Category: Granite Views

Spring is a time of rebirth and renewal. I have found the increase in sunlight hours and warmer weather to be invigorating, inspiring hope and infusing optimism. I’ve noticed more people are out when I am out on my neighborhood walks, often with dogs or baby strollers, and strangers exchange friendly greetings in passing. My walking partner and I have optimistically started a couch-to-5K app regimen. My elderly mother has resumed her daily laps around the driveway, slowly regaining strength and endurance as she shakes off the winter and arthritic deconditioning from months spent indoors. And my husband is carefully tending and planting fig cuttings to grow more fruit trees.

Additionally, with 40.1 percent of New Hampshire’s total population with at least one dose, and 19.2 percent fully vaccinated, according to an April 4 report from NPR, and now all residents age 16 and older eligible, I sense the heightened anticipation for our return to some semblance of the pre-Covid “normal.” And while we patiently wait for all our family and friends to get vaccinated, I am excited to resume safe, outdoor socializing with others, including backyard barbecues and evenings around a firepit, all facilitated by the warmer weather, as social interactions are a really vital contributor to our mental health and well-being.

We know that the pandemic has resulted in many of us feeling isolated and lonely, with increased stress and anxiety, thus necessitating learning healthy ways to cope with stress and build resilience; and sometimes requiring professional assistance. Connecting with others, talking with people we trust about our feelings, and sharing our concerns through meaningful conversation are powerful coping tools. Unwinding, whether alone or with friends, undertaking activities we find enjoyable and doing good and helping others are also helpful for our well-being, as are efforts to take care of our bodies, such as regular physical activity, eating healthfully, getting plenty of sleep, and avoiding excessive alcohol, tobacco and other substance use.

Finally, connecting with community can be really impactful. For me this has manifested as returning to church after a year to resume playing music with others, thanks to being fully vaccinated. And so I returned to accompany the lone keyboardist who has carried on this past year; the other musicians and singers are looking forward to returning once they are vaccinated, as well. In my faith, Easter Sunday is of monumental significance, and the new life and new joy of the occasion was evident in the upbeat and celebratory music and rhythms that stirred clapping and swaying and inspired hope for new beginnings.

As the warmth and wonder of spring unfold, what new opportunities will you be exploring?

This week’s issue is a celebration of many of the things that make up what many of us have come to think of as our community and our quality of life. It’s Hippo’s Best of 2021 issue, where you tell us what you like best about your community.

We made a few changes this year to reflect the realities of the effects of the pandemic on our community, including more questions relating to outdoor activities and removing some relating to live performances. We also changed how we classified the Best of picks. We kept the Best of the Best — those are the top vote getters in a category — but rather than having geographic Best of picks, such as Best of Manchester, we classified the next four top picks as “Readers Bests.” We hope you enjoy the results and explore (once you feel safe to do so) your community. The results start on page 10.

One of my favorite parts of the Hippo Best of is the Smaaart answers we get. When asked to name the “Thing New Hampshire does better than any other state,” many folks answered maple syrup or four seasons or the great outdoors or live free and others suggested, “hate Massachusetts,” or “just not Massachusetts,” and others hit on a drinking theme with answers such as “booze” or “great beer” or “liquor stores on the highway.”

On a question where we asked readers to fill in the blank — “2021 in NH: Year of the __” — we also got some creative answers. They included “mask,” “Covid,” “lockdown,” “pandemic” and “Oh God, what now,” but there were also a few that went in different directions, such as lobsters, cider doughnuts, beer, babies, divorce, smiles and tattoos. I guess I can see that too much cider doughnuts and beer leads to babies and divorce and soon to follow are smiles and tattoos. “Oh God, what now.”

One of the more surprising reader answers came from our multiple-choice question asking whether vegetables on pizza are a crime against pizza, OK in the case of __ vegetable, or always delicious. One of our vote-counters asked if we were being punked because a fair number of people answered, “broccoli.” Clearly that vote counter is in the George H.W. Bush camp. But as you can see on page 13 the great majority of Hippo readers think veggies on pizza are A-OK (a sentiment I share). I even like broccoli on pizza, though probably not enough to mention it by name.

