alert, avoid walking alone, text our friends when we get home, and constantly think three steps ahead just to stay safe. Imagine how exhausting it is to live like that every day.

Now imagine learning there are online spaces where people allegedly share tactics, conversations and content surrounding the abuse and assault of women like it’s some twisted hobby. That is not “locker room talk.” That is not “dark humor.” That is predatory behavior.

As someone who advocates for survivors of domestic violence and sexual violence, I was hit differently by this story, because behind every headline is a real human being whose trust, body, mental health and sense of safety may never fully recover. Survivors already spend years fighting to be believed while carrying shame that never belonged to them in the first place.

Honestly, I am tired of society acting shocked only when stories like this become national headlines.The warning signs have always been there. Women have been speaking. Survivors have been speaking. Advocates have been speaking.

The scariest part about all of this is not just the cruelty – it is the normalization. It is watching people become so desensitized to violence that abuse turns into content, jokes, power or entertainment. Social media has connected the world, but it has also exposed how comfortable some individuals have become publicly expressing hatred, domination and violence toward women.

As a mother, that terrifies me. I think about daughters growing up in this world. I think about young boys learning from online spaces before they learn empathy, accountability and respect. I think about survivors silently sitting in classrooms, workplaces, relationships and homes carrying trauma while society debates whether their pain is “serious enough.”

Rape is not a culture. It is violence. It is abuse. It is trauma. It is life-altering. And the fact that people are bold enough to organize around it online should alarm every single one of us. Because when violence becomes normalized, humanity becomes numb. And I refuse to be numb.

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visitcollaborativenh.org.

N.H. doubles down on crypto with bitcoin-backed municipal bond plan

Is the Granite State embarking on an innovative proposal or a reputational risk?

By Peter Miller, Granite State News Collaborative

Last November, the N.H. Business Finance Authority issued a dramatic press release: Its trustees approved what it called “a groundbreaking financing structure that will make New Hampshire the first state in the world to issue a municipal bond backed by Bitcoin.”

The proposal is part of a larger effort to normalize the use of cryptocurrency in traditional finance, but now, six months after the autumn announcement, it has yet to come before Gov. Kelly Ayotte and the Executive Council for approval, and Moody’s Investors Service has assigned it a below-investment grade rating.

Under the proposal, bitcoin will be used as collateral. On March 31, rating agency Moody’s assigned a Ba2 provisional rating to the bond. Per Moody’s methodology, “obligations rated Ba are judged to have speculative elements and are subject to substantial credit risk.” They are familiarly referred to as “junk bonds.”

Bitcoin has a history of instability. After its value hit an all-time high above $126,000 in October 2025, it fell to a little over $60,000 in February 2026 — a drop of over 50%. By mid-May, its price recovered to under $77,000..

When asked about the Moody's rating April 8 at a session of the N.H. House Commerce and Consumer Affairs Committee, BFA Executive Director James Key-Wallace said he believed it was more or less equivalent to that given to Ford Motor Co. bonds, adding, “The fact that it got rated at all is a pretty big deal — the first one actually in the world.”

Ford’s bonds are rated a notch higher than the BFA proposal, at Ba1, but both ratings are in the speculative/junk category.

“The provisional rating makes sense,” said Rep. Keith Ammon, R-New Boston, a cryptocurrency proponent and vice chair of the House Commerce and Consumer Affairs Committee. “Bitcoin has short-term volatility and this is a novel product, so a cautious initial mark is expected. It’s a starting point, not a ceiling.”

The Ba2 rating is highly consequential, according to Neil Mathew — a longtime commentator on cryptocurrency. In a blog post on the Coinspeaker website, he wrote, “Ba2 paper cannot be held by most municipal bond funds, pension systems operating under fiduciary investment-grade floors, or insurance company general accounts subject to NAIC [National Association of Insurance Commissioners] capital charge rules – meaning the natural buyers here are high-yield muni investors, hedge funds, and crypto-native fixed-income allocators, a materially different compliance posture than any prior New Hampshire public authority issuance.”

Two classes of taxable revenue bonds are planned to be issued, with an initial total balance of $100 million. Bonds will be collateralized by a loan between the BFA, as lender, and the borrower, NH CleanSpark Borrower Trust. CleanSpark is a publicly traded data center developer and bitcoin miner based in Nevada. The company owns and operates multiple mining facilities across the United States and operates 19 data centers, primarily in the southern U.S.

The arrangement features frequent collateral valuation — meaning the appraised fair market value pledged by the borrower will undergo regular reassessment. Under the arrangement, $160 million will be placed in collateral by CleanSpark, and mandatory liquidation and redemption of the bonds is stipulated if the collateral value falls to 140 percent of the outstanding bond obligations.

New Hampshire’s bitcoin-backed bond proposal involves the issuance of conduit bonds, with the state Business Finance Authority BFA serving as the facilitating “conduit” between borrowers and bondholders. The agency is headed by Executive Director James Key-Wallace. (Screenshot)

The bond is being underwritten by New York-based investment bank Jefferies.

‘Very volatile assets’

Other governmental entities have entered the cryptocurrency arena with varied outcomes. 

In 2024, the city of Quincy, Mass., was the first municipality to issue bonds using the blockchain technology that underpins crypto. Bitcoin was not involved, and the transaction was deemed successful. J.P. Morgan served as both the sole underwriter and purchaser of the entire initial issuance.

The most expansive experiment has been playing out in El Salvador, which made bitcoin legal tender in 2021 and has amassed a disproportionate amount of global bitcoin holdings. Bitcoin’s dramatic rise and fall have increased the small Central American nation’s national debt and led to a $1.4 billion bailout by the International Monetary Fund in late 2024.

As for New Hampshire, its bond strategy involves conduit bonds, with the BFA serving as the facilitating “conduit” between borrowers and bondholders. Conduit bond borrowers are typically community-benefiting entities, such as hospitals, housing developments and nonprofits, that will be obligated to repay the debt. 

“Most people, when they think municipal bonds, think, ‘Oh, the town’s borrowing money to build the library or the state’s borrowing money to build the highway,’ and those are typically tax-exempt, lower-interest, paid for by taxpayers,” said BFA Director James Key-Wallace. “Conduit bonds are not those things. Conduit bonds are a private loan to a private entity. The loan is not made with state monies. It’s not backed by the taxpayers. New Hampshire is not buying bitcoin with this transaction or even lending money to companies based on bitcoin. It’s a private arrangement between a lending institution and a company.” 

The BFA said it assumes no investment risk, and there will be no risk to New Hampshire taxpayers. But potential risk to the state’s financial reputation is another matter.

“I think even the most hardened proponent of crypto would have to concede at this point that crypto and bitcoin are very volatile assets,” said Benjamin Schiffrin, director of securities policy for Better Markets, an independent, Washington-based nonprofit. “I’m not sure now is the right time for municipal and state governments to be getting into the game.”

However, Les Borsai of Wave Digital Assets sees it differently. His firm, based in Los Angeles, conceptualized the bitcoin bond strategy and reached out to New Hampshire because of its reputation as a crypto-friendly financial environment.

‘I don’t see any risk to taxpayers’

In 2025, New Hampshire passed House Bill 302, which allows investment of up to 5% of state funds in precious metals and digital assets. It helped elevate the Granite State in Wave’s estimation as a place to consider a new type of proposal. 

“There's lots of states that wanted to do it,” said Borsai, but “New Hampshire was the first state in the country to have legislation, so I very cognizantly wanted to be in New Hampshire first for that reason — because they were very forward-thinking. The second part is, if you look at the BFA and the way they think, this isn’t about a single transaction. This is about scale and this is about being open for business from their perspective so anyone that wants to issue could come to New Hampshire.”

The BFA is a self-funding, quasi-governmental state entity created in 1992 to foster economic development and create employment in New Hampshire. 

