Zack Sheehan (00:00)

'Cause Rand already — like, Rand had a decision in the superior court in favor of the plaintiffs last year.

Liz Canada (00:06)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (00:07)

This is the state's appeal that we're talking about. It's, like, the big appeal—

Liz Canada (00:09)

Right. That's where we are now.

Zack Sheehan (00:11)

—heading to the Supreme Court.

Liz Canada (00:14)

And that Supreme Court's doing great right now, by the way. They're doing fantastic. No, no, no news—

Zack Sheehan (00:17)

Yeah, there's some—

Liz Canada (00:19)

—there.

Zack Sheehan (00:20)

Well,

Liz Canada (00:33)

You're listening to New Hampshire Has Issues, and I am your host, Liz Canada. Today's episode is absolutely jam-packed. Whether you know everything there is to know about school funding, or perhaps you feel like you have no idea where to even begin, this episode is for you. Zack's gonna walk us through from the beginning, back at the Claremont decisions. Maybe you've heard of them and maybe you haven't. All are welcome here. And he's gonna take us all the way to present day, quite literally.

And what this most recent legislature and this state administration is arguing for actively in court right now about public education. What they're trying to do, literally this moment. I made a z I made a joke to Zack that I hope the listener is making an apple crisp. So I felt compelled to offer you a recipe in the show notes, courtesy of my wife Molly, who makes our 13 year olds favorite apple crisp in the world.

Thank you, Molly. If you'd like to support this little podcast, New Hampshire has issues, please visit patreon dot com slash NH has issues and become a monthly supporter. All right, let's get right to it. Thank you for listening.

Liz Canada (01:49)

Zack, do you have a tagline for the episode today?

Zack Sheehan (01:51)

I think it's, like, the podcast that dares to ask: should our kids have a right to an education? Which is basically what the state is arguing.

Liz Canada (01:59)

I actually don't want people to answer that at this point. I just — I don't want to hear the answer. I'm sorry, listener.

Liz Canada (02:04)

It's been a long day. I don't want to hear it. That's my answer. Mine was: welcome to New Hampshire Has Issues, the podcast that dares to ask, is the state constitution just, like, a recommendation? Just—

Zack Sheehan (02:17)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (02:18)

—a—

Liz Canada (02:18)

Welcome back to the show, Zack Sheehan, executive director of the New Hampshire School Funding Fairness Project.

Zack Sheehan (02:24)

Yeah, thanks for having me back. It's fun to be one of the first guests and be back after more fun things are happening. I'm one of the last. It's—

Liz Canada (02:29)

One of the last.

Liz Canada (02:36)

I'm so glad you're here, because I feel like I've been talking about education a lot, actually, on the podcast, with the House Bill 1300 law going into effect, with the new question that's gonna be on the ballot this November. And, you know,

Liz Canada (02:51)

the boys are back in school. You and I talked about the boys last time. Now we have a high schooler and a middle schooler, apparently.

Zack Sheehan (02:57)

Ooh.

Liz Canada (02:57)

They keep growing up. That happens regularly, actually. So school is, like, top of mind, and you are my resident expert on all things school funding, and whether or not those things are fair, and what's happening right now in New Hampshire.

Liz Canada (03:16)

So let's jump into it. Simple question, Zack: how many court cases are we dealing with right now in New Hampshire when it comes to school funding? Ballpark.

Zack Sheehan (03:26)

Kind of actively, like, three. But they're—

Liz Canada (03:29)

Actively three. Okay.

Zack Sheehan (03:30)

—referencing a few more.

Liz Canada (03:33)

Boy. All right. Well—

Zack Sheehan (03:34)

So we'll see if we—

Zack Sheehan (03:35)

—can weave them all together in a coherent—

Liz Canada (03:38)

Great. And listener, if court cases aren't for you, just listen along. Just join us on this journey. Go, you know, make an apple crisp while you listen to this. It'll be a great time for everybody. Zack, where should we begin? What is the case we should begin with?

Zack Sheehan (03:55)

Yeah, I mean, I might go back to the Claremont cases, just to—

Liz Canada (03:59)

We're going way back now.

Zack Sheehan (04:01)

—lay those out a little bit. And to your point about, if, you know, listening to a discussion about court cases sounds very boring to you—

Liz Canada (04:13)

Great.

Zack Sheehan (04:15)

I think the thing that I hope to do, and a lot of the work we do, is trying to connect what's happening in the court.

Zack Sheehan (04:23)

Because that is just a very specific environment in which the state — you know, in this parameter of briefs and motions and oral arguments, and kind of this very structured environment — has to lay out very explicitly what their goals are. And that is a different level of detail than we see in, like, the legislative process, right? Where there can be lots of talking, and it's kind of hard to tell if it's talking points or messaging, or someone did polling to kind of trick me about a bill, like, you know.

Zack Sheehan (04:53)

At least generally, legal proceedings have very specific parameters, so you can kind of get right to the heart of, like, what is the state's argument. So hopefully that's a little bit of a hook for—

Liz Canada (05:05)

And—

Liz Canada (05:05)

—people, right. And I mean, listeners of the show care about what's happening in New Hampshire. And—

Zack Sheehan (05:12)

Mm.

Liz Canada (05:13)

—you know, the election is coming up, of course, but we're thinking about, like, the costs have been going up. Everything seems to be going up in prices and costs. And folks point to schools. Like, what's happening with schools? What's the responsibility from a community?

Liz Canada (05:30)

Am I feeling a lot of pressure here in my town only? Is that happening across the state? And I think all of that comes back to these court decisions that, you know, as you're mentioning — the Claremont one is back in the nineties. And, like, all of these conversations have been happening. And my curiosity, why I asked you to come back on the show, is like: what is the state of New Hampshire arguing for right now? As we're all feeling this pressure, what is the state of New Hampshire saying should happen? And I don't want to give it away,

Liz Canada (05:58)

but that feels really important to the time that we're in right now. Zack, I love traveling back in time. Tell me about these Claremont cases back in the nineties.

Zack Sheehan (06:07)

So in general — and this is what's kind of an interesting parallel — the impetus for the Claremont lawsuits was pretty similar times to what we're living in right now, right? There were—

Liz Canada (06:17)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (06:18)

—really high property taxes, property taxes that varied a lot community to community. Some schools were really struggling a lot more than others. You know, Claremont, the kind of named district that was the lead district on those cases. Something I find interesting that a lot of people don't know is

Zack Sheehan (06:36)

it wasn't just school districts that sued the state. Students were also involved in that lawsuit.

Liz Canada (06:41)

Mm. Right.

