AROUND NEW HAMPSHIRE
1. Some Impacts in NH of Climate Change
Climate Change on the Table: Impacts on Agriculture, Local Food and Vulnerable Communities
by NH Labor News, nhlabornews.com, November 23, 2015
CONCORD, NH – A gathering of New Hampshire groups, experts, and businesses discussed the agriculture and farming challenges from extreme weather events, invasive plants, and other climate impacts. Impacts seen in the farming community and from consumers were presented with special emphasis on more vulnerable communities in the state who experience food access hardships. Lastly, Jane Presby, owner of Dimond Hill Farm in Concord, gave a tour of the farm to point out examples of impacts around her farm (pictures attached).
NASA scientists have reported that 2015 is expected to be the hottest year on record[1]. The summer, the months of October and September were hotter than any other on record. What does it mean to increase the world temperature by a half of a degree? We all have heard about the dire predictions for moose, public health, and extreme weather events. But we have not heard much about the ways climate changes will impact the food at the table and the availability of food.
Impacts on the farm: Jane Presby, Dimond Hill Farm , Concord, NH
“Climate change is creating new challenges for the sustainability of food production in our region, our country, and our world,” said Jane Presby of Dimond Hill Farm. “Education is fundamental to understanding these changes and to becoming conscious consumers.”
Jane Presby, owner of the Dimond Hill Farm in Concord, NH, calls her farm “icon of times gone by and a beacon for the resurgence of small farms and locally grown meat, dairy and vegetable products that is sweeping New Hampshire and the region.” Dimond Hill Farm is a 7th generation 150-acre farm that grows and sells vegetables from the farm stand located in the big yellow barn a hill overlooking Concord.
Jane prioritizes a variety of techniques to address climate vulnerabilities to still produce healthy crop yields, like invasive insects or plants; unusual early frosts or high temperatures; and unpredictable rainy or drought conditions. She uses greenhouses to control watering and temperature conditions for the vegetables to adjust to the less predictable shifting climate trends. Despite here best efforts and planning, Jane and her crew still can’t predict everything. This year the traditional expected rains did not come in April and she completely lost her bean crop. No beans were grown and none were sold this year. She plans to expand her greenhouses in the coming years.
Jane encourages everyone to visit their local farm to meet the farmers and shop at the farm stand to get their food. Not only does it give you the freshest fruits, meats, and vegetables, you can see where your food comes from and help our local economy become stronger and independent. You can find Dimond Hill Farm on Route 202/9 between Concord and Hopkinton, NH or online at http://dimondhillfarm.com/.
Impacts in New Hampshire and the Northeast: Erin Lane, USDA Northeast Climate Hub
“In our synthesis of assessed vulnerabilities in northeastern agriculture and forestry, we found that perennial crops such as tree fruit are among the region’s most vulnerable products,” said Erin Lane, Director for Partnerships with the USDA Northeast Climate Hub. “When an extended warm period causes premature leaf-out or bloom, and is followed by hard frost, crop losses can be high. Other top threats to northeastern agriculture include extreme precipitation, drought, and pests. On the flip side, a longer growing season could provide opportunities in the northeast. Adaptation can mean both adjusting to and taking advantage of variable weather conditions. Some strategies include promoting soil health, protecting our farm systems from the extremes, and using weather data to support practical decision-making.”
New Hampshire is home to the US Department of Agriculture’s Northeast Climate Hub. The Climate Hub mission from its website is:
“to develop and deliver science-based, region-specific information and technologies, with USDA agencies and partners, to agricultural and natural resource managers that enable climate-informed decision-making, and to provide access to assistance to implement those decisions. This is in alignment with the USDA mission to provide leadership on food, agriculture, natural resources, rural development, nutrition, and related issues based on sound public policy, the best available science, and efficient management.”
The Northeast Climate Hub region includes Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia and D.C. In June 2015, the Northeast Hub released the Northeast and Northern Forests Regional Climate Hub Assessment of Climate Change Vulnerability and Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies to provide a greater understanding about the climate shifting and the trends developing from the shifts. They found in New Hampshire three main trends affecting farmers:
- Frosts after early spring hurt perennial crops. When an extended warm period causes premature leaf-out or bloom, and is followed by hard frost, crop losses can be high (which is what happened with apples in NH in 2012).
- Extreme precipitation and wet springs are delaying planting and harvesting dates, causing flooding and soil compaction, damaging crop quality, and reducing vegetable yields.
- Warmer temperatures on average cause more heat stress in livestock.
Dairy constitutes the most important agricultural activity in the Northeast, especially in New Hampshire, New York, Pennsylvania, and Vermont where milk is the leading agricultural commodity. Given the economic importance of dairy to agriculture in the Northeast, the vulnerability of the industry is significant. Warming daytime and nighttime temperatures, as are projected to occur during summer, will likely have adverse effects on milk production. Heat stress also causes lower birthing rates and feed intake, again impacting milk production.
- A rise in minimum temperatures affect crop growth cycles causing earlier leaf out and flowering, longer growing seasons, and later senescence, which may result in increases in production for heat tolerant crops and woody perennials but, shorter growing seasons for cool weather crops (e.g. potatoes, lettuce, broccoli, and cabbage). Maple syrup season is coming earlier and is shorter. Weeds, pests and diseases are intensifying as ranges move northward.
Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies:
- Promote soil health using practices that protect soils from erosion (cover cropping and reducing tillage) while improving productivity and resilience to drought or extreme moisture.
- Protect from extremes with hoop and high tunnel houses, ventilation systems, riparian buffers, expanded irrigation, and the shifting of production zones away from flood- and frost-prone areas.
- Decision support tools provide better information faster to help managers improve practices such as: integrating pest management, shifting planting dates, adjusting feeding management, identifying and selecting better adapted varieties, breeds and cultivars.
- Increase carbon sequestration and reduce greenhouse gas emission by retiring organic soils from cultivation and restoring forested wetlands, as well as improving manure management.
