Skip: November 2010 Archives

Date:       11/10/10 (Wednesday)

Time:       5:30pm   Buffet Dinner ($14)
                6:30pm   Meeting

Place:      Shanghai Restaurant
                331 South Main Street
                Laconia, NH
                603 - 524 - 4100

"But experienced hands in Concord will tell you that keeping a majority focused on a narrow agenda is often easier said than done. Gene Chandler of Bartlett was speaker of the house from 2000 to 2004.

“It definitely is a challenge to keep everybody on the same page; sometime you have a tendency to think, well we have so many people we can do whatever we want and it doesn’t make any difference here or there. So you have to be careful.”

Chandler is in the running to reclaim the House Speakers seat in January. He admits it will be tough to balance the budget without taxes but says that has to be the priority."

The awesome size of the GOP bloc improves the upset chances of Mont Vernon Republican Rep. Bill O’Brien, elected to his third term.

Until the election results came in, the early favorite was former House Speaker Gene Chandler, of Bartlett, who soon begins his 15th term.

The other GOP candidates for speaker are Deerfield Rep. John Reagan, 64, and Rindge Rep. Susan Emerson, who begins her fifth term.

Chandler ran the House GOP political action committee that sent campaign checks to candidates, worked to rehabilitate himself from a 6-year-old scandal over unreported cash gifts and had strong backing among the House’s most experienced Republicans.

Meanwhile, O’Brien spent months meeting one-on-one with the new class of House Republicans-elect members, more than 165 in strength.

“I think we are going to have a leadership in the House and a Republican caucus that pays attention to issues that have always been of concern to the Republicans at the grass roots, attention to our constitution, adherence to the party platform and fiscal responsibility,” O’Brien said.

Chandler remains optimistic at getting the gavel back.