Thank you to everyone who voted and congratulations to all the winners — even broccoli.

Walking and talking is the new coffee date. I’m glad; I relish any opportunity to combine fresh air, movement and conversation. By necessity, though, many interactions now take place online, either Zoom meetings where you can’t really talk, even when unmuted, or FaceTime chats. This got me thinking about who I have or have not been keeping up with during the pandemic. 

To our surprise, a professional friend and I recently found ourselves bemoaning the loss of rubber chicken dinners. If you haven’t had the pleasure, these were large-scale annual meetings, fundraisers and award ceremonies hosted by organizations from nonprofits to political groups to media outlets. In spring there were a handful of must-attend events where leaders and lobbyists, mentors and movers, accomplished honorees and ambitious newcomers alike would gather. Frequent flyers might run into each other at functions every week or two in the fall. We used to grumble mildly about lukewarm food or lengthy speakers; nowwe yearn for a chance to mill around in a room full of even tangential acquaintances. In this year of social distancing, we’ve been keeping up pretty well with our family and close friends, but our circle has frayed at the edges. 

Why does this matter? The Atlantic’s Amanda Mull recently explored the issue. While close relationships have long been recognized as essential to well-being, the pandemic has underscored that casual friends are important, too. They make us feel part of a community, part of the world. They make mundane errands enjoyable. They introduce us to new business and recreational opportunities, information, issues and ideas. “Peripheral connections tether us to the world at large; without them, people sink into the compounding sameness of closed networks.” 

Even before the pandemic, surveys by StayWorkPlay, the organization that helps New Hampshire attract young workers, revealed many found it hard to make friends here. Some cited a lack of gathering places, others the lack of diversity. They felt a sense of “aloneness.” The pandemic has exacerbated this. When asked what she seeks going forward, a college student I know from church said, “If I could change something, [it would be] getting those little intimate connections back, the ones that make us a community, the greetings on the street, catching up with an old friend, the feeling that you are intimately part of a larger group.” 

It’s time to rekindle our acquaintanceship. Want to go for a walk?

Susan Hatem, former Director of Programs and Grant Making at New Hampshire Humanities, is a CASA of NH guardian ad litem and a connector, mentor and writer. Email her at susanh8m@gmail.com.

In their book Scaling Leadership, Robert Anderson and William Adams note that “Leaders bring the weather.” They further note that the tone, mood, presence, focus and behavior of the leader is the weather in any organization — a force of nature. And everyone who works there can feel it, see it, experience it and describe how it impacts them and those around them.

All leaders bring the weather — organizational leaders or elected government leaders. In New Hampshire, we have a lot of elected state leaders. There are 400 leaders in the House of Representatives, 24 leaders in the Senate, five leaders on the Executive Council, and then of course, our governor. I wonder if these 430 leaders realize that they bring the “weather” to the state by their statements, actions and behavior?

I am a bit of a political junkie, and I will read just about any publication and any article written covering state and federal issues. Needless to say, I am frequently left scratching my head. As an example, US News & World Report recently picked up this headline, “New Hampshire Lawmaker Apologies for Anti-LGBTQ Language,” a story about Manchester Rep. Dick Marston’s apology after referring to LGBTQ people as having “deviant sexuality” in a Zoom House committee hearing. As InDepthNH and other sources reported, earlier in that same meeting, Manchester Rep. Nicole Klein-Knight appeared to take a gummy from her bottle of medical cannabis (“prescribed medication for arthritis,” she later tweeted), apparently trying to make a point during a discussion of two bills, including one related to fines for the possession of marijuana and therapeutic cannabis. WMUR reported on the House’s use of a University of New Hampshire facility for its sessions last year. House Speaker Steve Shurtleff had to apologize to UNH leadership this past September after some members were drinking beer in the hall and failed to wear masks outside the facility, violating UNH and town ordinances. Did I mention the head-scratching?