Impacts on the Most Vulnerable: Jessica Carson, Carsey School of Public Policy
“Recent estimates show that one in ten Granite Staters are food insecure, meaning that about 132,000 of our families, friends, and neighbors do not have access to enough food for an active, healthy lifestyle,” stated Jessica Carson, a Vulnerable Families Research Scientist at the Carsey School of Public Policy. “Households in poverty, headed by a person of color, with children, or in rural places are especially likely to be at risk for food insecurity, with nutritious foods often being less accessible and/or affordable for these groups. While the formal food safety net—food stamps, food pantries, school meals programs—go a long way, it is important to consider ways to continue improving the reach and efficacy of these programs to alleviate food insecurity.”
Research shows that one in ten New Hampshire households experienced food insecurity in the period between 2012 and 2014, meaning that 52,000 Granite State households did not have consistent access to enough nutritious food to maintain a healthy and active life. Risks for food insecurity are not uniform across the state. Households with children, headed by a female householder, headed by a black or Hispanic householder, in a rural community, or living below 200% of the federal poverty line are especially vulnerable.
Whether people can afford food is a critical factor in food security, but a second key element is the availability of food, a particularly important issue for rural Granite Staters. That is, where population density is low, the availability of traditional food sources like grocery stores, convenience stores, and farmers markets are likely sparse, as are food safety net resources, like food pantries and food service programs. Research from the Carsey School of Public Policy shows that communities with the lowest risk for food insecurity are clustered in the Southeastern part of the state (e.g., Merrimack-Bedford area and the Portsmouth-Rye area), while some of the highest-risk areas include some of our most rural communities, like the Northwestern parts of Coös County (e.g., Stratford, Northumberland) and parts of Western NH (Claremont-Newport area). While some of our bigger cities, like Manchester and Nashua, have high poverty rates, their high population density means that grocery stores and food safety net resources are more readily available.
Indeed, food safety net resources like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as food stamps), free and reduced price school meals, and food pantries can be important resources for Granite Staters in need. However, it’s important to always consider how these kinds of resources might be more effective. For instance, among those who do receive SNAP benefits, New Hampshire’s average benefits are among the lowest in the nation, inadequate for meeting food costs even for the USDA’s thriftiest meal plan. In addition, there is a disconnect between those who are eligible and those who actually participate in many programs. Only one-in-three poor seniors receive SNAP benefits, and only 52 percent of eligible households participate in the School Breakfast Program. Intensifying community outreach to increase awareness, guiding eligible persons through the enrollment process, and working to ensure programs are delivered in useful and convenient ways may all increase efficacy of the food safety net.
Section on State-Wide Efforts with NH Food Alliance: Jennifer Wilhelm, NH Food Alliance
“Local efforts are underway to improve the connection between our local farmers, producers, and consumers so that products can reach markets effectively and profitably,” said NH Food Alliance researcher Jennifer Wilhelm. “One goal of NH Food Alliance is to increase food access to help address hunger in New Hampshire. The Granite State Market Match program opened the door for SNAP recipients to redeem credits at local farmers markets across the state. Another goal is to help food producers to support local farmers, like the relationship between LaBelle Winery in Amherst, NH and Aylison’s Orchard in Walpole, NH.”
The NH Food Alliance is a growing network of people working together to build a food system that is good for people, businesses, communities, and the environment. Together with a diversity of stakeholders from all sectors of the food system, the NH Food Alliance is working to connect the good work already underway, and to advance Farm, Fish, and Food Enterprise Viability in New Hampshire.
NH Food Alliance is supporting and building the network of food system professionals, organizations, and businesses working within New Hampshire. By shining a light on successes, sharing information, and promoting learning innovation and great ideas can multiply across the state. We also make new connections between groups and individuals, generate new information and research, and coordinate advocacy around issues.
There are several great examples of work being done that supports enterprise viability and market development, improving both food access and increasing income for businesses.
- Granite State Market Match program for SNAP recipients
- Three River Farmers Alliance
- Local businesses buying local food: Throwback Brewery, LaBelle Winery, Concord Hospital
By working together to rethink our local food system, we not only support food entrepreneurs, but also improve food access for all New Hampshire residents, and reduce the distance food travels to our plates. NH Food Alliance information and reports can be found at http://www.nhfoodalliance.
Individual Action: Catherine Corkery, NH Sierra Club
“New Hampshire is not immune to the impacts of climate – though at times the worst of the worst happens far from our communities. The effects of climate do not take holidays off; rather, during the holidays it amplifies the hardship,” stated Catherine Corkery of New Hampshire Sierra Club. “Supporting local farms, fisheries, and food producers creates demand for their products which promotes local solutions to climate impacts and hunger.”
Climate research shows that the most vulnerable in our society will be often last to adapt and most severely burdened so it comes to bear in New Hampshire. With humility and generosity, deliberate action can help address local hunger and climate by promoting our local farms.
Our communities benefit by having farms nearby as open space, as local producers, and as economic drivers. We need farms for many more reasons. As the farmers attempt to address progressively less predictable weather, the cycle of crop failures and adaptation increase instability. When farmers are unable to grow their food efficiently, higher demand pushes food prices higher. More unsold food is left on the shelves resulting in hunger to those unable to buy food and hardship to the farmers who cannot sell their produce. Less viable farms mean fewer farms.
Another example of climate change impacting our local food and economy is the shrimp industry. The Gulf of Maine has warmed pretty steadily since 2004 with 2012 a record warm year at all depths. Though there has been some variability the overall trend has been a warming one for a decade or more now. A report prepared by the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission’s Northern Shrimp Technical Committee in October 2014 details the climate changes and harvesting trends.
The Northern shrimp industry was a $12 million dollar industry on average for the Gulf of Maine fisheries. The importance of the shrimp harvest cannot be overstated as shrimp fishing occurred during the winter months after lobstering decreases profitability. This winter will be the second year in a row for total closure. And the two previous seasons 2012 and 2013 were very bad as well causing the complete closure.