Zack Sheehan (06:43)

And so effectively they were saying the state's not kicking in enough money to provide it — you know, make sure that every kid in the state has access to a good public education, and, you know, an excellent public education. And because it's all in property taxes, communities with low property value are really struggling. And that's a big oversimplification, but

Zack Sheehan (07:05)

they effectively argued that in front of the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court, over, like, eight years — so I'm really condensing the timeline, but over eight years and two Claremont decisions — the Supreme Court said, "We think the Constitution provides this specific responsibility: that the state must make sure every kid has access to an adequate public education in New Hampshire." And "adequate," when they use that word, they meant—

Zack Sheehan (07:34)

They kind of wrote this, like, fancy legal language about what they mean by adequate, but it was, like, really expansive, future-oriented — like, whatever a kid needs to thrive in whichever year they're graduating in, in the next five, 10, 50 years. That's what we mean by adequate. So not this kind of limited definition. So, like, "excellent" would be a better, you know, word than "adequate," but that's what they meant by that. And then the other ruling was about whatever taxes the state uses

Zack Sheehan (08:03)

to pay to make sure that every kid has access to an adequate education: they have to be uniform. So when the state's making payments so that Claremont has just as many resources as it needs, as Portsmouth, as Berlin, as Concord, they can't tax those cities or those residents differently. And so those are kind of the two base rulings. Every kid has access and a right — a constitutional right — to this public education, and taxpayers need to be treated fairly. That's kind of, like, the baseline set by the Claremont rulings, which

Zack Sheehan (08:33)

to date are still some of the strongest Supreme Court rulings in favor of public education in the country. And the—

Liz Canada (08:40)

You told me that last time, Zack. You—

Liz Canada (08:42)

—told me that in our first episode together. And I think I was shocked then. I'm still shocked.

Zack Sheehan (08:48)

Then the big question, though, is — like, a strong ruling then needs to be enacted and acted on. And that's the kind of, like—

Liz Canada (08:54)

Yeah. I'm glad you said it. I don't want to be the Debbie Downer.

Zack Sheehan (08:58)

—separation of powers piece, which we'll get to in the kind of current—

Liz Canada (09:01)

The separation of powers. Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (09:04)

—stuff. But just a quick primer: like, the courts can—

Liz Canada (09:06)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (09:07)

—make these rulings, but it's the legislative branch that's in charge of raising money via taxes, and spending, generally through making laws and appropriations.

Zack Sheehan (09:17)

And so the court, until last year, has, in all school funding cases, said, "Hey, you're not doing enough. Do better," basically.

Liz Canada (09:25)

Hmm.

Zack Sheehan (09:28)

"But we're gonna stop right there," by, like, "Do better. You go define it. You go figure it out." Whatever you're doing now — in this new lawsuit, Claremont, and there's another case ten years later, another case — "Not enough. Do better, legislature."

Liz Canada (09:42)

Do better.

Zack Sheehan (09:43)

And then they've done some.

Zack Sheehan (09:45)

And then it kind of backslides.

Liz Canada (09:48)

So let's do a quick check for understanding, since we're in education mode. The Claremont I decision comes out, and it says every student has the right to an adequate public education. And anyone can bring that to court to enforce it. Anyone can say, "If that's not happening, I'm gonna go to court to say this is the right that's in the New Hampshire Constitution." It's the right to an adequate public education for every child. Claremont II

Liz Canada (10:17)

is about how fair the funding is, and the mechanism of funding it. So—

Zack Sheehan (10:22)

Mm-hmm. And the taxes,

Zack Sheehan (10:23)

yeah.

Liz Canada (10:25)

Have we said the word "SWEPT" yet, Zack? Is now the time—

Zack Sheehan (10:29)

Not yet.

Liz Canada (10:29)

—where we say SWEPT? There's a statewide—

Zack Sheehan (10:32)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (10:33)

—education property tax. And even though it says "state" and "wide," what it actually is, is a tax in your local community that is sort of designated as a state tax toward—

Zack Sheehan (10:48)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (10:49)

—public education.

Liz Canada (10:51)

And that came about because of Claremont, too, I think.

Zack Sheehan (10:55)

Yeah, and the thing I find interesting about that relative—

Liz Canada (10:59)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (10:59)

—to New Hampshire is, a lot of people, when they hear about tax reform or talking about different revenues or how to change taxes — most people hear, like, "I'm gonna pay more, me, individually,"

Liz Canada (11:09)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (11:10)

right? Taxes are additive. If you add one on, it just — you know, just stacks and stacks and stacks. The statewide education property tax was what the state implemented to respond to the Claremont rulings in the nineties.

Zack Sheehan (11:25)

They created this brand-new state property tax, slapped it on everyone's tax bill in the whole state. Most people have residential properties, most of them. Brand-new tax. But then — and all the money did flow to the state — they redistributed it based on need. They said, "Hey, Claremont, we think you need more money, and so we're gonna give you more, based on the formula created, more than Portsmouth. Here's why: Portsmouth already has more resources; Claremont needs more funding."

Zack Sheehan (11:55)

And the fascinating part for me is that when they did that, communities like Claremont now got a much bigger chunk of cash from the state. Yes, they invested a good amount in their schools, but almost all the communities that got a significant increase in funding passed on a huge amount of savings to their property taxpayers.

Liz Canada (12:16)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (12:17)

And so communities like Claremont, where everyone in town just had this new $6 tax added on — which is a lot —

Zack Sheehan (12:24)

added onto the property tax, then had their local taxes slashed. And so net property taxes dropped all over the state.

Zack Sheehan (12:34)

And so it was additive for some people — a little more for some people, but mostly in places for folks who could actually afford that. For folks that were really struggling, most people around the state in those communities with lower property values and higher tax rates saw significantly reduced property tax rates.

Liz Canada (12:54)

All right, we're through the Claremont era for now. So I know that there are other court cases in between, and we're gonna sort of jump ahead. Listener, travel with—

Zack Sheehan (13:04)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (13:04)

—us in time, if you will, to the — I think it's the late twenty-tens. Yeah, twenty nineteen.

Zack Sheehan (13:08)

Twenty nineteen has been—

Liz Canada (13:11)

On the cusp of a new decade. The ConVal suit is next, I believe.

Zack Sheehan (13:19)

Yes. So—

Liz Canada (13:19)

All right,

Liz Canada (13:20)

Zack,

Zack Sheehan (13:20)

And just to kind of give a little preview: we're gonna talk about the ConVal suit and then the Rand suit. And basically, each of—

Liz Canada (13:25)

Very quickly. Mm-hmm. Not very quickly—

Liz Canada (13:27)

—through it, but, like, ConVal and then Rand: two different suits happening very close in time to each other.

Zack Sheehan (13:34)

Yeah. And one way to kind of keep them separate is: ConVal is a school district, the Contoocook Valley School District. Rand is a dude named Steve Rand, right? So he's—

Liz Canada (13:42)

Hey, Steve.

Zack Sheehan (13:43)

—a person. And so the Rand lawsuit was about taxes and brought by taxpayers. The ConVal lawsuit was more about school funding, brought by school districts. So the ConVal suit started in 2019, effectively arguing similar stuff to the original Claremont lawsuit, saying, "We're not getting enough funding from the state."