Let’s be clear. We have many outstanding, hard-working leaders in Concord who are essentially volunteering their time to serve the citizens of New Hampshire, and they deserve our respect and gratitude. Unfortunately, that behavior is not what typically makes the news. Instead of providing the attention-getting headlines described above, wouldn’t it be better if there were more to report on in terms of bipartisan work being pushed out of the House and Senate? Wouldn’t that be a better weather report from our elected leadership?

Most folks probably scanned past the news item that recently reported the imminent closure of the 450-year-old “Lamb and Flag” pub in Oxford, England. This venerable gathering place on St. Giles Street has served clients local and visiting, famous and ordinary, and even the likes of me. The pub not only held fond memories for me, it also indirectly affected the upbringing of my children.
In the early ’70s, while doing research for my doctoral dissertation in the Bodleian Library nearby, I would repair to the Lamb and Flag at the end of the day for well-earned refreshment. My favorite seat in the pub — if it were available — was at an ancient and worn oak round table situated in a corner and flanked by two tall bookcases.
On my first visit to the pub, that space caught my eye because it was occupied that afternoon by an Oxford don and three of his students. I sat close enough to them to engage in my favorite pastime, namely eavesdropping. They were discussing a poem and each had their book open in front of them along with a pint of bitter. Behind them, the two tall bookcases were filled with Oxford University Press reference books. From time to time, I noticed, one of the group would turn around, take down a book, and look up a reference. I was fascinated by the ritual, not to mention the novelty that a pub would keep so many shelves of reference books. Thereafter, I sat at that table every time I could and I too would turn and look something up from one of the books.
Twenty-five years later, my family and I moved into a house in southern Oregon. A feature of the house that attracted me immediately was a little corner dining nook that had two tall bookshelves behind it. Ah ha! I decided to fill it with all of my reference books, from the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music, Dictionary of Ancient History and Fowler’s Modern English Usage, to The Oxford Dictionary of Modern Slang. There were tomes of history, books on world religions, collections of poetry and language dictionaries.
Before long, our family had its own ritual. We had many of our meals together at that round table in the nook. Whenever a question of fact or definition arose, someone would say, “Let’s look it up” and would reach around to find the appropriate reference work. Tedious? Yes, I am sure our son and daughter felt that way many times. Nevertheless, we sorted out a number of homework assignments, not to mention settled disputes.
So, yes. I shall miss the Lamb and Flag, almost as much as I miss those family gatherings around our own reference table. With Google readily available now, we don’t need those any more. Do we?

In 1999 the Supreme Court declared New Hampshire’s system of taxation “unconstitutional” based on the Claremont education funding decision. The Supreme Court forced the legislature to make a hard choice. The Claremont decision was based on Part 2 Article 5 of our Constitution, which says taxes “must be proportional.” Like any other state tax, like the Tobacco Tax, Gas Tax, Rooms and Meals, one rate statewide. It became clear that the state’s education regulations were mandates and therefore needed to be funded with a uniform tax rate.

Studies were done to determine the cost of the education regulations. Most every analysis showed that the so-called “property rich” towns, largely on the seacoast, resort lakes, or ski mountains, had plenty of valuable property and could easily raise money while many communities, including Manchester, Londonderry and Derry, struggled. Tax concepts were brought forward including an income tax, sales tax and statewide property tax. The state property tax emerged.

Similar to how we would think of it today, the statewide property tax was born in 1919 at a tax rate of $3.50 per $1,000 of value. So studies were done to see what would happen if a state property tax were to be re-enacted. Spreadsheets showed that if every community were to pay the same rate to cover the cost of the education regulations, the result would be that 75 to 80 percent of the state’s population would see a reduction in property taxes while the remaining percentage (20 to 25 percent), those property-richer communities, would see a tax increase. Ironically, even if this were enacted, the property-richer communities would still have the lowest property tax rates in the state.