An incomplete list of suggestions to address hunger and climate at once is included.
Things You Can Do To Help Address Hunger as Climate Action
Please consider these alternatives regularly as good practice or in times of need:
1. Shop at your local farms and farmers markets for the freshest vegetables, meats, and fruits. Most NH farmers markets accept SNAP coupons.
2. Try a CSA subscription – Community Supported Agriculture programs provide weekly fresh food deliveries for you and your family while giving the farmer the security of regular clientele. There are often easy payment programs and you get a ton of food every week. Learn more about CSAs in NH at the NH Department of Agriculture, http://agriculture.nh.gov/
3. Eat seasonally – by eating foods in season in your area, you can reduce costs, like costs associated with transportation and environmental impacts.
4. Find resources at the NH Food Bank: http://www.nhfoodbank.
5. Try something new – sometimes an unfamiliar local vegetable or fish can be cheaper and delicious.
6. Grow a garden – no matter how small or large, in containers or in the front yard. You can eat what you grow, share with your neighbors, or bring it to your local soup kitchen.
7. Cook all your food for one week or whole month to improve nutritional value and lower costs.
8. Reduce the uneaten or spoiled produce by buying only what you need.
9. Community Meals at local churches, granges and community centers is a great way to lower costs and meet your neighbors.
To help those in need
1. Host a Food Drive: at work, in your neighborhood, at church, at school, at the hockey game.
2. The New Hampshire Food Bank needs volunteers year round. Hunger knows no boundaries and can hide in plain sight.
3. Donate items to the food bank, soup kitchen, local programs, and other service groups. http://www.nhfoodbank.
4. Volunteer your time with food programs for people in your town, like school children, homelessness, and the elderly.
5. One on One: carpool grocery runs with an elderly person, refugee family, or a busy neighbor; plan a neighborhood cooking group to explore and share cooking experiences.
6. Grow a garden – no matter how small or large, in containers or in the front yard. You can eat what you grow, share with your neighbors, or bring it to your local soup kitchen.
2. Repealing Mandatory Minimum Sentences?
END MANDATORY MINIMUM SENTENCES?
by LFDA Highlights, lfda.org, November 23, 2015
The House Criminal Justice and Public Safety Committee is recommending that New Hampshire end some mandatory minimum sentences.
The bill, HB 605, was originally written to repeal mandatory minimums for a wide array of crimes. The Committee amended the bill to focus on two kinds of offenses.
First, HB 605 would remove the mandatory minimum sentence for individuals possessing a firearm who have been previously convicted of three or more felonies. Second, the bill would remove the mandatory minimum sentence for driving with a suspended or revoked license.
Supporters of mandatory minimums argue that they make sentencing more consistent and fair for offenders. Supporters also argue that mandatory minimum sentences deter offenders.
Opponents of mandatory minimums argue that the “one size fits all” approach prevents judges from tailoring sentences to the circumstances of each crime. As a result, jails become overcrowded with nonviolent and first-time offenders.
3. NH's Housing Shortage Affects Seniors Too
NH housing market puts squeeze on seniors
by Dave Solomon, unionleader.com, November 21, 2015
LONDONDERRY -- At 89, Flo Sylva seems to have a lot more living to do. She's fiercely independent, sharp as a tack, active in her community and desperately in need of housing she can afford on her sole source of income, a monthly Social Security check.
She represents a growing number of New Hampshire's oldest residents who find themselves caught in the middle of a housing market that is poorly suited for aging seniors who can still take care of themselves.
Often living on a single income, they can't afford market rents or mortgages, but are too healthy to qualify for a Medicaid-funded nursing home bed. Many end up living with their adult children, which often isn't the optimal situation for either generation; or worse, they live in substandard housing that eats up most of their income.
And the trend is heading in the wrong direction, as aging baby boomers swell the ranks of the retired, while funding for senior housing is declining. The problem is particularly severe in New Hampshire, which has a large elderly population and high housing costs as a percentage of median income.
"There is a real challenge for people who are on fixed incomes, lower incomes, but who don't really need nursing home-level care," said Dean Christon, executive director of the New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority. "As the number of seniors in the state continues to grow, that's going to become more and more of a concern."
Many seniors in New Hampshire are able to retire comfortably, as evidenced by the popularity of market-rate 55-plus communities and assisted living apartments, but Sylva has become an unofficial spokesman for those who can't, at least in her home community of Londonderry.
She's been on the board of the Elder Affairs Committee in town for the past eight years, much of it spent trying to get some subsidized senior apartments built in her town. When the hosts of a national housing summit held at St. Anselm College last month came to the Londonderry Senior Center in search of someone to speak on behalf of seniors, Sylva volunteered.
"I'm known for my big mouth," she said with a broad grin. "So I was willing to do it."?
Long waiting lists
There are about 14,000 apartments across the state that are either in public housing projects built for seniors when such programs existed, or are now eligible for rental assistance that caps costs at 30 percent of income, according to the state Housing Finance Authority.
Another 8,000 elderly housing units have their rent tied to local median income because they were built by developers who applied for and were granted federal tax credits to help finance construction.
That may sound like a sufficient number, but according to Christon, the waiting lists are long.
"It's hard to measure perfectly because each project maintains its own waiting list, so there is no central repository," he said, "but I would say in general the number of people on waiting lists is at least twice the number of units that are available."
Sylva has been on three different waiting lists in the past five years. In the meantime she struggles to make the rent on the lot and other expenses needed to maintain the mobile home she's lived in for the past 12 years.
"It's getting so I just can't do it,"? she said, "the rent, the utilities, keeping a car on the road. It (a subsidized unit) is the only thing I could afford, unless I pitch a tent."?
Like many seniors in her situation, Sylva says she is occasionally pressured by well-meaning family to go into a nursing home. "They're ready to put me away, but I'm not going," she said, adding with characteristic humor, "I don't want to share a bedroom. Unless it's with a man, I'm not interested."
