Governor Sununu vetoed House Bill 1166, legislation that would have provided enhanced unemployment relief for COVID-related reasons as well as valuable protections to workers as New Hampshire continues to open.
HB 1166 as amended would have suspended certain disqualifying conditions for those applying for unemployment compensation if they were in quarantine for COVID-19 or for other COVID-related reasons. It would have ended the 1-week waiting period for unemployment insurance and added language to protect New Hampshire from losing federal funding. Also included were protections for workers that are vital to avoiding spikes like we have seen in other states in coronavirus cases as we continue to re-open. In short, HB 1166 was all about getting people back to work in as safe a way as possible.
We had hoped that legislation aimed specifically at supporting our state’s workforce during a pandemic would have not fallen victim to the governor’s veto.
In his message the governor claimed that HB 1166 would have cost New Hampshire over $30 million in federal funding even though it was never a given that we would be out of compliance with federal regulations. In the off chance that this did happen, the bill contained explicit provisions that would have protected our federal funding.