Executive Councilor Karen Liot Hill, D-Lebanon — who, along with her four colleagues will review final documents before voting on whether to approve the bond proposal — said her primary concern is that taxpayers do not stand to lose anything, even if the deal doesn’t work out as planned. “This will be the first time that bitcoin will be used as collateral for a municipal bond,” she said. 

New Hampshire Treasurer Monica Mezzapelle, a member of the BFA board of directors, doesn’t see cause for concern.

“The BFA — they do conduit bonds on a regular basis, and so part of the practice is to follow their own procedures and to make sure that they have reserves, so they know what they're doing,” Mezzapelle said. “When it comes to taxpayers, the state is not involved, the state is not guaranteeing this bond, so I don’t see any risk to taxpayers at this time.”

The BFA’s Key-Wallace reports plenty of interest in the bond world among potential buyers.

“There’s competition among different financial institutions who want to provide the capital for the deal because they don’t just get a normal interest rate — they also get a percentage of the increase of the price of bitcoin if it goes up,” said Key-Wallace. “This gives them a way to have a downside-protected mechanism because of the liquidation, earn some interest and then have partial upside if bitcoin does go up. They get a much more measured risk reward profile, and that’s very attractive for a lot of conventional financial institutions who want to be active in this asset class.” 

He said he’s not yet able to disclose exactly who the buyers might be because of Securities and Exchange Commission rules that prevent public comment at this point in the bond issuance process. 

Rep. Keith Ammon, R-New Boston, has been the lead sponsor of two key bills that promote the expansion of cryptocurrency. He sees the state’s bitcoin-backed bond proposal as a ‘sweet spot’ that can benefit all involved. (Screenshot)

The BFA stands to earn a fee from the transaction, which will be paid in bitcoin and added to a new Bitcoin Economic Development Fund controlled by the BFA. The BFA’s options at that point could include selling the bitcoin and using the cash to fund economic development projects or alternatively holding the bitcoin and borrowing against it.

Encouraging cryptocurrency in N.H.

Finance experts will closely follow how this unusual strategy plays out.

“What’s worth watching is whether this structure can attract institutional buyers accustomed to stable, predictable returns,” said Tonya Evans, adjunct professor at Penn State Dickinson Law. Evans previously was associate dean and a faculty member at the UNH Franklin Pierce School of Law, where she directed the school’s Blockchain, Cryptocurrency & Law program.

“For context, New York City recently rejected a similar bitcoin bond proposal,” Evans said. “[Then-] Comptroller Brad Lander cited concerns about federal tax law prohibiting tax-exempt municipal bonds from being used to acquire cryptocurrency. New Hampshire’s conduit structure appears designed differently, but the contrast highlights ongoing questions about how digital assets fit into the public finance frameworks.”

Ravi Sarathy, a professor of international business and strategy at Northeastern University, said the proposal’s liquidation option could involve reputational risk. 

“What does it do to your reputation and your ability to raise normal regular financial bonds?” Sarathy asked. “Does it compromise that or force you to pay a high interest down the road because people say, ‘Oh, New Hampshire, they play some fishy games I don’t know about’”?

Rep. Ammon acknowledged the potential for reputational damage, but said, “The vision is for the BFA to serve as a conduit for a series of these issuances, channeling bitcoin's upside into our local business economy. The downside is narrowly contained: The BFA's exposure is reputational, not financial. And the speculative rating is a feature, not a flaw. It signals sophisticated buyers to do appropriate due diligence.”

The bitcoin proposal is among several related developments that have positioned New Hampshire as a state to watch among cryptocurrency advocates. If approved, the proposal’s success will be measured not only in terms of economic activity but in how the wider financial world views the state’s role in this burgeoning field.

First, there was the passage of HB 302 in May 2025 — a first-in-the nation measure enabling the state treasurer to invest state funds into precious metals and digital assets. That bill helped pave the way for the current bitcoin bond proposal, according to Rep. Ammon.

Ammon was the lead sponsor of HB 302 as well as a current bill, HB 639, “The Blockchain Basic Laws,” which seeks to establish a blockchain dispute docket to oversee blockchain-related disputes. HB 639 passed the N.H. House last year, and the House and Senate recently appointed members to a conference committee to hammer out differences on the measure.

Ammon also served on the Governor’s Commission on Cryptocurrencies and Digital Assets and chairs the N.H. Blockchain Council. He sees the BFA bond proposal as a “sweet spot” that can benefit all involved because it can “minimize some of that downside risk” and can benefit the crypto industry.

“You think about a bitcoin miner — they're sitting on a lot of market risk because they need to make payroll next week and who knows what, so it helps them smooth out the bumps on their end, and then from the buyer — they get exposure to some of the upside, but they get guaranteed percentage return in dollars,” Ammon said.

At a House Commerce and Consumer Affairs Committee session April 8, Rep. Anita Burroughs, D-Glen, the committee’s ranking member, asked Key-Wallace what advantage there is for a company to do it this way rather than through traditional financing.

“Most companies that are in the digital asset space don’t have access to traditional financing at all,” responded Key-Wallace. “The fact that they may do now — that is sort of the innovation that they have. Bitcoin is still viewed as ethereal to many in the traditional asset space, especially in the municipal bond space. The fact that this can be set up to be conventional is what makes it so interesting.”

Lessons learned from the bitcoin bond proposal will undoubtedly be closely examined, and both Professors Evans and Sarathy view New Hampshire as a test case.

“If it succeeds, it could create a template for other states and municipalities,” said Evans. “If liquidation mechanisms are triggered during a market downturn, we’ll get real-world data on whether these structures adequately protect investors.”

These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

UNH still valuable, studies show, despite budget cuts and low public funding

More than half of all grants have been lost, including one flagged by an anti-DEI initiative for marine biodiversity

By Daniel Sarch, Granite State News Collaborative

State budget cuts are forcing the University System of New Hampshire to evaluate its mission and raise the price for students to attend.

With 11 colleges and graduate schools, the university system is the largest provider of post-high-school education in New Hampshire. The flagship is the University of New Hampshire in Durham, with about 13,500 students; the system also includes Keene State College and Plymouth State College, each with more than 3,000 students.

A 2025 study found that the university system is a significant driver of the state’s economy, with a total economic impact of $7.6 million in fiscal year 2023 and responsible for nearly 52,000 jobs.

But the university system has its critics, particularly in the Legislature, which has voted periodically to reduce the system’s budget, forcing major adjustments. The N.H. Fiscal Policy Institute found in 2025 that New Hampshire continues to rank last in the nation for public higher education funding, and the ripple effects include rising tuition costs, cutbacks in education programs, and the strength of the state’s workforce.

Students cross the intersection at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

In the 2024-25 school year, higher education funding in the Granite State dropped 3.9%, while that funding in the U.S. overall increased 4.3%. U.S. News and World Report ranked UNH among the 10 colleges with the highest in-state tuition. Keene State College eliminated 25 staff positions in November, with 12 faculty opting to leave voluntarily after a $4 million budget shortfall. In 2025-26, the cuts were even deeper, with an additional budget cut of 17%.

In 2025, Rep. Dan McGuire, R-Epsom, was the primary sponsor of House Bill 1, the foundation of the new appropriations for the state budget. McGuire says the funding for USNH does not serve the general population as well as other services of the state. He said the budgets increased funding for special education and nursing facilities. And he believes in the Community College System of New Hampshire as the way to fill the gaps in the workforce, such as nursing and the trades.

But as a proponent of school choice, he felt the increased funding for Education Freedom Accounts – a program that provides vouchers to help families pay for private schools – is one of the biggest achievements of the current budget. Over $87 million in total was allocated for the state fiscal years 2026 and 2027, 119% percent more than the previous budget.

“Is government there to be something for everybody, or is government there to protect people’s rights and fill in the gaps for people who can’t provide for themselves?” he said.