Projects planned
Most of Sylva's applications have been in nearby Derry, which has four elderly housing projects -- Abbot House, Derry Meadows, Nutfield Heights and Pillsbury Square.
Earlier this month, Atkinson developer Steven Lewis broke ground on a 39-unit elderly housing complex on Chandler Avenue in Plais-tow, funded through the tax-credit program. Many of those on hand for the groundbreaking, including Senate President Chuck Morse, R-Salem, stressed the need for more such projects.
"The reality of this is, it's sorely needed," he said.
Sylva's focus has been on helping Lewis get a similar project built in Londonderry, which has done more than many towns to attract workforce housing, but still has no subsidized elderly units.
Lewis is hoping to build on town-owned land at a cleaned-up brownfield site on Sanborn Road near the Londonderry Senior Center, according to Catherine Blash, senior affairs director for the town.
Londonderry has market-based senior communities, like the Grand Estates on Golen Drive scheduled to open next summer, but the cost is out of reach for many, said Blash. "They tout that as affordable, and yes it could be for some," she said, "but you have another group of people who can't afford $1,300 for a one-bedroom."
The average monthly Social Security benefit is $1,335, according to the Social Security Administration.
Keeping hope alive
Sylva, who's outlived her husband by more than 40 years, isn't looking for a handout, just some help. She's worked many jobs over her lifetime, including egg candler (someone who tests the freshness of eggs by holding them between the eye and a lighted candle), eventually retiring after 12 years as a night-shift nurse's aide at Tewksbury (Mass.) Hospital.
"I've been trying to pack in case I get called. My house is, like, boxes everywhere," she said, her voice starting to crack. "If I cry, just ignore me. I get very sensitive about this kind of thing. I know it's tough all around."
According to Christon, many people are in the same situation as Sylva (who turns 90 in May), facing long waits. "We are not losing units, but we are not able to grow the program to meet increasing demand," he said, "which means wait periods are going to get longer."
The best advice to baby boomers winding their way to retirement with no guaranteed pensions and underfunded 401(k) plans is to start saving.
"Congress is reluctant to increase spending on housing programs," said Christon. "It's part of the broader concern about federal spending and the cost of domestic programs. The reality is, we need more resources if we are going to reduce these waiting times, and it does not appear that there is a high probability that that's going to happen any time soon."
She represents a growing number of New Hampshire's oldest residents who find themselves caught in the middle of a housing market that is poorly suited for aging seniors who can still take care of themselves.
Often living on a single income, they can't afford market rents or mortgages, but are too healthy to qualify for a Medicaid-funded nursing home bed. Many end up living with their adult children, which often isn't the optimal situation for either generation; or worse, they live in substandard housing that eats up most of their income.
And the trend is heading in the wrong direction, as aging baby boomers swell the ranks of the retired, while funding for senior housing is declining. The problem is particularly severe in New Hampshire, which has a large elderly population and high housing costs as a percentage of median income.
"There is a real challenge for people who are on fixed incomes, lower incomes, but who don't really need nursing home-level care," said Dean Christon, executive director of the New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority. "As the number of seniors in the state continues to grow, that's going to become more and more of a concern."
Many seniors in New Hampshire are able to retire comfortably, as evidenced by the popularity of market-rate 55-plus communities and assisted living apartments, but Sylva has become an unofficial spokesman for those who can't, at least in her home community of Londonderry.
She's been on the board of the Elder Affairs Committee in town for the past eight years, much of it spent trying to get some subsidized senior apartments built in her town. When the hosts of a national housing summit held at St. Anselm College last month came to the Londonderry Senior Center in search of someone to speak on behalf of seniors, Sylva volunteered.
"I'm known for my big mouth," she said with a broad grin. "So I was willing to do it."?
Long waiting lists
There are about 14,000 apartments across the state that are either in public housing projects built for seniors when such programs existed, or are now eligible for rental assistance that caps costs at 30 percent of income, according to the state Housing Finance Authority.
Another 8,000 elderly housing units have their rent tied to local median income because they were built by developers who applied for and were granted federal tax credits to help finance construction.
That may sound like a sufficient number, but according to Christon, the waiting lists are long.
"It's hard to measure perfectly because each project maintains its own waiting list, so there is no central repository," he said, "but I would say in general the number of people on waiting lists is at least twice the number of units that are available."
Sylva has been on three different waiting lists in the past five years. In the meantime she struggles to make the rent on the lot and other expenses needed to maintain the mobile home she's lived in for the past 12 years.
"It's getting so I just can't do it,"? she said, "the rent, the utilities, keeping a car on the road. It (a subsidized unit) is the only thing I could afford, unless I pitch a tent."?
Like many seniors in her situation, Sylva says she is occasionally pressured by well-meaning family to go into a nursing home. "They're ready to put me away, but I'm not going," she said, adding with characteristic humor, "I don't want to share a bedroom. Unless it's with a man, I'm not interested."
Projects planned
Most of Sylva's applications have been in nearby Derry, which has four elderly housing projects -- Abbot House, Derry Meadows, Nutfield Heights and Pillsbury Square.
Earlier this month, Atkinson developer Steven Lewis broke ground on a 39-unit elderly housing complex on Chandler Avenue in Plais-tow, funded through the tax-credit program. Many of those on hand for the groundbreaking, including Senate President Chuck Morse, R-Salem, stressed the need for more such projects.
"The reality of this is, it's sorely needed," he said.
Sylva's focus has been on helping Lewis get a similar project built in Londonderry, which has done more than many towns to attract workforce housing, but still has no subsidized elderly units.
Lewis is hoping to build on town-owned land at a cleaned-up brownfield site on Sanborn Road near the Londonderry Senior Center, according to Catherine Blash, senior affairs director for the town.