Zack Sheehan (14:04)

And when people hear this sometimes — it's not so much that they're saying, "We should get more funding from the state to increase how much we're spending on schools." It's saying the share of the pie that the state's kicking in right now, about twenty percent of total funding, that's not enough. "We should get a bigger chunk, so then we can relieve the pressure of local property taxes." That's the central—

Liz Canada (14:28)

Right.

Zack Sheehan (14:30)

—argument. It's not to—

Zack Sheehan (14:31)

—across the board expand how much we're spending on public schools; it is to shift who is actually paying for it. And "more of that should be coming from the state" was ConVal's argument. And basically, a seven-year trial summed up in 30 seconds, but—

Liz Canada (14:45)

Ha ha.

Zack Sheehan (14:45)

—which is gonna—

Liz Canada (14:48)

Yeah, yeah.

Zack Sheehan (14:49)

—make any lawyers very frustrated, but effectively they—

Liz Canada (14:53)

Lawyers, you can come on the podcast and talk to me anytime. We'll have a seven-hour episode with you. It's totally fine.

Zack Sheehan (14:59)

Effectively, they successfully argued all the way up to the Supreme Court. So, just a quick kind of Court 101: you know, you bring it to court, and there's a few layers to it, but the first major layer is superior court, where they got a ruling in favor. The plaintiffs did, where the superior court said, "Yes, you're right. The state's not kicking in enough." The impact of that is that students in some communities

Zack Sheehan (15:27)

are not getting access to an adequate education paid for by the state. Because they're paying so little, local communities have to pick it up, and no school could possibly operate under the amount of funding the state's kicking in. So that's kind of what they were going for: the 20% the state's kicking in is laughably not even close to providing what you need to operate a basic school with everything pared down. And so they won in the superior court.

Zack Sheehan (15:57)

The state appealed to the Supreme Court — which, just as a flag, you don't have to appeal. So in Pennsylvania a few years ago: massive school funding lawsuit, massive school funding ruling in the superior court saying, "State, you gotta do more." And the state said, "Okay." And they didn't appeal. They said, "We're gonna actually—

Liz Canada (16:17)

Right. Okay, yeah. Well—

Zack Sheehan (16:20)

—work on this and try to make things better." So it's a—

Liz Canada (16:23)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (16:24)

It's an active decision to appeal.

Liz Canada (16:25)

Yeah, it's not required to appeal.

Zack Sheehan (16:27)

Ha ha.

Liz Canada (16:28)

You can just do what the court—

Zack Sheehan (16:30)

You—

Liz Canada (16:30)

—says, yeah.

Zack Sheehan (16:32)

And so they appealed to the Supreme Court and lost. The state did. So ConVal won in the Supreme Court. It was a ruling that came out in July of twenty twenty-five. And in short, what they said was the state needs to increase the amount of funding it's sending to schools. They were focused on one part of the funding formula, which is base aid, which every student gets. Basically, kind of like the foundational amount that is sent per kid

Zack Sheehan (16:59)

to school districts. And they said you've got to increase that from about $4,000 to a little over $7,000. And there's a lot of math and reasoning behind it. And there's kind of two big punchlines out of that. One is they called the state out on — over a, what is that, a seven-year trial, six-year trial — the state never presented one piece of evidence. We're talking about millions of pages of

Zack Sheehan (17:26)

documentation in, like, a three-week trial. Like, huge, huge case over six years. The state never presented one piece of evidence saying that they're providing enough funding. Never once defended how much funding they're providing. The entire case was built on just attacking the arguments brought by the plaintiffs. And—

Liz Canada (17:45)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (17:45)

—the second piece is, for the first time ever, the Supreme Court said not just, "Hey, go do better,

Zack Sheehan (17:54)

legislature." They said, "You are incapable. Thirty years of history shows—

Liz Canada (17:58)

Amen.

Zack Sheehan (17:59)

—that you're incapable" — of a lot of things, no — "of—

Liz Canada (18:01)

Ha ha ha.

Zack Sheehan (18:02)

—solving this complex problem. And in the past, when we've said, 'Hey, go do better, you're violating constitutional rights of students or taxpayers,' we've given you the, you know, full responsibility to do that, and you have not lived up to the test. So we're gonna say go do better, but here's the floor."

Liz Canada (18:19)

"We've given you thirty years to do it, and you didn't—

Zack Sheehan (18:21)

Ha, yeah.

Liz Canada (18:23)

—do it. You failed to do it. Here's the floor. Here's the amount, based on all the mathing that we've mathed. Here's what you need to do."

Zack Sheehan (18:32)

And they even, like, took that and notched it down and said, "Here is the—" but the quote was, like, the conservative bare minimum of a floor. And then they said, "But you should still go figure out what the real number is. But to be clear, here's the bare floor." Yeah, which was a, you know, roughly five-hundred-million-dollar increase that the state should take on, that could come off of local property taxes.

Liz Canada (18:59)

Right. And your point earlier is worth mentioning probably a few times in this episode, which is that the communities are not saying, "State, give us more money so that we can increase our budgets and have more spending." It's saying, "Please help, because our local property taxpayers are being crushed by this. We need—

Zack Sheehan (19:18)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (19:18)

—your help so that we do not have to continue to pummel them with higher property taxes." And the courts, for all these

Liz Canada (19:28)

decades, have said, "Yes, you need to do that," and the state is like, "Well, what if we say no? What if we appeal and say, could we not do—

Zack Sheehan (19:35)

We just don't.

Liz Canada (19:36)

—that, please? Could we continue to not do that?" And so you're saying that the Supreme Court in New Hampshire said, "Here is the conservative bare minimum that it should be, but you should figure out what the actual number should be. But it should be at least this number."

Zack Sheehan (19:51)

"We recognize that you are incapable in a lot of ways of doing this. So we're gonna say here's the floor, and then it's most likely higher than that. Please go figure it out. And here's, like, you know, all of our receipts." There's a lot of information in that ruling.

Liz Canada (20:05)

Mm.

Liz Canada (20:08)

Okay, we've got Claremont: right to an adequate education. Anyone in the state can enforce that in court — go to court and say—

Zack Sheehan (20:19)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (20:19)

—this needs to happen. Claremont II says taxpayers need to be treated fairly across the state. ConVal says, "You guys are incapable

Liz Canada (20:30)

of doing this right. So here is the bare minimum that it needs to be. But go figure it out. But it needs to be this much." Yes, you need to be contributing more. The base aid—

Zack Sheehan (20:40)

Is it?

Liz Canada (20:40)

—needs to be increased from the state. Okay. Rand case. I liked what you said earlier: it's a person, Steve Rand, and it's about taxes. Got—

Zack Sheehan (20:51)

Yep.

Liz Canada (20:52)

—it.

Zack Sheehan (20:53)

So this is Steve Rand and, I think, like ten other plaintiffs, but he's the first named plaintiff, which is what the case becomes named. Steve Rand lives in Plymouth. He owns a hardware store. I think it's, like, third or fourth generation. It's right on Main Street in Plymouth.

Liz Canada (21:08)

Nice.

