NHBR.com: Web Feeds

Ruger 2Q earnings, sales fall

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:08:48 EST

Sturm, Ruger & Company Inc. reported lower sales and earnings in the second quarter.The company reported second-quarter net sales of $64.4 million and earnings of 43 cents per share, compared with sales of $72.4 million and earnings of 46 cents per share in the second quarter of 2009.For the six months ended July 3, net sales totaled $132.7 million and earnings were 86 cents per share. A year earlier, net sales totaled $135.9 million and earnings were 76 cents per share.The company -- which is based in Southport, Conn., but has a manufacturing facilities in New Hampshire -- also declared a dividend of 10 cents per share, payable Aug. 27 to shareholders of record on Aug. 13. -- NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

N.H. foreclosures set June record

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:08:41 EST

As the recession drags on, foreclosures in New Hampshire have continued to climb, reaching record levels.According to the New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority, 377 foreclosed deeds were recorded in June – a 45 percent increase over June 2009.It was a record for the month of June and the second highest since 2005.Foreclosure auction notices were also up in June, with 867 notices posted, an increase of 12 percent from 774 in May.June 2010’s numbers were only 1 percent higher than those of June 2009."At this pace New Hampshire remains on track for a record number of foreclosures this year," said the authority. "A significant decline in the number of foreclosures is unlikely until we see steady improvement in the underlying economic conditions including real growth in jobs and a resurgence of residential property values accompanied by an increase in demand."New Hampshire Housing Finance Authority operates a broad range of programs designed to assist low- and moderate-income residents in obtaining safe and affordable housing. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

U.S. tech grant programs extended

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 20:38:28 EST

In another 11th-hour reprieve, Congress has passed an extension authorizing funding for the Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) and the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) programs through Sept. 30.Without the extension – passed by both the House and the Senate on July 27 – funding for the SBIR, STTR and eight other programs would have expired on July 31.(Similar programs under the Department of Defense had previously been extended through Sept. 30.)This was the eighth short-term fix for the SBIR programs, but the House and Senate small business committees are reportedly close to a compromise bill that would provide long-term appropriations, possibly passing it before the Sept. 30 deadline.Eleven federal agencies – including the Department of Defense and National Science Foundation — participate in the SBIR, STTR and related programs, which provide millions of dollars in grants — with awards reaching upwards of $750,000 to individual businesses meeting specific criteria. — CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Brookstone sees quarterly loss

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 20:38:25 EST

Lifestyle retailer Brookstone posted an increase in sales for the second quarter, but it wasn’t enough to keep the Merrimack company out of the red.Brookstone announced net sales of $76.3 million for the quarter ended July 3 -- a 4.7 percent increase from sales of $72.9 million in the second quarter of 2009.A $12 million loss from operations for the quarter dragged down the total net loss to $19 million for the second quarter.The loss for the first half of 2010 was to $42.5 million, down $1.5 million from the $44 million loss reported in the same period a year ago.Sales for the first six months of 2010 increased more than 8 percent to $146.1 million, up from $134.4 million in the first six months of 2009."We continue to make inroads to returning to historical sales levels; however, we continue to face a difficult retail environment,” said Ron Boire, Brookstone president and chief executive. “We remain focused on our turnaround efforts." – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Clarification

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

In an article published in the July 16-29 issue of NHBR, “State was warned well before BrandPartners demise,” there was no intent to assert or imply that any official, including board chairman Anthony Cataldo, was involved in racketeering or criminal wrongdoing, or that any Web site or published article asserted this. NHBR also reported in the article that the New Hampshire Bureau of Securities Regulation had launched an investigation based on a memo sent by employees and discussions with them, and that the investigation was ongoing. The article did not imply that any individual mentioned in the memo, including Cataldo, was a target of that investigation or any other investigation. NHBR does not have any information about the nature or direction of that investigation.

Anonymous BrandPartners allegations unsupported

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

To the editor:On July 16, 2010, the New Hampshire Business Review, under the byline of Bob Sanders, published an article critical of certain business practices of BrandPartners and suggesting improprieties of certain board members. The allegations of disgruntled former employees, who declined to be identified and who have questionable motives, were the basis for the article and should have been looked at in that light.Your publication’s obligation is to report on the facts and not to blindly present unsupported allegations from individuals who remain anonymous to avoid responsibility or liability for untrue statements. There are many public documents filed with the SEC, including quarterly and annual reports, which contradict statements made in the article. Among them: loan documents and filings that identify the mezzanine lender and documents that detail the fact that the loan, which was inherited from a prior board of directors as a result of the 2001 leveraged buyout, had been renegotiated in 2004 by the new board. There are also public documents showing the company filed lawsuits in Stafford County in 2009 against former key executives, Frank Beardsworth and Chris Howe, alleging serious breaches against the company, including launching a new company on company time and using company resources to compete against BrandPartners. Mr. Sanders was aware of the lawsuits, and you should be further aware that one of the employees agreed to pay damages to the company for his actions.Your reporter, by reviewing the lawsuits, should also have known that the key executives, in April 2009, were acting against the company when employees were contacting government officials about BrandPartners. So, rather than advocate their position in the courtroom, it appears that these individuals chose to pursue a path of publicly harassing BrandPartners and its board members, a cause which your publication has now advanced.Furthermore, Mr. Sanders stated that on February 19, 2009, four large shareholders wrote a letter to the company demanding that a shareholder meeting be scheduled. He was aware of the Stockholders Meeting that was held on August 7, 2009, which was documented in an SEC filing and at which the shareholders unanimously elected all board members with more than 70 percent of the vote, yet Mr. Sanders made no such mention of the meeting.There are also many other inaccuracies in the article, including the fact that the company was not in financial trouble on April 23, 2009, nor was it in trouble at the end of its second quarter in 2009; the company’s first quarter in 2009 was profitable, the second quarter in 2009 had a slight loss, but more importantly the company had not borrowed any money against its line of credit with its bank through June 2009. These are all facts from the first and second quarter filings with the SEC.Furthermore, the separation agreement referred to in the article was not lucrative, rather it was substantially less than the company’s contractual obligation; again, this information is in the public filings.With respect to the article’s implication that there was some conspiracy or racketeering, these are totally untrue, baseless and libelous allegations that have no place in a respectable business publication. The company urges you to take the time to review the publicly available information and correct the numerous false statements made by former employees with ulterior motives hiding behind anonymity in the article. Board of DirectorsBrandPartners Group Inc.

Stealing money from the JUA: The saga continues

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

The Insurance Department recently held a public hearing on proposed new rules for the New Hampshire Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriting Association, known as the JUA.These new rules, if ultimately approved by a joint legislative committee, would permit the commissioner of Insurance to take the more than $110 million of surplus funds from the JUA rather than return them to policyholders as required by 23 years of contracts and the applicable regulations.Does this sound familiar? It should. Last year, the governor and Legislature tried to do the same thing with the enactment of House Bill 2. A coalition of more than 300 health-care providers — doctors, nurses, hospitals — successfully sued the state to stop this raid and won. The Supreme Court held that state’s efforts to take this money was an unconstitutional impairment of the policyholders’ contractual rights.The policyholders won. The politicians in Concord lost. Most people thought this was the end of the issue. Unfortunately, a sequel to the attempted theft is now under way.Armed with spurious new rationales and unchastened by their thorough previous defeat in the courts, the governor and his commissioner have cooked up another scheme to deny policyholders their vested rights in the JUA surplus funds. This time, they are trying to change the rules of the JUA to put the commissioner, rather then the JUA board of directors, in charge of the surplus funds with the authority to pay the money to the state. The fox would now officially be guarding the henhouse.Every 5-year-old child understands that you cannot change the rules of a game after it has been played to achieve a different outcome. That is what these misguided public officials are trying to do. Despite clear obligations in our New Hampshire Constitution, and applicable statutes, regulations and contracts to protect the rights of policyholders, the governor and insurance commissioner are trying to change the rules so they can take something that does not belong to them — the policyholders’ money.The most recent “justification” for the proposed rules changes is the claim that the JUA will not qualify for federal tax-exempt status if the Supreme Court’s decision is obeyed and the contracts and regulations are enforced according to their terms and policyholders are paid the surplus funds to which they are entitled.There is no basis for this position. The policyholders have retained and are working with an international accounting firm with direct experience on this issue. This firm disagrees with the state’s position.Moreover, to follow the state’s “reasoning” through to its logical conclusion, the insurance commissioner and governor believe that it is permissible to ignore the Supreme Court’s order, breach the insurance contracts, forget about the applicable regulations and disregard the vested rights of policyholders in order to preserve retroactively a tax exemption. A curious, indeed monumentally unlawful (and erroneous), position. In fact, even if this purported justification were genuine, it would necessarily mean that the JUA — with the oversight and approval of the insurance commissioner — was issuing fraudulent insurance contracts, under regulations that didn’t mean what they said, for the past 23 years promising phantom benefits that were never possible given the claimed tax exemption. A curious position to say the least for public officials who swore an oath to uphold the law and defend the state’s constitution.When private parties engage in this type of behavior, they are prosecuted or sued for fraud, deceit, unfair and deceptive trade practices and on occasion even racketeering. The only difference between this attempted theft by our governor and insurance commissioner and a masked gunman holding up a convenience store is that the gunman offers no pretense of what he’s doing.Kevin M. Fitzgerald, W. Scott O’Connell and Gordon J. MacDonald are attorneys with Nixon Peabody LLP in Manchester and represent JUA policyholders.

New rules would protect the JUA

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

Today, it is rare to hear about government programs that truly work to benefit the public. But such programs exist, and one of these is the New Hampshire Medical Malpractice Joint Underwriting Association.In 1975, facing growing concerns over the availability of insurance from private companies, rising medical malpractice insurance premiums and the loss of health-care services, the Insurance Department used authority granted by the Legislature under state law to establish the JUA. For the past 35 years, the JUA has successfully offered medical liability insurance to health-care providers at market rates, even to those high risk providers who are refused coverage by the private insurance market.On May 24, 2010, the Insurance Department announced amendments to rules that govern the structure and operation of the JUA — rules that the department has amended many times over the last 35 years. Past rule amendments have not been newsworthy, but due to recent controversy involving the JUA, there may be greater interest in these proposed rule changes.Why have we proposed amendments to the rules at this time? First, during the litigation that led to the January 2010 New Hampshire Supreme Court ruling that the state could not withdraw funds held by the JUA, it became clear that the current rules leave many important questions unanswered.Immediately after this decision, the Insurance Department commenced an examination to consider the impacts of the Supreme Court’s decision on the operation of the JUA. We identified provisions in the current rules that needed clarification and improvement.Consistent with my responsibility as commissioner, I am proposing these changes as amendments to the current rules.In addition, our examination has focused on preserving the JUA’s exemption from federal income tax. Since 1975, the JUA has not paid federal income tax.

Under federal tax law, programs that are “integral parts of a state government” and operate for public purposes are not subject to federal income tax. In a 1976 letter, the Internal Revenue Service confirmed the tax-exempt status of the JUA program because it “is an integral part of the state government.”Why is this tax issue so important? Because in recent litigation three policyholders seeking a monetary distribution from the JUA questioned the JUA’s status as a state program, thus calling into question whether the JUA is tax-exempt.They argued that the JUA is not a public program but instead is a private enterprise for the financial benefit of private parties — not the public. If this view were correct, the JUA would not be exempt from federal tax. If the JUA is not tax-exempt, then the IRS could assert that the JUA should have been filing tax returns for the last 35 years.Our preliminary analysis indicates that the IRS could seek all 35 years of past taxes, along with interest, in excess of $100 million.The Supreme Court, in its January decision, wisely declined to adopt the argument that the JUA is not a state program. However, in order to ensure the continued successful operation of the JUA, it is critical that I take very deliberate steps to protect the JUA from potential federal tax liability.The first of those steps is to clarify the rules governing the JUA in order to confirm the JUA’s status as an integral part of the state, operating for the public benefit.The rule changes I propose are necessary to ensure the JUA can continue to provide necessary and affordable medical malpractice coverage into the future.

These changes will clarify and improve the operation of the JUA, and will confirm that the JUA owes no back taxes to the IRS and is tax exempt.These changes are all consistent with the Supreme Court’s recent decision. I am confident that the rule that is proposed will protect this successful public program that helps to ensure that New Hampshire citizens have access to quality health-care providers.Roger A. Sevigny is commissioner of New Hampshire Department of Insurance.

It wasn’t ‘all for naught’

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:26 EST

After 15 years of serving the community, the Women’s Business Center will be closing its doors on Aug. 31. While I have only been with the organization since January 2009, I have had the good fortune of witnessing the positive impact the WBC has had on countless women entrepreneurs.I was hired just in time to experience the recession in all its glory, and the last year and a half has been a real roller coaster of emotions. I have never worked so intensely to keep an organization financially viable as I did over these past 18 months.I wasn’t alone in my endeavors. No matter what I asked of my staff they did it and gave 100 percent. I also had a board of directors who were invested in our success and who contributed their time, talent and treasure to the WBC. I felt that if anyone could weather this storm we could. We had the talent and the drive, and I believed that would get us through it all. I was wrong.We made the announcement Monday, July 19, the day I returned from vacation and just 10 days after I had been given the news of our demise. I was actually grateful that I was away and had some time to digest the reality of not only losing my job but also the impact on my staff and the numerous women who had come to depend on us for business counseling and support.I felt a range of emotions, from sadness to anger to fear and also guilt. I was sad for my colleagues and members who made our organization so unique and wonderful. I was angry that we didn’t receive the financial support that I believe we deserved and desperately needed. I felt fear as I have two young children and a mortgage. I felt guilt as I wondered if I didn’t do enough or didn’t do it well enough.I found myself revisiting all of the decisions I made over the past 18 months, wondering if they were the right ones. I have to admit that I also felt some relief as this battle has been physically and emotionally draining, and I wasn’t seeing an end in sight.I have been flooded with e-mails and phone calls of support. It has been heartwarming and enlightening. I received one particular e-mail that was brief but powerful. This person thanked us for our service and then told me that she hoped I didn’t feel that my efforts were “all for naught,” because they weren’t.How did she know exactly what I was wondering at that moment? I put 100 percent into this job every day, and we still ended up closing our doors. I lost sleep, got too many colds and cried over this job. Could it have been, “all for naught”?Not a chance. Every day our doors were open we were helping entrepreneurs. Every counseling session provided needed business tools and moral support. Every networking event brought together women with similar struggles and experiences. Every phone call had the potential to help someone make better informed decisions to grow their business or save them from making disastrous mistakes.If we had all come to work each day holding back our best efforts we never would have had the positive impact that we had. Each time that the WBC helped a struggling entrepreneur made it all worth it. If we had given less than our best we never would have received the calls and e-mails expressing such kindness and support. If I hadn’t given 100 percent every day I would have to spend the rest of my years wondering if it could have worked out differently. That is a burden I never want to carry.There are many businesses out there right now that are either closing up shop or thinking about closing. I’ll bet that many of these entrepreneurs are experiencing the same flood of emotions and self-doubt that I have been experiencing. Was it all for naught? The answer, in my opinion, is no. The closure of a business does not necessarily have to be translated as the failure of a business.The only true regrets I will have in this lifetime are for opportunities that I did not seize. I have a wonderful quote on my refrigerator by Robert H. Schuller: “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?” That is how I want to live my life. In doing so we (especially entrepreneurs) are going to face a lot more risks and perhaps more “failures” (I prefer to call them learning experiences). We are entrepreneurs, and we just won’t be satisfied living a cautious life. We are driven, we are optimists and we will learn from our experiences and go on to create new ventures. We will leave this world knowing that we went after our dreams and wouldn’t have done it any other way.Christine Davis is executive director of the Women’s Business Center in Portsmouth, which will be closing its doors at the end of August.