Londonderry has market-based senior communities, like the Grand Estates on Golen Drive scheduled to open next summer, but the cost is out of reach for many, said Blash. "They tout that as affordable, and yes it could be for some," she said, "but you have another group of people who can't afford $1,300 for a one-bedroom."
The average monthly Social Security benefit is $1,335, according to the Social Security Administration.
Keeping hope alive
Sylva, who's outlived her husband by more than 40 years, isn't looking for a handout, just some help. She's worked many jobs over her lifetime, including egg candler (someone who tests the freshness of eggs by holding them between the eye and a lighted candle), eventually retiring after 12 years as a night-shift nurse's aide at Tewksbury (Mass.) Hospital.
"I've been trying to pack in case I get called. My house is, like, boxes everywhere," she said, her voice starting to crack. "If I cry, just ignore me. I get very sensitive about this kind of thing. I know it's tough all around."
According to Christon, many people are in the same situation as Sylva (who turns 90 in May), facing long waits. "We are not losing units, but we are not able to grow the program to meet increasing demand," he said, "which means wait periods are going to get longer."
The best advice to baby boomers winding their way to retirement with no guaranteed pensions and underfunded 401(k) plans is to start saving.
"Congress is reluctant to increase spending on housing programs," said Christon. "It's part of the broader concern about federal spending and the cost of domestic programs. The reality is, we need more resources if we are going to reduce these waiting times, and it does not appear that there is a high probability that that's going to happen any time soon."
4. The Monthly Housing Report
Another Report Shows Strength In October Home Sales
by Brady Carlson, nhpr.org, November 23, 2015
Another set of housing data shows a rise in New Hampshire home sales in October. The latest New England Housing Report from RE/MAX INTEGRA showed there were 1,979 home sales in the state last month.
That number was more than 8 percent higher than the 1,819 sold in October 2014.
Median home prices also rose by 2.7 percent, to $225,000 dollars.
The report found that the housing market is showing signs of slowing for the year, but remains stronger than it was at this point a year ago.
5. An Ayotte Pretzel
CNN’s John King Reports On Kelly Ayotte’s Latest Political Contortions As She Tries To Undo Her Early Embrace Of Trump
by Mmiller, nhdp.org, November 23, 2015
Concord, N.H. — After Kelly Ayotte called Trump’s entrance into the presidential race a “positive development” and even met privately with Trump in New Hampshire following his announcement, CNN’s John King reports that Ayotte is now politically contorting herself once again to try to undo her early embrace of Trump.
According to King, an “increasingly anxious” Kelly Ayotte now fears that Donald Trump carrying the banner for the Republican party into next year’s election would spell doom for her own campaign. King added that “there’s an effort underway by key Ayotte allies to press GOP activists in the state who back Trump to apply the all politics is local rule and perhaps think again.”
Despite Ayotte’s recent political posturing, when it comes to actual policy positions Ayotte and Trump have a lot in common. NH1’s Kevin Landrigan reported, “Candidate for Senate Kelly Ayotte back in 2010 offered her support for amending the Constitution to get rid of birthright citizenship,” years before Donald Trump came under fire for advocating the very same position.
“Once again, Kelly Ayotte is resorting to blatantly political contortions to try to save her political career as she tries to undo the damage she caused by helping lend legitimacy to Trump’s campaign,” said New Hampshire Democratic Party Chair Ray Buckley. “It’s no surprise that Ayotte is now trying to run away from her early embrace of Trump and their shared position on ending birthright citizenship. This is just another example of Kelly Ayotte doing and saying anything to rewrite her record and save her own political career.”
AND NATIONALLY
6. The Existing Steps for Refugee Entry
https://www.whitehouse.gov/
Infographic: The Screening Process for Refugee Entry into the United States
by Amy Pope, whitehouse.gov, November 20, 2015
Summary:
A step-by-step guide to the rigorous process for refugee entry into the U.S.
Refugees undergo more rigorous screening than anyone else we allow into the United States. Here's what the screening process looks like for them:
7. Demographic Fundamentals
I’ve seen America’s future – and it’s not Republican
by Stan Greenberg, theguardian.com, November 5, 2015
Given the kind of things the Republican presidential candidates have been saying every day for weeks now, you might reasonably conclude that US politics is stuck not just in another decade, but in a previous century. Ben Carson thinks Obamacare is “the worst thing that has happened in this nation since slavery”. To boost an argument against gun control Carson also said thatHitler would have killed fewer Jews in the Holocaust “if the people had been armed”. Donald Trump, meanwhile, would expel 12 million undocumented migrants because so many are “criminals, murderers and rapists”. Carly Fiorina asserts that “every single policy” Hillary Clinton espouses, including paid family leave and equal pay for women, “has been demonstrably bad for women”.
This Republican race to the political bottom is happening because America’s conservatives are losing the culture wars. The US is now beyond the electoral tipping point, driven by a new progressive majority in the electorate: racial minorities (black and Hispanic) plus single women, millennials (born between 1982 and 2000) and secular voters together formed 51% of the electorate in 2012; and will reach a politically critical 63% next year.
And each of these groups is giving Clinton, or whoever emerges as the Democratic candidate for the 2016 White House race, at least a two-to-one advantage over a Republican party whose brand has been badly tarnished.
The country today, particularly the bigger urban centres, is being dramatically remade by the hi-tech, internet, big data and energy revolutions. Just as important are the revolutions in migration, the family, gender roles and religion. Together these revolutions are producing seismic and accelerating changes to the economy, culture and politics – which is what animates so many Republican candidates. America is emerging as racially blended, immigrant, multinational, multicultural and multilingual – a diversity that is ever more central to its political identity. We are not talking here about trends, but profound demographic changes accompanied by a dramatic shift in values. They have produced a country where racial minorities form 38% of the population, and 15% of new marriages are interracial. One in five global migrants end up in the US, and thus nearly 40% of the populations of New York and Los Angeles are foreign born, as are 50% of Silicon Valley’s engineers and more than half of US Nobel laureates.