Zack Sheehan (21:09)

And he sued the state in twenty twenty-two, so kind of, like, in the middle of the ConVal case. As that was still going on, this case started. And they—

Zack Sheehan (21:19)

Two central arguments. One: "State, you're not giving enough for education funding." And they use a slightly different — they highlight a few different things. But the kicker, they said, "The reason I can sue on that is because you're putting in so little, our local taxes have to pick it up. And therefore our local taxes, which are very different than our neighbors', right — we're picking up your responsibility.

Zack Sheehan (21:46)

That violates the 'we should have even taxes to pay for public education.'" The—

Liz Canada (21:52)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (21:52)

—place where Steve Rand lives is interesting, because Plymouth is in the same school district as Waterville Valley. So the kids are going to the same high school, and Waterville Valley's tax rates are way lower than those in Plymouth and a lot of the other towns in that district. Same kids at the same high school, and you could be paying four or five, ten times as much on the same property value, same home value,

Zack Sheehan (22:15)

from one town to the other, because of this issue we have with the lack of funding from the state.

Liz Canada (22:21)

So, checking for understanding: two parts so far. The first one is, go to court and say, "State, you aren't contributing enough funding toward public education." So, a "yes, and" to all the other cases we've heard so far, essentially. And two, as a taxpayer: "State, you are giving so little, in fact, that I am being treated unfairly, based on that Claremont II decision. I am having

Liz Canada (22:49)

more put on me, which is unfair, as other folks in this same school district — their tax rate is so much lower than mine."

Zack Sheehan (23:01)

Yeah, and the nuance in the second part is, it's not just "it's unfair." It's "I'm paying for your responsibility, state." And because—

Liz Canada (23:07)

"I am paying for your responsibility."

Zack Sheehan (23:10)

"I'm paying for it, and we have different taxes, that violates that uniform tax piece. So you kick in so little, it's laughable, and courts keep ruling against that. Because you kick in so little, our local property taxes are paying for what you should be paying for. And we're paying for it in very different ways."

Liz Canada (23:30)

And so that goes to court, they're there, and what happens? That's twenty twenty-two. What happens?

Zack Sheehan (23:38)

So it takes — yeah, these cases take a while, so it—

Liz Canada (23:40)

A few years. This is a good time to—

Liz Canada (23:42)

—sort of pause and say, listener, this is not uncommon. Like, court cases take a long time.

Liz Canada (23:49)

Because that's how the process works. It's not just New Hampshire that has these very long court cases. That is what happens, and it's easy to lose track of all these different cases that are happening at the same time, essentially. And yet, in this case, these school funding cases keep coming to the same conclusion, it sounds like. Hmm. Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (24:09)

Pretty similar. And—

Zack Sheehan (24:12)

—when you just don't fix them, right? Like, these are the issues that are setting the context for people bringing these lawsuits. If nothing is changed, it doesn't just magically fix itself.

Liz Canada (24:27)

Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (24:28)

Which brings us to Rand, right? In the case they're filing. And the

Zack Sheehan (24:35)

trajectory they followed was: they filed, had a hearing in the superior court, and they won that case. So, kind of two big pieces. The judge said, "You know what? You're right. The state's not kicking in enough." Again, the nuance here—

Liz Canada (24:55)

You're right. Okay, yeah. Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (24:58)

—one layer of nuance here is that the argument the Rand lawyers used, which was different than the

Zack Sheehan (25:04)

ConVal lawyers', was — the Rand lawyers said, "We're gonna look at a specific subsection of school funding to prove our point even more." And what they looked at was special education funding. And they said — so—

Liz Canada (25:16)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (25:18)

—as opposed to ConVal, which is looking at kind of the amount provided for every student — so we look at that as kind of, like, the equality part of our school funding formula. Every kid gets the same amount from the state. There are some equity pieces, meaning

Zack Sheehan (25:33)

some funding goes to some students based on some need. And special education is one of those. The state has identified that special education services generally cost more. Sometimes it's not that much more; sometimes it's a lot more. It's a pretty big range. But they said, "We know services cost a little bit more. Well, we're gonna kick in a little more to help provide those services." Rand called BS on that. They said, "You have literally identified that special education services cost more.

Zack Sheehan (26:02)

But the amount you provide is so low, it can't even come close to covering any of the services." And I'm trying not to use too many numbers, because I know saying numbers out loud is, like, not always helpful. So the—

Liz Canada (26:13)

No, but I think I'm actually looking for the numbers too, 'cause I remember writing it down. Go ahead, go ahead.

Zack Sheehan (26:19)

The fascinating piece here is the state says, "We know these services cost a little bit more. We're gonna kick in roughly $2,200 per student that qualifies for these services," right? It actually—

Liz Canada (26:30)

Don't spend it all in one place.

Zack Sheehan (26:32)

Yeah. It actually costs — and again, this is an average — more than thirty thousand dollars per student. And, you know, averages are pulled by higher numbers, right? So I want to be clear about that. But the kicker, the thing that they found in Rand, which I found fascinating: so the state's kicking in $2,200, and the plaintiffs successfully argued that it costs about sixteen hundred dollars

Zack Sheehan (26:57)

just to evaluate or re-evaluate, to make sure a student needs these services and is getting the services they need. So just once you've gone through the testing — to, A, make sure they even qualify for these services, which is a pretty rigorous standard, and then, if they do, what services should they get — you've already eaten up almost all of the money to actually provide those services.

Liz Canada (27:18)

You've got a nice six hundred dollars ready to be used on any of the services that are then needed to support the student who has needs. Easy.

Zack Sheehan (27:29)

So using that—

Liz Canada (27:31)

Uh-huh, mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (27:32)

—line of argument, they really kind of, like, drilled into the lack of funding from the state. Because many of the services provided for in the special education element of our public schools are legally mandated, either by state law or federal law. They're baked into the requirements for our schools. And, you know, on top of them being required, there's

Zack Sheehan (27:56)

a huge amount of evidence that shows that not only do students who get those services benefit from having those services, but students who don't get those services do too. So again, for students who are not getting special education services, there's a ton of metrics to show they benefit when their peers get those services. And so, like, this benefits the whole school system, whether or not your kid actually accesses these. And so, A, you know, legally required;

Zack Sheehan (28:24)

B, actually really helpful for everyone in the building. And the state is just not contributing really anything for them.

Liz Canada (28:32)

It's required and it's good for you. Two of—

Zack Sheehan (28:35)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (28:35)

—those two things: required, and good for you. Mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (28:40)

So—

Liz Canada (28:41)

So then the state was like, "We're super gonna do this now. You guys really pointed—

Zack Sheehan (28:45)

Ha.

Liz Canada (28:45)

—it out. We get it. We totally get it," right?

Zack Sheehan (28:50)

I wish. They appealed to the Supreme Court, and — did—

Liz Canada (28:56)

Again, didn't have to. Didn't have to appeal.