Getting more bang for your marketing buck

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:28 EST

Getting new clients and customers is expensive and not easy. It takes time, effort, energy and money and a great marketing message.Through marketing, you can reach hundreds, thousands or millions of people with your sales story. The “marketing line” is simply moving people from suspects to prospects and then prospects to paying clients and customers. I use the word “people” because even if you’re selling business-to-business, you’re still selling to people.Suspects are those you’d like to do business with. They fit the profile based on certain traits. But are they interested? Do they suffer from the pains your product or service can cure? Do they desire the benefits you offer? Prospects are much different. They’ve expressed some sort of interest in what you have. They’ve taken the first step toward you by “raising their hands” and saying, “I have that pain, can you cure it?” Or, “I want that benefit!”Many businesses waste an enormous amount of money chasing suspects. Those same resources can be focused on prospects. But since prospects are created and don’t just appear, how can you create them? The answer is found in your marketing message. What are you going to say to your suspects so that they can turn themselves into prospects?

Let’s use the Internet as an easy example. When suspects surf the Web “looking” for a cure to their pain or a desired benefit and find your site, it’s foolish to think that every one of them will be ready to buy at that moment. In our world of advertising overload, it takes several contacts to establish trust. When suspects find your site, your message must entice them in order for them to become a prospect. You can allow them to leave their contact info in exchange for something of real value. “The 7 Ways to (achieve their benefit or cure their pain)” would be a good start. Once that request is made, they become prospects. The key is allowing them to take the first step with no real risk.Now you can move them down the line. You can build rapport. You can follow up with phone calls. These are “warm” calls, not “cold calls.” You can employ more “marketing messages” using a variety of different media. You can include “irresistible offers” to entice your prospects to become clients and customers.See how this works? Focus on turning suspects into prospects and then use your best resources and your best marketing to convert those prospects into clients and customers. But is your marketing message too inwardly focused and egotistical? If so, it’s costing you a bundle.Pay close attention one day to the different marketing messages you hear and read. They’ll be filled with “platitudes” — marketing messages that have no value. A common example: “Serving the Granite State Since 1988.” One key question all marketing must answer is, “Who cares?” Answer honestly – does the above platitude answer it? No.Instead you can say, “Serving the Granite State Since 1988. You’ll Have Peace of Mind Knowing Rock Solid Dependability & Experience is What You Get.” Longer yes, but much more beneficial. Plus you don’t blend in with the thousands of others that get lost in the clutter by shouting, “Me too!”To get the most bang for your marketing bucks focus on creating result-oriented marketing messages. Think of the results you provide your clients and customers. Those results can easily be transformed into magic words that resonate with your target market.The right words can go a long way in getting your business noticed. When you focus on the self-interests of your suspects and prospects, you’ll see your marketing dollars come back to your bank account multiplied.Mike Dolpies, a business owner, author, speaker and Internet marketing consultant, can be reached at 603-286-4864 or askmiked.com.

How meaningful is your value proposition?

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:28 EST

While the term “value proposition” gets thrown around a lot, there are many missed opportunities in how companies actually articulate their value — and with all of the noise in the market, it is crucial to get it right.

Contrary to many messages in the marketplace, a value proposition is not a description of what a company does, what it provides, or a laundry list of product features. It is the unique, perceived worth of a contract between a business and its prospects. The value proposition resides at the heart of the market with the pain points and needs of users, buyers, and influencers — and the company and its products and services.

The value proposition is a strategic asset that lays the foundation for business planning, market and marketing strategy, competitive and partner strategy, product roadmaps, operations, lead generation, pricing and customer service. It is also reinforced (or diminished) by each customer interaction with the business.

Here are some concrete steps businesses can take to ensure that target markets should care about the products and services that a business offers:

• Understand what keeps targets awake at night: When tasked with articulating the market pains in the way that customers would speak about them, many executives and marketers struggle. While they may be able to intellectually talk about the pain or the problems that customers and prospects have, it is clear that they cannot empathize in the language that the markets actually use. This empathy and common lexicon are essential to demonstrating that a business understands before it can show that it has a solution that fits.

• Invest up-front in multiple value propositions: In any strategic sale, businesses have to reach out to users, influencers and the actual person holding the purse strings — and messaging falls flat when companies use a single “one size fits all” approach.

As an example, a client was expanding into enterprise transformation initiatives. In voice-of-customer discussions it was clear that IT managers, the users, wanted to ensure that the company products would eliminate downtime for business users. The CFOs wanted to know that the costs would be contained and predictable — no budget surprises. Same initiatives, different vested interests, different messaging required — across all channels.

• Embrace that prospects are buying holes, not drills: As tempting as it may be to talk about the latest feature or widget the product has, businesses need to focus on the problem the product solves. Too often, internal stakeholders get excited about what they believe will be the key “feature differentiators” that will set the product apart from the competition. Prospects want to know that a product solves their problem.

A start-up team looking at a “better way to help users organize digital assets” was very excited about all the competitive features that the Web-based solution could offer. In fact, when prospects for the tool were surveyed about why their digital assets — photos and home videos — mattered, the consistent answer was “sharing memories.” The new tagline and executive summary in the business plan represented that. The features were still important, of course, but not essential to the value proposition.

• Demonstrate impact: This is really the “so what?” principle. So many companies are focused on talking about what they do, they miss talking about why their targets should care. Businesses need to tell targets how their products and services can make a meaningful difference — save time, reduce costs, make money. How a company can demonstrate impact drives pricing and is the beginning of the conversation of how embedded it can be in the value chain.

As businesses look at impact, they also understand that profile of the ideal customer. This profile will help with higher quality lead generation by targeting like customers who are not as price sensitive, who are loyal, and with whom a business can have a long-term relationship. The further the prospect is away from that impact, the more price sensitive the buyer will be.

• Optimize the marketing mix: New channels have leveled the media playing field in ways that did not exist as recently as five years ago. As marketing and PR expert David Meerman Scott has remarked, “You can buy attention (advertising), you can beg for attention from the media (PR), you can bug people one at a time to get attention (sales), or you can earn attention by creating something interesting and valuable and then publishing it online for free.” In reality, businesses need to do all four activities to get attention.

Having the right value propositions, maximizing finite resources and understanding the different channels to reach users, influencers and buyers are essential to being strategic and optimizing your marketing mix.

• Reinforce at every stage: Every prospect and customer interaction is an opportunity to reinforce your value. This is the daily currency. If a business cannot consistently do this across all aspects of its operations, customers and prospects will find someone else who can.

Getting the product-market fit right is an essential first step. Companies also must be able to clearly articulate the value. Given the noise in today’s marketplace, the many channels and stakeholders, and finite resources, the value proposition is a strategic asset that businesses must get right in today’s market to reach targets.

Toral D. Cowieson, the founder of SISUTEK, a market due-diligence and product strategy firm based on the Seacoast, can be reached at 603-828-1633 or tcowieson@sisutek.com.

Avoiding the overdraft

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:28 EST

As of July 1, federal regulations require that when you open a new bank account, you will have to choose to be covered by overdraft services for one-time, point-of-purchase debit card or ATM transactions. If you choose not to enroll in such services, your ATM or debit card will be declined if you try to make a purchase and there isn’t enough money in your account to cover it.

For current account holders, the new rules will go into effect on Aug. 15. The new rules do not apply to checks or automatic bill payments you may have set up to pay bills such as your mortgage or utility bills.

Why have these changes been made? You may have read stories in the news about people inadvertently paying $35 for a cup of coffee by using their debit card at the coffee shop. How could that happen? It’s simple — you use your card to buy something, but there isn’t enough money in your account to cover the expense. For example, maybe you forgot to make a deposit, or you paid for the week’s groceries and didn’t note it in your checkbook.

As a standard service, many banks will cover such an overdraft until you make a deposit to cover the difference, but there’s a fee for that, which could add $20 to $35 to that cup of coffee. In the past, most ATM and debit card transactions were covered with such standard overdraft services automatically built into the account. As outlined above, however, you will now have to choose (or “opt in”) to have the bank automatically cover such overdrafts.

Why opt in? Let’s say you’ve just done the family’s grocery shopping for the week. You get to the register and, using your debit card to pay, you discover you don’t have enough money in your account. If you were participating in an overdraft service, your purchase may be completed and the bank will charge you a fee. Without it, the transaction will be declined.

Most banks offer different types of overdraft protection services and programs. The standard service charges a flat fee (generally $20 to $35) for each overdraft. But if you are prone to making overdrafts — and let’s face it, some of us are simply better at keeping our books than others — you might want to consider an overdraft protection program.

These programs work in one of two ways. The first links a savings account to your checking account, and with this type of plan, your bank will automatically transfer funds from savings to checking to cover an overdraft, usually at a lower fee than standard overdraft charges.

Another type of overdraft protection program involves a line of credit linked to your checking account. If you accidentally use your ATM or debit card for more than is in your checking account, the money is automatically drawn from your line of credit.

Since this is essentially a loan, a separate loan application is generally required, and interest charges/standard fees apply.

Of course, the best option is to avoid overdraft charges completely, if you can. Here are a few tips on how to do that:

• Keep track of your spending: If you create a budget, you’re more likely to know where your money is going and when. Part of your budget can include keeping a “cushion” in your checking account to avoid embarrassing situations at the checkout stand.

• Keep track of your balance: Faithfully entering your expenses in a budgeting program also keeps you up-to-date so that you always know how much is in your checking account.

• Communicate: Make sure, if your account is jointly held, you know who is spending money and when. That way, you’ll avoid surprises when you go to make purchases.

• Keep track of your cards: These days, most of us carry multiple cards, and it’s easy to reach for the wrong one. Grabbing your debit card when you meant to use a credit card can cause problems if there isn’t enough money in your checking account.

One suggestion is to use certain cards only for certain types of purchases, to make tracking expenses easier.

The most important part of the new regulation is that you get to choose. If you want the protection of overdraft services for everyday debit and ATM transactions, and many banks still offer them, you just have to opt-in.

Paul Rizzi is president of Concord-based Merrimack County Savings Bank.

Accentuating the positive in the workplace

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:28 EST

Q. I know the importance of social networking, but my company says “no” to going on Facebook and such during the workday. How can I get my boss to see that I’m promoting the company, just in a different way?

A. First of all, let’s be honest – Facebook and Twitter and other social network sites are fun and a huge energy drain. It’s not a surprise that companies are concerned about employees visiting such sites, because it can interfere with getting the job done.

But if you’re sincere about wanting to use social media to promote and advance your company, here’s what I suggest: Develop a brief proposal explaining how social media can help your company and give specific suggestions and examples about how other companies are using social media effectively. Then map out a plan for what you’d like to do.

Your proposal should be detailed with specific goals, outcomes and time estimates.

My guess is that you and your supervisor will learn a few things about social media — she’ll be impressed with your initiative and will gladly help create a path for you and your company to venture into the brave new world of communication.

Q. I’m seeking a new job and have interviews scheduled that are during the workday. I hate lying, but don’t want my current company to know I’m looking. What should I do?

A. Oh, the angst of quietly looking for a new job! Let’s face it — lots of people who find new jobs do it quietly, so you’re in good company. I respect you for wanting to conduct your job search ethically and fairly. The simple answer is that you’re an employee, but you also deserve a certain amount of privacy and latitude.

I’d suggest simply asking for and taking some personal time so that you can maintain your professionalism and so that you aren’t seeking a new job on company time. Your boss might suspect something is up, but he or she will also respect you for your honesty.

Q. What do you do if you are assigned a task for which you feel completely ill-prepared and know nothing about?

A. Be honest. Would you rather accept the assignment and do such a poor job that it harms your company or would you rather red-flag the fact that you don’t possess the knowledge base to take on this particular job?

A third, more acceptable, option would be to state that while you don’t feel ready to accept the assignment, you would be happy to conduct the research and conduct whatever professional development training is necessary to learn the skills necessary to accept the task. This demonstrates initiative, shows that you are dedicated to improving and also allows your company to develop a backup plan until you are ready.

Q. I get the value of teamwork, but what do you do if one member of the team is not pulling their weight?

A. Most teams have strong performers, weak performers and a whole lot of folks in the middle. Most everyone knows who they are, and the weak performers seldom make a difference or move ahead. A member not pulling his or her weight gives you an opportunity to shine. Don’t complain about what they’re not doing – that’s wasted effort and often comes off looking like sour grapes.

In actuality, you can’t reasonably affect what others are doing and can only control your own actions. Instead, put all of your energy into doing the best job that you possibly can while encouraging others to raise to your level of productivity. You will be noticed and you will be valued not only for your teamwork but for your demonstration of leadership qualities.

Q. Everyone has their pet peeves and mine is people who have to always be in charge and don’t “play well” in the workplace. What suggestions can you offer for dealing with domineering personalities?

A. Laugh! I know that this sounds glib, but I’ve discovered that simply making light of certain behaviors not only redirects your energy, it communicates your frustration in a more lighthearted way. Negativity breeds negativity, and lashing out at a co-worker only ensures that the situation will get more hostile and that workplace productivity will be stunted.

However, if you approach the situation in a more positive fashion, even directing humor at the situation, you have a much higher probability of redirecting negative behaviors and lightening the mood so that more effective communication can take place. When in doubt, humor and positive energy is the way to go! Paul Boynton, president and chief executive of Moore Center Services, Manchester, is also a personal coach, corporate consultant, motivational speaker, host of the television show, “Begin with Yes” and author of the book by the same name. He can be reached at beginwithyes@comcast.net.

H-1B basics: hiring foreign nationals

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

If your company is recruiting professional employees and you are considering employing a foreign national, H-1B visas are available this fiscal year to hire those employees.

The H-1B visa allows professional people working in specialty occupations to work for businesses in the United States. Each year on Oct. 1, 65,000 such visas are made available for persons hired for professional positions in a specialty occupation requiring a minimum of a bachelor’s degree. An additional 20,000 visas are available for professional positions for foreign nationals who obtained a master’s Degree from a U.S. university.

Of the 65,000 visas, 1,400 are especially allotted for persons from Chile under the United States-Chile Free Trade Agreement and another 5,400 are allotted for persons from Singapore under the United States-Singapore Free Trade Agreement.

Thus, even if there is a heavy usage of H-1B visa, you are generally able to hire persons from Chile or Singapore from the visa set-aside.

In the late 1990s and up to about 2006, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service ran out of H-1B visas before the fiscal year even began. For many years, the agency had to hold a visa lottery, all of the H-1B visas for the next fiscal year were used within the first two days of filing.

Last year, H-1B visas were available until Dec. 21. So far this fiscal year — fiscal year 2011, which begins Oct. 1 — 22,000 visas have been issued against the 65,000 cap and 9,400 against the 20,000 cap. Therefore, many new H-1B visas are still available.

If a foreign national already has an H-1B visa, he or she is generally not subject to the visa cap. A company can transfer the H-1B visa and, for the most part, not be concerned with the cap.

When considering hiring a professional in the H-1B visa category, the position must be in a specialty occupation, which is defined as an occupation that requires “theoretical and practical application of a body of highly specialized knowledge” and “attainment of a bachelor’s or higher degree in the specific specialty (or its equivalent).”