Since 2011 a majority of Americans have been living in unmarried households, and a diversity of family types – from same-sex marriages and cohabitation to remarriage after divorce, delayed child-rearing, childlessness and those who never marry – is now accepted. Millennials are in fact marrying later and having few children, while working class women are avoiding marriage with working class men who are no longer assured of secure, decent-paying manufacturing jobs. With the traditional male breadwinner role nearly extinct, three-quarters of women are now in the labour force and two-thirds are the principal or joint breadwinner. The result: single women will form a quarter of the electorate in 2016. Religious observance meanwhile has plummeted across all religious denominations, with the exception of white evangelicals. People who define themselves as secular now outnumber mainline Protestants.
The political landscape is also being reshaped by a reversal of the historic pattern of mobility and home ownership. The middle class ladder used to take every generation and new wave of immigrants from city centres to suburbs to theexurbs. But in the past decade cities, with their falling crime rates, have attracted more people – particularly retiring baby boomers – than suburbs, and real estate values in metropolitan areas have risen faster than elsewhere and created more jobs. At the same time, only half of millennials have a driver’s licence, the right of passage for prior generations.
Not only are baby boomers now outnumbered by millennials – but also the groups could not be more different: 66% of boomers are married, 72% are white and their income is $13,904 above the national median; over 40% of millennials are racial minorities, 60% are single and three-quarters believe America’s diversity of race, ethnicity and language makes the country stronger.
All this social disruption has taken place at remarkable speed: the political centre of gravity has in effect swung from right to centre in under a decade. When Barack Obama first ran for the White House in 2008, 46% of Americans described themselves as conservative, but that has fallen to 37% now. In some national polls, the number of American liberals equals the number of conservatives. Gallup marked 2015 as the year when cultural attitudes reached a significant benchmark: when 60-70% of the country said gay and lesbian relations, having a baby outside marriage or sex between unmarried women and men were all “morally acceptable”.
The shift marked by these polls reflects the new American majority and explains why next year’s election will prove shattering and divisive for the Republican party, even if it retains its strongholds in the House of Representatives and states.
It also explains why, since 2004, Republicanshave been engaged in a ferocious counter-revolution to stop these new and expanding demographic groups from coalescing to form a politically coherent bloc capable of governing successfully. The tactic adopted by Karl Rove, George W Bush’s election strategist, and other social conservatives was to forsake “big tent Republicanism” and the swing voter. Instead of an earlier emphasis on “compassion” or the “Latino vote”, they made politics a battle for social and cultural values – “American values” – that would raise the stakes and engage those who leaned furthest to the right, particularly evangelicals and the religiously observant. Rove’s ambition was to create a permanent Republican majority, and he saw “moral” issues such as opposition to gay marriage as the most powerful force in politics. Indeed, he used them to galvanise enough support to get Bush re-elected in November 2004.
But the culture war ignited by Rove is a fire that requires ever more toxic fuel – it only works by raising fears of the moral and social Armageddon that would follow a Democratic victory.
The Republicans have, of course, won big numbers of seats at state level and inoff-year elections in the past decade. However, their conservative supporters, motivated by moral purpose, are now angry that Republican leaders have failed to stop Obama, particularly as the country, as they see it, tips into global and economic oblivion.
On the other hand, this intensifying battle for values has also left the Republicans with the oldest, most rural, most religiously observant, and most likely to be married white voters in the country. These trends have pushed states with large, growing metropolitan centres, such as Florida, Virginia and Colorado, over the blue Democratic wall, creating formidable odds against Republicans winning theelectoral college majority needed to win the presidency.
Encamped in the 20 states of the south, the Appalachian valley, parts of the plains states and Mountain West, conservatives have waged their culture wars to great effect. But those states account for only 25% of the voters. Success here turns Donald Trump, Ben Carson and Ted Cruz into plausible candidates – but not plausible presidents in a country that is past the new electoral tipping point. America will get to send that message 12 months from now.
8. A Rigged System and the Opportunities
Americans See a Government Of, By, and For the Rich
Democrats would be wise to adopt policies that help level the economic playing field.
by Harold Meyerson, prospect.org, November 20, 2015
At first glance—and second, and third—Americans look to be marching off in two diametrically opposed directions. On immigration, Democrats and Republicans could not have more contrasting views; cities, which have become distinctly progressive bastions, are enacting a host of liberal ordinances, while the substantial number of states under Republican rule are moving well to the right of the GOP orthodoxy of just five years ago; and the federal government, its power divided between the two parties, has frozen into inaction.
Most polling tends to confirm this view of the United States as a house divided. But a new survey of our compatriots’ beliefs from the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), which queried a far larger number of respondents than typical polls, has unearthed one area of remarkable agreement: Across party lines, Americans believe that our economic system is rigged to favor the wealthy and big corporations, and that our political system is, too—so much so that by nearly a 2-to-1 margin (64 percent to 36 percent), Americans believe their “vote does not matter because of the influence that wealthy individuals and big corporations have on the electoral process.”
To be sure, the PRRI survey shows that on a host of issues, the rift between Democrats and Republicans is huge. Asked whether immigrants strengthen or burden the nation, 63 percent of Democrats said “strengthen” while 66 percent of Republicans said “burden.”
But on economic questions, anti-corporate and more economically egalitarian sentiments have been rising in both parties. Fully 86 percent of respondents cited corporate offshoring of jobs as a major cause of the nation’s economic problems, up from 74 percent in 2012. Seventy-seven percent (including 67 percent of Republicans) said that corporations were not paying a fair share of their proceeds to their employees. Seventy-nine percent (including 63 percent of Republicans) said that our economic system unfairly favors the wealthy, up from 66 percent in 2012. Seventy-six percent of Americans, including 60 percent of Republicans, favor raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 per hour. Support for requiring employers to provide paid sick leave (85 percent) and parental leave (82 percent) is massive and bipartisan.