Zack Sheehan (28:58)

—not have to. But here's the kicker. So when you appeal to the Supreme Court or anything, you say which parts of the ruling you disagree with, right? So, for example, they could have said, "We're appealing, and yeah, we agree we're not giving enough for special education funding, but we disagree that

Zack Sheehan (29:19)

it's, you know, our fault that your tax rates are different." Right? It would have been hard to peel those out, but they could have pulled out specific—

Liz Canada (29:23)

Sure. Sure.

Zack Sheehan (29:24)

—pieces and said, "We're gonna appeal on this one element," because these cases are broad; there's a lot of pieces to them. They went the complete other direction. So not only did they appeal on basically everything in the case, they said, "You know what? While we're at it, we're gonna attack things that have not even been part of this case so far." Which — I'm not a lawyer — my understanding is that's

Zack Sheehan (29:45)

pretty iffy ground. You're not supposed to be able to pull in new things on an appeal. That was my understanding. So instead of saying, you know, "Here are the five elements of the Rand case we're gonna appeal on," they're like, "Actually, we're gonna make it ten, and we're gonna bring in, in our appeal: we think we should just completely overturn the Claremont rulings.

Zack Sheehan (30:08)

Period." Because if you overturn — exactly.

Liz Canada (30:09)

"While we're here, since we're talkin' school funding and education—

Liz Canada (30:15)

I mean, we're here, so why not just get rid of those decisions?" Which, if you rewind in the episode, those were the right to an adequate education for students, and that anybody can enforce that. And that taxpayers need to be treated fairly in the school funding—

Zack Sheehan (30:35)

Fairly. Yeah.

Liz Canada (30:36)

—process. And you're telling me, Zack,

Liz Canada (30:40)

that the state used their opportunity and their appeal to say, "What if we don't do those things anymore? Can you just throw those out?"

Zack Sheehan (30:49)

Yep. And what's — I don't know what the right word is here. A lot of the work we do sometimes is depressing, because just stating the facts, it's so absurd that we don't—

Liz Canada (31:02)

Yes.

Zack Sheehan (31:03)

—need to do any, like, creative messaging or, like—

Liz Canada (31:05)

Right.

Zack Sheehan (31:06)

—it's just like, here is the state's data, and you can see, like, or whatever — you know, just complete unfairness. And this is one of those where it's like, the

Zack Sheehan (31:15)

truest and simplest way to explain this is: the state is just arguing, "We don't think there should be a constitutional right to a public education. Period. And we don't think you should have to have fair and uniform taxes." That the state should have to abide by that. Period.

Liz Canada (31:36)

These folks said—

Liz Canada (31:38)

—they've been told for decades, "You gotta do better." They haven't. And instead they've said, "What if you just threw out the assignment entirely? What if we just didn't do that at all?" Okay, well, that's—

Zack Sheehan (31:49)

Yep. And not only that—

Zack Sheehan (31:52)

—what if you threw out the assignment, and then kicked out the teacher who was allowed to grade you? And actually, let's just get rid of the idea of grades at all. Like, you just kind of dismantle any structure around that. So, like, the idea of an assignment now can no longer even be questioned, to bring that metaphor to the extreme.

Liz Canada (32:10)

I just—

Liz Canada (32:11)

I don't understand how they think this is a good idea or an appropriate idea. I guess that's what I'm just sort of shocked by. Don't we all think that students should have the right to an adequate — I mean, we could debate "adequate," but don't we agree that that should be the case? Isn't that what the New Hampshire Constitution has been saying?

Liz Canada (32:37)

So that's their position. They're like, "We would like you to throw the whole thing out so that we don't have to do this at all." Like, is that the reason they're saying it, essentially?

Zack Sheehan (32:47)

Well, there's the potential reason, but then there's another kind of piece to weave in here, which is, like: why do they think that they might win on this? Which is a different question, right? And, like, a scarier one. So let's come back—

Liz Canada (33:00)

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait,

Liz Canada (33:01)

wait. I have been treating this as a big joke, Zack, because this doesn't seem like they could be winning on this. But you're saying they could be winning on this?

Zack Sheehan (33:10)

Yeah, I mean, I think part of the — well, you think about it. So we had the—

Liz Canada (33:11)

Less jokey.

Zack Sheehan (33:14)

We had the ConVal case just a year, or a year and a half, ago, when the state appealed to the Supreme Court in the ConVal case. They could have done this then, right? Said, "Hey, while we're at it, while we're here talking about school funding, let's wipe out those Claremont rulings so we don't have to deal with this anymore." And they didn't. So it's like, well, what changed in a year, year and a half, that makes them think they actually have a shot at this, right? 'Cause

Zack Sheehan (33:40)

that's a pretty quick turn. You know, you don't normally have high-profile cases going to the Supreme Court on such related issues and taking such different tactics from one to the next. One big thing that changed was, like, a very different makeup of the court.

Zack Sheehan (33:57)

So we had a justice retire. He retired in between these two cases, and he actually ruled—

Liz Canada (34:05)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (34:05)

—in favor of the school districts in the ConVal case and then retired, because they age out at 70, right?

Liz Canada (34:07)

Sorry to interrupt. Quick note. Zack is about to say that it's four out of five justices, but it's actually three out of five justices. Still a majority, still shocking, but I wanted to just correct that before you hear the line. Okay, back to the show.

Zack Sheehan (34:24)

I know one or two more were appointed, but the interesting part is that, like, we're going from — I think four of the five people from ConVal to Rand are different. And so that is, I—

Zack Sheehan (34:39)

Yeah, we had — you know, we had Gordon MacDonald, right, who was the AG, and then—

Liz Canada (34:43)

He's here and he's gone. Yes. Right? Yes. He was — yeah, yeah, yeah.

Zack Sheehan (34:46)

—you know, in the midst of these cases going on, he was then appointed to the Supreme Court as the chief justice.

Zack Sheehan (34:54)

So that's a new one. But he was recused from the ConVal case, because he was the AG while the case was being heard. And so he wasn't in ConVal, so he's gonna be a new person in Rand. Then you had someone retire, someone else get appointed. One of them was Bryan Gould, and there was actually a lot of reporting that one of the reasons he was even appointed to be a Supreme Court justice was to—

Liz Canada (35:22)

Deal with this. Okay. Mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (35:22)

I think the term was "torpedo" the Claremont rulings.

Zack Sheehan (35:28)

You know, that was speculation. Those were questions asked of him, and he denied it, but he's a different person, and that was something that was brought up. And then there was one more that I'm spacing on, but the point is, like, a very different group of people is hearing this case. So the way I see that is, you have the ConVal case; you take this one approach.

Zack Sheehan (35:52)

You're now looking at a different bench of people, and you're like, "Ooh, you know what? We're gonna tack on just wiping out everything." So—

Liz Canada (35:57)

Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (35:58)

I imagine there was some assessment done saying, "We think we actually have a shot at that, so we should tack that on this time."

