3/20/26: Housing Matters Newsletter

Welcome back to our weekly newsletter!

We’ve had some long newsletters lately with dozens of bills on the House floor, so thank you for continuing to follow along!

Luckily, this week’s newsletter is short! It’s a relatively quiet week ahead for housing-related proposals, as the House and Senate address final legislative proposals with fiscal impact prior to the legislative crossover deadline on March 26th.

With the first half of the legislative session coming to a close, we published a legislative crossover memo recapping the last two and a half months and previewing what’s to come. The memo highlights key themes and the remaining legislative proposals.

As always, if you have questions about the legislation we mention in the newsletter or housing-related proposals that aren’t included, please don’t hesitate to reach out.

If you were forwarded this newsletter and would like to receive future updates, you can sign up here.

Best,

Nick Taylor

Executive Director

Housing Action NH

nick@housingactionnh.org

Housing Matters Zoom Recap

Thank you to Ariel Hayes at the Youth Success Project for joining us at our monthly Housing Matters Zoom meeting this morning, and for all the inspiring work the Youth Success Project is doing to address youth homelessness! If you missed the meeting, please take a moment to review their Youth Count Report and PhotoVoice Book.

If you aren’t registered for our monthly housing matters Zoom meeting, you can do so here.

State House Updates:

In The Committee Room

* As a reminder, the legislative office building is closed for renovations. All House committee meetings will be held at 1 Granite Place (South Building), Concord, NH. You can find directions and general information here. *

There are no relevant House or Senate Committee hearings next week.

State House Updates:

On The Floor

The next House session will be on Thursday, March 26th. There are no relevant housing-related proposals on the House floor next week

The next Senate session will be on Thursday, March 26th. There is one priority legislative proposal on the floor.

• House Bill 348 is on the Senate Consent Calendar for next week. As introduced, Housing Action NH strongly opposed this proposal because it would allow municipalities to impose strict documentation requirements on individuals seeking public assistance. These requirements would be difficult for individuals fleeing domestic violence and unhoused individuals to meet, leading to the denial of benefits that they are legally entitled to. As amended, HB 348 extends the initial granting of benefits to six days and, if there is a dispute among municipalities as to which one is required to fund the services, the municipalities must enter into a hearing process designed to resolve the disagreement. This is a significant improvement over the bill as introduced, but we still believe it is unnecessary and will lead to individuals being denied benefits they are legally entitled to due to documentation issues.

Floor Recap

The House and Senate did not meet for session last week.