State lawmakers wrapped up their session in a series of high-stakes votes this week. Some priorities were pushed across the finish line, while others failed to win support in either the New Hampshire Senate or House.
State senators voted to table a Republican-backed bill for open school enrollment, which would let New Hampshire students enroll in any public school in the state. Among other things, the House and Senate agreed to legislation that will require towns and cities to consider capping local property taxes spent on school and district administrative costs.
Meanwhile, 2026 political hopefuls are streaming into the State House, with the state candidate filing period open until June 12.
And a meteor exploded over New England before crashing into Cape Cod Bay. Astronomer John Gianforte puts this space rock into perspective for us.
This week’s guests on the NH News Recap:
- Josh Rogers, Senior Political Reporter at NHPR
- John Gianforte, director of the UNH Observatory and contributor to Cosmically Curious on NHPR
Transcript:
Rick Ganley: It's Morning Edition here on NHPR. Time for the New Hampshire News Recap. We're recapping some of the week's news. New Hampshire lawmakers wrapped up their official work this week. They voted on a slate of bills that had resulted from the end of the session negotiations. NHPR’s senior political reporter Josh Rogers logged a lot of time at the state house this week, and he joins us now in studio. Good morning Josh.
Josh Rogers: Good morning.
Rick Ganley: Okay. So, Josh, anyway, thanks for being here so early. I know after a long week and a long evening.
Josh Rogers: I can handle it. Nice to be with you, Rick.
Rick Ganley: It's good to be with you too, Josh. What were some of the remaining loose ends in terms of legislation yesterday?
Josh Rogers: Well, I guess if the bills survived yesterday, I'd say the proposal that will require voters across the state to consider capping local property taxes tied to schools, that's a big one. Another, I'd say, is a bill that would lift the filing threshold on the state's business enterprise tax and create a triggering mechanism to drop the BET rate, should revenue and savings targets be met. That's another big one, politically, I'd say.
Rick Ganley: Okay. Two big potential changes there very close to taking effect. Let's talk about how those would work. Why don't we start with the tax cap?
Josh Rogers: Sure. What the tax cut bill will do will put a question on the ballot in November and again in 2028 in every city and town in the state, asking voters if they'd support limiting increases in local property taxes tied to education and set that limit to inflation and to growth in local property values. So beyond those factors, local taxes tied to education could not rise. And that's that would require 3/5 support in school districts for that to take place. And, you know, once that cap were in place, it could also be overridden by a 3/5 vote. The cap's backers, Republicans, top Republicans in the House, really push this. They say that putting this before voters in a state election rather than during town and city elections, will ensure that the will of more voters and not the smaller subset that participates in municipal elections are heard on this issue. Uh, and the bill's critics would include pretty much every Democrat, some municipal groups and teachers unions. They say this bill is bound to make it harder for school districts to operate, and won't erase the real costs that school districts face from things like special education to fulfilling teacher contracts, to rising health insurance costs, or from any new mandates that could be imposed by the state. So it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out in the districts that may adopt it functionally, to be sure, but also in terms of the politics of it and how those get expressed during campaign seasons both this November and two years from now.
Rick Ganley: Yeah, we're likely to see a tapestry across the state with it. I mean, this is a 3/5 of voters in a school district agree to this.
Josh Rogers: Yes. 3/5.
Rick Ganley: Okay. Um, Republicans, at least some of them seem to think that this could be a potent way to drive up voter turnout, uh, come November. Do you agree?
Josh Rogers: Well, we'll see. There are Republicans who believe, you know, forcing a vote on a local tax cap will get more conservative voters, maybe even new conservative voters, to turn out. That's something they want to do, particularly given, uh, you know, sagging popularity of Donald Trump, who's now going to be on the ballot but will loom over all these races, you know, midterm elections favor the party out of power typically. And so that would be Democrats and Republicans I've talked to really do see this as a tool, as a way to sell tax relief. And, you know, I think the same goes for the changes the legislature passed yesterday regarding the BET, the business enterprise tax. Uh, and, you know, we can talk about that if you want.