“Or its equivalent” means that if you have found a person with experience who does not have a degree, that person may still be qualified for an H-1B position based on experience. You do not have to automatically disqualify a candidate based solely on the lack of a degree. Visa requirementsThe process for obtaining an H-1B visa begins with the U.S. Department of Labor. Employers are required to submit an approved labor condition application as a prerequisite to filing an H-1B petition. The labor condition application attests that the company will pay the foreign national either the prevailing wage or actual wage for the position offered, whichever is higher. This is to ensure that companies do not hire foreign workers in order to put higher-paid U.S. workers out of business.

The company also attests that it will provide working conditions that will not adversely affect the working conditions of similarly situated workers; that on the day the labor condition application is filed there is no strike, lockout or work stoppage; and that notice has been given to the other employees or the company bargaining representative, if there is one.

It is very important that the foreign national worker be paid either the prevailing wage or the actual wage, whichever is higher. The prevailing wage can be made either by requesting the Labor Department review the job duties and requirements and then give a prevailing wage, or a company is allowed to use the agency’s online wage surveys to find a prevailing wage. The actual wage is determined by an examination all similarly situated employees and a determination of how much the company actually pays those individuals. The company must pay the higher of the two numbers.

“Working conditions” refers to hours, shifts, vacation periods, and fringe benefits. The company must be able to show that the working conditions of the H-1B employee are similar to those in like business establishments in the area.

The H-1B visa petition must be prepared and submitted to the Citizenship and Immigration Service with documents supporting each requirement of the law. The filing also must include the approved labor condition application.

If approved, the visa will allow a professional worker to work in the United States for up to six years. The maximum period of time that can be requested for an H-1B visa is three years. If the employer seeks to retain the H-1B worker for longer than three years, then an extension petition must be filed for the remaining period of time.

Many people ask if a company is required to publish a job advertisement for an H-1B position prior to filing the H-1B visa petition. The answer is no. The requirement to publish a job advertisement for the position would arise only if the company subsequently determines that it would like to hire the individual permanently. (A company also may file for a part time H-1B worker, if that is what is required.)

It is also important that both the company and the foreign national employee understand their responsibilities and obligations under the H-1B regulations. Among the most important are that the H-1B employee is only allowed to work for the employer that obtained the H-1B visa and the employer must pay the prevailing wage or actual wage, whichever is higher.

Mona T. Movafaghi, an immigration attorney with the law firm of Wiggin & Nourie, can be reached at 603-629-4523 or mmovafaghi@wiggin-nourie.com.

Making lemonade out of lemons

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

The other day a client asked me, “How is it going? Are you busy?” I replied, “We find ourselves busy doing 10 $3,000 jobs/projects instead of three $10,000 jobs/projects. The revenues are level, but the workload is double.” Then the light bulb went off in my head because, as I have shared this with various people, they simply nod their heads in agreement. They too, are working harder to generate the same revenues.

We are not out of the woods yet, relative to commercial real estate. We have received several calls for assistance from banks now having to deal with troubled commercial real estate loans. Frankly, we have anticipated such calls for more than two years and we had anticipated quite a volume by now. Not so far. But the ongoing Great Recession continues to linger, and job recovery is anemic, so firms are coming to realize that they not only do not need so much space, they cannot afford it.

To quote Jeff Thredgold of Thredgold Economic Associates, “Constraining a more impressive economic growth rate are sluggish residential and commercial real estate valuations and soft demand, historically high unemployment, and consumer anxiety about ever expanding government and mind boggling budget deficits … numerous forecasts have been downgraded in recent weeks, mostly tied to European financial challenges.”

Jeff states that for the first time since the Great Depression, total job losses during a recession wiped out total employment gains during the prior expansion and hundreds of thousands of jobs in construction and manufacturing are lost for good. Ouch!

More importantly, the future path is not clear. Inflation versus deflation? The pundits are equally divided on this one. More of the critical analysis comes from academic economists and economic historians who do not have a point of view or spin to push. Many corporate and bank economists, as well as those working in government, cannot or will not speak their minds for fear they will be chastised for being too negative.

Back here on Main Street, we are not sure what the short-term future holds. We are working hard — in fact, we are working on projects that two years ago we would’ve declined. But at least we are working and we are busy. When the going gets tough … adversity brings opportunity!

A recent e-mail newsletter stated that until the overall economy rebounds there will be no meaningful recovery in the commercial real estate industry. But there are other opportunities for real estate professionals, such as managing troubled asset portfolios, creatively refinancing loans and acquiring assets that cannot be conserved by owners.One constant factorFor those of us who have worked in these vineyards for years, we have seen many cycles. Commercial real estate becomes in short supply during a growth cycle, rents increase and profits increase. This invites competition, so new players come into the market, or existing ones build more buildings, the shortage of space becomes a surplus or even a glut, the economy turns down and the cycle nosedives.

The one constant factor is obsolescence. Buildings age. They leak, grow mold, their HVAC systems become less efficient, they do not have enough electrical power for new technologies. So, some buildings no longer can compete. They change uses — perhaps an office tower becomes a residential condo building or a former Wal-Mart (replaced by a Super Wal-Mart) becomes a community center. The point is that over time there is always change and some upgrading of the building stock. The sector is dynamic.

But that does not mean that someone who bought a building for $100 a square-foot in 2005, which can be replaced with a brand-new building today for $70 a square-foot, is excited about investing in commercial real estate. In these challenging, trying and uncertain times, having an experienced, veteran real estate adviser at your side is well worth his or her weight in gold (at $1,200 per ounce, that is a topic for another column!).

Bill Norton, president of Norton Asset Management, is a Counselor of Real Estate (CRE) and a Facilities Management Administrator (FMA) with the Building Owners and Managers Association. He can be reached at wbn@nortonnewengland.com.

Lawyer, firm to advise in ouster cases

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

The Executive Council has voted to hire a former state prosecutor and his Manchester law firm for advice while it hears Gov. John Lynch’s bid to remove two state agency heads.

Donald Perrault, a former assistant attorney general, will supervise his work and that of associates with the Wadleigh, Starr & Peters firm on the looming petitions to remove state Liquor Commission Chairman Mark Bodi and Banking Commissioner Peter Hildreth.

The firm will be paid up to $175 an hour for its advice, with a budget not to exceed $75,000.

Kathy Sullivan, former chairwoman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party and ranking member of the Democratic National Committee, is a partner in the firm.

Councilor Raymond Burton, R-Bath, said constituents in his northern district are following both controversies closely and growing impatient with the pace.

“This will keep the process going. It comes up unprompted in my district. People ask, what are you doing here?’” Burton said.

Lynch wants the council to remove Bodi on allegations of malfeasance for interfering in a liquor enforcement action against a Keene bar in December.

Bodi claims he was trying to deal with political pressure brought on the bar owner’s behalf by Rep. Daniel Eaton, of Stoddard, the fourth-ranking Democrat in the 400-person New Hampshire House.

Bodi maintains he asked state prosecutors for assistance on amending a search warrant and got no help.

Former Attorney General Philip McLaughlin will defend Bodi at a public hearing before the council that may begin this summer.Hildreth hearingLynch has called for Hildreth’s removal for his failure to regulate Financial Resources Mortgage Inc. of Meredith until it declared bankruptcy and defrauded more than 150 investors out of as much as $80 million.

Attorney General Michael Delaney authored a report that found “significant failures” in the state departments of Banking, Securities and Justice that allowed FRM to remain in business while 15 complaints came in on the firm over a nine-year period.

Hildreth says he’s proud of his agency’s review on this matter and confident the council would decide to keep him on the job.

Former Senate President and Rep. David Nixon, D-Manchester, is representing Hildreth.

This second removal track is likely to take much longer.

Delaney said his office was unable to find a New Hampshire lawyer qualified to prepare the petition to remove Hildreth. One lawyer did respond to an in-state bid request but did not have the requisite skills, Delaney said.

The FRM scandal extends to investors, banks and developers who have ties to lawyers throughout the state, the attorney general said.

“Most law firms have a client with some interest in the matter,” Delaney said.

Lynch told reporters he wasn’t surprised the state will have to go outside New Hampshire for help in the Hildreth matter.

“It’s a small state and a state where everybody knows everybody,” Lynch said

In light of the attorney general office’s role in the FRM scandal, Delaney asked to hire the independent prosecutor to make the removal case to the council.

The attorney general expanded the legal search to lawyers in Massachusetts.

Lynch and Delaney said they were committed to pursuing legislation in the 2011 session to give back to the attorney general’s office the power to investigate complaints on banking and securities.

Lawmakers exempted those industries in adopting a bill in 2002, and Lynch recently vetoed a bill (House Bill 1490) that would have broadened that exemption.

“That is, in part, why I vetoed that bill, and I’m fully supportive of giving the attorney general’s office this jurisdiction they should have had all along,” Lynch said. — KEVIN LANDRIGAN/THE TELEGRAPH

Women’s Business Center to close its doors

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

After 15 years of serving women entrepreneurs, and those who want to be entrepreneurs, the Women’s Business Center will be shut down at the end of August.

The Portsmouth-based organization is yet another nonprofit victim of the recession. The WBC’s membership numbers have been falling since its height of 450 in 2008, along with attendance at its programs, and some expected contributions have not come through, paving the way for the decision to close up shop.

Julie Vogt, chair of the WBC’s board, said the recession in general as well as the crisis in the financial services industry added up to a “primordial soup” with the message, “You know what ladies? Your time has come.”

The bulk of the WBC’s funding comes through a matching grant from the U.S. Small Business Administration. Much of the other funding comes from contributions from businesses, many of them banks.

Vogt said the size of the donations from non-SBA sources has decreased in the last year. “They didn’t have the ability to fund us like they used to.” And coupled with the even greater demand related to the economic turmoil, the funding picture didn’t look encouraging down the horizon she said.

“It’s hard when people need clothes, food, shelter and heat,” said Vogt. “There’s only a finite number of dollars to go around.”

The WBC also may have been the victim of its own success. According to Christine Davis, executive director for the last year and a half, there has been more competition from other organizations in the state that are offering some of the same informational programs the WBC pioneered over its 15-year history.

For instance, chambers of commerce and law firms around the state have been offering small-business education classes and workshops for entrepreneurs — the very kind the WBC offers.

But the organization was seeing a continued, and growing, need for its small-business counseling services, with the WBC logging some 250 one-on-one sessions in the last year. “There was a lot of demand for that,” said Davis.

“The counseling was probably the biggest and strongest service we offered, as well as the mentor program,” said Vogt. “That was a huge hit in popularity. We matched a seasoned business owner with someone who needed help in that area, for instance finance or marketing. I think people found great benefit from that,” said Vogt.

There was another aspect to the decision to shut down the WBC, said Vogt: a perception that “the need for a women-focused business organization is waning.”

“The younger girls today do not see the need for a women’s business association,” she said. “Even my own daughter — she’s 20 — said to me, ‘I don’t know why you do this. What difference does it make? Men, women — it’s all business.’”

But women approach business differently, said Vogt, and still face their share of discrimination at the hands of men.

“We do business differently, we manage differently, we negotiate differently, and that’s why I think there’s still a need for an organization like this,” she said. “The younger women say no and I would love to be dead wrong, but I fear that I am not.”

Nevertheless, she said, “We’re walking out with our heads held high. We’ve done a great job and helped thousands of women over the years.”

Added Davis: “It has been inspiring to see how many successful business owners the WBC has helped throughout our 15-year history.” — JEFF FEINGOLD

Lynch signs 1031 exchange tax fix

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

About 30 investors, assessed by the state Department of Revenue Administration for owing a total of $5 million in back taxes on various investments, are off the hook, thanks to a bill signed into law July 8 by Gov. John Lynch.

The bill retroactively allows investors to engage in real estate exchanges permitted by federal law without paying capital gains taxes.

“I’m very, very pleased,” said George Foss III, a Littleton escrow agent who facilitates such exchanges. Foss was the main advocate – along with the New Hampshire Association of Realtors – for the bill. “To think to come from a town that represents only 3 percent of the population and to have an effect on policy in one of the largest legislative bodies in the world, that is absolutely amazing,” said Foss.

Senate Bill 483 covers a subset of exchanges exempted by Section 1031 of the federal tax code governing the reinvestment of capital gains. Just as homeowners, who don’t have to pay capital gains on a property they sell as long as they buy another house in a certain amount of time, real estate investors can use the same method in deferring taxes on such gains.

However, real estate investors often have to buy and sell property under different entities, since they sometimes must satisfy lenders that those entities are free from various liens and encumbrances or they want to limit personal liability or protect other business holdings.

The IRS previously ruled that it would “disregard” the different names of an entity selling the property and the entity buying a property as long as the ownership of those entities are basically the same.Defining ‘disregards’But New Hampshire took a different stance because it doesn’t have a personal income tax, and its business profit tax is imposed on entities only. So when an investor buys a property under one entity and sells it under another, the money isn’t reinvested as far as the state is concerned. Instead, it is deemed a capital gain that should be reflected in the company’s profits for that year.

Ironically, it was the federal interpretation clarifying why such “disregards” were permitted that caused the DRA to determine that they should be taxed under New Hampshire law.

The problem, said Foss, is that the DRA’s new interpretation wasn’t backed by a specific law, or even a rule. It was done by audit, and investors, who were scrupulously following federal law, were told by the DRA that they owed hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes on transactions going back to 2005. Several said that the tax interpretation could wipe them out.

Aside from the fate of individual investors, Foss and the Realtors warned that outlawing such like-kind exchanges would scare investors away from the state, as it had in other states that changed their law to capture this income.

While Foss couldn’t be happier about the bill, he did say that investors should still be careful when making such transactions. For one, state law is silent on whether exchanges in which an investor sells a property as an LLC and buys it as an individual is free from the state capital gains tax, even though an investor can do so under federal law.

And even under federal law, such exchanges have to go through an escrow agent, to make sure that funds aren’t commingled with any other.Bob Sanders can be reached at bsanders@nhbr.com.

No support for changes at JUA rules hearing

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

Health providers and lawyers compared a proposed Insurance Department rule to a “masked gunman” making off with $110 million meant for state government.

At a July 20 hearing in Concord, the department heard only opposition to its rules proposal. The plan came six months after the state’s high court ruled Gov. John Lynch’s gambit to use the Joint Underwriters Association surplus to balance the state budget violated the contract clause of the state Constitution.

Kevin Fitzgerald, lead lawyer for the health providers who successfully sued Lynch over the JUA gambit, said these proposed rule changes are an attempted government theft by another name.

“The only difference between this attempted theft by our governor and insurance commissioner and a masked gunman holding up a convenience store is that a gunman offers no pretense of what he’s doing,” Fitzgerald wrote in commentary on the proposal.

Insurance Commissioner Roger Sevigny claims changes in rules for the 35-year-old JUA are to protect the group’s tax-exempt status and avoid a $100 million IRS judgment.

The high court never ruled if the JUA is a state program, even though the Legislature created it in 1975, Sevigny noted.

“These changes will clarify and improve the operation of the JUA and will confirm that the JUA owes no back taxes to the IRS and is tax exempt,” Sevigny countered.

Scott O’Connell, another lawyer for Dr. Georgia Tuttle, Laconia-based LRGHealthcare — parent company of Lakes Region General Hospital and Franklin Regional Hospital — and the other providers, said Sevigny is using the tax-exempt threat as a weapon to gain omnipotent power over the JUA and to move its surplus into state coffers.

