If we want to grow, we need to invest

Yahoo

08-05-2025

"The New Hampshire House's proposed budget does not just hurt programs and the people they serve. It hurts our state's ability to compete in the 21st century." (Photo by Dana Wormald/New Hampshire Bulletin)
After a winter full of guardrail-breaking politics, I arrived at the State House Tuesday on a rainy spring day, ready to protest and testify before the New Hampshire Senate about a budget I believe will shrink our state's future.
Then came hours of thoughtful, passionate testimony from caregivers, health care workers, state and local officials, nonprofit leaders, and fellow parents. I had to leave before the Finance Committee got to my name on page 14 of the sign-up sheet, but I took solace in how many who came before me said versions of what was on my mind.
Below, though, is the framing I didn't hear Tuesday that I still can't shake. As we think about a future that works for everyone in New Hampshire, I hope it reaches a persuadable audience.
The New Hampshire House's proposed budget does not just hurt programs and the people they serve. It hurts our state's ability to compete in the 21st century. It doesn't fund a future. It retreats from it.
We talk a lot in New Hampshire about economic growth and keeping young people here. About attracting workers and building strong communities. But budgets are where rhetoric meets reality. The budget passed by the House — now under review in the Senate — does not make New Hampshire more competitive. It makes it harder to stay, harder to raise a family, and harder to grow.
Being pro-growth means being anti-poverty. It means investing in the people who make our New Hampshire work — in their housing, their child care, their health care, their education, their job training. But at a time when the U.S. economy just contracted by 0.3% — driven in part by trade imbalances and decreased government investment — this budget pulls back from the very people and services we should be supporting most.
When state leaders offer only cuts, local property taxes jump just to keep the lights on. And with housing, child care, and everyday costs soaring, middle-income families are barely hanging on. Many of our teachers, nurses, and first responders can't even afford to live where they work.
Across New Hampshire, we're short over 23,000 housing units. But the House budget eliminates the Housing Appeals Board, making it harder to build, even as 1 in 4 homes on the market now costs over $1 million.
More than 16,000 Granite Staters are out of the workforce because they can't find child care. But in the proposed budget, there's no meaningful investment in providers or parents. The budget also eliminates the Family Planning Program. This strips access to affordable reproductive health care, contraception, and cancer screenings, especially for low-income and rural folks.
We're still 15,000 workers short since the pandemic, but the House budget cuts job training and Medicaid provider rates, pushing caregivers and health care workers further out of reach.
The $50 million cut to the UNH system is particularly shortsighted. Amid these workforce shortages, we're gutting one of our most vital talent pipelines for tradespeople, nurses, engineers, teachers, social workers, and in-state students who tend to stay and work locally. Many UNH campuses also serve rural and low-income communities already stretched thin.
If we want young people to stay, work, and raise families here, we need to fund the things that make that possible — homes they can afford, schools they trust, child care they can find, and jobs they can build on. Gutting those things tells young people like me that this is not the state we grew up in.
Are we still that state? Where if you work hard, play by the rules, and respect the fact that your neighbor's path isn't your own, you can still get ahead?
These cuts don't tell that story. We're closing the Office of the Child Advocate as over 1,300 survivors of abuse at the Youth Development Center pursue justice. We're ending the Commission on Aging as 27% of our population will be 65 or older by 2030. Pulling $10 million from the Renewable Energy Fund while the Seacoast and Upper Valley face repeated flooding. Expanding education freedom accounts — siphoning public dollars into private schools with no accountability as public schools remain underfunded and understaffed. Eliminating the Council on the Arts amid constant assaults on cultural freedom and innovation — in the 'Live Free or Die' state.
None of these actions solve problems. They shift burdens, weaken services, and undermine long-term growth.
My wife and I are doing well. We have a safe home, reliable child care, and stable careers that help us pay for it all. But life in 2025 is exorbitantly expensive and a state that relies on high earners like us — while cutting the support that helps others rise — is not building a future. It's running out the clock, scaring off talent and investment, and pricing out the working people who keep us strong.
There is still time to get this right. The Senate can reject this budget, close loopholes that let out-of-state investors avoid paying their fair share, bolster housing support, reinvest in public education and workforce training, and protect the public services families count on. And citizens across this state can keep demanding a smarter, more honest approach to growth.
Real competition requires real investment. And making good on 'Live Free or Die' means funding the freedom to stay and thrive.