N.H. News Recap

The NH News Recap catches up on the latest in a probe of alleged abuse at the Sununu Youth Services Center in Manchester.

Energy industry representatives and state officials gathered this week in Portsmouth to begin to shape a plan for more nuclear development in New Hampshire. And Republican candidates for the U.S. Senate met this week for their first debate.

These invasive aquatic plants can threaten native wildlife, harm water quality and make lake recreation difficult. Dozens of lakes across the state are trying to keep the plants at bay.

Education reforms dominated the state Legislature this year. Most efforts failed, though a few bills await action from Gov. Kelly Ayotte. Lawmakers rejected bills mandating new public school courses, open enrollment expansion, and increased oversight of the state’s school voucher program. The federal courthouse in Concord handles all kinds of cases, but over the past year one particular type of ca...

State lawmakers wrapped up their session in a series of high-stakes votes this week. Some priorities were pushed across the finish line, while others failed to win support in either the New Hampshire Senate or House. State senators voted to table a Republican-backed bill for open school enrollment, which would let New Hampshire students enroll in any public school in the state. Among other things,...

Lawmakers have released a 12-page report detailing how failures by the state’s top child protection agency contributed to a crisis at the Sununu Youth Services Center in Manchester. Leaders from the Division for Children, Youth and Families are scheduled to tell lawmakers later today how they are responding to the report’s findings. And a proposal to build a data center in Nottingham has been with...

The director of the New Hampshire Division for Children, Youth and Families is disputing many recent allegations at the state’s youth detention center. Marie Noonan testified before lawmakers this week after concerns of abuse or improper restraint were detailed in reports by the Disability Rights Center and the Office of the Child Advocate. Noonan sent a letter to the Disability Rights Center late...

New Hampshire Corrections Commissioner William Hart says his department is struggling to find enough people to staff the state's positions. Currently half of the positions in the corrections department are vacant. The state Executive Council voted Wednesday to approve $12 million to cover overtime for guards currently working at the state prisons. Gov. Kelly Ayotte says she’s committed to making s...

President Donald Trump has been outspoken about fighting antisemitism, but it continues to creep into politics nationally and here in New Hampshire. That’s according to a new NPR investigation of a state lawmaker who tried to get a holocaust denial conspiracy theory into public school lesson plans. And a federal judge ruled that she will not hold New Hampshire officials in contempt for suspending...

It’s been a little over a year since New Hampshire police departments started signing agreements with federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement to help enforce immigration law in the state. ICE now has 15 local partnerships, which are encouraged by Gov. Kelly Ayotte, and these so-called 287g agreements have contributed to a notable uptick in arrests here. Immigration arrests have doubled in the...

The Office of the Child Advocate says it is increasing oversight of the Sununu Youth Services Center in Manchester following new allegations of abuse and neglect of children in the state’s care. The state health department and Attorney General’s office say they are investigating. And the oyster industry in New Hampshire has grown, but across New England, oysters have been dying at alarming rates d...

Gov. Kelly Ayotte has expressed interest in expanding nuclear development in New Hampshire with the help of the federal government. But there are still questions about the local effects of nuclear power, including how to safely handle nuclear waste. And the crew aboard NASA's Artemis II mission is due to splash down to Earth following a record-breaking trip around the moon. What can we learn from...

President Trump issued an executive order this week aimed at limiting voting by mail. New Hampshire’s Secretary of State David Scanlan says he won’t change state election practices to follow that order. A number of states across the Northeast joined a public health collaborative this fall in response to turmoil within federal health agencies. New Hampshire was the only New England state that opted...

Immigration and Customs Enforcement sent $122,515 to the town of Carroll this month. The payment follows Carroll’s decision to be part of the Department of Homeland Security's Task Force Model, also known as the 287(g) program. The New Hampshire Legislature is about halfway through its current session. What are the top issues and bills arising in the State House now? We talk about these stories an...

This week the Executive Council approved over $100 million in federal funding to go toward health care access in rural New Hampshire. The state Attorney General's office is reviewing North Country Healthcare, which operates hospitals in Berlin, Lancaster and Colebrook. And the New Hampshire Supreme Court ruled this week that the way police obtained cellphone location data without a warrant to trac...

Increased polarization and eroding social norms is making is harder to police bad behavior in the New Hampshire House. Town meeting season is well underway in New Hampshire, and voters across the state cast their ballots on a number of local issues this week. And majority of the state has been in a drought this winter. Will the snow melt help? We talk about these stories and more on this edition o...

The U.S. Senate voted down a war powers resolution this week that would have blocked the US military from continuing attacks on Iran without Congressional approval. New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen voted in favor of the resolution, telling NHPR, “There was real concern about having the sole authority to go to war vested in the president of the United States.” Shaheen said Ayatollah Ali Khamenei w...

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is ditching its plan for an ICE detention facility in Merrimack. Emails released by the federal government shed further light on New Hampshire businessman Dean Kamen's ties to Jeffrey Epstein. And state lawmakers are considering a bill that would restrict abortions to 20 weeks. We talk about these stories and more on this edition of NHPR's New Hampshire New...

The Midterm elections will be upon us soon, and some campaigns are gaining traction here in New Hampshire. A federal court issued a ruling this week that ends the Trump administration's ban on diversity and equity initiatives in public schools, including here in New Hampshire. And Republican lawmakers are backing a bill that would allow students to attend any public school in the state. We talk ab...

Gov. Kelly Ayotte has long denied knowing anything about Immigration and Customs Enforcement's plan for a detention facility in Merrimack. But at a U.S. Senate hearing Thursday, ICE director Todd Lyons told New Hampshire Sen. Maggie Hassan his agency had been in contact with the governor. Thursday night, Ayotte released an additional statement that she now has documents on the facility from the De...

The latest batch of Epstein files include dozens of records about the relationship between Jeffrey Epstein, the convicted sex offender, and New Hampshire businessman Dean Kamen. The board of directors for ARMI, the government-funded Manchester research project led by Kamen, says it will investigate its founder. Newly revealed documents show some state officials had known for weeks about federal pl...

Senators reached a deal Thursday to avoid a government shutdown. The deal funds most of the government, and also gives Republicans and Democrats time to negotiate on future funding for the Department of Homeland Security. At the center of the negotiations is the federal immigration crackdown across the country and criticisms of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, who shot and killed a U....

Reports of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Manchester schools spread across social media and within local communities this week. The Manchester School District says it has not received any substantiated reports of ICE activity, but would continue to monitor the situation. And earlier in January, federal officials dropped the number of vaccines recommended for children. Now it's up to the st...

Protests have erupted in Minneapolis and across the country this week in opposition to tactics used by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement or ICE. How active is the federal agency here in New Hampshire? State lawmakers repealed the death penalty in New Hampshire in 2019. Now some lawmakers are looking to bring it back. We talk about these stories and more on this edition of the New Hampshire...

Two New Hampshire courts have told the Legislature that it needs to increase the amount of money the state spends per public school student. But in the first meeting of the legislative session this week, lawmakers voted against doing so. And the Trump administration has frozen child care funding in several states amid allegations of fraud in Minnesota, but Gov. Kelly Ayotte told child care provide...