SB11 – the bill ostensibly written to allow Exeter and Stratham to cooperate on a water system. However, as we have written here on the ‘Grok, we have seen a lot of problems with the bill as it is too broadly written. With the Feds and the NH regional planning commissions pushing the Federal “Sustainable Communities Initiative”, we see that as one of the possible on-ramps for totally losing that which makes NH special without any of us having much of a say so in favor of Planners’ solution to any future ill – a move from local control in towns and cities to ‘regional approaches’ (overseen, of course, by the NH Regional Planning Commissions). Thus, I wrote to a couple of NH Senators a bit ago:
<redacted>, thanks for writing and letting us know.
To say that when Steve posted the news up on GraniteGrok about SB-11, it took my breath away – I had no idea it was even in the works. It looks just like legislation I would have expected to see coming from the Water Sustainability Comission. Why? They made it quite clear that during their “listening session” (how I HATE that phrase, as having been to some, there is no “listening” going on; only Cass Suntein style “nudging” to a determined outcome) that one of their stated aims was to remove water from being private property (“I BUILT that well”) to a publicly owned “common resource” with a handful of votes and the signature of a pen.
I crossed swords with them earlier this year – and look at the verbiage in the bill:
- Therefore, the general court declares and determines that the waters of New Hampshire constitute a limited and precious public resource to be protected, conserved, and managed in the interest of present and future generations.
- This requires careful stewardship and management of water and wastewater within the state
- To maximize health and safety, ecological and aesthetic values, and the overall well-being of the people, the state of New Hampshire must enable municipalities to protect water supplies
- In order to foster regional approaches
- and authorize the establishment of charges to owners and users of property
At no point in time in this bill is there any specific verbiage protecting the rights of land owners with respect to water rights on or under their land – is this not a radical change from the traditional sense of private property? Which, I might add, was specifically called out during their process – that our strong tradition of private property was something that had to be “overcome”. In reading the wording as a software engineer (trained to read code to see where “holes” are and to scout out “where and when really bad things can happen”, it is certainly the case that collective “stewardship”, “maximize health and safety”, and “regional approaches” will be used to radically shift the major paradigm of NH from being a individual property right is
cededtaken to one where “the Collective needs” takes precedence. Yes, I have become cynical over the past few years when it comes to politics and some might charge that I have gone off the deep end on this – but again, in reading this, even this lowly blogger could now easily structure things to make my fears a reality – the on-ramps are already built in.To be fair, we have a Water District here in Gilford – but while Exeter and Stratham may want to cooperate, this bill was too broadly written. Given my interest in the WSC and now in the regional planning commissions, combined with the verbiage called out above, I see it becoming easier and easier to get rid of the local control that has been the hallmark of NH. Already, the regional planning commissions make decisions about NH on an unelected and unaccountable basis – nobody runs for election to these entities and they are not accountable, effectively, to anyone. Oh sure, they show up during the budget cycle of a town, tell the BudComm members what they do, count noses, and hand us a bill on a per nose basis. And casually mention that our DPW or other entities in town HAVE to go through them to get stuff done at the state level. And sign contracts with out of state entities (as the Nashua RPC did with HUD, DOT, and EPA to spear head the Federalization of local zoning ordinances under the rubric of their Sustainable Communities Initiative.
And now, this bill, as bolded above, is going to recreate yet ANOTHER level of unelected and unaccountable boards?
How is this much different from MaggieCare, where Hassan tried to put in an IPAB style board that effectively would have “staticized” (as opposed to “nationalized”) all of the hospitals by the implementation of a unelected and unaccountable board that had the ability to set its own taxes upon those they had “oversight” for? I opine that was, if it had been implemented, a unimaginable taking of private property and a dissolution of local self-government (as that board would have been free from Legislative oversight).
And make no mistake – the doors have been opened here and those that are in favor of interlocking regionalism will be racing to pull their collective triggers. After all, regionalism is a Progressive philosophy, is it not? And in my opinion, this will help them to implement it just that much further. Live Free or Die? Hrumph – you can’t Die – you haven’t finished and signed your triplicate paperwork yet!
Forgive me the length of this email, but this concerns me greatly. And I wish that this had been tightly written just for those two towns, for I fear that the lamp has now been rubbed.
The question now stands – how can this be limited, given the outside-the-state push for regionalism that is now getting established here in the State?
Kindest regards,