Thompson Hall looms in the background as students cross the street at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

Despite the financial adversity, UNH has earned major plaudits. In 2025, it was named the Best Value Public University in New England for the fifth straight year, based on four  factors: academic quality compared to price; percentage of students receiving aid;  how much of that is through grants and scholarships;  and the average discount from the university system’s original sticker price.

So how can a university system with budget struggles be such a good value? It’s complicated.

One graduate’s experience

Tucker Nugent , a 23-year-old research technician in the Adaptive Agroforestry Principles and Teaching Lab, graduated from UNH in December 2025. 

He comes from southern Massachusetts but pays in-state tuition — an opportunity afforded to students in the wildlife and conservation biology program and other niche programs through the New England Board of Higher Education Tuition Break program.

While he had a good experience with UNH academics, he said, the in-state tuition was his biggest draw to the school. And while the price was value enough for him, he thought the school did everything it promised — and got him a job in his field.

“I got employed the day I graduated. As far as opportunities, there's plenty of that here,” he said. “Especially in the natural resources field, there's a lot of opportunity for students who are young and hungry and want to make a difference.”

Being creative about value

A student looks at Thompson Hall as she passes it at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

The school has had to be creative in how it competes with other schools in the region, said Kimberly DeRego, UNH’s vice provost of enrollment management. According to a 2024 UNH Destination Survey, recent graduates have an average starting salary of almost $60,000, 88% have jobs related to their major, 91% were satisfied with their education, and 75% had at least one major internship during their time at school.

“It takes a lot to make that happen for students. You can't just tell students, ‘Go find internships,’” UNH provost DeRego said. “You have to support them. You have to have people to support them. You have to have industry partnerships and things like that.”

Though the University System of New Hampshire had to deal with a state budget cut of almost $18 million for the 202 and 202-26 fiscal years, it is still pitching itself as a good option for students. But for the first time in six years, in-state tuition at the University of New Hampshire has increased, and it is expected to increase more in the next school year. 

“Most of the money that the state of New Hampshire gives us, appropriates to us, goes toward reducing the cost of tuition for the residents in the state of New Hampshire,” DeRego said. “We have had to be very thoughtful and very careful about what we do when we offer tuition to students.”

In the 2019-20 school year, in-state tuition was $15,520 a year. For the 2025-26 school year, it increased 2.5%, to $15,908. The 2026-27 yearly tuition rate is expected to hit $16,304 – just over a 5 percent increase.

The school has maintained a priority for academics as it battles reduced funding. 

UNH President Elizabeth Chilton “has said repeatedly she wants to protect the student experience and undergraduate student offerings,” said Tania deLuzuriaga, executive director of UNH media relations. “And so that's why you see, when these reductions happen, it's, you know, the closing of a pharmacy. It's closing the on-campus print shop. It is a consolidation of dining hall services on the weekends.”

Looking for external help

One of the ways UNH has supplemented its funding is through external sources. In 2024, external funding hit $252 million — $42 million more than the previous year. It has doubled since 2019. 

The federal government has been its largest source of funding, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration its leading agency, at $28.3 million. UNH has broken ground to construct a new Center of Excellence for Operational Ocean and Great Lakes Mapping funded by NOAA and the National Institute for Standards and Technology. It is expected to open in 2027.

Students walk underneath signs that read “#1 Best Value Public University in New England” at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. The statistic was determined by U.S. News and World Report, where UNH has been at the top of the list for five years straight. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

The Center for Coastal Ocean Mapping at UNH, founded in 1999, provides research and development and funding to its related industry. Interactive Visualization Systems was one of the first companies to collaborate with CCOM when it moved from New Brunswick, Canada, to Portsmouth in 2003. Lindsay Gee, one of the company’s founders, said CCOM moved to New Hampshire to be closer to the major airport in Boston to connect with its American and European clients because of the funding UNH offered.

“The business would not have succeeded to the level we had without the collaboration with UNH, certainly,” Gee said.

CCOM has more than 60 industry partners, including New Hampshire-based sonar technology company Klein Marine and the French maritime robotics company Exail.

Federal cutbacks

But last year, the Trump administration imposed widespread cuts in funding to universities like UNH. In fiscal year 2025, total federal funding for UNH was more than cut in half – to $121 million – and the number of awards reduced from 1,057 to 392.

For instance, a grant focused on marine biodiversity research was eventually cut because of a federal anti-DEI initiative that flagged certain keywords such as “diversity.”

“Universities across the nation are all experiencing delays in receiving funding, so UNH is not unique in this regard,” said Jennifer Miksis-Olds, interim vice president for research and innovation at UNH.

Miksis-Olds also said many grants that existed during the Biden administration were set to expire come the next presidential term, unless renewed. Every president has different funding priorities, with the Trump administration focusing on quantum technology, artificial intelligence and autonomy, while Biden remained passionate on topics like climate change. 

But UNH tries to adapt to these changes quickly.

“A shift in federal funding priorities between the Biden and Trump administrations was expected, and the UNH research community is actively responding to the new priorities,” Miksis-Olds said.

Private sources

Because of the uncertainty about much federal funding, UNH has turned to industry-backed funding.

Students walk on campus during a sunny day at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

Industry funding at the university is still small compared to federal funding, with the highest amount received in recent years coming in fiscal year 2023, when it received over $18 million from domestic sources and $740,000 from international companies. And while it is unclear whether the current fiscal year  will outpace that total for domestic support, international funding has doubled, to $1.3 million. 

While it is unclear why UNH has seen an increase in international corporation funds, it is a welcomed addition.

“I can’t pinpoint the exact reason for the increase in international corporate funding, other than the global reputation of UNH, its faculty and its students is attracting attention and partnership more widely internationally, as reflected in the growing portfolio of international awards,” Miksis-Olds said.

State budget cuts don’t directly affect external funding from agencies like NOAA, but performing the necessary research can become more difficult, with less money to hire and maintain researchers. And in turn, that can lessen the incentive for industry to stay in New Hampshire.

“It puts the ongoing research under threat, so that can impact industry,” Gee said.

Together, the state’s public universities are among the largest employers in the state. For instance, in 2024, Keene State College employed 687 people, making it the fourth-largest employer in the city, behind Cheshire Medical Center (1,531), C&S Wholesale Grocers (1,200) and the Keene School District (846). Keene Mayor Jay Kahn, who has also been interim president for the college and vice president of finance and planning, said the school has played a large part in attracting people to the city.

“That attraction has the potential of providing the workforce needed by our state that we just can't satisfy with the high school population that there is within the state,” he said. “The return on investment to higher education is enormous.”

Lessons from 2012

Gene Martin, executive director of the N.H. Fiscal Policy Institute, said current events reflect a moment in the past, when state appropriations for the University System of New Hampshire were cut nearly in half, from $100 million in 2011 to $51 million in 2012. Not only do deep budget cuts make it more difficult for USNH to maintain its operations, Martin said, but they send a difficult message to students, which reduces the pool of students coming to the Granite State.

The university system’s $100 million budget in 2011 would be equivalent to $144 million today, yet the fiscal year 2025 budget was just $95 million, and was cut 17% in the current two-year budget. But overall, Martin sees a national trend of disinvestment in public education, and one result is that going to college is increasingly expensive.

“Not only did you lose funding, but you lost students, and that created sort of a ripple effect,” Martin said. “I don't know what's happening now, but it's possible that could be happening again.”

New Hampshire’s public colleges get 68% of their revenue from student tuition; the national average is 39%. Full-time student enrollment in 2023  declined 13.6% from 2019, and as many as 56% of recent NewHampshire high-school graduates leave the state to seek their four-year degree – the second-highest percentage in the country, behind Vermont. Out-of-state tuition is expected to rise from around $37,070 a year in the 2025-26 academic year to a projected $37,996 in 2026-27.

A sign for the University of New Hampshire on a lamppost lines a walkway at the UNH Durham campus on March 4, 2026. (Photo by Daniel Sarch)

“Over the last 20 years, we've just had demographic declines, which has led to enrollment declines at our universities, and so already we were feeling that pressure,” DeRego said.