Liz Canada (36:05)

I don't mean to make this all about me, Zack, but this feels a lot like what happened with the US Supreme Court prior to Ruth Bader Ginsburg passing away and a new Supreme Court justice being put on the bench. Prior to that, people were like, "Roe v. Wade — nothing's gonna happen to it." And then—

Zack Sheehan (36:24)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (36:25)

—once there were new justices that were suddenly packed onto the court, that case went right up, and

Liz Canada (36:34)

Roe v. Wade was overturned, because the makeup of the court had shifted so dramatically. Not to make it all about the things that I work on on a day-to-day basis. A lot of parallels here in—

Zack Sheehan (36:41)

Yeah, there's a lot of parallels. Yeah.

Liz Canada (36:46)

—New Hampshire. If our courts are changing right before our eyes — because all judges are appointed by the governor and then confirmed by the very gerrymandered Executive Council —

Liz Canada (37:03)

that can have huge impacts. Okay, so a very different court from the ConVal decision to the Rand decision time. Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (37:11)

Process, yeah, yeah.

Zack Sheehan (37:13)

And so, looking at that new court, the state then makes this very dramatic appeal where it's like, literally, "Let's just wipe out the Claremont rulings" — which, again, are, like, the constitutional framework by which someone can sue the state, either because they think their kid's not getting access to a public education or because there are unfair taxes. But also, it's just, like, the statement that we have as a state that says kids deserve

Zack Sheehan (37:41)

and are entitled to this right to an adequate public education.

Liz Canada (37:42)

"Cut it. We don't want it. Cut it."

Zack Sheehan (37:45)

And the rationale they gave — this is my favorite part. The rationale they gave was a few things. And, like, I'm gonna be a little sarcastic, but I'm not straying from the truth. Like, this is what they're saying. One is,

Zack Sheehan (38:01)

"We've really, really tried to fix this, and no matter how much we try, it's unfair. Someone is always unhappy, and they keep suing us. So the only way to do this — because you can't satisfy everyone, and we really have tried — is you take away the right for someone to sue us on this, because it's getting annoying."

Liz Canada (38:22)

So they are trying to get rid of Claremont I because of that piece in it that says, yes, every child has the right to an adequate public education, and if anyone sees that that's not happening in New Hampshire, they can bring it to court. And the state right now is saying, "We don't want that to happen. We don't think people should be able to bring that to court."

Zack Sheehan (38:49)

Yeah, they're saying, "It's unfair to us as the state, for trying so hard over all these years. And it's a complicated policy issue, and no matter how much we try, someone's gonna be unhappy and they're gonna sue us, and it's expensive to be sued, and it's annoying to be sued. And so please, court, take away the ability for people to sue on this issue. Period."

Zack Sheehan (39:17)

A lot of this language is coming from some legislators who've been kinda leading the charge on responding to the ConVal case, where they're saying, like, "Not the court's job. They can't tell us what to do. They should stay out of this. You know what? They shouldn't even have a role in enforcing any of these rights relative to public education. It should only be up to legislators, and they should stay out of this entirely."

Liz Canada (39:38)

So then what's the point of the judiciary, if not to make sure that laws and the constitution are being followed? Am I missing something here? Are they seeing—

Zack Sheehan (39:49)

No.

Liz Canada (39:50)

—something that I'm not seeing? I thought, like, the judiciary is there — we have courts — to make sure that, like, the constitution—

Zack Sheehan (39:55)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (39:56)

—is being followed and upheld by the government. Am I wrong? Did I misunderstand? I haven't been in a civics class in a long—

Zack Sheehan (40:00)

Yep. No, you're not—

Liz Canada (40:05)

—time, so maybe I missed something along the way.

Zack Sheehan (40:07)

No. And if this sounds insane, it's because it is, just to be clear. Like, I talk about this a lot, and so, like, I kind of — but, like, this is insane. But not only that, it is the mental gymnastics the state's going through to say, "We should have no oversight. You can't—

Liz Canada (40:27)

Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (40:28)

—tell us — no one can tell us what to do." And why they're doing that, right, is kind of, like,

Zack Sheehan (40:35)

the history of this school funding challenge. Because to engage with solutions for such a broad and complex and large structure like public education, you have to talk about big policy change. You have to talk about just complicated things, like how to raise money, and taxes, which most people, especially politicians, do not want to talk about. You have to talk about who gets money, right? Which are tough decisions. Like, none of this is easy, but

Zack Sheehan (41:05)

the active argument they're making in this Rand case is, "Because we don't want to engage in challenging conversations like tax reform — who pays, who should pay, who should pay more, who should pay less, what money should go where, right? Instead of us engaging in those challenging conversations as elected officials" — elected to make laws, right? Like, that's what they signed up for — "we just think

Zack Sheehan (41:29)

no one should be able to tell us that we have to engage in this conversation. We want to actively be able to put our heads in the sand relative to school funding. And so whatever we do will be, by definition, enough." That is one of the other arguments they're making in the Rand brief: whatever money is spent on public education, from anyone, local or state, the state should get credit for. "And therefore,

Zack Sheehan (41:57)

we've done enough." That is literally one of the main arguments in this appeal to the Supreme Court: "We should get credit for all spending in public schools."

Liz Canada (42:08)

See, this is the problem with group assignments. Sometimes you do nothing as part of the group assignment—

Zack Sheehan (42:11)

Ha ha ha.

Liz Canada (42:13)

—and you still get a good grade, and it's like, "No, no, you didn't do anything. We know you didn't do anything."

Zack Sheehan (42:16)

Yeah. Yeah.

Liz Canada (42:19)

Wow.

Liz Canada (42:20)

So any money that's spent at all on schools, the state is like, "We would like a high five. We would like credit for that." Just—

Zack Sheehan (42:26)

Mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (42:26)

And also, like—

Zack Sheehan (42:27)

—to go back to the way we've been framing this, they're saying, "Hey, since we're gonna be in court talking about school funding, let's just wipe out the Claremont rulings." No right to an adequate education; the state's saying no one can tell us what to do, and whatever we're doing is enough. "But if you're not willing to go that far, how about—" and it lists this out — "how about—

Liz Canada (42:46)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (42:46)

—you just give us credit for all local spending on public schools?

Zack Sheehan (42:50)

And we'll count that as state also." And so therefore, now we get credit for locals. Boom. We did it. We're spending a lot more because we're taking credit. "And if you're not willing to give us that, make it so people can't sue us, because it's annoying, and, like, no matter how much we try, we still can't get it right. And if you're not willing to go that far, how about—" let's see —

Zack Sheehan (43:14)

"throw it out because they didn't have standing to sue." Like, they keep giving this, like, menu of options where it's like, "How about this? How about this? How about this?"

Liz Canada (43:23)

I am reminded of when I taught at a college and I had a student who didn't do any of the essays. That's not true — he did two of the essays. There were five for the class. And he failed the class. And after the grades were posted, he emailed me over and over again. Could he bring his grade up? What could he do? Could he go back and submit things later? And finally, Zack,

Liz Canada (43:48)

I emailed him and said, "If you had put half the amount of time that you're spending right now emailing me into doing your essays, you would have passed the class." I didn't hear from him after that. But it feels a little bit like that, where, like, the state is like,

Zack Sheehan (44:00)

That's exactly what it's like.

