2 weeks Ago
Child Advocate Cassandra Sanchez and leaders of the Housing Appeals Board made separate pleas Monday for their survival after a House-approved state budget proposal had recommended elimination of both. Leadership on the House Finance Committee said it considered the child advocate to be duplicative of the work that in-house inquiries made of the state Division of Children, Youth and Families by an ombudsman in the Department of Health and Human Services..
State Sen. Tim Lang, R-Sanbornton and a member of the Senate Finance Committee, asked Sanchez to identify a “unique” case that her staff does that HHS reviewers do not do. She pointed to Bledsoe Academy, a juvenile treatment facility in Gallatin, Tennessee.
Two years ago, Sanchez and an associate discovered two New Hampshire boys living there that she said had operated “on a culture of fear and intimidation.” A seven-page update in the summer of 2023 revealed that children had been forced to watch movies described as pornographic. Both New Hampshire boys said a female staffer in her 20s had a relationship with one of their peers and told colleagues, “She is mine.
” After the two New Hampshire boys met with state inspectors, a Bledsoe staff member threatened to beat up one of the boys and told associates, “A snitch is coming.” Two days before leaving Bledsoe, the boy said someone turned off the light when he was in the bathroom and entered the stall he was in, out of sight of cameras, and beat him. “Because of our advocacy, we got those kids returned to New Hampshire safely to a facility that is run well,” Sanchez said.
House budget writers concluded the Housing Appeals Board was run well but was costing taxpayers more than $10,000 a case when these matters cost just over $1,000 apiece in the court system. Elizabeth Menard, the board’s clerk and only employee, said, “A cost for case analysis does not demonstrate the value of the Housing Appeals Board.” Board Chairman David J.
Rogers said he worked in the court system for years as a lawyer and it takes much longer for appellants to get justice there than it does before the three-person Housing Appeals Board. “It’s longer by a factor of three to four months,” Rogers said. The courts can delay civil cases in favor of the criminal docket that is time sensitive while the appeals board gets every case done within five months, he added.
Senate Deputy Democratic Leader Cindy Rosenwald of Nashua maintained this is the worst time to get rid of the appeals board the Legislature created five years ago to give property owners and developers a more affordable, quicker option than filing a lawsuit. Since then, Menard said its decisions have affected nearly 2,750 housing units. “We are in the middle of a housing crisis,” Rosenwald said.
What's Next : The Senate Finance Committee has until mid-May to recommend its own version of the state budget Prospects : Every odd-numbered year a two-year spending plan is the only bill that has to pass, but it will require a lot of compromise between what Gov. Kelly Ayotte, the House and eventually the Senate will propose in competing plans. klandrigan@unionleader.
com.