“The tax exemption is total horse hockey; it’s not based in reality,” O’Connell said in a telephone interview. “They want to use this stalking horse with all it can provide them. Every change is calculated to give the commissioner oversight and control over everything.”‘Prospective’ rules?

Chiara Dolcino, general counsel for the Insurance Department, said the rules achieve two important objectives.

“First, to provide greater clarity with respect to the structure and operation of the JUA and the responsibilities of the commissioner, the required participants in the plan and the board and to make necessary changes to preserve the longstanding federal tax exemption of the JUA,” Dolcino said in her testimony.

But Tuttle offered a similar theft analogy to her lawyers’ in remarks to state regulators about Sevigny’s plan.

“In fact, his actions, in my opinion are no different than those of a thief robbing my home, except that when the thief comes into my home, he knows that what he is doing is illegal,” Tuttle said. “This action is action that is being taken trying to make it look like it’s the right thing to do. It isn’t, plain and simple.”

Sevigny and state regulators contend the rules would be “prospective” and only give the state access to future surpluses amassed over time.

Henry Lipman, LRGHealthcare’s chief financial officer, said the proposed rules go much further than that and state officials know it.

“I don’t know how you can say this is a prospective rule, and with all due respect, I think it is a sham to say it’s a prospective matter,” Lipman said.

The policyholders will continue fighting the issue when the proposed rules go before the Joint Legislative Committee on Administrative Rules, O’Connell said.

He said one argument will be they would violate a New Hampshire law that bans state government from operating an insurance company.

“The state would function as its own company running the JUA entirely with the board only being advisory,” O’Connell said. “Be honest with us; we’re not stupid. We know what you are trying to do, and that is keep your options in play to grab these dollars.” - KEVIN LANDRIGAN/THE TELEGRAPH

Concert, expo to spotlight efficiency

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

Grammy Award-winning musician Sheryl Crow, joined by 2009 BMI Pop Award Songwriter of the year Colbie Caillat, will headline this year’s Greenerpalooza III concert beginning at 8 p.m. Aug. 12 at the Meadowbrook U.S. Cellular Pavilion in Gilford.Co-sponsored by Public Service of New Hampshire and Citizens Bank in coordination with the New Hampshire Division of Economic Development and media sponsor New Hampshire Business Review, Greenerpalooza III is a celebration of New Hampshire’s energy-efficiency efforts.Over 5,000 concertgoers will not only get to enjoy a concert from a multi-platinum artist, they will also be able to visit a special eco-village on the Meadowbrook midway, where vendors will be extolling the virtues of wind and solar power as well as other alternative energy sources.Tickets to the Sheryl Crow and Colbie Caillat concert, which include entry into the eco-village, are available online at meadowbrook.net.To learn more about the latest happenings with Greenerpalooza, visit the newly created Greenerpalooza III Facebook page at facebook.com/greennh.

Hampton firm’s turbine technology is on energy cutting edge

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

Jim Kesseli, founder and president of Hampton-based engineering research firm Brayton Energy, knows a thing or two about being ahead of the alternative energy curve.As a young, MIT-educated research engineer almost three decades ago, Kesseli had a front-row seat in the alternative energy development arena before energy prices bottomed out and government funding dried up.“At the time it was impossible to make the economic case,” said Kesseli, an MIT graduate, about major innovations in high-efficiency and low-emission micro turbine engines that he saw while working at Lockheed Sanders (now BAE Systems) in the early 1980s.But the economic case has changed dramatically, as the drive for alternatives to a fossil fuel economy has become more urgent politically and economically amid concerns about climate change, volatility in the energy markets and man-made disasters, such as the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.Kesseli’s research and development-intensive company specializes in design, prototyping and testing of turbomachinery and gas turbine systems.Kesseli said Brayton Energy — which is named after the 19th century gas turbine engine innovator and Exeter resident George Brayton — is on the cutting edge of micro turbine and other alternative energy development projects — ranging from working with commercial truck fleets in the United States and Brazil to one of the more intriguing solar energy collection and distribution projects in the country.Green incubatorBut Kessli, whose company has attracted the attention of multinational giants Wal-Mart and Google, wants to do more. He plans to foster green business development by hosting an incubator to help early-stage clean energy companies.The Seacoast Sustainable Energy Technology Incubator is located in one of the two buildings Brayton occupies along Lafayette Road in Hampton (the companyalso is planning to buy a third building).Kesseli said he wants to do his part to assist young businesses that will come from a wide range of clean-energy avenues including thermal, solar, wind, LEED energy efficiency, insulation, hydro and energy auditing.“We’ve had success and we wanted to turn our attention towards something more egalitarian and bring in companies who can benefit from working together in the same space,” said Kesseli, who has talked to a few firms and is seeking good fits for both parties. “We can offer favorable terms and lend a helping hand with our expertise.”That expertise would be considerable.Kesseli, who has 16 patents in the gas turbine field, said that what Brayton’s 28 employees do is sometimes hard to quantify because of their R&D work. In short, they do basic research, designing, engineering and creating manufacturing prototypes in partnership with other companies.Brayton is heavily involved in a number of innovative projects, and Kesseli said the company expects a major expansion in its engineering staff.Among the more noteworthy projects is SolarCAT, which could lead to the establishment of the nation’s first solar-powered power plant in Arizona. The project resulted in a major Department of Energy grant, and Brayton has created a gas turbine system to generate electricity from energy collected by dozens of solar dishes.“This (SolarCAT) concept has been around for a while, but it ended up dying in the 1980s due to a lack of economic viability,” said Kesseli as he gave a tour of Brayton’s prototype workshops. “But this is a radically new way to make electricity.”Another development, funded by Brazilian investors, has become a renewable energy biomass turbine power plant.But the most “revolutionary,” according to Kesseli, is the next stage of what he saw as a young researcher — an ultra low-emission and multi-fuel micro turbine as an advanced propulsion system for large trucks. Brayton is partnering with a truck manufacturer and corporations such as Wal-Mart on the project.It’s “revolutionary,” Kesseli explained, because it will replace the diesel engine — which has been around for more than a century.“This is a low-emission gas turbine with advanced high efficiency. It will have large-scale applications and multi-fuel capability, from renewable fuels to natural gas.”While Brayton has remained very low key, it caught the attention of the national Pew Environment Group which cited Brayton last year for being a positive example of New Hampshire’s fast-growing clean technology economy.“We chose them because they were a premier company in clean energy technology, “ said Jan Pendlebury, the New Hampshire representative for the Pew Environment Group. She said companies such as Brayton, in conjunction with the state’s climate action plan, have “attracted almost $67 million in clean tech venture capital in the last three years. Together, policy leaders and private investors can boost New Hampshire’s clean energy economy.”Kesseli, who believes that government investment in alternative energy development is still too low, said the company was humbled by the Pew recognition and hopes it spurs more recognition to “create clean energy economy jobs here in New Hampshire and expand the potential for renewable energy across the country.”

Health pilot eyes a new approach to reimbursement

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:27 EST

Pay-for-performance may be coming to New Hampshire’s health-care industry.Under a five-year pilot program unveiled earlier in July by Gov.John Lynch, health-care providers will be compensated based ontheir quality of care instead of the current fee-for-service model.Five working groups that include over a dozen hospitals and other health-care providers around the state have agreed to take part in the “accountable care organization,” or ACO, program.The pilot will use health-care benchmarks that providers must meet in order to receive reimbursement, but just what those benchmarks are and how providers will be compensated have yet to be determined.What is known is that “they will define the long-term plan and the overall transparency,” said Heather Staples of the New Hampshire Citizens Initiative and the pilot’s facilitator. “We will probably be looking at typical measures – cardiac care and readmission rates, for example – as well as youth and preventative measures.”Staples said other areas that could be studied include the use of services, such as in the emergency room, overall health-care costs in the community and information on episodes of care, such as what different services are used. Among those taking part are members of a North Country initiative that will include Littleton Regional Hospital, Ammonoosuc Community Health Services and North Country Home Health and Hospice in Littleton and Cottage Hospital in Woodsville.The Central New Hampshire Health Partnership will include Speare Memorial Hospital, Mid-State Health Center and Pemi-Baker Home Health and Hospice in Plymouth, Genesis Behavioral Health in Laconia and Newfound Area Nursing Association in Bristol. Cheshire Medical Center and Dartmouth-Hitchcock Keene will study populations in the Monadnock Region, Exeter Health Resources will run the pilot on the Seacoast, and Southern New Hampshire Health System in Nashua — composed primarily of Southern New Hampshire Medical Center, Foundation Medical Partners and Advantage Network Physician Hospital Organization — will run the pilot project in southern New Hampshire.Staples said all of the major insurance carriers in the Granite State are participating in the program as well.Prevention: a ‘key aspect’Southern New Hampshire Medical Center has been evolving an integrated system for the better part of 20 years, according to Tom Wilhelmsen, chief executive of the 188-bed Nashua hospital. Becoming one of the pilot sites for the new project is something of a next step.“We believe ACOs are the future. In reviewing the health-care reform act (Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act), they will be required in 2014,” he said. “The sooner we can become involved and participate in the formation, the sooner our patients and our organization will benefit.”For Littleton Regional Hospital — a 25-bed critical access hospital that sees a large volume of outpatients, netting revenues of some $65 million — the ACO pilot is an opportunity to increase focus on the North Country’s diabetic population.“We’re looking to keep diabetics out of the hospital and keep the cost per care down,” said Warren West, the hospital’s chief executive.West said that once the diabetes trending process is running smoothly, the North Country ACO group will look at other key diagnoses in the community.

Wilhelmsen said SNHMC and its pilot partners will take a closer look at the area’s Medicare population, something he said the health reform act identified as crucial.“You want to identify chronic disease. That includes diabetes, congestive heart failure, hypertension. We want to keep those populations as healthy as possible. Obesity is another high-risk population,” he said, adding that “prevention is one of the key aspects of an ACO.”As important as improving patient care and lowering costs are, another critical element of the ACO pilot is strengthening mechanisms for delivering integrated care across providers.That opportunity was key, said Littleton’s West.“This is a process and a program treating the whole patient. Why not treat community needs by working in a collaborative way?” he said.Help for business?Another focus of the ACO pilot is the use of technology to drive efficiencies.A priority of several prior presidential administrations, the Obama White House in particular has set aside grant money for health-care technology projects, an area for which Staples said program officials will be seeking help.“We are also considering the creation of an independent data entity — a reporting engine to report back to communities about their care using claims and care data,” she said.Another goal of the pilot, albeit a future one, is to slow the rising cost of health care for small businesses.“Ideally, rather than lowering costs, we’re hoping to affect the rate of increase, the trend,” said Staples. “Rather than small-business owners getting a double-digit trend, hopefully we can get it closer to the rate of increase similar to the consumer price index.”But, she said, health-care providers and business owners shouldn’t be the only ones working to decrease health-care costs.“Consumers will have to learn appropriate use of treatment, in seeking it and receiving it,” Staples said. “It takes patients to be active in the care plan as well.”Staples said the program is not a repackaged form of managed care or a capitation formula —a practice in which an insurer reimburses a provider for a specified dollar amount, for a given time period, to treat patients. Capitation led some providers to offer less care or only see a certain number of patients covered by that insurer.“We will not be withholding services at all,” she said. “We will be looking instead on integrating clinical operations, focusing on appropriate delivery.”But just how – and more importantly, how much — providers will be reimbursed is still a question.“We will use the current fee-for-service method for now, then establish a global budget across all carriers for a community,” said Staples.In fact, with more efficient care leading to fewer trips to the emergency room and fewer in-patient admissions, the providers might actually lose money in the initial phase.“I’m not convinced we will see an ROI,” said West. “I am convinced it is the right thing to do for the community. In time, by saving the system money, and when we quantify the savings from all the reduced medical needs, in theory, a portion of that shared savings will come back to the hospital.”But right now, West said, that’s a big unknown.“You will never have all the answers until you ask the questions. We have great partners, and I am certain, after five years, we’ll have some answers,” said West.Staples said a July 1, 2011, start is expected for reimbursements under the new method.“The systems that volunteered are very excited to be a part of this pilot,” said Staples. “It might mean less money in the short term, but greater quality and less costs in the future through efficient delivery of care.”

Cindy Kibbe can be reached at ckibbe@nhbr.com.

Flotsam & Jetsam

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:22:28 EST

That July 6 Boston Globe article claiming that the governor’s office tried to convince Paul Hodes’ campaign not to run an ad lambasting Kelly Ayotte after her “the buck needs to reach my desk” testimony in the Financial Resources Mortgage hearings sure has opened a wound among state Dems.

On one side are the folks who are one step away from asking to see the actual papers asserting John Lynch really is a Democrat. On the other side are the folks who couldn’t care less about where Lynch stands on an issue, as long as he keeps winning.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle on the Globe’s Ayotte claim. But it’s not that hard a stretch to see the man who is known occasionally to post a yard sign supporting a Republican candidate on his lawn visibly cringe at the idea of dumping on his former AG.East side, west sideSarah Palin’s recent endorsement of Kelly Ayotte in the GOP U.S. Senate race may have carried a bit more weight if the former Alaska governor actually had spent more than half a day in New Hampshire — and while here didn’t refer to the region she was in as being the “Great Northwest.”Crowd controlJust add that July 15 rally organized by the National Organization for Marriage (on its “Summer for Marriage, One Man-One Woman Tour”) to the growing list of events whose hype far outweighs its turnout.

In fact, the crowd that showed up at the NOM rally at Manchester’s City Hall Plaza — about 75 to 80 people — may actually have been small enough to fit inside Manchester Mayor Ted Gatsas’ impressively sized Mercedes.

And it was one of those rallies at which the number of opponents may have been more impressive than the number of actual ralliers. (There were about 35 to 40 anti-NOM folks keeping an eye on things, including several Free Staters.)

And, considering that NOM is going around the country in the hopes of putting gay marriage once again on the front burner of national politics, the turnout of political types was even less impressive.

There were Karen Testerman, one of the GOP gubernatorial hopefuls, and Reps. David Bates of Windham and John Cebrowski of Bedford (the rep who last year made a name for himself when he opined, “A peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich can’t be anything other than a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich. Creamy peanut butter and chunky peanut butter can never be peanut butter and jelly.”)

Another GOP gubernatorial candidate, Ovide Lamontagne, sent a message of regret to the crowd for not being in attendance.

“I think New Hampshire is definitely pro-traditional marriage and ripe for our message,” said NOM’s executive director, Brian Brown.Reasons to be cheerfulThe economy may remain in a sputtering state, but there are some things to be grateful for.

One of them is the assertion of New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg — made during his recent visit to Dartmouth College — that he is not going to run for president.

Here’s hoping that the mayor — who spoke July 16 at the school, delivering the first lecture in the newly minted Dartmouth Presidential Lecture Series — actually meant president of the United States, and not president of Dartmouth College.

F&J TOTE BOARD

Carol Shea-Porter: The congresswoman is one of the candidates shut out from a list of Democratic incumbents who’ll be getting a share of $28 million in advertising by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee this fall. Dennis Hogan: The chairman of the Nashua Republican City Committee and candidate for county attorney, battles revelation that he was reprimanded by N.H. Supreme Court earlier this year for representing a couple seeking a divorce and then striking a deal to reimburse them if they agreed not to seek a malpractice lawsuit. George Copadis: The labor commissioner, originally nominated by former Gov. Craig Benson, a Republican, is nominated for another term by Gov. John Lynch, a Democrat. Steve Forbes: The erstwhile GOP presidential wannabe endorses GOP 1st C.D. hopeful Rich Ashooh. Victoria Reggie Kennedy: The widow of the late Sen. Ted Kennedy will be the featured guest at a Sept. 12 fund-raiser for Carol Shea-Porter.

