This article is a message from State Representative Matt Towne about Education Taxes.
Many of you know that we held an informational seminar regarding the education portion of property taxes in NH on October 6. The seminar, as I expected having seen it presented already once and having reviewed it many times again, was quite informative.
The gist of the information is that we cannot cut our school expenses to make the tax rate as low as some neighboring communities such as Portsmouth. We simply do not have and are unlikely to have, enough property value to allow that to happen.
One particularly important piece of this is that the NH constitution requires both that the state assumes responsibility for children’s education AND that the funding for that education be “proportional” meaning that all towns in the state pay the same rate. Neither of these constitutionally mandated responsibilities is being met by the State and thus the NH Judicial system has ruled three times that the State must comply.
It is roughly calculated that if the tax rate were proportionally applied, the tax rate statewide would be $12.12/thousand-dollar valuation. Clearly it is much higher than that here in Barrington and much lower than that in Portsmouth, Moultonborough and Alton.
This funding issue will be a continuing problem and I want to reiterate that it is NOT the school system being spendthrifts. To even come within a few dollars on our own here locally, we would have been willing to tolerate class sizes in the 60 per class range and elimination of sports, music, phys ed, school counseling and a host of other programs.
I have the presentation and if anyone wants it please email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. It is a large file so be aware that it might take a bit to download. Alternatively, I am willing to present it to any local group that wants it.
I want to make note of one item that is occurring over the past several weeks since the budget was passed. Governor Sununu is touring the state making a big splash in handing out giant checks for education to various communities. This is straight-up deceit. His budget had ZERO for increased education funding over the past 4 years. The Legislative budget is the one with the educational funding increases and even we fully acknowledge that we have a ways to go to make the town’s education funding complete. The Governor waited until the 11th hour to sign the budget to avoid a shutdown. He deserves no credit for the increased education funding no matter how he may spin it. Even the Union Leader called him out on this. I point this out so that you can use this information to inform your own choices going forward.
I will be happy to entertain any questions you may have at the above email. And, of course, as I have repeatedly stated, I am happy to meet with you in person over coffee somewhere locally.
NOTE: Follow the link to download the materials that were used at the October 6th, 2019 Town Hall meeting on Education Taxes in Barrington, New Hampshire.