“The real question for policymakers and residents is what underinvestment costs New Hampshire’s future economy,” Martin said in an email. "The result will sadly be higher prices, more student debt, fewer in-state students, and lost economic activity from employee reductions at a time when nearly six in ten New Hampshire high school graduates leave the state for college, and our aging workforce and economy can least afford it.”

These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org. 

Understanding property taxes in New Hampshire: Where does the money go and who pays them?

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

New Hampshire famously has no state income tax and no sales tax. So where does the government get the money to operate? Primarily property taxes. In New Hampshire, property taxes pay for roughly 61% of local government revenue — the highest percentage compared to any state in the country. Phil Sletten, research director of the N.H. Fiscal Policy Institute, talks about the ins and outs of property taxes in the Granite State.

Melanie Plenda:

Generally, how do property taxes work in New Hampshire?

Phil Sletten:

In New Hampshire, property taxes are based on an assessment of the value of the land and buildings on the land that's owned by a person or a company. Some states will tax other types of property, but in New Hampshire, it's the assessed value of that land and those buildings. The state requires that properties be assessed every five years at least. That usually happens with a city or town contracting with an agency to perform a physical site visit that determines what is the actual value, particularly the market value of that property, or what could the market value of that property be. 

The rates themselves are determined by the taxable property value within a city or town and the expenditures for local governments that cover that community. That includes municipal governments, city and town governments, school districts, county governments and any village districts or other governments that have a special taxing authority or expenditures within that community.

The property tax rate is set after all of the other revenue sources for that community are determined. That could be state or federal grants, motor vehicle registration fee payments, county nursing home fees, parking meter and parking ticket payments, money paid for school lunches — all that information goes to the state, and then the state evaluates, based on that and the assessed property values in the community, what the tax rate would be. It layers on the statewide education property tax as well, then approves that overall tax rate for that community. 

Melanie Plenda:

What do property taxes fund in New Hampshire?

Phil Sletten:

They're not a dedicated revenue source for the most part. There are two state-level property taxes. There's the statewide education property tax and the utility property tax. Those are both state taxes. Those are dedicated to funding public education and go to the state's Education Trust Fund.

The rest of the property taxes in the state depend on which local government is needing a certain amount of money for certain services. At the county level, property taxes might help pay for the county nursing home. At the school district level, property taxes might help pay for the expenses that school districts face, whether that's, special education costs, transportation costs, funding teacher salaries — that all goes into that education budget. At the municipal level, for city and town governments, it's for police and fire services, for upkeep of roads, trash collection, plowing roads — all of those things that cities and towns do on a regular basis.

Property taxes, in general, in New Hampshire are raised by local governments, and that property tax bill comes through on the municipal side, because those municipal borders matter a lot for what the property tax base is in a community. Those property tax bills — those aren't dedicated to funding one particular service or another beyond those different levels of government that they go to, whether it's counties or school districts or cities and towns. 

Melanie Plenda:

Why do these taxes vary so much from town to town, sometimes even between neighboring towns?

Phil Sletten:

I think it's important to remember that there's a couple of different parts to this equation. One is the expenditures that communities have. Different communities have different levels of need, different amounts of infrastructure that they need to take care of, in terms of the resources available within those communities and other revenue sources that those communities may have so that can affect property taxes. A lot of those decisions are made by voters locally: What quality of education are we providing there? What are the infrastructure needs? Do we have fire trucks that are running as well as we want our fire trucks to run? Those are all community-level decisions, so that's on the expenditure side. 

Even if all communities decided on exactly the same set of expenditures, the property taxes would vary because the property tax base matters a lot, and the amount of taxable property value within a community matters quite a bit. So some communities may have those higher expenses, but even if expenses were the same, the revenue picture would look different because of how communities are constrained by what's in their property tax base, and that affects the amount of money that's raised on a per-household or per-person basis. 

What do I mean by property tax base? I mean what can be taxed — what’s the taxable value of land and buildings within that community. And, based on that, if there's a higher amount of property that is taxable, then there's a lower tax rate. Or if there's a higher amount of taxable property per resident, then there may be a lower tax rate as well. 

Melanie Plenda:

How does having a focus on property taxes — without something like sales or income tax — impact the state?

Phil Sletten:

We do have some forms of sales tax — for example, the meals and rentals tax. When you go out to eat at a restaurant, you're paying a sales tax on that meal, if you're renting a hotel room or renting a car or if you're buying a pack of cigarettes or buying or selling property in the state, they're all forms of sales taxes that are within the state's tax system. However, we don't have a broad-based income tax or a broad-based sales tax — we're one of two states that don't have either a broad-based income or broad-based sales tax. The other is Alaska.

In New Hampshire, we rely on property taxes, and disproportionately on local property taxes to fund public services. That local focus is, I think, a particularly important component here, because that means that since we're relying on property taxes, and since we're relying on local property taxes to fund services — more than, on average, any other state in the country — that means that the value that happens to be in your community in taxable property value relative to its service needs can be very deterministic as to what you are paying in property taxes relative to the resources that you have or relative to the investments the community is seeking to make in itself. That can be very different depending on your income level.

For households with lower incomes, it tends to be a higher percentage of income that goes to property taxes in New Hampshire than households with the highest incomes. It's lower- and middle-income households that pay those higher effective tax rates based on property taxes in the state, whether it's passed through to renters or whether it's homeowners paying them directly. Those effective tax rates tend to be higher for lower- and middle-income households than for the highest-income households in the state.

Melanie Plenda:

Can you give us an example of what percentage of income property tax might be for someone who is lower income? 

Phil Sletten:

We can look at modeling from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy. They did an evaluation of all states back in 2023 using 2023 incomes. If we look at those income levels, the bottom 20% of tax units — that’s individuals’ or family incomes — were $35,000 a year or less in tax income. If we look at those households that have that $35,000 a year or less in 2023, property taxes accounted for about 5.9% in the ITEP modeling. About 5.9% of income went to pay for property taxes in New Hampshire.

Again, that can vary substantially by town, and that does assume a certain amount of pass-through to renters. Renters are disproportionately more likely to have lower incomes — median household income for renters in New Hampshire is about half what it is for homeowners. So that 5.9% is for those lowest-income households. 

The next highest places that we see are in the middle 20% and then the fourth 20% — that’s the group between the middle and the highest 20%. For those middle- and upper-middle-income households, about 5% of income, on average, goes to pay for property taxes in New Hampshire.

If we look at the highest-income households, particularly the top 1% of income households — in 2023 that was $721,000 a year or more — their effective property tax rate was about 2%. That’s about a third of what it is for for the bottom 20% — those $35,000 a year or less.

Melanie Plenda:

This also affects people who don’t own property, yes? 

Phil Sletten:

If you're a renter, those property tax bills that your landlord has, or the property owner has — those still have to get paid somehow. There may be different strategies that different landlords have to pass those costs on, or to absorb those costs, but it likely increases rent for everyone who's renting, because it is a cost to owning a property in New Hampshire.

Those figures that I just spoke about — the 5.9% of income going to property taxes for a household with $35,000 a year or less in 2023 — that is including the assumption of how much is passed on in terms of property tax cost to renters. It's not assuming all of it, but it's assuming much of it is passed on to renters — and that assumption, if we look at what the cost of renting versus owning is, again, depends on which community you're in, and it depends on which year you're looking at. But property taxes effectively raise the cost of maintaining all properties in the state, because it's an additional bill associated with owning that property, owning that wealth, owning that building, etc.

Melanie Plenda:

What’s the solution here?

Phil Sletten:

It depends on what your goal is. When it comes to ways that property taxes could be, for example, alleviated for lower-income households, there are states that employ property tax credits or homestead exemptions that will help households with low and moderate incomes afford property taxes and be reflective of what their incomes are.