It's been making the rounds...

• Considering that more observers are warming up to the idea that Kelly Ayotte isn’t going to win the GOP primary, it sure is interesting that the Hodes campaign would still think she’s their No. 1 target.

• Will environmental officials be prepared to issue an air pollution alert on Friday, Oct. 22? That’s the day Fox TV bloviator Bill O’Reilly appears at the Nackey Loeb First Amendment dinner to share stories about how great he is.

• Wonder how Warren Rudman feels to be endorsing the same candidate as Sarah Palin?

• Paul Hodes going to Canada for a fund-raiser is the political equivalent of throwing a hanging curveball to Albert Pujols.

• Perhaps someone should send GOP gubernatorial hopeful John Stephen — who’s advocating a rooms and meals tax holiday as economic stimulus — a copy of the new Tax Foundation report questioning the value and fairness of such tax holidays.

• Did Sean Mahoney actually tell New Hampshire Public Radio that he quit his RNC post because of his opposition to the bank bailout and wasteful spending? And all along he had us believing it was over GOP Chair Michael Steele’s profligate spending.

NHBR About Town

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:39:02 EST

A team from Merrimack County Savings Bank recently got a chance to sample two new ice cream flavors at Granite State Candy Shoppe in Concord. It was their reward for winning a recent Friends Program auction at which they won the right to name the new flavors, which they dubbed Merrimack Mocha Munch and the Rizzi Fizzy, the latter named in honor of current president and incoming chief executive Paul Rizzi. Among those at the tasting were Ed Caron, Jeff Bart, owner of Granite State Candy, and Linda Lorden.

More photos

Submit items for About Town to editor@nhbr.com. Please include a color photo and a brief description.

Future residential construction gains in N.H.

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 20:42:16 EST

Future residential and nonresidential construction in New Hampshire continued at a strong clip in June, with combined contracts almost tripling in amount from last year's levels.Future nonbuilding contracts -- for projects like roads and bridges -- were 34 percent lower last May's stimulus-fueled numbers.According to figures from industry information service McGraw-Hill Construction, the total value of future residential construction contracts was $96.9 million, almost $50 million more than both the $47.9 million reported in June 2009 and the $47.9 million reported in May 2010.Nonresidential construction contracts totaled $96.9 million in June, almost $78 million more than the $18.9 million reported a year earlier, but down some $6 million from the $102.8 million reported in May 2010.Nonbuilding contracts totaled $19.1 million, about $9 million lower than last year's $28.8 million and some $25 million less than the $44.6 million reported in May.Thus far in 2010, a total of $869.6 million in total construction contracts have been reported -- 23 percent less than the stimulus fueled $1.12 billion reported a year earlier. -- JEFF FEINGOLD/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Unitil reports 2Q loss

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 20:42:12 EST

Unitil Inc. lost $2.1 million in the second quarter of 2010, compared to barely breaking even in the same quarter a year earlier, thanks primarily to a warm spring and larger interest payments, according to the company's quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.The results translate into a 19-cents per-share loss, though for the first half of the year the company's net income was $4.4 million, or 3 cents a share. That’s a decrease from the $9.3 million net gain for the first half of 2009.Electricity sales were up a bit but so were interest payments, thanks to the company’s issuance of some $40 million in long-term debt. The company spent $800,000 more in interest in the second quarter of 2010 than it did the same quarter in 2009. The Hampton-based utility hopes its profit margin will go up next year, thanks to a number of filings with state and federal regulators to increase rates.The state Public Utilities Commission approved a $5.2 million increase in an electric case, including recovering costs from the 2008 ice storm. And a decision from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for an increase of $3 million in natural gas revenues means annual revenues are expected to rise in January. The gas division is also asking for a rate surcharge to recover some $12.7 million during the three-year period of 2011-13.In the filing, the company also disclosed the amount it spent on costs associated with the windstorm of February 2010: $7.2 million. In June, the company included those costs under its annual reconciliation and rate filing. That matter is still pending. -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Q and A with: Chef Liz Barbour

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 08:25:52 EST

Liz Barbour, chef and owner of The Creative Feast in Hollis, travels all over the state giving cooking demonstrations and classes in people’s homes and elsewhere, teaching them how to make scrumptious, healthy meals. Now she’s taking the same concept and adapting it for school lunchrooms.

Barbour, wife and mother of two teenagers, is trying to show school districts that cafeteria food – not exactly known for being gourmet cuisine – can be healthy, tasty and cost-effective.

Q. When did your love affair with food and healthy preparation begin?

A. I graduated from Syracuse University and went into clothing retail in Manhattan. It just wasn’t the place for me. I then came to the Boston area. I was the manager of a gourmet deli and food store in Cambridge.

I was fascinated with the idea of cooking. My college roommate could just pull stuff out of the fridge and make something wonderful. I always wanted to be able to do that.

I got a little burnt-out working on the deli floor all the time, so I said, “Put me in the back.” The gourmet food store also made prepared foods. That where I really got my training. It was definitely a seat-of-the-pants kind of thing.

I did that for a while and realized I needed to have some kind of training. I found the Inn at Harvard and went in and asked the chef what she suggested I do. She said you need to get job with a kitchen, then train and move on. I went in the next day with my resume, I made her lunch to thank her – and she hired me.

That’s how I learned how to cook.

I eventually went on to work at an Italian restaurant in Maynard, Mass., and eventually became the chef there.

Then I went on to catering in Newton. What that brought me was the realization that I am movable – I can create a kitchen in a place that has no kitchen.

All of that together allows me to do what I do today.

Q. Tell us about your cooking-class business, The Creative Feast.

A. My idea was that I would go to you, a library, a community adult ed, a kitchen showroom. I would bring everything with me, and offer whatever program I was teaching.

What I want is for everybody to walk out having had a great meal, but having had four recipes that they are confident to make. They’ve seen how to prepare them. They get why the heat on your sauté pan has to be really hot, why your onions have to be cut to same size – they’ve seen the results.

Q. You’re embarking on a new program focused on school food service departments.

A. Before we start the sessions, I give food service personnel a questionnaire – what are the most challenging foods that you get from your government commodity food service? When I come to them, I take those answers they’ve given on the questionnaire and incorporate them into the program.

There are actually several classes in the program. The first one is “Infusing Flavor.” That focuses on not only adding flavor to dishes, but layering it. There’s also “Improving Knife Skills.”

My other goal is I need to be that staff’s champion in learning how to work within federal food program guidelines and their budgets. I may be a trained chef, but I think what they do is pretty amazing. It’s a lot. They have to accomplish a lot with incredible restrictions.

Q. Were you thinking about this before Chef Jamie Oliver had his TV special on The Learning Channel, “Jamie’s School Lunch Project”?

A. Yes. The timing was perfect. I had already had my first session before he did his program. Right after he had it, I sent out that press release, thinking now was the time to do it.

Q. What goes on in a session?

A. One of my other cooking class students happened to be the superintendent of schools in Raymond, Dr. Jean Richards. I told her I was looking for a school that would let me come in, free of charge, and let me work with their food service staff, let them be my guinea pigs, so I could learn how to teach, learn what they need to work within these guidelines but still make food that was healthy.

At the first session, there were 17 food staff members from across the entire Raymond school system.

I brought in with me a big batch of plain brown rice with nothing in it. I passed it out in sample cups for everybody to try. It wasn’t very tasty. Then I took the brown rice, added healthy olive oil, a little bit of salt, a little bit of pepper, stirred it up and passed it around again.

Not bad. They were in control of every ingredient that went in there. So rather than butter, we used olive oil. Control the salt.

Now, let’s add some herbs, then a little bit of feta cheese. They said, “Oh, our kids will never eat feta cheese.”

Do not underestimate the palates of kids. If they learn how something tastes or why it tastes that way, they’re ready for that.

So mix white rice with the brown – which is a whole grain and a great way to get whole grains into their diets. Start with 75 percent white, 25 percent brown and try that for two weeks. Then 50-50. It works.

You can make a simple stir fry using commodity foods like broccoli and peas, put it over brown rice and add a simple Asian sauce you can make that keeps in the refrigerator or freezes.

Q. Tackling school lunch programs sounds like it’s a challenge.

A. There are a lot of barriers to cafeteria staff as far as training goes.

Number one, it’s the appreciation and understanding that the food staff at your school is just as influential on your children’s education as the teachers.

In schools that receive a lot of free and reduced (cost) lunches, that may be the best meal of the day for some children – the healthiest meal of the day.

If we’re not providing the healthiest meal of the day, then they continue to be eating things that are not feeding their brains. We all know this – what we eat influences how we perform during the day.

Food service staff are hourly employees, so their days are structured differently, their contracts are done differently.

Many do have training in their contracts, but training provided for them is on a weekend. A dedicated employee may give up their Saturday, but they’re not necessarily getting paid for that.

Some have to pay for the program themselves, and may be reimbursed or may not be.

The other barrier to them is the USDA guidelines. They are very outdated, but they are trying to improve them.

The lunches have to have a certain amount of vegetables available to the kids, a certain number of foods, to get the free and reduced lunch program. The amount of money schools receive from the government is based on how many free and reduced lunches they provide.

They also rely on government commodity foods – they meet the government guidelines, but remember they are very out of date. Your goal for your bottom line is to use as many of the commodity foods as possible.

So there are a lot of things that come into play.

Q. With school districts so strapped for cash, how do you convince them, A) to pay for your class, and B) start offering more nutritious – and arguably more expensive – food?

A. I have a rate that’s the same whether they send one staff member or 35. It comes out to about $10 per person.

It’s paying for my travel time and whatever, but the unique thing about what I do is I go to that school. I will travel, they pick a time – they have professional days when the school is basically closed.

I tailor the program to that specific school; they need to walk out of there thinking they got a lot of information for their school.

Q. How many districts have you worked with so far?

A. So far, with Raymond to get it started off. Now I have bookings for the fall with two school systems and one is considering it.

Q. How have the programs been received? Were food staff skeptical at first, or were they excited?

A. I actually haven’t been getting any resistance. But it’s important how I present it. I can’t go in there assuming I know everything – every kitchen is different, every staff dynamic is different.

Through the School Nutrition Association of New Hampshire, I gave the knife skills class to over 75 food service staff in three sessions.

The food service directors are very excited. It’s very easy for school food services to go into the red, but if you use some of that money to train your staff, to make tastier, healthier meals, your income is going to go up because you’ll be selling more lunches.

Q. How are you introducing new foods to the kids? How do you get them to choose broccoli over hamburgers or Twinkies?

A. I’ve developed a kids’ tasting program based on one from Vermont.

Say you’re introducing brown rice. You introduce it to two children from each class at every lunch time. They get to sit at the special tasting table. The other kids are out there watching, wondering what they're getting.

Food service asks them to taste it and tell them what they think of it. Then they go back and eat their lunch.

The teacher back in class will ask them what they had and how they liked it and the other kids will hear about this. The next week, it will appear on the menu.

Recipes will also go home in the school newsletter so parents can prepare it. Now it’s not a new thing when it’s in the cafeteria.

Q. Why do you think the typical American diet is still so abysmal?

A. A lot of people blame the manufacturers, but we’re not being tied up and dragged to the store and told to buy this.

The book “Mindless Eating” talks a lot about this. A lot of what we do is being influenced by sources that you’re not even aware of.

For example, when you go to a restaurant, they serve you dinner on a very large plate. A normal portion on a large plate looks very small. Your perception of a calorie content of a meal is off.

I also think we have to learn the basics. Eat more plants. When you start to do that, then you can start to embrace the organics.

Q. What’s next? Are you taking your food service program to other community organizations or nonprofits that have food programs for kids?

A. The possibilities are endless. This is open and available to any group. We need a larger parent group who’s going to promote this kind of thing. But change happens slowly.

Q. What’s the one thing parents should be doing in the kitchen for their families?

A. Take your kids to the grocery store and have them participate. They have to learn how to choose the right things.

Cindy Kibbe can be reached at ckibbe@nhbr.com.

Firm keeps N.H. malpractice premiums unchanged

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:31:00 EST

ProSelect Insurance Company has announced that it will not be increasing medical liability insurance premiums for New Hampshire providers.According to a press release, the company said, “medical malpractice jury awards have leveled in New Hampshire," prompting the decision to "stabilize” insurance rates.More than 900 individual physicians and surgeons will see stabilized premiums throughout their policy's 2010-2011 term, said ProSelect. Richard W. Brewer, president and chief executive of ProMutual Group, said "a possible reason" for the reduction in claims is "our focused attention on risk management, physician education, patient safety and the aggressive defense of good medicine for our policyholders." – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Ex-nurse exec sues Keene nursing home

Tue, 27 Jul 2010 10:45:58 EST

The former director of nursing at Langdon Place of Keene says she was forced to leave after she charged that the assisted living facility administrator knew about Medicare fraud and did nothing to stop it, according to a lawsuit moved last week to U.S. District Court in Concord.Lori Dwyer, a Lempster resident who worked at the facility since 2004 and became head nurse in April 2006, is represented by Concord attorney Chuck Douglas, who first filed the suit last month against Sunbridge Healthcare Corp., the Albuquerque, N.M.-based national chain that owns Langdon, and Langdon’s administrator Darrell Carlson, who lives in Vermont.Dwyer's suit says Carlson allegedly told Dwyer she “had thrown him under the bus” for fingering him in December 2009, and harassed her for four months until Dwyer was “constructively discharged” in April 2010.Carlson says the nursing home would “vigorously defend itself” against the lawsuit.Carlson’s alleged harassment began shortly after Christmas in 2009, following an investigation into charges that the nursing home clinical case manager had allegedly been “unlawfully backdating” Medicare authorization forms required for federal reimbursement of patient care. Dwyer says Carlson told her to “handle it” while he was on vacation, and Dwyer says that she found that the allegations were true, leading to the suspension and eventual resignation of the case manager, according to the lawsuit, which did not reveal he case manager’s identity.But the suit also says that “Carlson had knowledge of the back dating practice but did not put a stop to it.” It was then that Carlson made the statement “to the effect the plaintiff had "thrown him under the bus."The lawsuit does not state that the fraud allegations were reported to state or federal authorities. No one at Langdon Place has been publicly charged with Medicare fraud. A spokesperson for the Office of Inspector General in Washington, D.C. – which normally investigates Medicare fraud -- said it would neither confirm nor deny any investigation of the facility or its employees.In the following months, according to the suit, the demeanor of Carlson, who previously had a close working relationship with Dwyer, became “threatening and angry,” and he “persistently and belligerently badgered her” on trivial matters, such as who she ate lunch with, excluded her from meetings, wrongfully accused her of lying and at one point “abruptly snatched a piece of paper from her” in front of her co-workers. At one point, she says in the suit, she “feared for her physical safety.”On March 9, she wrote to human relations department of Sunbridge that “I am fearful that he might strike out at me” and asked for an investigation, but “nothing meaningful” was done to resolve the situation, the suit says.Instead, Carlson retaliated by putting her on a “performance improvement plan” and gave her additional job responsibilities and then criticized her job performance, the lawsuit charges.When asked to comment, Carlson issued the following statement:“Other than to say that the center will vigorously defend itself as this case proceeds, we cannot comment on the pending litigation. The center complies with all state and federal regulations, including those relating to Medicare, and requires all employees to abide by a strict “Code of Conduct” to ensure proper reporting and investigation of any concerns. I want to assure our residents and our community that our first priority is to provide our residents with a safe and caring environment and we strive to do so with integrity.” -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Enterprise Bancorp 2Q income: $2.6m