Rick Ganley: Yeah. Let's talk more about that. Josh, what would that bill do?
Josh Rogers: Well, you know, the bill again, was a priority item for top House Republicans. It it aimed to shave half a percentage point from the business enterprise tax. It's one of the largest sources of state revenue that tax. And you know, citing concerns over the potential of lost revenue, the state Senate tried to scrap the idea of an outright rate cut and instead pushed to lift the filing threshold. Excuse me, on that tax right now. Uh, that filing threshold sits at $297,000. Under this bill, it would climb to $400,000, so fewer businesses would end up having to pay the tax altogether. The final version of this bill also would send some money to nursing homes to boost Medicaid provider rates. That was another Senate priority. But the final version of the bill also includes a trigger to automatically ratchet down the BET’s rate if collections from the tax come in $100 million over target, and the state also carries a maximum balance in its rainy day fund. So the likelihood that those you know, that those things appear on the state's balance sheet at the same time, you know, could be remote. But the bill contemplates cutting the rate of the business enterprise tax, you know, until it ratchets down ultimately to the rate, uh, when it was first imposed in the 90s. So it's an interesting, uh, it's an interesting compromise that they worked out. And, you know, I expect we're going to hear a great deal of talk of the BET’s rate cut, uh, you know, on the campaign trail. But what will be happening for sure is the filing threshold is going to be lifted, which means that maybe several thousand businesses that now have to pay that tax won't be paying that tax.
Rick Ganley: Okay. A few big bills did fail yesterday involving so-called open enrollment in public schools and in gun policy. What happened there, Josh?
Josh Rogers: Well, the idea that public school students should be able to attend school in any district, anywhere in the state that they choose, regardless of where they live, is a popular idea with plenty of the Republican majority. But the execution of this policy, you know how it might work, how costs could be apportioned between sending and receiving districts and the state. You know, it's pretty complicated and really a bit angst-inducing for districts and policy makers. And this bill changed a bunch along the way. And what was on the table at the end was a plan that would require districts to allow open enrollment but impose a 10% cap on it. Governor Ayotte announced last week she didn't think the proposal was ready, and the bill ended up getting tabled.
Rick Ganley: Yeah, I think she said something like, it's not ready for prime time. Um, there seemed to be a similar dynamic here with the gun bill that failed yesterday too.
Josh Rogers: Well, yes, that bill aimed to assert that the primacy that the legislature has primacy in terms of setting gun policy, and it would have blocked gun policies of any kind being set by cities, towns or executive branch agencies. Ayotte's opposition to the bill didn't scuttle that, although it was pretty clear she didn't really want to see this on her desk. Attorney General John Formella, he wrote a memo to lawmakers last week urging them to defeat the bill, and it also ended up getting tabled yesterday.
Rick Ganley: All right, Josh, we also got a taste of the campaign season this week. The filing period for candidates opening on Wednesday at the State House. Can you walk us through some of what you saw as some of the top candidates formally launched their campaigns Wednesday and yesterday?
Josh Rogers: Well, yesterday, both Governor Kelly Ayotte and her Democratic challenger, Cinde Warmington, filed their campaigns. They filled the hall outside the governor's office full of supporters with signs and, you know, sort of mini rallies from the governor. We heard kind of what you might expect. She touted things like bail reform, her work to support police and firefighter pensions. She talked about fighting to retain the, quote, New Hampshire Advantage and warned where one election away from turning into Massachusetts. Uh, and you know, when we and when asked about Warmington, she repeatedly called her an opioid lobbyist. Uh, Warmington did represent Purdue Pharma at the statehouse and OxyContin 25 years ago from Warmington. We heard she'd fight to make New Hampshire more affordable, and voting for Ayotte would be, in her mind, a vote for data centers and Ice detention facilities. So it was kind of blunt force on both sides in the governor's race on day one.
Rick Ganley: Absolutely. Well, the sides are set up. We'll see how it goes this summer. NHPR's senior political reporter Josh Rogers. Thanks so much, as always.
Josh Rogers: You're welcome.
….