While the property-poorer communities would run bake sales to pay for their attorneys, the property-richer communities simply hired lawyers to make the case that they would be unfairly treated by a uniform statewide property tax. They called themselves “donor towns.”

But which are the real donor towns? If the state constitution says that everybody needs to pay the same rate tax rate, but somehow the property-rich towns’ lawyers have tricked lawmakers into ensuring that they don’t actually have to pay the tax, thus, forcing monies to be raised from other sources, especially from property-poorer towns, is that fair? In reality, the property-poorer towns are contributing higher property taxes in order to ensure that the property-richer towns don’t have to pay the uniform rate. So who’s donating to whom?

Fred Bramante is a past chairman and memtber of the New Hampshire State Board of Education. He speaks and consults on education redesign to regional, state and national organizations.

I’ve been hearing and thinking about annual cycles lately including Black History Month, the Lunar New Year, Mardi Gras, and the last day we worked in person — or the day our lives changed dramatically — due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

At our house, this one-year mark coincides with my 89-year-old mother getting her second Covid vaccine and that’s a really big deal for us. For the last year, we have been working so hard to keep her safe in the midst of this pandemic. Her health has been our primary motivator to keep wearing masks and physically distance when our longing for social connection was pulling us to congregate with friends – she is the reason we’ve been so cautious. We’re really grateful that she was able to get the vaccine.

Many people who are vulnerable and at risk are waiting eagerly for their turn; others are more hesitant for a variety of reasons. We know that this virus has disproportionately affected some populations at higher rates because of the unique combination of factors that make certain groups more vulnerable — being older, having multiple chronic medical conditions, or being a member of certain racial/ethnic groups. These differences, known as health disparities, arise not because of any biological differences between groups as we are all part of the same human family. Rather, it is for reasons such as being more likely to be employed in essential work settings and thus at greater risk of being exposed to the virus, and more likely to be uninsured and have less access to health care with more chronic medical conditions. These factors are called the social determinants of health, where longstanding underlying inequities have been revealed by the pandemic. That is why some of us say that everything contributes to health, and health contributes to everything — because good health is requisite for our ability to be successful in school, to be productive workers, to enjoy time with our families, and to live long, fulfilling lives.

As a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel begins to shine with increasing numbers of people vaccinated, and hospitalizations and deaths finally beginning to decline, we can dare to look forward to resuming the in-person celebrations we had to cancel or put off. And I imagine that even the mundane activities of our daily lives will seem celebratory — going to work and chatting around the water-cooler, convening in person, exchanging handshakes and hugs.

The infectious nature of this pandemic has illuminated how we are all connected, that any one of us is only as healthy as others in our community, that we are all in this together — and that at heart, we all want the same thing.

Dr. Trinidad Tellez is a family physician and health equity strategist, community advocate, and consultant.

We’re now deep into the pandemic hoping against hope that 2021 will be the year that we’ll get to see friends, family and some of our favorite places. It’s too early to say how much will return to normal or even what we’ll consider normal then, but there is hope. Hope that we’ll get back to some of those routines and hope that we’ll discover new ones. Hope for one another.
This is Hippo’s 20th Best Of and like many of you we’ve had to make some adjustments to accommodate this pandemic. We’ve changed some of the questions and pared down some categories to better reflect the current situation and past year. The goal, as always, is really to get the pulse of our readers about what they value and like about their community. As big box stores, big tech and big finance occupy more of our landscape it’s all the more important to share what you think makes your community special and different from another place. It’s those great hiking trails, those places to take the kids sledding, the places to grab a scoop on a lazy Sunday or the person who kicks your butt into shape. It’s the coffee shop with art for sale on the walls and it’s the juicy burger that you probably didn’t need. It’s that slice of pizza that you tell people from out of town about.
Those are the things we want to know about in our annual Best Of and it’s those things that we enjoy now or look forward to enjoying when we can. You can vote in this year’s best of at hippopress.com. Voting ends Feb. 28.

