The top 6 things to look out for on this week’s town meeting day

Over 100 towns and cities across New Hampshire are observing Town Meeting Day today, Tuesday, March 11, and the stakes for local offices in the state have never been higher. So here are the six things you should know about Town Meeting Day in New Hampshire in 2025.

What Town Meeting Day is — On Town Meeting Day in New Hampshire, communities can hold two distinct events, town elections and town meetings.

The town elections are when residents vote to elect local officials like selectboards, budget committees, library trustees and planning boards. This is conducted via ballot, similar to a regular election.

The town meeting, on the other hand, is a legislative session where citizens gather to discuss and vote on warrant articles that determine the direction and policies of the town. During the town meeting, residents have the opportunity to debate and vote on these warrant articles, essentially acting as legislators for their community. Some towns have a slightly different “SB2” process, with a deliberative session prior to the town election ballot.

Voter turnout for these local elections can vary significantly between towns, with some seeing high engagement and others struggling with low participation. The town meeting day process is meant to give citizens a direct voice in the governance of their local communities, though the complexity of the system can present challenges for residents to stay informed and engaged.

It’s one of the best places to fight Republican book bans in New Hampshire libraries — New Hampshire Republicans have made banning books and attacking state libraries one of their top priorities. Two Republican lawmakers even sued their local public library last year to prevent them from distributing information about the 2024 election, and are running in Goffstown this year to restrict the library from the inside.

Many towns have library trustees on the ballot. These trustees have the ability to influence the values and policies of the local public library, including decisions around book selection and removal.

There are ongoing national efforts by some groups, particularly Republicans, to push for the removal of certain books from public libraries, often centered around issues of race, gender, and LGBTQ+ content. 

By electing library trustees, local voters have the power to push back against these national-level efforts to censor library collections and uphold the values of a library as a community space. The library trustee positions are an important way for towns to maintain local control over their public libraries.

It’s where you can defend your local public school’s budget —  As Republicans have slashed taxes on the top 1% of wealthiest Granite Staters, towns and municipalities have been pressured to increase local and property taxes to maintain critical services at the local level.  School budgets are often voted on directly by citizens during the town meeting business sessions. This gives local voters a direct say in the funding and resources provided to their public schools.

NH Republicans have stepped up attacks on school budgets as they downshift funding of critical services from the state to towns and municipalities. With national efforts to defund or dismantle the Department of Education, as well as state-level policies like school vouchers, local school budgets are facing increasing pressure and potential cuts. 

By engaging in the town meeting process and voting to support strong school budgets, local citizens can push back against these top-down efforts and ensure their public schools have the resources they need to provide quality education.

Electing school board members who will advocate for adequate school funding is also a crucial way for voters to defend their local public schools during town meeting day. Supporting teachers and maintaining robust public education is a key issue for many communities.

It’s where you can improve housing in your community — Housing affordability and availability is one of the top concerns for nearly every community in New Hampshire as state Republicans continue to ignore and stall progress on the issue. However, local zoning and planning boards play a crucial role in determining the types of housing that can be built.

By electing officials to these local boards, Granite Staters can ensure that their community’s zoning and planning regulations allow for the construction of more affordable and diverse housing options. Local boards can decide what can and cannot be built. This helps create more livable communities where people can afford to live.

Additionally, town meeting day provides an opportunity for voters to support municipal budgets and initiatives that invest in affordable housing programs, infrastructure, and services that make a community more livable and accessible.

A new voter suppression law is in effect this Town Meeting Day — A Republican-backed law considered one of the strictest voter suppression bills in the nation goes into effect on town meeting day this year, which requires voters to not just present a voter ID to vote, but documentary proof of citizenship. Not even a REAL ID driver’s license — which requires proof of identity, proof of having a US Social Security number and proof of state residency — is enough to vote. They would require you to bring a birth certificate or U.S. Passport to vote this year. Check out the secretary of state’s guidance for what you will need to vote.

The law is likely to disenfranchise voters without those documents, as it was intended to do

Where to go for information — The best place for specific information on your local town meeting day is by visiting your town’s website, as this is where you can typically find sample ballots, candidate and ballot measure guides, and other relevant local election details, as well as contacting your town clerk’s office directly and engaging with trusted members of your local community. 603 Forward also has a voting guide with lots of information about where to go on town meeting day available at https://www.603forward.org/vote.