Rick Ganley This is the New Hampshire News recap. We're recapping some of the week's news. NASA says the meteorite that caused that sonic boom heard around much of coastal New England last Saturday, landed right in the middle of Cape Cod Bay. The space agency says this thing was about five feet in diameter and weighed about 5.6 metric tons. I checked and that works out to about 12,345 pounds in Ye Olde English. Anyway, screaming into our atmosphere at 46,000 miles an hour or so, it caused that big boom. It's thought to have exploded into fragments, meaning there could be some at the bottom of the bay. Astronomer John Gianforte is the director of the UNH Observatory. John. Good morning.
John Gianforte: Good morning.
Rick Ganley: John. We've had you often on our cosmically curious segment, and you talk to talk about space. And this was a big story heard around the world and in fact, heard right around New England, two of that sonic boom. Did you hear it at all?
John Gianforte: I did not hear it. I was really, uh, mad that I didn't. I spent a few days last week on Nantucket Island. That would have been a great place to listen and and maybe even hear this on Saturday. But I was here in Durham, near campus, and I didn't I didn't hear it. You know, these things aren't that rare, but they're rare around where you live right there. You know, the earth is is big, has a lot of surface area. And, you know, it's it's, it's hard to believe that between 50 and 100 tons of material fall to earth from space every day. And most of it is very, very small micrometeorites that, that you can't see. But occasionally, you know, you see a, you know, a shooting star or a meteor. Um, they're not really stars shooting their pieces of space debris, broken off pieces of comets or small pieces of asteroids that are just orbiting the sun, um, minding their own business. And we call those things meteoroids. And if their path crosses the earth and it intersects the earth as the earth orbits the sun, um, and it, it, it bursts through our atmosphere like this one did on Saturday. Um, we call that a meteor if it actually makes it to the ground like this one apparently did landed in Cape Cod Bay. We call that a meteorite.
Rick Ganley: What might have happened if this was over land? If it had broken apart and the fragments had fallen? You know, just 15 or 20 miles, um, you know, away onto shore.
John Gianforte: So it would have it would have made a huge thump, a huge impact scar would have left a crater, um, probably 15, 20 feet across depending on what kind of terrain it struck. And it would have been a, you would definitely have felt that for miles around. Um, probably wouldn't have caused too much damage because, you know, three feet isn't something that we typically worry about. Although if it fell on your house, it would be a really bad day.
Rick Ganley: Yeah. It would, John. What do we learn from meteorites when we do? When you get these fragments and we we do recover them.
John Gianforte: Well, it teaches us it really it really reveals a lot about our solar system. And we have a lot to learn. Planetary scientists have a lot to learn about small orbiting bodies in the solar system.
Rick Ganley: Right? Yeah. Can you learn something from the chemistry from the iron that's within these meteorites?
John Gianforte: Well, sure, you can learn about the composition. Um, this one apparently, um, according to NASA, this one didn't, um, fragment into a lot of small pieces, which leads them to believe from that, that it was a dense, maybe a metallic iron meteorite, which, which iron is, is a common chemical element that usually we find in the cores of the terrestrial planets. So it does teach us about, about the composition, um, of the, of the early solar system. And it's even possible in some cases, Rick. To determine the source object for the, the, the piece of space debris that fell to earth.
Rick Ganley: Well, John, we're heading into summer, and I know the Perseid meteor showers will be happening in August, but you can catch a few meteors, you know, just about on any clear night. Any advice for for catching some, for seeing some.
John Gianforte: Um, the best time to look for meteors is after midnight. Um, from a relatively dark location. Doesn't have to be, you know, pitch dark, but away from city lights, away from street lights, the darkest part of your backyard where you have a pretty open place of the night sky. We can see sporadic meteors on any night, um, if we're observant and patient. Um, and if our eyes are dark adapted.
Rick Ganley: John Gianforte is an astronomer and the director of the UNH Observatory. John, thanks so much.
John Gianforte: You're welcome. Rick. It was my pleasure.
Rick Ganley: If you missed part of today's segment or if you want to catch up on previous weeks, you can find the New Hampshire News Recap wherever you listen to podcasts. I'm Rick Ganley and this is NHPR.