Some Republicans in the New Hampshire House are pushing legislation that could give about $4,100 to anyone sending their kids to a private school or home schooling them. As currently envisioned, it should not pass.

Arguments for direct grants to parents, like the ones this bill would set up, are that families should have the freedom to find a private school or home-school option if their public school is failing their children. It’s a powerful argument. It is unfair that children can be deprived of a good or adequate education by being stuck in a failing school.

But this legislation does not focus on the needs of the low-income families who have the least financial ability to leave poorly performing schools. Let’s be blunt here. This is largely a handout to parents who can already afford to send their children to a private school. If this legislation really wanted to address educational freedom then it would specifically target children in underperforming schools whose parents don’t earn enough money to send them to a private school. This legislation as currently envisioned doesn’t offer enough to truly bring school choice to those families. The proposed $4,100 is probably not enough to completely cover the cost of a private school. (For example, the non-parish-sponsored tuition listed on the websites of Manchester area Catholic elementary schools seems to be over $5,000 annually and many nonreligious schools are much more.) And it’s highly unlikely that low-income parents would be able to afford to stay home and home-school their children. For the parents and students who need it most, the legislation is still likely to leave families paying some of the private education bill.

This legislation could be re-envisioned to target those in need by means testing and targeting districts that fail to meet agreed-upon standards. Kids going to those schools could be eligible for a grant covering the entire cost of tuition to private school, charter school or a different public school district if their parents met agreed-upon low-income guidelines.

Rather than $4,100 going to 16,000 private school students (or possibly more, if additional New Hampshire families jump on this universally available deal), New Hampshire could focus the aid on a few thousand families who really need help. An additional benefit would be continuing to provide aid to those schools in districts that aren’t meeting expected standards for their students.

If we are truly trying to give each child the best opportunity to succeed then let’s target our aid to those that need it most.

WMUR reported that on Jan. 22, nearly 150,000 people signed up within the first 10 hours of Phase 1b opening for a Covid-19 vaccine. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, by Jan. 27 this number had increased to 200,000 with another 50,000 signed up by their health care provider. This phase includes anybody 65+ years of age, as well as those with certain health conditions, and others who qualify because of where they work. All totaled, there are about 300,000 in this group. That is an impressive response from our New Hampshire residents, and it gives me hope that the end is on the horizon for a pandemic that has taken so much.
While we’re off to an ambitious start, I continue to hear concern and hesitation about taking the vaccine. Given how quickly both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines received emergency authorization, it is understandable. According to PBS NewsHour, the methodology that both of these vaccines utilize, however, messenger RNA (mRNA), is not new. mRNA has been studied for 50 to 60 years, not only for vaccines but also for cancer treatment. Scientists and researchers have been studying how to utilize mRNA with RSV, MERS and SARS viruses since the early 2000s. Both Moderna and Pfizer built on science that had been collected for many years, thus enabling Moderna to design its vaccine in just two days. After development, both vaccines were required to go through the normal three phases of trials encompassing nearly 70,000 people in the Phase 3 trials. Both companies reported efficacy of approximately 95 percent.
This vaccine is not mandatory. People are free to choose whether or not to receive the vaccine based on their personal circumstances and personal health situation. The decision should be made after fully understanding the facts. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention offers factual information on the vaccines (cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/faq.html), and the State of New Hampshire’s Covid-19 website (nh.gov/covid19/) is very informative.
We must achieve herd immunity for the pandemic to end. The World Health Organization states that herd immunity should be achieved through vaccination rather than through exposure to the pathogen that causes the disease. To achieve herd immunity, most experts agree between 75 to 80 percent of the population needs to be vaccinated. Will New Hampshire be first in the nation again and lead the country out of this pandemic? It seems as though we are well on our way.