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In an interview with the Concord Monitor former Governor and New Hampshire Republican Party Chair John H Sununu outlined the Republican talking points for the upcoming election.
Sununu claims that Governor Lynch and legislative Democrats are harming the state's "special" character and leading it to financial "ruin":
That ruin, Sununu said, is visible in many places: in the decline in citizen participation in local affairs; in the $7 billion unfunded liability in the state retirement systems; in the decline in population growth. At the root of these problems, Sununu said, is the gradual shift in the way taxes are collected, with the statewide property tax swamping the town- and city-centered tax structure of past decades.
Okay, I can take this on before any morning caffeine:
The decline in citizen participation is because wages have not kept up with the cost of living. It takes two wage earners to support a family, and after domestic duties, that leaves little time and energy for civic participation. The Republicans are typically against raising the minimum wage.
The problems in the state retirement system were started under Republican majorities in the 1990s "boom" years. Contributions from towns and cities were kept artificially low. Also, the accounting methods used for the system did not conform to federal guidelines. The Democratic majority has been working since the 2007-2008 legislative session to correct these and other problems. Rep. Ricia MacMahon (D-Sutton) and Rep. Anne Marie Irwin (D-Peterborough) were instrumental in correcting the structural flaws in the system. They came up with a viable way to fund the system with the least amount of pain.
When I look at my property tax bill, the vast majority of it is local. New Hampshire still lags behind the rest of the states in percentage of state support for local schools. Cuts to funding of necessary services at the state level leads to increasing property taxes at the local level. Republicans love to talk about budget cuts without specifying what they will cut and what it would mean at the local level.
We've discussed the fact that New Hampshire is losing its younger population. They're going to states with income and sales taxes.
Sununu wistfully longs to return to the 1980s.
Sununu peppered his remarks with references to his own time in the corner office, for six years in the 1980s. He recalled it as a period of surplus budgets, slimmed bureaucracies and efficient services, a pattern Democrats have largely abandoned, he said.
He fails to mention that in the past, the Republican majority would low-ball the budget and have department heads fill the gaps through the Fiscal Committee when the legislature was not in session. In other words, money was spent that was not clearly in the budget. Hmmm what Republican executive does that remind you of? GW Bush, perhaps?
The Democratic majority changed that in the interests of transparency in budgeting.
Also, the 1980s began nearly thirty years ago. The world and everything in it has changed.
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