The federal government, in most Americans’ view, bolsters the economy’s unfairness. The highest level of bipartisan agreement in the survey came on particular questions of whose interests the government is looking out for. Ninety-three percent of Democrats and 88 percent of Republicans said it tended “very” or “somewhat well” to the interests of the wealthy; 90 percent of Democrats and 86 percent of Republicans said it did the same for big corporations. No such agreement is apparent, however, when respondents were asked about the government’s assistance to other groups and strata. Seventy-six percent of Democrats, for instance, said the government looked out for Christians, while only 51 percent of Republicans agreed. Just 32 percent of Democrats said the government looked out well for low-income Americans, while 61 percent of Republicans said it did. On a host of issues, white working-class Republicans made clear their conviction that government policies favor minority and immigrant interests over their own, and that the nation—its economy and its culture—has gone into decline as, and because, it has become more racially diverse.
It’s those beliefs that have driven a large share of the white working class into Donald Trump’s column rather than Senator Bernie Sanders’s, even though its members plainly agree with Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren’s perspective that the economy is rigged to favor the wealthy and big business. While the PRRI survey makes clear that there’s remarkably little support anywhere for what we might term the Chamber of Commerce’s agenda, years of talk radio, Fox News, and now the Trump campaign have tapped into and built a right-wing populism that focuses the white working class’s blame for its woes downward—at the racial other—rather than up.
Nonetheless, the political takeaway from the survey for Democrats in general, and Hillary Clinton in particular, is clear. To bolster their political credibility—not to mention to foster a more vibrant and equitable economy—they need not only to push to make taxes much more progressive and diminish the role of money in politics but also to alter corporate practices and structures so that workers again receive a fair share of the proceeds. That means bolstering the right to form unions and giving employees a major share in corporate governance and seats on corporate boards.
To paraphrase William Butler Yeats, most Americans believe this is no country foranyone but the rich. The only way Democrats can change that perception is to change that reality.
9. New Rules for the Economy
Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz - The Finance Industry Is Gobbling Up Money That Belongs in Our Pockets
by Amy Goodman, alternet.org, October 28, 2015
As presidential candidates spar over economic policies and Congress debates the TPP, one of the nation’s leading economists is calling for a comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. economy. Nobel Prize-winning economist and Columbia University professor Joseph Stiglitz has just published a new book called "Rewriting the Rules of the American Economy: An Agenda for Growth and Shared Prosperity."
On Saturday, leading Democratic presidential contenders addressed the Iowa Democratic Party gathering known as the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner. The high-profile party dinner has been a defining moment on the campaign calendar since ’75. This is former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
HILLARY CLINTON: There is something wrong when the top 25 hedge fund managers earn more in a year than all the kindergarten teachers in America combined, or when top CEOs make 300 times what a typical worker does, or when corporate profits soar but employees don’t share in those profits, when it’s easy for a big corporation to get a tax break, but it’s still too hard for a small business to get a loan.
AMY GOODMAN: Hillary Clinton. Well, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders also spoke in Iowa over the weekend, calling for a raise in the minimum wage.
SEN. BERNIE SANDERS: When you see the middle class of this country disappearing, and when you see people you know working two or three jobs trying to cobble together some income and some healthcare, you don’t just shrug your shoulders and say, "That’s the way it is." You fight to raise the minimum wage to a living wage.
AMY GOODMAN: Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, speaking at the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner in Iowa, which has become the bellwether of Democratic support.
Well, as presidential candidates spar over economic policies, one of the nation’s leading economists is calling for a comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. economy. Nobel Prize-winning economist, Columbia university professor Joseph Stiglitz has just published a new book; it’s called Rewriting the Rules of the American Economy: An Agenda for Growth and Shared Prosperity.
Joseph Stiglitz, it’s great to have you with us.
Below is an interview with Stiglitz, followed by a transcript:
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Nice to be here again.
AMY GOODMAN: Welcome to Democracy Now! Talk about these candidates and what they’re saying and what they actually do, what they support.
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Well, I think we’re in a new moment in America, because I think we’ve had a third of a century of a—you might call, an experiment, a grand experiment, where, beginning with Reagan, we said, "Let’s lower the tax rates on the top. Let’s rip away the regulations. We’re going to free up the American economy. We’re going to incentivize it. The result will be the economy will grow so much—yes, the top will get a larger share, but everybody is going to get a bigger piece, and so everybody is going to be better off." Well, we’ve had a third of a century of this experiment, and it has failed. It has failed miserably. The fact is, the bottom 90 percent have seen their incomes stagnate. Median income today is as low as it was a quarter-century ago. Talking about the minimum wage, minimum wage is the level, adjusted for inflation, it was 45, 50 years ago. You know, if an economy can’t deliver for most of its citizens, it’s a failed economy. What’s so striking is, we’ve had technological change, we’ve had globalization—all the things that were supposed the economy perform better—and in fact it’s performed worse.
So, what the two candidates are saying is really echoing, I think, the basic message of this book, which is, something is wrong with the rules of the economy. It’s not the American workers. They’re working hard. Productivity has continued to grow. What’s striking is how that pie is being shared, not fairly. And in fact, the distortions in the economy, that Hillary was talking about, have actually impeded, made the economy perform more poorly than it otherwise would. You take those CEOs getting 300 times the amount of the typical worker. When you’re taking the corporate income, giving so much to the top, obviously, you’re going to have less either to give to the people at the bottom or you’re going to have less to invest in the corporation. And actually, both of those are happening. So, weaker investment, more inequality, weaker wages, and then you get a vicious cycle going, so the economy isn’t performing as well as it should be.
AMY GOODMAN: Now, the candidates don’t actually agree. In fact, I think Hillary Clinton is getting rather nervous at the massive crowds that Bernie Sanders is drawing across the political spectrum. And so she has moved in on criticizing him. Speaking at that very same dinner, the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner Saturday, Hillary Clinton appeared to question Bernie Sanders’ electability.