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 21:11:24 EST

Enterprise Bancorp has reported second-quarter net income of $2.6 million, or 28 cents per share, as compared to $1.4 million, or 17 cents per share, for the same quarter a year ago.The Lowell, Mass.-based bank also recorded $5.5 million, or 60 cents per share, in net income for the first half of 2010, as compared to nearly $3 million, or 36 cents per share, in the first half of 2009.The bank attributed the increase in net income to growth in loans, deposits and investment assets under management during the last year. Total assets for the first six months of 2010 were $1.37 billion, an increase of 10 percent from assets of $1.25 billion for the same period a year ago.The bank recently announced it is seeking regulatory approval to open a third New Hampshire branch in Hudson. That office is expected to open by the end of the year.Enterprise Bancorp has branches in Derry and Salem in the Granite State, as well as 11 branches in Massachusetts.The bank earlier this week declared a quarterly dividend of 10 cents a share to be paid on Sept. 1 to shareholders of record as of Aug. 11. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Hampshire First income rises

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 21:11:52 EST

Manchester-based Hampshire First Bank reported net income for the quarter ending June 30 was $266,000, more than a 50 percent increase over first-quarter income.Net income for the six months ending June 30 totaled $440,000 or 16 cents a share, compared to a net loss of $40,000 or 1 cent, per share in the same period last year.Total assets as of June 30 were $201.5 million, compared to $147.1 million a year earlier. "This level of growth although slowing from prior year’s extraordinary pace shows that the market continues to accept our personalized products and services," said James Dunphy, President and chief executive of Hampshire First. The bank’s board also has authorized the additional purchase of $200,000 in shares of Hampshire First Bank stock annually. -- NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEWManchester-based Hampshire First Bank reported net income for the quarter ending June 30 was $266,000, more than a 50 percent increase over first-quarter income.Net income for the six months ending June 30 totaled $440,000 or 16 cents a share, compared to a net loss of $40,000 or 1 cent, per share in the same period last year.Total assets as of June 30 were $201.5 million, compared to $147.1 million a year earlier. "This level of growth although slowing from prior year’s extraordinary pace shows that the market continues to accept our personalized products and services," said James Dunphy, President and chief executive of Hampshire First. The bank’s board also has authorized the additional purchase of $200,000 in shares of Hampshire First Bank stock annually. -- NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

N.H. small businesses can reap health tax credit

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 21:12:13 EST

Over 80 percent of New Hampshire's smallest businesses will be eligible for tax credits this year to help finance employee health-care coverage, according to a recently released report.Beginning this year and running until 2014, businesses with fewer than 25 workers and average wages of under $50,000 will be eligible to receive up to a 35 percent tax credit on the cost of their employees’ health insurance. Nonprofits are eligible to receive a tax credit of as much as 25 percent.The smallest of small businesses – those with 10 or fewer employees and an average wage of less than $25,000 – are eligible to receive the full 35 percent credit, with eligible nonprofits qualifying for the full 25 percent credit.That translates to some 19,600 businesses, according to "A Helping Hand for Small Businesses: Health Insurance Tax Credits," released by Families USA, a consumer health organization, and Small Business Majority, a small-business advocacy group.According to the report, there were about 4,500 businesses in the Granite State that met the criteria for the maximum credit."Congress designed this system with the intent of providing the greatest help to those businesses most in need—the smallest employers who face the highest premiums and are the least able to offer coverage to their workers," said the report.Covered part-time workers also can go toward calculating the total employee count provision of the tax credit, with two part-time employees counting as one full-time worker. This could be an incentive for employers to provide coverage for their part-time workers, a group that often lacks health benefits.One drawback to the tax credit is that it is currently slated to sunset in 2014. It is hoped that the planned health insurance exchanges – which the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services defines as "a transparent and competitive insurance marketplace" – will be functioning by then, offering more affordable plans.New Hampshire small employers who want to get some idea of what companies are offering health plans for those with 25 or fewer employees in the state, can visit HealthCare.gov.While the insurers and the number of small-employer plans they offer is available, links to plan specifics, and more importantly, actual prices won’t be listed until October. -- CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Lynch signs business-related bills

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

Gov. John Lynch last week signed into law more than a dozen bills that affect business, and as a result doing business in New Hampshire -- for the most part -- didn’t get any cheaper.Here are a few of the changes:• Under House Bill 598, auctioneers will be more tightly regulated, and the cost of a bond they must acquire has been raised from $10,000 to $25,000. The law goes into effect Jan 1.• Under Jan. 1, private investigators also will face tougher regulations, and the fee for a license goes up from $100 to $150 for an individual and $400 to $500 per agency. In addition, the Safety Department can add on up to $50 more if the fee doesn’t cover expenses of licensing and regulating. The law goes in to effect Jan 1.) • Under HB 1239, administrative fines for wetlands violations will rise from $2,000 for each offense to $5,000, respective of the duration of violation. The new will also require that the Department of Environmental Services meet tighter deadlines in issuing permits. • Under HB 1252, auto insurers will be responsible for medical costs incurred for three years following an accident, not just one year. • Under HB 1267, hawkers and peddlers will be required by towns and cities to undergo background checks, including fingerprinting. And towns will be able to charge peddlers for the privilege. • Under HB 1352, direct shippers of alcohol (via the Internet, for example) willl have to obtain permits: $100 for wine manufacturers, $500 importers, retailers and wholesalers. • Under HB 1380, developers will be subject to charges by zoning boards of adjustment fees to cover costs, administrative expenses, third-party review and consultation. • Under HB 1404, those providing continuing education to Realtors could be subject to a fine of $2,000 per offense for not following regulations. • Under HB 1566, banks will have to disclose financial records of recipients whose eligibility for medical assistance is based on the applicant’s or recipient’s age, blindness or disability upon the state's request. -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Ex-manager sues over Tire Warehouse firing

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 21:07:20 EST

The manager of the West Lebanon Tire Warehouse store was told to "shut up and sit down" -- and later fired from his $100,000-a-year job -- for asking why his store’s workers weren’t getting paid to attend a mandatory companywide meeting, according to a federal lawsuit.Kevin Rumrill is suing Monro Muffler Brake Inc., which owns the Tire Warehouse chain, claiming its actions were "wanton, oppressive, and malicious," in a complaint filed Friday in U.S. District Court in New Hampshire.Monro, in a prepared statement, denied the firing was in retaliation for Rumnill’s complaint.Rochester, N.Y.-based Monro -- a chain with a half-billion dollars in sales -- allegedly required the regional meeting in Brattleboro, Vt., after agreeing to acquire the Keene-based Tire Warehouse franchise for $34 million in September 2009, but before the deal was closed.Rumrill had worked for Tire Warehouse for a decade when Monro bought it. At the time, he says he had an annual salary of $87,780 plus an annual bonus, which in March, 2009 was $15,100.Monro announced the purchase on Sept. 24, 2009. The merger added 40 tire stores to the nationwide chain along with a distribution center in Swanzey. The stores had produced annual net sales of $53 million in 2008.Monro followed up with a memo, saying that Tire Warehouse would keep its name and workers and advised that "all employees" attend a Sept. 30 evening meeting, according to the lawsuit.Here is what happened next, according to the suit:Rumrill says he was initially assured -- by Robert Schlosser, the vice president of store operations for Tire Warehouse -- that the employees (including the seven hourly workers who were at the West Lebanon store) would be paid to attend the meeting.But Rumril then received a memo from the human resources manager saying that the workers wouldn’t get paid unless they had comp time coming. When Rumrill contacted Schlosser to explain the contradiction, Schlosser allegedly told him that the sole owner of Tire Warehouse – Robert Dabrowski – had made an executive decision that the workers would not be paid.Rumrill says he disagreed with that decision, but went to the meeting, which he says – in addition to information about the merger – also dealt with a presentation and training on winter tire sales.When Joseph Tomarchio, executive vice president of operations for Monro, stated that Monro’s second-best asset was its employees, Rumrill raised his hand and expressed his concern that the employees were not being paid."You sit down and shut up and I’ll deal with you later," Tomarchio allegedly responded.After the meeting, Schlosser approached Rumrill, and allegedly said "if you’re not happy here, maybe you should do something different." Rumrill says he said he was happy with his job but unhappy that employees were not being paid.Schlosser reiterated that Dabrowski made the decision, since the employees were not yet Monro employees, so Monro wasn’t going to pay and suggested that Rumrill apologize to Tomarchio, since he wasn’t "starting off on the right foot."But Rumrill didn’t back down. He says he told Tomarchio after the meeting that he "really felt strongly that his employees should be heard."The lawsuit alleges that not paying the workers for a mandated meeting where training is involved is a violation of state and federal labor laws.According to the Monro’s proxy filing, Tomarchio was compensated $1,990,298 last year.Rumrill said he didn’t hear anything further about the incident until Oct. 23, a little more than two weeks after the merger was consummated on Oct. 5. He says he met with Schlosser at a McDonald’s restaurant near the West Lebanon store. Schlosser asked him about his relationship with Woodstock Sunoco Tire and Auto, and Rumrill says he replied that he was the "money behind that business" as a managing partner. Schlosser allegedly said that the store is a direct competitor and Monro was terminating him for violating Monro’s conflict-of-interest policy, in the employee handbook.In the lawsuit, Rumrill says the store, 18 miles away, was not a direct competitor, since it focused on repairs, not selling tires, and besides, both Tire Warehouse and Monro knew of his affiliation with the store in July and August, and he would have sold off his interest if he was told there was a problem."Mr. Rumrill would never have sacrificed his position," according to the lawsuit.But, Rumrill says, Schlosser didn’t offer that alternative at the meeting, even though a meeting before taking corrective action was required by the company handbook, says the lawsuit."It is clear that the real reason that Monro terminated Mr. Rumrill was because Mr. Rumrill raised his concern at the September 30th meeting about employees not being paid to attend the meeting, and not because of his affiliation with Woodstock Sunoco Tire and Auto," says the lawsuit.Monro’s action were "motivated by bad faith, retaliation, and malice," it charges.Calls to Schlosser and Tomarchio were not returned by deadline, but Ed Mullen, Monro’s Vice President Human Resources, issued the following statement:"Monro intends to vigorously defend its actions in terminating the employment of Mr. Rumrill and firmly believes that the facts will support the company's actions. It is our strong position that the meeting, which occurred nearly one year ago and before Monro owned or operated the Tire Warehouse locations, played no role in the subsequent decision to terminate Mr. Rumrill. Otherwise, the company has a general policy of not commenting on pending litigation." -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Nashua firm nets $5m in funding

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 21:07:30 EST

DiagnosisONE, a health-care software firm in Nashua, has received $5 million in funding from the Edison Venture Fund.DiagnosisONE’s Clinical Decision Support application integrates patient information from a variety of sources to aid health-care providers in developing treatment options at the patient’s bedside.The company, described in a press release as being in the expansion stage, said it will use the money for sales and marketing and for further product development.Edison was the sole funder in the round."DiagnosisONE is at the cutting edge of next-generation clinical decision support solutions and is well positioned in this fast growing healthcare IT market segment," said Michael Balmuth, Edison general partner. Last year, DiagnosisONE was selected by the Centers for Disease Control to develop the IT infrastructure for the national public health system in Pakistan. Its D1.Surveillance system helps Pakistani public health officials to collect and analyze data about real or potential outbreaks of communicable diseases. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Spanish firm, N.H. energy company in deal

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:50:25 EST

Concord-based Clean Power Development LLC has signed a partnership agreement with Gestamp Biomass -- a division of Gestamp Renewables of Madrid, Spain -- to develop, finance and operate biomass energy projects across the Northeast, including a project in Berlin that is expected to generate some 29 megawatts and several hundred jobs."The Berlin project is fully permitted -- it is shovel-ready," Bill Gabler, project manager for the Berlin biomass site, told NHBR.Clean Power’s Berlin plant will use wood biomass for combined heat and electricity production.The company is building its facility on an 11-acre site on the Androscoggin River near Berlin’s wastewater treatment facility several miles from the city’s downtown.The city of Berlin itself might also benefit from the plant, which could provide energy for a district heating system, proposed last October.During construction, slated to begin this fall, some 200 to 300 jobs will be created. When the plant is up and running sometime in late 2011, 23 workers will be employed at the facility, according to Gabler."And an additional 100 to 150 jobs, such as foresters and lumber workers, will be added in the fuel supply chain," he said.While transmission capacity has been a lingering question for renewable energy projects in the North Country, Gabler said, "there is absolutely enough for us" because the current loop has 60 megawatts of export capacity.Because of the limited capacity, a priority queue has been set up for the various alternative energy projects in the works around the North Country, with Noble Environmental Energy's wind project at the front of the line and Clean Power second, said Gabler. Third in line, he said, is Laidlaw Energy's wood-burning plant at the site of the former Fraser Papers mill in Berlin.Clean Power also has another combined heat and power biomass project in the southern New Hampshire town of Winchester in the works. The permitting process on that project is expected to begin in the fall.Still others could follow in the future based on the partnership with Gestamp – which reported more than $6 billion in 2009 revenues. The agreement covers activities in the six New England state as well as New York and Pennsylvania."We are the conduit for Gestamp’s entry in to the North American and Northeast biomass market," said Gabler.Mel Liston, president of Clean Power Development, said in a company release that the Berlin plant will be a model for other projects. -- CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Balsams GM in potential purchase group

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:38:16 EST

The general manager of The Balsams Grand Resort in Dixville Notch is part of a group of North Country investors looking to purchase the historic property.Jeff McIver, president and general manager since June 2009, and three other individuals are currently putting together a deal to buy and manage The Balsams. He declined to name the others involved in the effort.McIver, a native of Maine, served as general manager of The Balsams from 2002 to 2005, when Delaware North Companies Parks & Resorts, a hotel management and investment firm, took over the property. Delaware North ended its management contract in 2009."When I was hired back in 2009, it was with the understanding that the property was already up for sale and that I wanted to be a part of an ownership group," said McIver.Tillotson Corp., a diversified holding company based in Lexington, Mass., holds the deed to the Balsams and has daily management of the Neil and Louise Tillotson Charitable Trust. The corporation, itself an asset of the trust, is expecting to turn over all of the trust's assets -- including The Balsams – to charity or to be sold off by the end of the year.The Balsams has been on the market for the better part of three years as part of the wind-down of assets, but so far no offers have been accepted.McIver said business is actually booming for the North Country resort."Business is up 20 percent overall from last year," said McIver. "This August is up 30 percent."The Balsams is one of the area’s largest employers, which has been hit hard in recent years by the closure of paper and lumber mills and mass layoffs at other businesses, such as the Ethan Allen furniture factory on the northern border with Vermont."This is the first year we have not hired any foreign students to work at The Balsams," said McIver. "We have all local staff."No purchase price or other details about the McIver group’s deal were disclosed, although McIver did say the group would not be looking for another management company to run the Balsams."The manager needs to be in the store," he said.McIver said that there were a number of other groups looking at the property but did not have any other details. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Women's Business Center to close

