Concord
The training seminar, which was not mandatory, took place in response to rising awareness nationwide of sexual misconduct in the workplace, legislative leaders said. That includes the New Hampshire Legislature, where female lobbyists and legislators have reported using a “buddy system,” among other strategies, to deal with inappropriate comments and advances in the Statehouse.
“It tells me we’ve got a long way to go,” state Rep. Susan Almy, D-Lebanon, said of the low turnout after the meeting, which started at 8:30 a.m., was over.
Almy, who sat near the front of the hall for the roughly hourlong session, questioned why legislative leaders had scheduled the event so early and made attendance optional.
Paula Booth of the New Hampshire Employee Assistance program and Anne Edwards, an associate attorney general, gave a presentation outlining the New Hampshire General Court’s policies on sexual harassment. The talk included detailed examples and updates for the #MeToo era, where misconduct allegations nationwide have spurred previously silent people to speak and have inspired caution on the part of many powerful men.
Booth kicked things off by pointing out to the audience, a mix of male and female legislators, how much had changed over the course of her and their lifetimes.
Where once you could take a newborn home from the hospital in your arms, she said, now you can’t leave unless you have a proper car seat. So, too, have expectations changed with regard to sexual misconduct.
“That was then,” she said. “This is now.”
She and Edwards outlined different kinds of unacceptable behavior, from quid pro quo harassment to the creation of a hostile work environment.
Booth warned against retaliation for refusing advances or making a complaint. That kind of behavior could be subtle or overt — “See that broom closet down the hall? That’s your office,” she said as an example of such reprisal.
The pair also described the ways in which complainants may bring claims and what the process is for addressing them.
Edwards noted that in Hollywood, among other places rocked by waves of allegations against powerful people, some male executives have taken to avoiding social interactions with women out of caution.
“That’s not OK because that’s treating women differently,” Edwards said. “That’s a discriminatory act in and of itself. Where we need to get to is we’re treating everybody the same.”
The presenters ran through scenarios and quizzed lawmakers on appropriate responses, and then moved on to clarify what kinds of behavior are unacceptable in the digital age.
“I look forward to the day when I don’t have to say this anymore: If you are using a state-owned computer, you can’t download porn,” Booth said.
Near the end, Booth offered the legislators a general precept to go by: the “Grandmother Rule.”
“If you don’t want your grandmother to read it or hear it, don’t do it,” she said.
Afterward, House Chief of Staff Terry Pfaff said the training session was scheduled first thing in the morning because he thought more people would be able to come. Thanks to a packed legislative calendar that dotted the morning with committee meetings, including a handful at 9 a.m. and 10 a.m., the other option was to fit in the meeting at the very end of the day.
“We obviously wanted more,” he said of the session’s attendance.
Almy, the Lebanon Democrat, said in a Wednesday night phone interview that the time of the training made it difficult for many legislators to get into the city before the session was to begin. She said very few legislators manage to arrive until about 10 minutes before they start working, around 9:30 a.m. or 10 a.m.
“There are various reasons why turnout could have been suppressed,” Almy said, noting she herself was only able to attend because she spent the night before in Concord.
State Rep. Brian Sullivan, a newly elected Democrat from Grantham, said he was unable to be at the training session but cited his past experience providing sexual harassment training during his career working for the New Hampshire chapter of the National Education Association, a teachers union.
“Since I am relatively new to the N.H. House, I have not witnessed incidents of harassing behavior and am hopeful that such behavior is not common, but with a Legislature this large, I suspect that some members are perhaps not as enlightened as they should be in this area,” he said in an email. “Unfortunately, those who needed the training most are likely the ones who also chose not to attend.”
In addition to tales of uncomfortable work situations in the Legislature, recent reporting from statewide outlets revealed that only about three-quarters of the state’s 400 House members had turned in releases acknowledging that they had received and read the chamber’s policies on sexual harassment.
Dozens more submitted their forms after reports surfaced in November, bringing the total to 335 out of 392 on Dec. 1, according to WMUR-TV.
In the phone interview, Almy said that notice of the training was included in a Friday House calendar that was sent to representatives via email.
The meeting was described as training for legislators on the state General Court’s “policy on sexual and other unlawful harassment and discrimination.”
There was no mention of the training in the state Senate’s calendar. It appears the invitation was extended to senators on Tuesday, the day before the training was set to take place.
Almy said a link to a video of the training was emailed to House legislators after the session concluded for folks to watch on their own time.
She also said that she could not recall there having been such a training session held since the policy was drafted, sometime prior to the start of the Great Recession.
Legislators pointed to the current session’s heavy workload as a factor in Wednesday’s attendance.
“Unfortunately, we have a record number of bills for year 2 of a session,” state Rep. Steve Smith, a Charlestown Republican, said in an email. “I would have liked to attend, but I was already booked all day. I suspect many of my colleagues are in the same boat.”
House Speaker Gene Chandler, who was present at Wednesday morning’s training, noted the low turnout but said it was more reflective of legislators’ schedules than their attitudes toward the subject matter.
“Depending on how you look at it, you could say it percentage-wise was poor attendance,” he said.
Chandler, a Republican from Bartlett, N.H., said the time of day made it difficult for some lawmakers to come. These meetings are part of an “ongoing effort,” he said, and legislators will have more chances to educate themselves about sexual misconduct.
“We’ll just keep doing these things,” he said.
Rob Wolfe can be reached at rwolfe@vnews.com or 603-727-3242.