Liz Canada (44:02)

"Well, we haven't done anything" — they've done almost nothing — but they're spending all this time making arguments for what should change. And it's like, what if you spent all that energy on—

Zack Sheehan (44:14)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (44:14)

—fixing

Liz Canada (44:15)

the school funding issue in the first place? The assignment that you had in front of you for the last thirty years was to deal with this school funding issue. And now you're coming up with all these excuses and wanting to backpedal out of it entirely.

Liz Canada (44:32)

This is very frustrating, Zack. This is very frustrating.

Zack Sheehan (44:35)

That's generally what I do. No, but it's a really good point. Like, think of — I mean, we're talking, I don't know about tens, but definitely thousands of hours of state employee time. They also contracted with out-of-state lawyers. Like, thousands and thousands of hours of highly qualified, competent people working to defend the state, saying, "Don't tell us what to do." Like, what could have been produced just in the past seven years, with these two recent court cases?

Zack Sheehan (45:04)

What could have been produced if the energy had been directed at that? And I think that's part of the challenge here. I think a lot of people, when we talk about this, get pretty depressed, because it's like, "Okay, cool. So nothing matters." And yeah. Exactly.

Liz Canada (45:18)

But the listener is also making an apple crisp right now, so there's no reason to be depressed, 'cause you're making an apple crisp, so everything's fine.

Zack Sheehan (45:25)

Although, depending on how much you've been paying attention, you might be, like, kneading the dough too much.

Liz Canada (45:29)

Right. Should—

Liz Canada (45:29)

—have given a more tactical assignment.

Zack Sheehan (45:31)

Yeah.

Zack Sheehan (45:33)

I think the—

Zack Sheehan (45:35)

Regardless of how this plays out in court, right — so let's say that the court overrules the Claremont decisions. Well, things won't all of a sudden be better. Overruling the Claremont decisions does not now mean that — for example, like, Acworth and Charlestown are in the same school district, towns right next to each other. You know, a house

Zack Sheehan (45:57)

three miles away from another house, right? And they're paying four or five times as many dollars in, because of the way this system is set up, right? And that's happening all over the state. And so if Claremont's overruled, that reality still exists. If the plaintiffs succeed, right, and the Supreme Court again rules against the state, the reality still exists.

Zack Sheehan (46:22)

And really, the crux of this is, like, they need to spend more time engaging with how to solve some of these complex issues instead of just running around being like, "Don't tell us what to do."

Liz Canada (46:34)

They did pass that law, Zack. House—

Zack Sheehan (46:37)

Yes.

Liz Canada (46:38)

—Bill 1815. I think the title of it was, like, "Relative to Education Funding," or something like that.

Zack Sheehan (46:44)

Yeah, education finance.

Liz Canada (46:46)

Education finance. They passed it through both chambers, and Governor Ayotte signed it. So tell me, Zack — it sounds like they solved something with education finance. What did they do?

Zack Sheehan (46:57)

So, just to put it in the timeline: the Supreme Court ruling comes out in July of twenty twenty-five and says, "State, you gotta kick in more funding." The next legislative session started in January. The one thing they did on school funding was to pass this House Bill 1815, which—

Liz Canada (47:15)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (47:15)

—and not to get too much into conspiracy theory, right? But it was, like, authored and championed by

Zack Sheehan (47:20)

Representative Bob Lynn, who's the former chief justice of the New Hampshire Supreme Court, and who was very vocal, even—

Liz Canada (47:25)

So he's familiar with the place. Mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (47:28)

—before the session, about how he disagreed with the Claremont rulings. He disagreed with the ConVal rulings, and he was basically, like, giving public commentary and telling the court how they maybe could go about ruling differently on this in the future. There's just—

Liz Canada (47:41)

Mm.

Zack Sheehan (47:42)

—a fascinating conversation he had with Annmarie Timmins last fall, where three of the Supreme Court justices were in the audience,

Zack Sheehan (47:49)

listening to him explain how to dismantle all of this, which is kind of fascinating anyway. And then he files this bill, House Bill 1815, that ends up getting passed and signed into law, that basically did some of the things that the state's asking the court to do in the Rand lawsuit. They went into the adequacy part of the law and effectively, again, didn't

Zack Sheehan (48:15)

change anything for the better. Like, nothing — no actual change. But they went in and basically changed some of the law to say we should get credit for local funding.

Liz Canada (48:26)

They put that in law?

Zack Sheehan (48:27)

Yeah, but, like, not in the part of the law that changes how the actual money flows. It was, like, in the preamble definition around the adequate education part of the law. They're like,

Zack Sheehan (48:39)

"School funding is a shared responsibility between state and local," basically taking credit for local spending. And they also did this thing — which, you know, we'll see how it plays out — but they effectively said that the funding that the state puts toward an adequate education is adequate. So basically, like, whatever we throw at schools, that's enough.

Zack Sheehan (49:05)

And they passed this as, like, "We're solving things." But again, it's the same tenor of, like, "You can't tell us what to do. Whatever we do is enough. Whatever we decide to kick in is enough. And also, we should get credit for local contributions." And so that was, just to give, like, the mismatch there: the Supreme Court says, "Here's all our evidence; increase funding." And they say, "How about we just monkey around with some of the language in the law and say we're kind of already doing enough?"

Liz Canada (49:35)

And said that the courts can't—

Zack Sheehan (49:37)

They used very similar language, yeah, where they basically—

Liz Canada (49:37)

—enforce. Yeah, like—

Zack Sheehan (49:40)

—said, like, the court should stay out of this issue.

Liz Canada (49:42)

"The courts should — this is a legislative

Liz Canada (49:44)

and executive thing. That third branch of government, you're not invited, and you're not part of this."

Zack Sheehan (49:52)

"We don't like that you're calling us out for not doing enough."

Liz Canada (49:55)

"You've been telling us for thirty years we've been doing it wrong, and so you're not invited anymore. You can't hang—

Zack Sheehan (49:58)

"It's hurting my feelings."

Liz Canada (50:00)

—out with us." They passed that, and it's in law now.

Zack Sheehan (50:04)

Yes. One of the things we raised — we and a lot of other people raised — was, okay, if you say that whatever dollar amount the state kicks in is by definition enough, because we now say so, then couldn't the state just reduce its funding to one dollar per kid? Because now,

Zack Sheehan (50:26)

by definition, whatever they put in is enough. That was never answered by the sponsors or anyone who voted for the bill. I mean, I don't think that they're gonna do that. That would be pretty dramatic. But, like, what about going from, you know, forty-two hundred dollars to forty-one hundred dollars per kid, and kind of going, "Now whatever we're gonna kick in is enough"?

Liz Canada (50:52)

Right, and—

Zack Sheehan (50:52)

"It's whatever we put in."