In New Hampshire, we have the low- and moderate-income homeowners property tax credit. It's a relatively small rebate that the state provides relative to the statewide education property tax, although it was expanded relatively recently — and actually for people who are interested in signing up for that, the window to sign up is open until June 30. 

There are other ways. Sometimes they're called circuit breakers by people who are in the policy and economic world that are trying to make property taxes a little bit more reflective of the resources that people have, or if it's a primary home versus a secondary home. Now, every state is different in terms of what's permissible under the state constitutions. New Hampshire does have a clause in its constitution that has been interpreted to mean that there can't be graduated tax rates for similar types of taxation on similar economic activity. So there are then legal questions around what some of those solutions would look like in New Hampshire that I think complicates what is a transferable solution from other states.

There are other ways that the state could raise revenue or permit local governments to raise revenue. There are proposals at the state level to allow local governments to put either a surcharge or some other add-on to the meals and rentals tax, particularly the hotels portion, to raise money from people who are renting hotel rooms that are within those municipalities’ borders. That money would then stay locally, as opposed to going to the state and then, in some cases, being redistributed by the state to local governments. Those are the sorts of mechanisms that have been proposed in the past to help offset some local property taxes and to even out what may be the municipal share of funding services. 

Melanie Plenda:

You recently published an analysis of the disparities in how property taxes affect residents in different towns, and produced an accompanying podcast on the issue. Where can people find this podcast or more information if they are interested?

Phil Sletten:

I'd encourage folks to again look at the full report at nhfpi.org. We have interactive maps to let people examine what's going on in their local community, unpack some of the details of these issues and more interstate comparisons as well. Our regular podcast, “New Hampshire Uncharted,” can be found on Apple podcasts, Amazon Music, Spotify, YouTube, Podbean and iHeartRadio. I hope everyone is able to download it and enjoy listening.

Melanie Plenda:

Thank you for joining us, Phil.

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Special Committee on Family Division Final Report (PDF)

Changes that might ease family court frustrations are slow to take hold in New Hampshire

Answers to ‘complicated problem’ include more programs, resources, judicial training 

By Kelly Burch-Granite State News Collaborative

When Susan Carbon, a retired New Hampshire judge, thinks about her 36 years on the bench, it’s the family court cases that strike her as the most difficult — more than medical malpractice or even homicide. 

“They are hard cases,” said Carbon, who is also past president of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges. “They’re emotionally laden. You can’t make things right for people. You can help them, but there’s no beginning, middle, end. … It’s really challenging.”

Carbon, who as a retired judge still sits as a judicial referee in New Hampshire courts, isn’t alone. The roughly 30,000 annual family court cases in New Hampshire are “among the most challenging and time-consuming work confronting New Hampshire trial court judges,” according to the N.H. Judicial Branch. 

The very nature of family court cases — including divorces, child custody and support, and domestic violence protective orders — means there is rarely a black-and-white legal precedent that can be applied. Too often, that leads to frustration with the family court system, according to a committee assigned to look at New Hampshire’s family courts in 2023 and 2024.

Retired New Hampshire Judge Susan Carbon sits on the bench in a courtroom at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, in Manchester, on May 7, 2026. Carbon now acts as a sitting referee and part-time judge, residing over family cases once a week. Credit: Daniel Sarch / Granite State News Collaborative

While it would be virtually impossible to satisfy everyone who came through family court, experts say structural adjustments — such as simplifying forms and ensuring a family sees the same judge throughout their case — that could make the system in New Hampshire function more efficiently, and perhaps reduce widespread frustrations.

“We have a complicated problem in front of us,” said Rep. Mark Pearson, R-Hampstead, who chaired the Special Committee on the Family Division of the Circuit Court. “How do we do [what’s] best for all?”

Progress, but a ways to go

The committee, which issued its final report in 2024, found through public hearings that there was a widespread sense that family court was unfair. Members of the public expressed their concern that there was a lack of due process; that the system was biased, including in how it admitted evidence; and that the court process was difficult to understand. They noted it took a long time to hear cases as well.

Since the report was issued, the Judicial Branch has made efforts to address some of those concerns, according to a statement that the branch sent to the Granite State News Collaborative in response to an interview request. It has made adjustments in the guardian ad litem program (which appoints someone to advocate for the best interests of the child in family court cases). It has hired a person to oversee the Office of Mediation and Arbitration, and it has required both mail and electronic notifications for changes in a child’s guardianship. 

Two pilot programs have also been established — one in Concord Circuit Court that allows litigants with limited English to speak with court staff via a remote interpreter, and another in Salem Circuit Court that provides people with a conference room and physical resources, such as a printer, to submit orders of protection. 

Some of the most substantial changes, according to experts, have focused on helping people understand the court process. That’s critical in family court, where most people do not have lawyers: About 85% of circuit court cases (including family court) involve parties who are representing themselves, according to the N.H. Bar Association. 

In part due to feedback from the special committee, the Judicial Branch simplified many of the forms used in family court, Pearson said. The court has also posted a number of educational videos on its YouTube channel, on topics such as “Navigating Your First Family Court Appearance” and “How to Fill Out a Parenting Plan.”

“There are things we do really well, [like] forms and videos,” said Carbon. However, she would like to see more educational programs. 

Explaining how court works helps address concerns about bias and delays, experts say. Family court parties “file far more motions and request more hearings” than other court litigants, according to the Judicial Branch, in part because the cases are highly emotional and bitterly contested. 

Retired New Hampshire Judge Susan Carbon sits on the bench in a courtroom at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, in Manchester, on May 7, 2026. Carbon now acts as a sitting referee and part-time judge, residing over family cases once a week. Credit: Daniel Sarch / Granite State News Collaborative

Lawyers often help explain to their clients why the court acts as it does, Carbon said. Yet, since most people in family court don’t have lawyers, they often think decisions they don’t understand are unfair. While judges may try to explain a decision, “we have very little time to give to them,” Carbon said. 

Sometimes, Carbon ventured, people complain about judges “because they think that’s the way to get the decision changed.” 

Yet, when people understand why a judge acted in a certain way — such as not admitting a piece of evidence — they’re more likely to be satisfied with the court, even if the ruling isn’t in their favor, she said.  “If they feel they were treated fairly, they’re more likely to accept your decision,” Carbon said.

Compounding frustrations 

The statute that establishes family court in New Hampshire (RSA 490-D:1) calls for a single judge to follow a family throughout their time in family court. That is also considered a best practice by the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges. 

“The judge is going to understand the parents, the children and that family to make better decisions for that family,” said Kathleen Quigley, an Arizona judge who is president of the council.

Yet the special committee found this typically doesn’t happen in New Hampshire. Instead, families often have multiple judges overseeing their cases, according to the committee report, which matches what Carbon has seen during her time on the circuit court.  

“We don’t really have one judge, one family,” Carbon confirmed. She believes that’s largely due to scheduling concerns.  “We don’t have enough bodies to do the work,” she said. 

The Judicial Branch did not respond to questions about this policy.

That gets to a second major issue that the committee’s report calls attention to — that circuit court (which includes family court) is vastly under-resourced. In 2022, the Judicial Branch worked with the National Center for State Courts to audit staffing needs for circuit court. The audit found that the system needs 66 full-time judges and 338 full-time staff — a substantial increase from the 48 current judges and 314 full-time staff. 

But last year, because its budget was cut by the Legislature, the Judicial Branch announced a hiring freeze in April 2025. 

“Like every branch of government in New Hampshire, the judicial branch must live within the State’s means,” the Judiciary said in a statement. 

Retired New Hampshire Judge Susan Carbon stands in a courtroom at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, in Manchester, on May 7, 2026. Carbon now acts as a sitting referee and part-time judge, residing over family cases once a week. Credit: Daniel Sarch / Granite State News Collaborative

However, Pearson emphasizes there are cost-effective ways to support family court, including by adding law clerks — which the Supreme and Superior Courts have. In circuit court, “judges often spend considerable time doing tasks which could also be done by law clerks who are paid significantly less than judges,” the report read. 

