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Sununu budget offers Claremont capital project grants for schools, Arrowhead

By GLYNIS HART
[email protected]
CLAREMONT – Gov. Chris Sununu visited Claremont Monday to promote his budget, which includes funds for several capital improvement projects around Claremont. He asked those assembled to call their legislators to support the budget, and “advocate to put this cash back into the communities.”

The biggest item on the list of projects was $1 million for improved lake access at Lake Sunapee, followed by:

$280,000 for a partner classroom and a new alarm panel at Newport Middle/Senior High School

$120,000 for sidewalk and drainage repairs in Claremont

$100,000 to Arrowhead Lodge for energy efficiency upgrades

$30,000 for energy efficiency upgrades at the Visitor Center.

“This is the first time a governor’s proposed budget has included something for Claremont,” said Mayor Charlene Lovett. “All of these projects have been on our capital improvement plan for years, and all align with state and federal goals.”

Lovett said the people have demonstrated their commitment to the community, notably by passing a $12 million bond to upgrade the schools several years ago, but “our taxpayers need relief. We need state support.”

Director of Planning and Development Nancy Merrill said, “As we work to expand the tax base and bring new companies into Claremont, as many of you know, we’re still confronted with really long overdue infrastructure projects and the need to lower operations costs. The projects that were submitted for the state budget process address both issues and support economic development and energy efficiency goals.

“With almost $7 million identified this year in the capital improvement projects for this year alone, I think it’s highly unlikely that any of that will get funded. So we really appreciate this. Energy efficiency lowers our operations costs, and for drainage issues, I don’t know how many times I’ve had to call the insurance company because our buildings were flooded. Not very efficient, not very 21st century,” said Merrill.

Chuck Allen, director of operations at Arrowhead Lodge, reminded everyone that Arrowhead is a city park and improvements there are to a city asset. “It’s one of the finest selling points this city has to offer,” said Allen of the skiing-tubing-skating center.

Allen pointed to the wall of glass behind him: all original single-pane windows from when the building was erected in the 1960s. The capital funds from the governor’s budget would replace all those windows, as well as making other upgrades.

Gov. Chris Sununu took the podium next. “We have a lot of surplus funds. The economy is booming. Instead of driving those funds into bigger government and massive programs that might be unsustainable down the road, we’re really looking to make investments in these communities.”

“We have nearly $65 million in one-time surplus funds out of the education trust fund,” said Sununu. “Now we actually have the funds to drive some of these opportunities.”

Sununu said that philosophically he believes one-time funds should be spent on infrastructure rather than operating costs.

School board member Jason Benware asked about the school funding bills working their way through the legislature. “It’s likely they’re going to get approved. Are you going to veto those, and if you are, why? All of this stuff is nice — except for the million dollars of expanded access to Lake Sunapee, which doesn’t necessarily help us — but the school funding, those are things that are going to help schools year after year. We have a $32 million school budget and we have the highest taxes in the state. If the majority of the people from the House feel that this is a good idea, why would you choose to veto it?”

“Couple reasons,” said Sununu. “I’m not sure what we’re going to do with the bills. They still could change before they hit our desk. I’ve always said the power of funding schools doesn’t belong in the courts and it’s not about lawsuits. It’s about your representatives. We have the most representative form of government on the planet — they, not the governor, should have the power of the purse to drive that forward.

“My budget proposed more dollars out of the state, more dollars per student, than any budget in history. That’s a fact,” he continued. “We’ve provided $65 million of one-time spending to rebuild schools.

“If the legislature wants the power to change the school funding formula, I will absolutely support that,” said Sununu. “Where the legislature’s looking now in terms of raising massive amounts of taxes to just pile more money into the system, you’ve got to be careful about doing that because once you open that door, it never closes. There’s a lot of money in the system — if the legislature wants to reallocate how those dollars get spent, I think they should absolutely do that.”

“I would love a constitutional amendment that puts all the power back in the legislature,” he said.

Sununu emphasized his ideal of not creating bigger government. “When times are good, invest in infrastructure.”

The Claremont projects were chosen thanks to Mayor Charlene Lovett’s “frankly relentless” advocacy, according to the governor. He said the process to apply for surplus funds was “a little bit informal because we didn’t have a lot of time.”

“As we realized the surplus was going to be there, we had to first decide how we were going to spend it, philosophically. We decided one-time money should go to one-time projects. That really opened the door.”

Sununu described his process of calling officials to find out their wish lists. “We had been hearing from constituents on projects for which there was a need, we called some of them back and said, ‘Is there still a need?’ We talked to some of the senators. We talked to Democrats, we talked to Republicans, we talked to Seacoast, we talked to North Country. We really tried to make sure everybody got a piece of the pie.”

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