Liz Canada (50:53)

—if the Claremont decisions are overturned, and one of those decisions is that taxpayers need to be treated fairly, right? If that's thrown out,

Liz Canada (51:04)

and this law is now in effect, where it says that, like, whatever we say, whatever we give, that's enough, they could say,

Zack Sheehan (51:10)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (51:11)

like, "All right, these towns, you're getting a dollar, and these other towns, you're getting—

Zack Sheehan (51:15)

Yeah.

Liz Canada (51:16)

—this much," and there's no mechanism to then go to court and say, "Hey, that's not fair," because they've thrown out that decision in the first place.

Zack Sheehan (51:23)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (51:24)

Hmm.

Zack Sheehan (51:25)

And I think the thing I — like, I find a lot of this fascinating, kind of, like, in a sick way. But, like, another thing I find—

Liz Canada (51:33)

Yeah, yeah. That's why we're here, Zack. We're here because we find it fascinating in a sick way. Yes.

Zack Sheehan (51:38)

—kind of going back to what I started with at the beginning: what I find illuminating about these court cases is that the structure of lawsuits forces clarity in the arguments you're making.

Zack Sheehan (51:52)

And sometimes it's unclear, because it's using big legal terms, but it is, like, very direct. And so the fascinating thing for me is, even if the state — which, again, by "the state," right, this is Governor Ayotte, this is legislative leaders in the House and Senate. Like, they need to approve the state appealing, and then the AG's office works in coordination, right? They're not just off appealing this without

Zack Sheehan (52:18)

approval from the heads of government, generally the governor and the heads of the House and Senate. They are actively making this argument, and spending time and energy saying, "We don't think kids should have a right to an adequate education." And, like, the fascinating thing to me is, that is so contrary to almost everyone in this state. Like,

Zack Sheehan (52:42)

very few people, no matter where you go, who you talk to, would disagree that kids should have the right to a good public education, right? How you get there, how you pay for it, what the curriculum is — these are all complicated questions that, like, do not have single answers. But, like, to go that clear, simple, and extreme, I find fascinating, because it confuses me a bit, in the sense of, like, why would you take such an extreme stance when

Zack Sheehan (53:12)

you've just been ignoring it for thirty years? So, like, why put all your cards on the table now and be like, "We're just gonna go for it and totally gut it, and, like, yeah, people will love that we're doing this"? It's pretty confounding to me.

Liz Canada (53:28)

And on top of all of those things—

Liz Canada (53:31)

—expanding education freedom accounts to any income, so that no matter what your income is, you can get that taxpayer funding for private education. Like, the money being directed toward

Liz Canada (53:48)

private education, Christian education, intentionally away from public education.

Zack Sheehan (53:53)

Yes.

Liz Canada (53:54)

And on top of that, too, is this HB 1300 ballot question that is forcing all local communities to have a question on their ballot about their own school budgets, mandated by the legislature, about school funding. Very confusing. Yeah, a very confusing, misleading question. Mm-hmm.

Zack Sheehan (54:11)

A very confusing question, a very misleading question. Yeah. And I think—

Zack Sheehan (54:17)

—it feels like all of those things in combination, right? It's like folks in the legislature just think normal people in the state are stupid, right? It's like, "We're just gonna kinda pull one over on you," right? "We're gonna—"

Zack Sheehan (54:34)

Even though most people — in whatever, you know, poll, just general conversation in the grocery store — most people like their public schools. Most people want them to be there, right? Most people want fair taxes. Most people don't want to be forced to vote on a confusing question that is misleading, that they don't understand, right? Like—

Zack Sheehan (54:54)

But I think that's a good point you bring up, where it's like, we're not talking about the state doing all this because they have really tried and there just is no money. They're making these decisions about public school funding, and then, you know, sending sixty — fifty, sixty — million dollars a year via vouchers to any family that's already going to a private school. Like, those are very different decisions with a shared pot of money.

Liz Canada (55:21)

If you feel like your property taxes are high right now — all of these actions that Zack is sharing with us, he's not saying it in these words; I'm saying it in these words — like, these actions, the appeals and trying to not have a positive change for school funding, that's only gonna make property taxes higher, and you're gonna feel more pressure.

Liz Canada (55:47)

Because the less that the state does — and they're already doing so little — the more it gets put on local communities. And that is direct action happening from this most recent legislature, and what the state administration is arguing in court right now. They are asking the court to overturn those—

Zack Sheehan (56:09)

Mm.

Liz Canada (56:09)

—decisions so that they have that flexibility, if they wanted to, to contribute essentially

Liz Canada (56:15)

nothing to communities, and you will have to pick up the tab on that in the future. I hope that apple crisp is delicious, listener, because boy, oh boy, this is really rough. Really, really rough.

Zack Sheehan (56:30)

You know, it's challenging, right? It's challenging to think through these and to not feel

Zack Sheehan (56:38)

overwhelmed by the scale of the problem. Like, "Wow, what can I, as a listener, or just one individual, do with this information?" when it's just like, damn, thirty years of precedent.

Zack Sheehan (56:49)

What I like to kind of try to leave people with is, like:

Zack Sheehan (56:52)

ask, if you ever run into a state rep, right? Or, like, anyone in any kind of position of authority, right? There's a lot of people running for office right now, right?

Liz Canada (57:03)

Sure are.

Zack Sheehan (57:03)

And, like, you might disagree with a lot of what I've said, or the framing of it, or, like, you know, where our organization is coming from. But I think part of what I want to leave people with is: ask folks in positions of power,

Zack Sheehan (57:18)

"What are you actively doing to lower my property taxes?" Because there are specific things they absolutely could be doing. School funding is one of them, right? "What are you actively doing? And do you think kids have a right to a public education?" Because the state—

Liz Canada (57:35)

That's an easy question to ask.

Zack Sheehan (57:36)

—government is arguing they don't.

Liz Canada (57:38)

That's a good homework assignment. Look up who's running for office in your local community. Who's running for state representative and state senator in your community? They're very local to you. There's probably more than one of them running. And ask them, "Do you believe that there is a right to an adequate public education for all children in our state?"

Liz Canada (58:00)

In fact, you can actually have a public hearing about your House Bill 1300 ballot question—

Zack Sheehan (58:05)

Mm-hmm.

Liz Canada (58:06)

—and maybe you can bring it up there. Request a public hearing and ask that very question in that public hearing in your own community. Just an idea. Just one example of a place you can ask that question.

Zack Sheehan (58:15)

Yeah. Yeah.

Liz Canada (58:19)

The Rand case began in between ConVal beginning and 1815. But it was like: ConVal, Rand, ConVal decision, 1815, Rand decision.

Zack Sheehan (58:34)

Well, yeah, and it's Rand — it's like, it's like—

Liz Canada (58:38)

The podcast that dares to ask: how many court cases can we mention—

Zack Sheehan (58:42)

Ha ha.

Liz Canada (58:43)

—before somebody says, "No, thank you"?

Zack Sheehan (58:45)

Loses it.