When compared to the Supreme Court and Superior Court, circuit court is “by far the least resourced of the three courts in our state,” Carbon said. That puts a strain on judges, she said, and also means that New Hampshire can’t offer programs that family courts in other states offer, everything from supervised visitation sites to family rooms at courthouses. 

“We just, across the board, don’t spend much money on families in this state,” Carbon said. “It shows in the court environment.”

‘Much more’  judicial training needed

Unlike criminal and even civil cases, which are adjudicated based on the law, family court relies heavily on a judge’s decision-making. According to New Hampshire law, the family court is a “court of equity” — a longstanding legal concept meaning that decisions are issued to try to achieve fairness. 

Having fixed rules in equity cases can be harmful, Pearson said, so “the judges in family court are given wide latitude.”

Retired New Hampshire Judge Susan Carbon stands in a courtroom at the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, in Manchester, on May 7, 2026. Carbon now acts as a sitting referee and part-time judge, residing over family cases once a week. Credit: Daniel Sarch / Granite State News Collaborative

Because of that, the importance of ongoing training for family judges “can’t be overstated,” said Quigley. Family court judges need to be well-versed in topics ranging from child development and the impact of trauma on parents to challenges facing military families, she said. In addition, best practices, and laws, change over time, so ongoing training is critical.

New Hampshire circuit court judges do six weeks of training prior to starting the job. The Judicial Branch holds quarterly in-person trainings, as well as remote learning opportunities, and recently conducted a daylong training on domestic violence and sexual assault cases. (The branch did not comment on whether those trainings are mandatory). 

“We have pushed for the Judicial Branch to have much [more] training in family matters,” Pearson said. 

Recently, a dozen judges and staff from New Hampshire attended a conference of the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges, learning about aspects of domestic violence, parenting and other issues. 

Talking to other judges — locally and at national conferences — can also help judges understand best practices and talk through difficult cases, said Quigley. In New Hampshire — especially in rural courts, where there may be only one judge — that’s difficult, Carbon said. She noted that judges do use an email list to connect with each other. 

“You just try to support judges the best way you can,” she said. 

These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

It’s your money: budgeting while costs keep rising

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

With grocery and gas prices fluctuating all the time, it’s hard to know how to budget right now. Maureen Milliken, who writes the “It’s Your Money” column for Ink Link, shares some financial insights and some tips for navigating this tricky time, and hopefully padding your wallet.

Rosemary Ford:

A few months ago, when you were last here, we discussed your tracking of grocery prices and their connection to the tariffs and other economic factors. How's that going, and what's been happening with the tracking lately?

 Maureen Milliken:

It started last April 2025, prompted by the tariffs. We tracked grocery prices for a year to see what happened, and obviously, a lot has happened. We learn something new every month. I just want to kind of disclaim that it's called the “grocery snapshot,” because it's kind of a snapshot of a variety of things that I normally buy. It's not like some big scientific study of grocery prices in general, but more kind of a relatable look, and I use what's happening with my items as kind of a springboard to talk about why prices go up and down and what's happening in general with things like produce or coffee. 

Rosemary Ford:

What have you seen steep rises in?

Maureen Milliken:

The biggest price rise in the year has been a 12-ounce bag of coffee. Whole bean, because I use a French press — I’m kind of picky — has gone up from $10.49 last April, and it is now $12.49, so it's gone up $2 which, percentage-wise, is a pretty big increase. I naively thought November, when the tariffs for coffee beans were lifted, that the price was going to go down. But first of all, prices have a tendency to go up and not go down. Second of all, it's not only tariffs that are affecting coffee beans. They have to be grown in a certain climate. and unfortunately, the places they're grown are the most susceptible to climate change and plant diseases that come with it. So it's a very challenging product right now. 

Another item is chocolate. I think last time I was on was right after Hershey had proactively announced that the prices were going to go up. That was a little bit before Halloween, but they already had all their Halloween candy made, so that was all set. But the things that affect coffee are the same things that affect chocolate, where the cocoa bean can be grown. 

Nothing has really declined in price, and in a year, produce has a tendency to go up and down. Last month, when I looked at the yearly arc, there were maybe three produce products — bananas, cucumbers and oranges — that had all gone down from what they were the April before. But all those have, except for bananas, seen big spikes, and I just was looking at my shopping list today on my grocery stores app, and cucumbers are now $1.29 apiece when they were 79 cents apiece two weeks ago. But produce is very susceptible to so many things that have nothing to do with tariffs that the prices just go crazy.

Rosemary Ford:

Is the war with Iran having an impact on prices?

Maureen Milliken:

It is. The biggest impact is to energy prices. There's a long chain of effects that ends up affecting your pocketbook, and the energy costs of transporting produce, of making fertilizer and all those other things, affects the cost. The first and biggest cost is to beef. Beef prices are affected because of energy prices, because of transportation costs, supply chain costs, the cost of fertilizer to grow the feed that the beef eat, and the USDA says that beef has already gone up 6.4%. The USDA just released its price prediction a few days ago, and it's predicted that it's going to go up another 6.3% this year.

I personally don't eat a lot of red meat. I'm not a vegetarian, but I just live by myself, and it's just never been cost-effective to buy it and use it. It's not on the tracker, but it would have, I think, have had a big impact. I track 26 things, and it’s gone up 6.5% in the past year, as opposed to the 2.7% that the USDA says grocery prices have gone up. But I think if beef was on there, that would be a much higher number. 

Even if the war ended an hour from now, and anything keeping energy from moving around the world was resolved immediately, you would still see it affecting prices for the rest of this year. When something has an impact on prices, the domino effect and the chain of events is such that there are just long-term impacts that are very difficult to solve. 

Rosemary Ford:

Are there other factors playing into the rise of prices?

Maureen Milliken:

When I first started this I was thinking of the tariffs and not thinking in more general terms, but so many things affect prices, including politics. Pasta, which I guess the federal government has had a bee in its bonnet for the last 20 or 30 years. They claimed that Italian imports were being dumped at lower prices than they should be into the market, which was affecting the price of pasta made in the U.S. There's been this like a 30-year investigation of it, which came to a head at the end of last year, and they were going to put this super tariff on pasta, which would be kind of ironic, since they were claiming that it was affecting U.S. made pasta prices. But if the price of imported pasta goes up, then the price of pasta made in the U.S. will go up. 

Rosemary Ford:

What do you plan to do to navigate this time?

Maureen Milliken

My plans are the same that I advocate — not only in the grocery snapshot, but in my money column. This goes beyond grocery prices, which is you have to be your best advocate for saving money. The grocery prices aren't going to magically come down because you're upset that they're high. If people say they don't have the time to plan meals or to cook or to research prices, you have to make the time. Time is money, and the more it becomes a habit, the more you'll be able to do that. Some quick tips are, if you're able shop at a large chain of which there are many, use the rewards. Use their apps which have rewards, coupons, savings and recipes. Figure out substitutions. Buy cheaper things. I know it sounds like it's a simplification. Eat more bananas, fewer $6 packages of cookies. One thing I've actually done is my mom cooked for six kids and liked to make healthy meals, but we didn't have a lot of money growing up, and I've revived some of my mom's recipes. They're fairly easy to make and they're nutritious, and they're not things I normally think of eating. I would also say that people with kids, until they reach around teenage age, can be the biggest advocates for change in your house. If you get them involved in thinking of ways to cut food costs and plan meals and plan grocery lists. Also track what you're wasting, track what's going in the trash. Start buying something else you're going to eat versus whatever's going into the garbage. 

Rosemary Ford:

When you’re writing your column, what do you hope people take away as a lesson or learn from what they’re reading?