HILLARY CLINTON: I know and you know it’s not enough just to rail against the Republicans or the billionaires. We actually have to win this election in order to rebuild the middle class and make a positive difference in people’s lives.
AMY GOODMAN: What is Bernie Sanders’ message? Why do you think it has resonated so strongly and actually, it seems like, forced Hillary Clinton to adopt some of the same language that he has been using?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Yeah, I think the point is the American people have figured out that this model hasn’t worked, you know, the model that began a third of a century ago. So, they’re angry, and they want a change.
AMY GOODMAN: A third of a century ago, this is very important. What? Like 35 years ago?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Exactly.
AMY GOODMAN: It’s addressed as some kind of natural phenomenon that we cannot get in the way of: We have to allow capitalism to work. You’re saying this is a very new invention that has written rules, and these rules should be changed?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Exactly. So, you know, take one example. Productivity of American workers has continued to grow pretty steadily. Historically, wages moved with productivity. You know, you do those two charts, they just move right together. Suddenly, around 1980, productivity continues to grow, but wages stagnate. This is really an unusual phenomenon. And that was one of the things that motivated writing the book. We said, "What’s going on?" And we said, what’s happened is, particularly in America, that we began to change the rules, rules of—labor rules, rules about the financial sector, rules about corporate governance, tax rules. You know, it wasn’t inevitable that you tax speculation at a lower rate than you tax people who are working for a living. That’s not inherent in a market economy. Actually, what we say is, this is a distortion of capitalism. This is a distortion of a market economy. And so—
AMY GOODMAN: What do you think most contributed to the inequality, in terms of the rules?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: I think, probably, if I had to say one thing—and I think it’s the whole package, but if one thing, it’s the financial sector. You know, the financial sector was about two-and-a-half percent of GDP. It went to as large as 8 percent of GDP. As it grew, you know, if it had led to the economy growing so much faster, you’d said, "Well, they’re getting their just desserts for helping all of us do better." But what they really were doing, you can’t see in the data at all—at all—any effect on economic growth. But what we do know is it led to this kind of greater volatility, the Great Recession of 2008, from which we still have not recovered. And what they were doing is figuring out how to seize a larger share of the national income pie in a whole variety of ways.
AMY GOODMAN: Where does the American labor movement fit into this?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Well, that’s another important piece, because, you know, you go back to the 1930s, we passed the Wagner Act, and the Wagner act said—made it easier for workers to bargain. What has happened in the last 35 years, we’ve made it more and more difficult for workers to bargain. Globalization has made that even more difficult, because you’re sitting there with 2 billion people around the world that have been brought into the labor market, and weakening the protection, strengthening the competition, inevitably has weakened the bargaining position of workers. And so you get results today, for instance, where America is almost unique among the advanced countries in not having family leave, sick leave. You know, we’re at the bottom. And, you know, to put another example, America has more inequality than any other of the advanced countries. Why is that? It’s because of the way we’ve written the rules. It’s a kind of choice that we’ve made. And one key part of that is the fact that unions have been made weaker.
AMY GOODMAN: Glass-Steagall?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Glass-
AMY GOODMAN: Explain what it is.
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: So, Glass-Steagall was—again, after the Great Depression, we divided the banks into two groups: the commercial banks, that take your deposits, ordinary people, supposed to give money to small businesses to help grow the economy; and then you had the investment banks, taking money from rich people, investing it in more speculative activities. And we had a big fight during the Clinton administration over whether we should eliminate that division. I strongly opposed it. And when was chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, it didn’t happen.
AMY GOODMAN: Under Clinton.
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Under Clinton. But then, instead—you know, Citibank wanted to bring together these various financial institutions, and—
AMY GOODMAN: Who surround Clinton.
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: And the result of that was that we repealed Glass-Steagall. And what I was worried about precisely happened. We wound up with bigger banks that became too big to fail. The culture of risk taking, that’s associated with the investment bank, spread to the whole banking system, and so all the banks became speculators, actually lending to small businesses lower than it was before the crisis. And the kinds of conflicts of interest that were rampant in the years before the Great Depression started to appear all over the place in our financial sector.
AMY GOODMAN: So Bernie Sanders has called for the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall. Hillary Clinton has not.
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Yeah, I hope that she will. But I think the fundamental issue here is, we have to tame the financial sector. And in our book, Rewriting the Rules, we describe how that can be done.
AMY GOODMAN: How, exactly?
JOSEPH STIGLITZ: Well, there are many things. Glass-Steagall is one approach that I’ve increasingly come to. We actually don’t talk about it in the book. There are some other ways that we do focus on, on things like curbing their excessive risk taking.
One of the important things that people haven’t realized is, every time they use their debit card, merchants pay a significant price for their use. It’s like a tax on every transaction. But it’s a tax that doesn’t go for public purpose; it goes to enrich the coffers of the credit card companies, the debit card companies. We were supposed to curtail the—one part of that in the debit card. It was called the Durbin Amendment to Dodd-Frank. But we delegated it to the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve’s staff recommended a fee—that I thought was excessive—and then the Federal Reserve doubled the fee that they had recommended. So, it’s much better than it was before Dodd-Frank, but it’s still a tax on every transaction, a tax that winds up being paid for by everybody who buys any good in our economy. So that’s an example of how you transfer money from ordinary individuals to the financial sector. And it’s one of the reasons why the financial sector is making so much money and the rest of us are paying the price.
One other example that President Obama has emphasized is, you know, people have savings accounts, a variety—IRAs. And the question is, when you put your money in an IRA, does the person who’s supposed to manage that have a fiduciary responsibility? That is to say, can he manage it for his own interest, turning it over and getting a lot of commission, or does he have a responsibility, a fiduciary responsibility, to manage it in your interest? Now, you would say, obviously, he should have that fiduciary responsibility. But the banks are resisting imposing that as a condition. And the result of not having that is that the banks are making billions and billions, tens of billions of dollars every year more than they otherwise would.
FINALLY
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