“Under Maggie Hassan’s watch, S&P has downgraded NH’s financial outlook rating from ‘stable’ to ‘negative.’ I believe that this grading falls squarely on Governor Hassan’s inability to manage state finances. This will have dire consequences and cost ramifications for NH businesses and taxpayers. Her Status Quo mentality and failure to advance New Hampshire’s economy, on any level, is at fault here. Governor Hassan should be held accountable on November 4th.” — Andrew Hemingway
We at the ‘Grok have received nothing from the Havenstein campaign on this as of posting time. From the Telegraph:
S&P downgrades NH’s credit outlook to negative (emphasis mine, reformatted):
CONCORD – A Wall Street rating group slapped a black mark onto New Hampshire’s credit outlook, warning policy makers the state is in a “thin financial position” because a state tax ruled unconstitutional has few resources to replace it. The outlook of Standard & Poor’s on Tuesday sent political leaders in both parties scrambling, some to affix blame on the opposition for the fiscal mess and others, like Gov. Maggie Hassan, urging this be the turning point to bring about a bipartisan compromise. The startling statement comes less than two weeks after a Hillsborough County Superior Court judge found the Medicaid Enhancement Tax unlawful because hospitals pay it and other health care providers do not. The finding does not raise the cost of New Hampshire lending, but in changing the state’s outlook from “stable” to “negative,” it signals investors should watch and policy makers should act in these closing weeks of the 2014 session.
“The negative outlook reflects our view of the state’s thin financial position and significantly underfunded pension funding levels, which we believe lowers its flexibility to withstand the potentially large effects of the loss of Medicaid Enhancement Tax revenue,” Standard and Poor’s wrote. “The amount of MET revenues is significantly larger than the state’s stabilization balance or projected undesignated general fund balance and represents a significant portion of general fund revenues.”
This comes on top of Gov. Maggie Hassan’s BRILLIANT idea to include $150 Million in the budget from a casino that doesn’t exist (and yet another bill for one got killed in the NH House today). This is her budget – and as the top Executive in the State, this is on her shoulders. I morally can’t pin the pension mess on her – this has been a decades long disaster in the making because SEIU 1984 protests and the politicians on both sides can’t bring themselves to make the hard decision (preferably one that goes to a defined contribution rather than a defined outcome style plan).