Maureen Milliken:

My biggest hope that people take away — not only with grocery prices, but with anything — is that you're the biggest advocate, and you're the one who has the power to change whatever is going on financially with your life. You may not be able to change everything. I know people have a lot of challenges, but you have to be proactive. You have to do the research and use your money from a place of knowledge. Figure out where your money's going and what you're doing with it and why you're buying what you're buying. It's hard work, and it's hard to break habits, but knowledge is power, and people need to be informed and have insight into their lives and what they're doing with their money, instead of feeling that it's this thing that's just kind of washing them away that they have no control over.

Rosemary Ford:

Thank you, Maureen.

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

Housing isn’t just a number, so why are people being treated like one?

Credit scores and income limits are locking families out of safe housing

By Shamecca Brown-Granite State News Collaborative 

I’ve sat across from families who are doing everything right – working, showing up, trying – and still can’t get approved for housing. Not because they don’t care, but because a number on paper says they’re not good enough.

The truth is, I’m writing this because my eyes are open now in a different way. When you actually see what people are going through, when you’re right there with them, it hits differently. Because no matter how much you care, you realize you can’t fix everything. All you can do is try to be more hands-on, show up, and help where you can.

Housing isn’t just hard to get right now, it feels almost impossible – especially for people who are doing everything they can just to stay afloat.

Lately, I’ve been seeing firsthand how credit scores and rigid housing requirements are blocking families from getting a place to live.The truth is, that system doesn’t always reflect reality. People go through things –  job loss, medical issues, domestic violence, unexpected emergencies – and their credit takes a hit. That doesn’t mean they’re irresponsible. That means they’re human.

At the same time, even people with good credit are struggling. Rent is high, wages aren’t keeping up, and the expectations to qualify for housing are unrealistic. You can have decent credit and still fall short when rent is more than half your income.

What makes it worse is that there’s often no room for explanation. No space to tell your story. No opportunity to say, “This is what happened, and this is how I’m trying to fix it.” The system is built on numbers, not people.

Then there’s the waiting lists for housing assistance. They’re long, sometimes years long. Families who need help now are told to wait, while trying to survive day-to-day. And if someone makes “too much” on paper, they may not qualify for help, even if they still can’t realistically afford rent. That leaves people stuck in the middle – no assistance, but no real access either.

As someone who advocates for families, this is one of the hardest parts of the work. You see people trying. You see the effort. But the barriers are so high that it feels like you’re fighting a system that wasn’t designed to give second chances.

Housing shouldn’t only be about numbers, it should be about stability, safety, and giving people a fair opportunity. There needs to be more flexibility, more understanding, and more pathways for people to explain their situation and still be considered. Because, at the end of the day, people shouldn’t have to lose everything just to be seen. The truth is, even when they are seen, help still isn’t guaranteed.

That’s why so many people are still homeless. Not because they didn’t try. Not because they didn’t care. But because the system meant to catch them is overwhelmed, restrictive, and often out of reach.

We shouldn’t have to wait until people hit rock bottom to respond – and even then, response shouldn’t be uncertain.

We need to do better. Earlier. Smarter. And with more humanity, before more families fall through the cracks.

Shamecca Brown is a New Hampshire-based columnist who is family-oriented and passionate about serving underserved communities. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visitcollaborativenh.org.

How are N.H. businesses and individuals adapting to AI?

By Rosemary Ford and Caitlin Agnew

This article has been edited for length and clarity.

Embracing and understanding AI is becoming essential for businesses that want to continue to prosper and innovate in this new era of technology. While many fear AI will lead to widespread job loss, others say its use in business settings can transform jobs and allow for workers to be more efficient. So what does this look like? How are businesses adapting? Philip Magnuszewski, founder of the think tank D!srupt AI and the nonprofit  AI in NH as well as co-chair of the NH AI Task Force. 

Melanie Plenda:

For people who are unfamiliar, what is AI and how might it be used in a business setting?

Philip Magnuszewski:

AI has been around for well over 70 years now. It's gotten kind of a recent plug on the marketing front over the past half a decade or so, but artificial intelligence has just kind of always been a way to kind of replicate how the brain works in a programmatic way, leveraging software. What it does, in essence, is enhance our capabilities. It allows us to potentially look at larger amounts of information, more quickly synthesize those things, and better understand our world or our businesses that we're involved in.

Where we see it specifically helping businesses or employees that are working in businesses is in helping them get maybe better and more in-depth insights to what their customers are doing, helping them do market research and understand where their products might be tweaked in order to better address the market, and to make operations a little bit more efficient, leveraging the technology as well. I think the best way to think about it is really to look at it as a collaborator, a tool — a co-pilot, if you will — that you can use to be more efficient or to even think differently, or rethink things a little bit in terms of how the organization operates.

Melanie Plenda:

How could that impact the New Hampshire economy, or the economy at large?

Philip Magnuszewski:

We're going to see it impact the economy in a huge way from a productivity standpoint alone. We always hear the term “Do more with less,” and I think that's definitely the case with what we're seeing today.

I think New Hampshire is a very unique state. We have a lot of things going for us. The ecosystem is more collaborative across the board. It's easier to access individuals across the state, and we have an opportunity to look at the state as a living lab. These changes that we're seeing seem to be happening quickly. Obviously, the tool sets are changing quickly, but the actual impact requires us to experiment, to use the technology for those kinds of things. I'm seeing there's a desire to understand how it works, and how do I use it to impact either my community or my organization at large?

Melanie Plenda:

Tell us about D!srupt AI and AI in NH.

Philip Magnuszewski:

I do a number of different things. Most of my day is talking and working with organizations to leverage the technology in a way that helps them bring their business strategy or vision to life. I think this technology, artificial intelligence, gives us an opportunity to rethink and reimagine the world around us, and we can produce impacts. We can produce results that are 10 times or 100 times what we're seeing today. So it's an opportunity for me to engage with individuals and organizations that are looking to really have impact in areas that are of importance to us, either at a community or a societal level. 

Melanie Plenda:

What is the NH AI Task Force?

Philip Magnuszewski:

The NH AI Task Force is a group of individuals — we’re closing in on about 20 individuals — driven and hosted out of the N.H. Tech Alliance. We cover about eight different sectors across the state, and the whole intent is to really understand how the technology is being used today, where there are gaps in terms of understanding or resources, and then making recommendations to the state Legislature, to the governor's office, in terms of the things we need, and also being able to provide some of those resources to the state here as well. 

We're trying to understand how it's being used, specifically here in the state. What are some of the best practices, what are some of the recommendations that we can make going forward? 

Melanie Plenda:

Tell us about the NH AI Task Force Survey.

Philip Magnuszewski:

What we're trying to do is gather some empirical data points. We had surveys go out to eight sectors. We also have working group roundtable discussions, typically one or two a quarter for each of those sectors, where we're getting additional context. 

We'll have a full report coming out in October. The idea is that as we get that information we will share it with the public so they can understand how their organization rates against other organizations in a particular sector or industry. That will help us create those best practices, blueprints, those things that can help an organization accelerate the usage of artificial intelligence. 

Melanie Plenda:

Earlier this year at an AI in NH event, you introduced Granite Staters to Google’s NotebookLM, which you referred to as one of the most underrated AI tools. Could you describe what this tool does and why it is so powerful?

Philip Magnuszewski:

I would say it's underrated because I don't think it gets the hype or the marketing prowess that Open AI or Anthropic has, but it's a Google product, and it's available to most users for free at some level.

It allows you as an individual to aggregate information, which just means kind of pull information. So if you're interested in a specific topic, you can pull videos, you can pull documents, and store those in a way that allows you then to ask questions about it, to synthesize information. I encourage everyone to use it for personal purposes, but if you wanted to get a better understanding of what was historically happening over in Iran, for example, you could have it do research on a particular topic, which would say what has happened over the course of the last five or 10 years, and you can look at it from different perspectives. You can pull different types of sources — press releases, videos, etc. — but it allows you then to get it in a format where you can better understand, get a summary of what's going on.

