Sununu Lays Out Agenda for Remainder of Term

By Richard Girard
EAGLE TIMES PUBLISHER
DOVER, N.H. — New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu made more news last Wednesday than just announcing he wouldn’t seek a historic fifth term as the state’s chief executive. In a more than ten minute question and answer session with reporters, after making his announcement, Sununu laid out his priorities for the remainder of his term and framed the choices in next year’s election.

Sununu said making sure newly adopted programs and initiatives are properly implemented tops his agenda. He singled out changes to Medicaid, the mental health system, making sure changes to the state’s education funding formula are “implemented the right way” and reciprocity laws governing professional licensing and certification as items that will have his attention.

“I think mental health will be a crisis in the country for, maybe, a decade to come,” he said, arguing that the state’s strong economy has allowed it to innovate, while increasing funding to improve and expand the system. He said states such as California and New York are unable to do the kinds of things New Hampshire has been able to do because they’ve “been absolutely crushed economically.” He said he will see that the changes that have been made are seen through, because just saying changes were made and boxes were checked won’t get the job done.

To help alleviate the state’s worker shortage, Sununu backed legislation that makes it easier for the state to recognize the licenses or certifications issued by other states. He indicated he’d been engaged in the rules making process that will enable the statute.

“Once rules go through with reciprocity of licensure and certification, what we did in New Hampshire is going to be of phenomenal benefit to us and, frankly, probably going to be emulated across the 49 other states. So, I’m staying ahead of all that, managing it because, you can have the best ideas, best programs [and] all the money in the world— if you don’t have the people, it won’t work. I don’t care what program you’re talking about…it’s all about making sure you have the people,” he said.

Sununu was asked about the skill set he thought the next governor needed to have.

“Approach is everything. Attitude is everything. You can’t be an extremist. You can’t be combative. We are a purple state. You have to adhere to what ‘Live Free or Die’ is all about — limited government, local control — even when the locals might not do what you want. You really have to appreciate that the voters, the citizens, the parents, they have much more say on what happens in their schools and in their communities when they have the power to do that. Don’t get caught into the trap saying ‘well, I have a better idea so I’ll just do it at the state level.’ Really adhering to the discipline of limited government is always a challenge but I think we’ve shown the model works, it really trickles down.

“And, obviously, making sure the economy is strong. When businesses do well, when you support businesses, when you go out and encourage them, when you cut their taxes, you have all these opportunities come in. You can keep cutting taxes and keep seeing your revenues and opportunities increase at the state level. The economy has to be strong. You need a pro-business governor and a strong economy to allow all the opportunities to be taken advantage of.”

Sununu said the success New Hampshire has experienced during his time in office, especially economically, “gives a huge opportunity for another Republican to win” the office.

In response to questions about efforts by the Democrats to say it’s time for a change, Sununu said he’d “be giggling” if Democrats attacked the economy, asserting he didn’t have to defend it, but gladly would.

“Really? Look at the economy around here,” he said laughing. “Why is it we’re the only state [in New England] growing in population? Why is that we’re the state with the strongest opportunity for businesses coming in here in the Northeast?”

Sununu said whatever economic ills people in New Hampshire were suffering, it would have been worse if the Democrats had their way during his time in office.

“The pains they [New Hampshirites] feel are around inflation. We’ve offset it because we don’t have a sales tax or the income tax that the Democrats all supported and all wanted to bring in here and thank God I vetoed it and Republicans stood strong.

“So, all those folks that supported an income tax and now want to be governor, good luck. The people of the state have soundly rejected that and I’ll keep raising that alarm because we were this close, this close,” he emphasized by narrowing the gap between his pointer finger and thumb, “to getting an income tax in New Hampshire and then they tried it again. Thank God they didn’t [get it] because, you know what, then we’d be like everybody else. We’re not like everybody else. We’re New Hampshire. We’re the Granite State. We do it differently. We do it better. We’re the envy of the nation. Why anybody would want to massively try to convince people that things are worse than they are, that they want to change course, um, we’re really sticking out from the crowd and I don’t know why we’d want to just be like Northern Massachusetts. If you want that, then by all means, then elect the Democrats. But if you want to keep a strong economy, pro-business opportunities and make it so that individuals are first, not big government solutions, that’s what we really do best and I’m proud of it.”

Sununu said he would make endorsements in the races for governor and president if he felt strongly about a candidate, noting he’d never been shy about doing that in the past.