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:50:46 EST

After 15 years of serving women entrepreneurs, and those who want to be entrepreneurs, the Women's Business Center will be shut down at the end of August.The Portsmouth-based organization's board of directors voted last week in favor of closing the WBC's doors and announced the decision Monday.The organization is yet another nonprofit victim of the recession. The WBC's membership numbers have been falling since its height of 450 in 2008, along with attendance at its programs, and some expected contributions have not come through, paving the way for the decision to close up shop.She said the recession in general as well as the crisis in the financial services industry added up to a "primordial soup" with the message, "You know what ladies? Your time has come."She added: "We've been working on this for nine months, and we realized we were going nowhere good," she said.The bulk of the WBC's funding comes through a matching grant from the U.S. Small Business Administration. Much of the other funding comes from contributions from businesses, many of them banks. Vogt said the size of the donations from non-SBA sources has decreased in the last year. "They didn't have the ability to fund us like they used to." And coupled with the even greater demand related to the economic turmoil, the funding picture didn't look encouraging down the horizon she said."It's hard when people need clothes, food, shelter and heat," said Vogt. "There's only a finite number of dollars to go around."The WBC also may have been the victim of its own success. According to Christine Davis, executive director for the last year and a half, there has been more competition from other organizations in the state that are offering some of the same informational programs the WBC pioneered over its 15-year history.For instance, chambers of commerce and law firms around the state have been offering small-business education classes and workshops for entrepreneurs -- the very kind the WBC offers.But the organization was seeing a continued, and growing, need for its small-business counseling services, with the WBC logging some 250 one-on-one sessions in the last year. "There was a lot of demand for that," said Davis."The counseling was probably the biggest and strongest service we offered, as well as the mentor program," said Vogt. "That was a huge hit in popularity. We matched a seasoned business owner with someone who needed help in that area, for instance finance or marketing. I think people found great benefit from that," said Vogt.There was another aspect to the decision to shut down the WBC, said Vogt: a perception that "the need for a women-focused business organization is waning.""The younger girls today do not see the need for a women's business association," she said. "Even my own daughter -- she's 20 -- said to me, 'I don't know why you do this. What difference does it make? Men, women -- it's all business.'"But women approach business differently, said Vogt, and still face their share of discrimination at the hands of men. "We do business differently, we manage differently, we negotiate differently, and that's why I think there's still a need for an organization like this," she said. "The younger women say no and I would love to be dead wrong, but I fear that I am not."Nevertheless, she said, "We're walking out with our heads held high. We've done a great job and helped thousands of women over the years."Added Davis: "It has been inspiring to see how many successful business owners the WBC has helped throughout our 15-year history." -- JEFF FEINGOLD/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

N.H. home sales, prices rise through June

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:50:36 EST

New Hampshire home sales continue to increase and prices are starting to creep up, but it is still not known if the latest monthly figures are part of a trend or a last hurrah of the federal homebuyer tax credit.At midyear, single-family home sales shot up 17.6 percent and prices climbed 3.8 percent over the dismal first half of 2009, according to the New Hampshire Association of Realtors. In June alone, statistics were a bit lower: a 10.1 percent increase in sales and a 1.8 percent hike in prices compared to June 2009. The average price of a home in June was $229,000. Not too long ago, that would have been a first-time homeowner’s bargain.The slowdown in the sales increase could be result of the phase-out of the $8,000 first-time homebuyer tax credit. There will be no more such sales after June 30, the deadline for closing the deal.But there might have been fewer tax credit-related deals in June because of an early April 30 deadline to sign an agreement of sale. That means that June has some "real" sales in the mix. But no one will really know what will happen in July."What we don’t know is exactly how much of an impact the tax credit has had on the market, and what it will mean once the effect of the tax credit is no longer part of the equation," said Monika McGillicuddy, president of the Realtors Association, which releases the figures based on its multiple listing service. (It's important to note that the figures don’t include all sales, such as homes sold at foreclosure auction, a number that has been increasing as well.)The good news is that the sales increase is pretty much across the board year to date, with Strafford County leading the way with a 30 percent increase and Cheshire County on the tail end with 3.6 percent increase.In Cheshire County, sales continue to decline (going down nearly 5 percent year to date), and in Merrimack County prices continue to be sluggish (a 0.8 percent decrease for the six-month period, though a 5.3 percent increase for June).Prices increased in all other counties -- albeit in the single digits-- except for Coos, which rebounded with a 51.7 percent increase to an average home sales price of $91,000.Condos followed similar trends, with unit sales increasing 27.9 percent through June and prices up by 3.1 percent to an average of $165,000. -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Giant retail vacancies pile up across N.H.

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 13:23:57 EST

The Walmart store in Hooksett moved across the street in August, reborn as a new “supercenter,” a building of some 150,000 square feet, leaving the older, smaller 75,000-square-foot building empty.

The empty Walmart in Hooksett is only the most recent addition to the growing roster of empty big-box stores. In fact, the sight of vacant large – sometimes very large – former retail outlets has become particularly more commonplace in the wake of the bankruptcy of retail chains like Circuit City, Linens ‘n' Things and Tweeter.

While the loss of a major retailer is significant to former employees and the owner of a shopping center, the downstream effects of empty properties as large as hundreds of thousands of square feet can have an impact on surrounding businesses and communities as well.

“Big boxes are going dark because it's a challenge to repurpose them,” said Dan Scanlon, an adviser with the Bedford-based real estate firm of Grubb Ellis| Coldstream Real Estate Advisors.

For instance, Scanlon speculated, the owner of the empty Walmart in Hooksett – Pennsylvania-based W.P. Realty — may eventually “have to cut it up” for smaller users.

Kathy Pricard, spokesperson for W.P. Realty, said she could not comment on whether there were people interested in the property, only saying, “We are actively marketing all our vacant properties.”

William Norton of Manchester-based Norton Asset Management said going the subdivision route won't be easy. “The number one challenge is scale; these are huge. They could be designed to be rebuilt, but that's costly, and most of these guys don't do that.”

The problem is a perennial one, only made worse by the economy.

For instance, the former Shaw's supermarket on Daniel Webster Highway in Merrimack has remained vacant for years. News reports say landlords are holding on to the property, but many of the other adjacent stores have moved away, leaving the plaza largely empty.

But the economy has made the situation far worse. Most recently, the Blockbuster video store chain said in September that it plans to close 960 stores across the country. Whether the pruning will affect its dozens of outlets in New Hampshire remains to be seen.

Coming due

While the residential real estate market was severely anemic even before the bottom fell out of the economy a year ago, commercial real estate also has been facing its own difficulties as credit became severely constricted, compounded by loans with more favorable rates from years past coming due.

“No retail is growing,” said Norton. “None of them have capital and they have huge debt that is rolling. It's not pretty.”

On the brighter side, some of the empty sites of former electronics retailer Circuit City have attracted some interest.

Kent White of CB Richard Ellis/New England's Portsmouth office — the company that listed the Circuit City stores in Manchester, Nashua and Portsmouth — said the firm recently sold the Portsmouth location on Woodbury Avenue to OSJ of Portsmouth LLC.

“That property was on the market for about 10 months,” said White. “Just two years ago a property of that size on Woodbury Avenue would probably have sold within six months.”

The price was affected too. He said it was originally listed at $6.4 million. It sold for $3.5 million.

White said the property will become an Ocean State Job Lot discount store.

“It just shows what we're seeing in the market,” he said. “The discounters are doing really well.”

He added the former Circuit City in Nashua was leased by Savers, another discounter.

Circuit City on Willow Street in Manchester was bought by abutter Quirk Autos.

Other uses?

There‘s another issue at play that has nothing to do with the economy, but with New Hampshire itself.

“The overall demographic is a challenge in New Hampshire,” Scanlon said. “Elsewhere, these boxes are getting subdivided and filled by non-traditional users, such as health clubs, medical offices, state offices and specialty grocers such as Trader Joe's, Aldi's and Tesco's Fresh & Easy Market. We're not seeing that here. We've pretty much maxed out on non-traditional uses here.”

NHBR contacted Trader Joe's, asking if the specialty retail grocery chain had any interest in opening a site in New Hampshire. Alison Mochizuki, a Trader Joe's spokeswoman, said “a New Hampshire location is not in our two-year plan.”

Another challenge to finding a new use for big-box stores is zoning, said Norton.

“Often these are in a commercial zone. If that doesn't fit the new use, (the owner) would have to deal with that,” he said.

Surprisingly, municipal revenues are not affected as much as one would think when a big-box store empties, since most of the properties have an owner who continues to pay property taxes.

“That's a misnomer. Property taxes are still paid, the light and the heat are paid,” said Scanlon. “It's not a real bite to the town in terms of revenue.”

The new Hooksett Walmart could actually benefit the town more than the old store in terms of increased property taxes on the larger property and more jobs being created, he said.

While no one knows what the next year will bring in terms of the economy and investment property, Scanlon said he believes things will get a bit worse before they get better.

“In the next 12 to 18 months, what's going to happen with retail investment property is we may see some hit to the market as loans are going to come due. Some owners will have issues with fewer tenants, therefore lower cash flow. And lenders are still scrutinizing their loans,” he said. “We don't have some of the same problems as other parts of the country. There are always opportunities for investors looking to pick up this stuff on a discount market. But from an investor's point of view, it's not going to be as good as they think. From the lender's and the owner's point of view, it won't be as bad.”

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Cindy Kibbe can be reached at ckibbe@nhbr.com.

Flotsam and Jetsam

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 08:33:30 EST

If Congressman Paul Hodes’ problem is that he’s perceived as the “incumbent” in the U.S. Senate race, does that mean that Charlie Bass, the former congressman looking to regain his seat in the 2nd C.D., is perceived as an “incumbent” too?

If he is – and it’s not that much of a stretch to argue that he is – that’s gotta mean plenty of sleepless nights for the Bass folks in the weeks ahead.Relationship wreckEvery so often, the media from “out there” show just how their hit-and-run coverage of New Hampshire politics falls short.

Such was the case in The Boston Globe’s recent report on John Lynch’s re-election chances. In running down the obstacles to any clear sailing by the governor, reporter Brian Mooney actually referred to embattled Liquor Commissioner Mark Bodi – the man Lynch has left twisting in the wind – as the governor’s “friend.”

Wouldn’t “former friend” be more accurate?Stranger things have happenedSure, it’s a long shot, but wouldn’t it be something if the 1st C.D. race in November is between Democrat Carol Shea-Porter and Republican Bob Bestani – and she’s the one who’s viewed as more pro-Afghanistan war?Salt on the woundA recent Siena poll of 238 presidential scholars had some more bad news for poor ol’ Franklin Pierce.

The poll, which ranks the top presidents in American history, found that Pierce – the only president from New Hampshire – ranked fourth from the bottom, right behind James Buchanan and just ahead of George W. Bush.

To add insult to injury, it appears that in the fall – after all accreditation approvals are granted – Franklin Pierce Law Center will be no more. Instead, it will be called the University of New Hampshire School of Law.

What a revoltin’ development this is.Hyperbole is Job 1Hyperbole, as we know all too well, is the coin of the realm for politicians. Whatever they’re spouting off about – the economy, war and peace, immigration, soccer – our elected officials and wannabe elected officials can’t help but turn the rhetoric dial up to 11.

John Stephen earlier this month tried his best to keep the volume up with a claim that one in six New Hampshire residents is in some kind of indentured servitude because they “have to leave the state for a job.”

Besides trying to set back the cause of interstate commerce faster than you can say “Articles of Confederation,” and considering that thousands of New Hampshire residents commute out of state every day for higher-paying jobs along Route 128 in Massachusetts and the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard in Maine (to cite two examples), perhaps it would have been more accurate for the candidate to use the phrase, “choose to leave the state for a job.”

After all, he should know that as well as anyone. Consider that after he left state employment a couple of years ago, he found himself a job with The Lucas Group, a consulting firm whose offices are located at 116 Huntington Ave., Suite 504, Boston, Massachusetts.

And while you’re at it, pay no attention to that lowest-in-the-region unemployment rate behind the curtain.

F&J TOTE BOARD

Jennifer Horn: The 2nd C.D. Republican hopeful garners 55 votes to win a Coalition of New Hampshire Taxpayers straw poll, 19 votes more than runner-up Bob Giuda, and 42 more than Charlie Bass. Nashua: Money Magazine ranks the Gate City 94th on its list of the 100 “Best Places to Live in America” – the only New Hampshire community to be included. Ovide Lamontagne: The Republican Senate candidate finds himself in the sights of the New Hampshire Firearms Coalition, which is attacking him for supporting “safe schools” legislation – which it says was a “statewide gun ban” – when he was chair of the state Board of Education. Cissy Taylor: The information officer for the New Hampshire House finds out Aug. 1 is the last day on the job, thanks to budget cuts. John E. Sununu: The former U.S. senator signs up with Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld, a Washington lobbying firm. Bob Smith: The former U.S. senator, off-again, on-again Republican and current resident of Florida, gets ready to revisit New Hampshire to attend a fund-raiser for John Stephen.

It's been making the rounds...

• That new statewide automated emergency phone messaging system – how long before some desperate state official decides there’s money to be raised by running advertisements along with the message?

• Has anyone else noticed that, since deinstitutionalization in the 1980s, New Hampshire politics seems to be moving ever so steadily beyond the fringe?

• With Ryan Murdough, the avowed white racist and anti-Semite, seeking to run for the New Hampshire House as a Republican, the GOP better watch out that its big tent doesn’t become a big sheet.

• What is it about certain politicos that, when they try to discuss why they’re against gay marriage, they end up with a self-inflicted pie in the face?

• So Sarah Palin’s PAC doles out $87,500 in political contributions – including $2,500 to California multi- millionaire Carly Fiorina – and not one thin dime to any New Hampshire candidates.

NHBR About Town

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:42:16 EST

Shown strutting their stuff on the red carpet at the recent 37th annual Daytime Emmy Awards in Las Vegas are Val Wilson and Mike Liston, center, between presenters the Blue Man Group, at left, and Montel Williams and his guest. Wilson and Liston, of Bedford-based Off The Wall Gifts, an advertising and product placement company, coordinate attendee gift bags for the National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, which puts on the Emmy awards, as well as NBC.

More photos from recent events around the Granite State

Submit items for About Town to editor@nhbr.com. Please include a color photo and a brief description.