I think one of the really awesome things about it is it will also put together output, which could be a presentation, an infographic, an explainer video — it could be a number of different things. It really helps accelerate the learning process for any subject that you're interested in, which is why I say it's incredibly powerful. For students in particular — if you're trying to get a better handle on a particular top topic or subject area, I think it's an incredible tool.

Melanie Plenda:

We’ve talked a lot about the helpfulness and possibilities for productivity with AI. Yet, when people mention AI, concerns always come up. One of them is about job loss. How would you address that?

Philip Magnuszewski:

I think it's a very real concern. I think it would be just disingenuous to say that there aren't going to be jobs that are lost as a result of this. I do think — and I use this term quite a bit — I think we have agency around it. I think, as business leaders, we can decide where, how and at what pace we're going to introduce the technology. I think on a personal level, we have agency in terms of just exposing ourselves and getting engaged with it as well.

It's not all doom and gloom, though. I think what we've seen historically with the introduction of any new technology is that while some jobs will go away, other jobs will replace those. I even think that some of the early examples of organizations who have let thousands of individuals go in specific departments because of AI are actually bringing people back now, because the technology doesn't exactly give them what a human can do, or what a human brings to the table. So I think the fear there has some legitimacy to it, but I would just say we're in an era where we all have to remain agile, flexible and kind of try to figure things out as we're going through this together.

Melanie Plenda:

What about AI’s use of intellectual property to learn and adapt? How would you address concerns about that?

Philip Magnuszewski:

I think that there's a couple of pieces to that. I am not a fan of how these initial large language models were built. I think that there are some lines that were crossed in terms of capturing or taking content from creators. I don't know what's going to happen with that. It's one of those cases where I think the law is still trying to catch up to the technology itself. I think that's a challenge.

Going forward, in terms of intellectual property in general, organizations are doing a better job of understanding where their data might be used to train these models, and actually leveraging their own data to better improve the models or what the models can provide from an outputs perspective as well.

Melanie Plenda:

As AI continues to evolve and develop, in five years, what impact will all of this have on New Hampshire businesses? What could that landscape look like?

 Philip Magnuszewski:

Trying to extrapolate five years out with this technology is tough. There's a wide range of things that can happen as a result of it. We could see everything from the dystopian view to a utopian view. I think we're going to be somewhere in the middle. I think we're going to grind through the next few years and figure out where it fits and how it looks. But I think that there is an opportunity — again if we do it responsibly — for businesses to operate with less friction internally. I think that there's an opportunity to kind of rethink and reimagine.

Melanie Plenda:

One of the goals of the non-profit AI in NH is to encourage curiosity about AI and to empower residents to engage with artificial intelligence. Why is curiosity important when learning about AI?

Philip Magnuszewski:

I think if you're curious, you're engaging with it, you're learning about it. I think that helps deal with some of the fears you might have, and it allows you to understand where and how you'd like to use it as an individual — where it fits and where the limitations are. I think of the people that I know that are using it quite a bit or the folks that are benefiting the most from it — it's the folks that are just curious. 

Melanie Plenda:

AI in NH recently hosted an AI Week with several events. Can you tell us more about some of the events and how they went? What do you have coming up?

Philip Magnuszewski:

We did it in partnership with the New Hampshire Tech Alliance. We had over 17 events over the course of the week, which was pretty intense. We had some folks up from Boston Dynamics talking about the future of physical AI, which is robotics. We had some kids attending there. We had hands-on workshops giving people a chance to explore what was possible and building things with it as well. We had organizations that were talking about how to build trust in an organization so your workforce is less resistant to the technology as well. We had students from Dartmouth and the University of New Hampshire that were showcasing some of the things that they built as well. 

Melanie Plenda:

What are some other ways Granite Staters can improve their AI literacy outside of attending events like these? 

Philip Magnuszewski:

There's a lot of resources out there today. There are podcasts. If you're interested in the technical side of things. I listen to a podcast that's called “Last Week in AI.” There are books and trainings from Google, Microsoft and all the major technology partners. And, frankly, you can't scroll a social media feed these days and not have a link to something that's going on with artificial intelligence. I think that those are all good resources. They give you a good chance to kind of understand what's going on as well.

But I'll go back to what I said before. The best way to learn and to understand what AI is, is to really just grab a tool — pick one, there are free versions for most of these tools. That’s the best way to get involved and to better understand

Melanie Plenda:

Thank you so much for joining us today Philip.

“The State We’re In” is a weekly digital public affairs show produced by NH PBS and The Marlin Fitzwater Center for Communication at Franklin Pierce University. It is shared with partners in the Granite State News Collaborative, of which both organizations are members. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.

We may just fix America

We may just fix America - Audio Component

By Anthony Payton-Granite State News Collaborative

Nearly 23 years ago, a friend, who happened to be white, once asked me:  "Where is the only place where white guys can be the majority, and no one will protest?" His answer:  "On a military battlefield dying in war." 

His response caught me off guard. Though I'm always prepared to have a civil discussion on sensitive topics, this was new. 

We were involved in the kind of business where you don't ask questions and you don't break trust. Him, an Army veteran. Me, a drug war veteran, whose tour of duty encompasses gun violence and prison riots. 

I let him continue. I sensed that he needed to vent and process. More importantly, he needed to process with someone who looked like me. For him, it was a bonus that I was someone he could trust. 

He opened up about his father losing a job to a Black woman. He spoke about feeling that straight white men were being blamed for the country's problems, about political systems that no longer included him. 

When he looked to the left, he saw a party that blamed straight white men for everything, while his voice wasn't allowed unless it advanced the party's objectives. When he looked to the right, he saw a party moving further to the fringes, weaponizing religion, race and ideology. 

He had no political home. 

He knew there was a way to be patriotic without demonizing the people he swore to protect. He loved ‘90s hip-hop and knew black American culture on a high level. He stood his ground if you tried to make him feel guilty for being a white male. And he felt he should be able to openly celebrate his European heritage, not in a hooded-Klansman type of way. Just in a bagpipe-and-kilt kind of way.

He didn't enslave anyone. He wasn't the one who designed the oppressive systems that permeate every level of education and government. 

I listened. And I'll be honest, I felt both frustration and restraint sitting across from him. 

No, it doesn’t end there. I lit his ass up.

Welcome to the party. 

Because here's what I've learned about having these conversations: You can't meet someone where they are without first letting them arrive. 

Find me a Black person, a descendant of the slave trade, born before 1968, and I'll show you a citizen who wasn't born with full rights. The final piece of the oppressive Jim Crow laws was real estate. That wasn't even 60 years ago. And one of the fastest ways American families handed down wealth? Real estate. 

When you enslave a race of people and commit unspeakable atrocities, the damage is everlasting, even after slavery ends. You deny them education and employment. You enact laws that specifically target them. After some time, the work becomes autonomous. Some of the people will even begin to spew the rhetoric of their oppressors, in an attempt to align with that power structure. 

Then their descendants, who benefit from these systems, turn around and ask why black Americans can't get their act together. 

The nerve. 

My friend took it all in stride. It showed me that he had something to get off his chest. He didn't flinch at my retort. He was one of the few who didn't have that knee-jerk reaction. Turns out, I needed that as well. 

I've had the opportunity to live in a trailer park and experience white poverty. It mirrored urban neighborhoods I was raised in – a lack of fathers in the home, poor nutrition, not enough focus on education. And just like those urban communities, that population continued to vote for people who did nothing for their growth or betterment. 

Unity can't be achieved without understanding.  From those conversations with him, I learned to stay off the fringes, stop fearing what I don’t understand, and think twice before I judge.

My friend lives a smooth life right now, trying to stay on top of his declining health. We've been planning on having dinner for three years now, but distance and life gets in the way.  With the political landscape in such a dire situation in New Hampshire and across the country, I'm thinking we should have this dinner soon.

We may just fix America … one dinner at a time.

Anthony Payton is a podcast host, freelance writer and father living in Manchester. These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.