CONCORD — Gov. Chris Sununu signed a bill Friday to streamline absentee voting during the coronavirus pandemic but vetoed other measures aimed at helping workers, children and nursing home residents.
While the Attorney General’s Office already had said voters concerned about the virus could cast absentee ballots this fall by indicating they have a “disability,” the new law creates a box to check that specifies the virus as the reason for not voting in person. Voters also will be able to use one application to receive absentee ballots for both the Sept. 8 state primary and Nov. 3 general election, and town officials will be able to begin processing ballots several days before the election.
Sununu rejected two other bills, calling one related to nursing homes and child care well-intentioned but redundant. The bill would have allocated $25 million in federal funding for long-term care facilities and $10 million for child care. But Sununu said $30 million already has been earmarked for long-term care, with additional money going to weekly stipends for workers. Another $25 million has gone to child care centers, though not to the scholarship program for low-income families that the bill would have funded.
Democrats criticized the veto, noting that the bill also would have created an independent review of long-term care facilities.
“These facilities need and deserve more support than they have received to date,” Rep. Lucy Weber, chair of the House Health, Human Services and Elderly Affairs Committee, said in a statement.
Sununu’s second veto message was harsher, calling the worker protection measure “a terribly written and poorly thought out bill that puts New Hampshire citizens at risk.”
The bill would have provided unpaid leave for those affected by the virus and waived insurance cost-sharing for testing and treatment of COVID-19. It also would have provided personal protective equipment to small businesses and used federal money to upgrade the state’s unemployment system computers. But it was the provisions related to unemployment benefits, including permanently waiving eligibility requirements for those citing the virus as a reason, that Sununu found particularly problematic. He said the provisions would have left the state out of compliance with federal law and jeopardized $30 million in federal funding.
“Our job is to open doors of opportunity in times of need, not cut off federal support when families are struggling,” he said in his veto message.
Supporters of the bill noted that it contained a clause that would have eliminated those provisions if the federal government found the state out of compliance.
Senate Majority Leader Dan Feltes, D-Concord, called the veto an attack on small businesses, worker safety and public health.
“Sununu continues to sweep our broken unemployment insurance system under the rug, opposes testing and health care for those impacted by COVID-19, and refuses to advance worker safety, including free PPE for small businesses,” he said in a statement.
Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine said experts were continuing to monitor a possible outbreak in the Manchester area that followed 59 people who tested positive for the virus after taking a type of test not considered to be as accurate as that used by the Health Department.
The Health Department has completed retesting 17 of the 59 individuals and two of those tests came back as confirmed cases of the virus that causes COVID-19.
After the 59 cases were reported, the Health Department and the Southwestern Vermont Medical Center from Bennington opened pop-up testing sites beginning Wednesday in Londonderry and Manchester for members of the community to try to determine if the virus had spread.
So far the laboratory has reported that all 405 tests that have been completed came back negative, although testing is continuing and positive tests are possible, Levine said.
“This is a good indication that these cases are not spreading within the community,” Levine said. “Remember, we know of two positive cases.”
The Health Department has reached all but 11 of the 59 people who tested positive. No links between the potential cases have been found.
The Vermont Department of Labor says the state’s unemployment rate dropped to 9.4% in June, down from 12.8% in May., though the highest reported rate was in an Upper Valley town.
The June unemployment rates for Vermont’s 17 labor market areas ranged from 7.1% in Newbury to 16.6% in Woodstock.
“Unemployment insurance claims continue to be elevated and are providing a more-timely picture of the economic hardship that many Vermonters are facing,” Labor Commissioner Michael Harrington said in a statement. “Until these claim numbers come down, the department will continue our expanded efforts to support claimants and job seekers with employers looking to hire.”
At least six substance abuse recovery homes have closed in New Hampshire since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, according to the state’s Democratic congressional delegation.
U.S. Sens. Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan and U.S. Reps. Annie Kuster and Chris Pappas wrote to congressional leaders Friday seeking increased funding for substance use disorder prevention, treatment and recovery programs in response to the coronavirus pandemic.
They said while drug overdose deaths were trending down in New Hampshire before the pandemic, preliminary data suggests an increase over the last few months. And while providers have been innovative in meeting the challenges posed by the pandemic, they are struggling financially, the group wrote.
As of Friday, 6,165 people had tested positive for the virus in New Hampshire, an increase of 21 from the previous day. The number of deaths stood at 395.
On Friday, the Vermont Health Department reported nine new positive cases of the virus that causes COVID-19, bringing the total since the pandemic began to more than 1,330.
It was unclear if the new case number included the two new cases confirmed as part of the possible Manchester outbreak.
The number of deaths from COVID-19 in Vermont remained at 56, where it has been for more than a month.
— Staff and wire reports