Q&A with: Constant Contact's Gail Goodman

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:42:16 EST

Since taking leadership of Waltham, Mass.-based Constant Contact in 1999, Gail Goodman has grown the e-mail and event marketing firm’s customer base to more than 350,000 worldwide. In an interview with NHBR, Goodman, who has an MBA from the Amos Tuck School at Dartmouth College in Hanover, discusses Constant Contact’s 2010 Small Business Attitudes and Outlook Survey, which looks at trends and issues affecting small business owners in a rapidly-changing economy.Q. What type of businesses made up the sample of your 4,580 completed surveys?A. They were mostly small businesses, across an incredibly wide range of industries. Retail is the largest, with professional services like legal and accounting, marketing and PR agencies. Really, a wide swath of industries. Q. Despite several nagging challenges in the economy, fully half of businesses you surveyed held a positive outlook for the economy moving forward.A. Absolutely. And 70 percent of them are expected to grow this year. Q. To what do you attribute the fact that suddenly they’re feeling better about things?A. Well, I do think that small businesses are inherently optimists. They’re out there fighting the tough economic battle every day and they generally tend to keep a very positive outlook. But I also think they have felt the turn in the economy. A year ago they were feeling pretty bleak not knowing how long it would take before the world turned around. I think they’re starting to feel it.Q. Another of the challenges alluded to earlier is the perception that the federal government is not as business-supportive as it could be. Elaborate please.A. Forty-nine percent of small businesses thought that the federal government’s attitude was moderately to very unsupportive. They look to what has been proposed to help small business, and certainly the federal government talks about small business a lot and they aren’t really finding those particular ideas very helpful.When you look at the tax credit for hiring, 88 percent said it would not influence their decision to hire. They’re going to hire if they need it and they’re not going to hire if they don’t. A tax credit doesn’t swing the vote.Q. How does your survey sample, in general, feel about the recent health-care reform changes?A. The biggest thing is they don’t know what it’s going to mean. Thirty-five percent did not have enough information or weren’t sure how it would help them. I think confusion reigns about whether health care is good or bad. Twenty-six percent thought it might impact their business negatively, 16 percent positively and 23 percent right in the middle – no impact at all. So really, all across the board I think it’s definitely going to be a wait-and-see. Q. Despite the many options at their disposal, your report says that businesses still feel that word-of-mouth marketing is still the most effective way to find new customers.A. Absolutely. Small businesses in particular really rely on repeat sales and word-of-mouth referrals to drive their sales. They compete on providing great service and support to their customers, and when they do that they know their customers will tell their friends. But they’re also increasingly looking to inexpensive online methods both to promote that word-of-mouth, but also reach new folks. They’re looking at things like e-mail marketing. They’re counting on their Web site, and they’re starting to experiment with social media tools like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter. Q. Your survey reports that Web site and e-mail are the No. 1 and No. 2 tools for marketing one’s business. Where do Facebook and other social media fit into the mix?A. Small businesses are always looking to reach new audiences. It’s actually their No. 1 marketing priority. How do I reach that new audience? How do I get more people into my business? And they’re hoping by using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, they not only get their own reach, but they get to reach the fans, friends and followers of the same people that are doing the word-of-mouth referrals.So if I have an audience that loves me, if I can get them to tweet about me, or comment about the great meal they had Saturday night on their Facebook page, I am not only talking to them, but now I’m talking beyond them to their fans, friends and followers.Q. So is that what you do at Constant Contact – advise the use of e-mail and Web site, but also mix in social media to create the complete marketing package?A. Absolutely. We want to be coaches to the more than 350,000 small businesses who use our tools and social media is the hot area we’re helping them understand how to leverage. Q. Like many young companies hurt when the dot-com bubble burst in 2001, you considered closing down. What did you do to right the ship?A. I think perseverance is the No. 1 thing. We went into starving start-up mode and ran the business on sweat equity for a while until we could get some critical mass, until we could find some incremental funding and grow the business. Q. Give us three things a business can do today to keep their marketing e-mails from not being opened.A. Be relevant. Be informational, and be sure that you are communicating with permission, that people know who you are and why they’re receiving your e-mails. Q. And the importance of a powerful subject line? A. You really want to be sure people understand why they should open your e-mails. Share some great tips or information. Don’t be too promotional and make sure you have a subject line that has that call-to-action that tells them why they should open it.

Internships sought for entrepreneurship class

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

The University of New Hampshire is hoping that Granite State businesses can use an extra pair of hands this fall in exchange for offering students some experience.UNH’s Whittemore School of Business and Economics is looking for entrepreneurial ventures at various stages of business development that are willing to host interns as part of its Entrepreneurship Internship course.The course, which starts Aug. 30, is taught by Jeffrey Sohl, professor and director of UNH’s Center for Venture Research. The Entrepreneurship Internship class aims to give students significant experience working at start-up and high-growth ventures as well as gaining insight from mentors at their host companies.Students will work eight to 10 hours per week in addition to lectures, team projects and working with nonprofits.While the internships are not paid, UNH is asking hosting companies for a fee ranging from $500 to $750 to participate in the program to offset interns’ travel expenses and administrative costs associated with the program. The fee is due at end of the semester in December. Warren Daniel, regional director of the New Hampshire Small Business Development Center, a partner in the program, said students in the class are "are of high caliber."He added that participating businesses "get a product that is professionally done and fills the needs of the business. The areas of assistance provided include marketing, financial analysis, access to capital, feasibility studies and expansion plans." For more information, contact Laura Hill, educational program coordinator, 603-862-3341 or laura.hill@unh.edu. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Tupelo Music Hall to open Vt. venue

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

Tupelo Music Hall, the popular music venue in Londonderry, has unveiled plans to open a similar spot across the river in Vermont.Scott Hayward, Tupelo’s owner, and Mike Davidson of Execusuite LLC of White River Junction, Vt., announced that a second Tupelo location will open in October in the historic Boston & Maine Freight House on South Main Street in White River Junction.Davidson is the owner of the former railroad freight station, which he has restored and adapted for mixed-use retail. Tupelo will occupy 4,000 square feet of space.Hayward said the Vermont venue will have about 240 seats for concert-style seating and 140 for cabaret-seating shows. Like its New Hampshire counterpart, will present regionally and nationally known artists.Over its six years artists as varied as George Winston, John Hiatt, Squeeze and Judy Collins have appeared at the New Hampshire Tupelo.Hayward said he will personally oversee the operation and book the talent, but he has hired Doug Phoenix, formerly production manager for the Hopkins Center at Dartmouth College in Hanover to serve as the Vermont Tupelo's manager.Like the Londonderry venue, Tupelo Vermont will present music in a variety of genres, from rock to blues to folk to jazz, performed by legendary artists as well as rising stars. A monthly comedy show will also be on the schedule. Hayward said he expects to announce a fall-winter schedule in early August. -- JEFF FEINGOLD/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Four N.H. United Ways complete merger

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

Capitalizing on the "strength in numbers" principle, four New Hampshire United Way organizations have combined into a single entity.Heritage United Way in Manchester, Concord-based United Way of Merrimack County, Upper Valley United Way of Lebanon and the North Country United Way in Littleton have merged into Granite United Way."Reductions in funding, decreased endowments and an increased need for services are all stressing our not-for-profit safety net," said Patrick Tufts, president and chief executive of Heritage United Way who is taking the same titles at Granite United Way. "As an organization in a leadership role, United Way recognizes that we need to change our existing structure in order to increase our impact. By coming together we can build upon our individual strengths to best address the needs of our communities."According to Granite United Way, the new organization serves over 500,000 residents in New Hampshire and Vermont, and covers nearly 40 percent of New Hampshire’s geographic territory.Granite United Way spokesperson Shannon Sullivan said the individual regional offices will all remain open "and all fund-raising and fund distribution will remain local."She also said staff will remain in place."Over time, there will be some reductions through attrition, but there really isn’t much overlap," said Sullivan.According to a press release by the organization, in addition to Tufts, Elizabeth Hager, executive director of the United Way of Merrimack County, will serve as executive vice president of the new organization. Dr. Steven Paris, medical director of Dartmouth-Hitchcock Manchester, is chair of the Granite United Way board of directors.Representatives of each former United Way will serve as board members of the new organization. Granite United Way will be holding individual community campaigns with a combined fund-raising goal of $6.5 million to support local programs and services in each region. -- CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Landmark Balsams resort for sale

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

The historic Balsams Grand Resort Hotel, one of New Hampshire's most famous resorts, is for sale.Atlanta-based hotel brokerage and investment banking firm Hodges Ward Elliot Inc. said Wednesday that it has been designated to represent the 203-room historic hotel in Dixville Notch.No sale price was mentioned, but the company said in a press release, “All reasonable offers for the resort will be considered."It said the hotel and its accompanying golf course and ski area represents "a truly unique opportunity for an investor to own a trophy asset in the beautiful Great North Woods region of northern New Hampshire at a significant discount to replacement cost.”

The Neil and Louise Tillotson Charitable Trust owns the Balsams. Grafton Corbett, president of Tillotson Corp., a diversified holding company based in Lexington, Mass., which oversees the trust, told NHBR the company is expecting to turn over all of the trust's assets to charity by the end of the year, and the hotel was "one of the last pieces." But, he added, "we have not found a charity that would like to run the hotel.”Corbett said that, in its "present configuration, it’s a cash drain.”He said Tillotson has been trying to find a “very wealthy buyer who would have his vision for the hotel that would include basically modernizing it, but not the atmosphere, and keep employment in the area.”He said the resort’s price “will depend on the financial viability of the buyer.”Most important, said Corbett, was the employment that the Balsams provides the North Country.He said the resort employs between 60 and 360 workers depending on the season.“The hotel is extraordinarily important to the North Country as an employer. If it closed, it would be quite disastrous, and would take a long time to recover,” he said.The Balsams opened in its earliest form in the late 1860s. In the decades since, many additions have been made. Today, the property includes a Donald Ross championship golf course, a ski area, tennis facilities, several dining rooms and a spa. It is also well known for being the site as the location where residents of Dixville Notch every four years cast the first votes in the the presidential elections. – CINDY KIBBE/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Ownership at center of business court dispute

Mon, 26 Jul 2010 21:12:31 EST

Does a single percentage in ownership make all the difference? That’s one of the questions that the state's new business court is attempting to answer in sorting out a dispute between two former partners of a time share and vacation property business located in Florida and Merrimack, N.H.The case, first filed at the end of May in Southern Hillsborough Superior Court, was transferred to the business court last week.According to court filings, Welsey Kogelman founded Vacation Property Resales in 2001 as a Florida corporation and sold 49 percent to Jason Hamilton in 2004, when he became president. (The two had the same ownership split with VP Resales LLC, based in New Hampshire, and both operated as one company.)Although the relationship between the two “was difficult,” according to Hamilton, it was “manageable,” because Hamilton mainly worked out of Florida and Kogelmen out of New Hampshire. Things started to deteriorate, however, after Hamilton learned that Kogelman was allegedly using company money and proprietary data to pay for “competing” Web sites. When he protested, Kogelman suspended Hamilton and “terminated” him on June 16, he said.Hamilton gets a severance package of $2,700 a week deducted from Hamilton’s share in the company.Hamilton wants to dissolve the corporation, claiming that Kogelman’s “self-dealing and mismanagement …” constitutes a “waste of corporate assets” Besides, the two were “deadlocked with respect to the transfer of membership interest and stock," according to the filings.But Kogelman says there was one matter of dispute: termination of Hamilton’s employment. “Kogelman voted his 51 percent in favor of terminating Hamilton, and Hamilton voted his 49 percent against, so the motion passed. There was no deadlock.” -- BOB SANDERS/NEW HAMPSHIRE BUSINESS REVIEW

Arizona v. all of us

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 07:57:38 EST

On the heels of July 4, when Americans often reflect upon our immigrant heritage, the Obama administration filed a lawsuit against Arizona’s controversial bill that for the first time requires local and state police officers to enforce federal immigration laws.For weeks, Arizona officials have been taunting President Obama and his administration by advocating that Arizona’s get-tough immigration law is just mirroring federal law. While federal immigration law enforcement in the post-Bush era is focusing on employers employing illegal aliens, Arizona has turned its enforcement attention to the person on the street.The reality is that when Gov. Jan Brewer signed Senate Bill 1070 into law, neither Arizona nor other states may enact legislation regulating who is a legal or illegal immigrant. At the end of the day, it is the federal government that decides who stays or goes, not 50 separate states. Presumably, that issue was settled in 1788 when the U.S. Constitution replaced the 13 colonies’ Articles of Confederation. According to Governor Brewer, swarms of illegal immigrants enter our borders everyday bringing drugs and guns to the United States. According to Arizona Sen. John McCain, illegal immigrants are bad drivers. The unspoken truth is that enforcement and deportations are up under the Obama administration as opposed to the Bush administration. Statistics show a significant acceleration in immigration enforcement, with over 387,000 immigrants deported since Obama’s inauguration — a fact ignored by the proponents of Arizona-type legislation.The lawsuit seeks to bar mandatory stopping and detention by Arizona police of innocent U.S. citizens and legal permanent residents arising from a “reasonable suspicion” that the person may be an illegal alien. The lawsuit claims that because the federal authorities may not be able to immediately verify lawful presence, the law will impose burdens on lawful immigrants and U.S. citizens who are stopped, questioned, or detained and cannot readily prove their immigration or citizenship status — including those individuals who may not have an accepted form of identification because, for example, they are legal minors without a driver’s license. This bill is not designed to protect Arizona citizens but to be more of a nuisance to any individual of multicultural descent. It does not solve problems, it creates them.With Tea Party activism springing up across the country, the surprise is that many conservatives are willing to sacrifice personal freedoms and expend huge sums of taxpayer money in the name of questionable security measures, including billion-dollar fences on our border. The answer clearly is that President Obama and Congress — particularly Sen. Judd Gregg, who in the past led on the immigration issue but who in recent times is missing in action — must focus on comprehensive immigration reform.

Neither lawsuits nor legalizing racial profiling are the answer to our country’s broken immigration system, and are no substitute for comprehensive immigration reform.

Enrique Mesa Jr. practices immigration law in Manchester with George Bruno, former U.S. Ambassador to Belize. They may be contacted at LawServeAtty@aol.com.

To jump-start the economy, fix our roads

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 07:57:38 EST

New Hampshire is a largely rural state, and because of this we are heavily reliant on our highway infrastructure for the efficient transport of goods and services. In today’s business environment, consumers demand goods more quickly. How fast a business can provide those goods is critical to its success.Deficient roads and bridges in New Hampshire pose a serious obstacle to quick delivery, as trucks currently need to navigate around weight-posted bridges and congestion. These hazards push new businesses to other states with better transportation systems, taking potential jobs with them. If we want to draw new business to the state, we must improve our infrastructure.Recently, The Road Information Program (TRIP) released a study of New Hampshire’s highways and bridges. According to the study, approximately one-third of New Hampshire’s major roads are deteriorated, 32 percent of the state’s bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete, and more than half of the state’s roads are congested during peak travel times. This growing disrepair has a direct impact on all New Hampshire citizens. In addition to the delays for business deliveries, there are costs and safety concerns for our families.The study found that these deteriorating roads and bridges cost each New Hampshire driver $259 annually in extra vehicle costs for items such as maintenance and tire repair.The TRIP report also highlighted the fact that New Hampshire lacks the necessary funding to make critical improvements to our roads and bridges. While many projects have been culled from the state’s 10-year transportation plan, there remains an anticipated shortfall of approximately $1 billion over the next 10 years. Projects critical to the state’s economic growth, such as widening Interstate 93 to four lanes between Salem and Manchester, lack the funding necessary to complete them. Investment and maintenance of our transportation infrastructure is a core function of both state and federal government. However, while taxes increase and government continues to grow, this critical need continues to get passed over. Consider that even though infrastructure investments were a key driver of President Obama’s stimulus program, in the end less than 5 percent of stimulus funds actually went toward infrastructure investments. In addition, while Congress has focused on health-care reform and various other government initiatives, the critical effort to implement a new federal highway funding program has been put on hold. As the economy looks to rebound, investing in the state’s roads and bridges is one of the quickest ways to jump-start it. Funding the maintenance and repair of the state’s infrastructure will put many people to work here in New Hampshire, and as a result, their paychecks will spread throughout the economy as they buy goods and services. Investing in our roads and bridges will make New Hampshire more attractive to businesses that require an efficient and effective transportation system, and it will make our roads safer for our workers and families.The benefits of these expenditures are manifold. This is the action needed to initiate a full-scale economic recovery, which will attract new businesses and create jobs while improving our quality of life.

Sen. Robert Letourneau, R-Derry, is a member of the Senate Transportation and Interstate Cooperation Committee.