State Rep. Aylward: Wow! What a Day in Concord and Beyond. . .

From the Commission on Aging Survey/Transportation Insecurity Issues

Community Transportation Needs Assessment 2025 · Impact Consulting for the NH Commission on Aging

Subscribe

Merrimack County: A central crossroads with rural disconnects 41.2% of Merrimack residents regularly struggle to get where they need to go.

The survey calls this moderate or high transportation insecurity. Statewide, the rate is 40.4%.

Sitting at the center of the state, Merrimack carries both urban and rural gaps at once.

Concord's regular bus service does not run evenings or weekends in the outlying towns.

Residents with a disability face a notably steeper burden than the county's general population, and
shift workers report missed healthcare and limited job access tied to inconsistent transportation.

Visit the survey: nhcoa.nh.gov/sites/g/files/ehbemt946/files/media/media_document/ctna-state-and-county-profiles.pdf

School Board Minutes In Serious Need of Correction

August 17, 2026

Dear Members of the Newfound Area School Board:

I am writing to request a correction to the minutes of the August 10, 2026 School Board meeting, which I attended.

During the public comment portion of that meeting, Audrey Pellegrino (an organizer of the
Danbury Chartered Public School) addressed the Board.

Among the subjects she discussed were
the proposed charter school application "passing legal status" and the possible applicability of
HB 1374 to the situation involving Danbury Elementary School building. She made other
comments, but due to poor acoustics, I was unable to hear them.

I have reviewed the posted minutes and do not find Ms. Pellegrino's appearance or the subject
matter of her comments (that sounded as if relevant to Agenda Item XV. New Business (a.)
Danbury School Building Updates, and lengthy report referred to by Mr. Limanni, where charter
schools were mentioned) reflected in them.

RSA 91-A:2, II requires meeting minutes to include the names of persons appearing before a
public body and a brief description of the subject matter discussed. The statute does not require a
transcript of a person's comments, but the fact that the person appeared and the general subject
discussed should be reflected in the minutes.

I therefore respectfully request that the August 10, 2026 minutes be corrected to reflect that
Audrey Pellegrino appeared during public comment and spoke regarding the Danbury charter
school, its legal status, and the possible applicability of HB 1374 to the Danbury Elementary
School matter.

This is particularly important because the legal status of Danbury Elementary School and the
effect, if any, of HB 1374 are now relevant to the continuing public discussion regarding the
school building. The official minutes should accurately reflect that these issues were
raised publicly at the August 10 meeting.

I would also appreciate confirmation that the correction will be presented to the Board and, if
approved, incorporated into the official posted minutes.

Thank you for your attention to this request.
Sincerely,

Deborah Aylward
52 Challenge Hill Road
Danbury, NH 03230

Commentary by Deborah Aylward

Danbury Elementary: Closed, Discontinued and Unused Are Not the Same Thing

There is a lot of discussion right now about what should happen to the Danbury Elementary School building.

Should Newfound keep it? Should it go back to the Town of Danbury? Should it be sold or leased? What rights might the proposed charter school have?

Before we can answer any of those questions, I believe we need to answer something much more basic.

What is the legal status of Danbury Elementary School right now? That sounds like a simple question. It isn't.

The reason is that four different things are being discussed as though they are all the same.They are not.

• A school can be closed.

• A school can be discontinued.

• A school building can become an unused facility.

• And property can eventually be sold, leased or otherwise disposed of.

Those are four different questions.

Closed

This is the part we know. The Newfound Area School Board voted in March to close Danbury Elementary School following the voters' rejection of the district's proposed budget. Students would be educated elsewhere in the district. Contemporary reporting described the action as the School Board's decision to close Danbury Elementary.

So when someone asks whether Danbury Elementary was closed, the answer is yes.But that is not the end of the story.

Discontinued

This word is different. The voters of the Newfound Area School District did not vote to discontinue Danbury Elementary School.

VOTERS were never asked that question!!!

That distinction has become much more important because the Legislature passed HB 1374 this year.

HB 1374 was signed by the Governor on July 10 and takes effect October 8, 2026. The new law says that an elementary or high school cannot be discontinued, or its location changed, without a majority vote of the voters in the municipalities served by the school or district.

The ballot question itself asks voters whether the district should authorize the discontinuation of the school and cease its operation. If the voters say no, the law says the school continues to operate.

That tells us something important. The Legislature itself treats discontinuing a school as a specific decision.

So what did the Newfound School Board's March vote do? Clearly, it closed Danbury Elementary for student instruction.

But did that vote also legally and permanently discontinue Danbury Elementary? I don't think that question should simply be assumed one way or the other. It should be answered.

I am also not suggesting that HB 1374 automatically reverses the March vote. The School Board acted months before the new law's October 8 effective date.

The question is narrower. If Danbury Elementary was closed but never formally discontinued, what is its legal status now, and what happens to decisions that remain unfinished when the new law takes effect?

Unused

Now we come to a third word, 'unused' and this may be the most important word in understanding what happens to the building.

New Hampshire law actually defines an "unused facility."

RSA 194:61 says an unused facility is a school building that is not being used for academic purposes, extracurricular activities, administrative school functions or sports and for which the School Board has no approved written plan for one of those uses within two years.

That means "unused" does not simply mean there are no children sitting at desks in the building.

A building can be closed to regular classroom instruction and still not necessarily meet the statutory definition of an unused facility.

For example, is it being used for any school administrative purpose? Extracurricular activities?Sports?

Is there a School Board-approved written plan to use it for one of those purposes within the next two years?

Those questions matter because the law says the superintendent must report each unused facility owned by the district to the Department of Education on July 1 of every year.

According to reporting following the August 10 School Board meeting, Danbury Elementary had not been formally declared an unused facility by July 1.

Business Administrator Michael Limanni told the Board that it should consider whether to sell, lease or maintain the building for future needs, and read from a report that leaned heavily towards consideration of a commercial/business occupant for the building.

That raises a very simple question.If Danbury Elementary was not an unused facility on July 1, when did it become one?

And what changed?

Again, there may be a perfectly reasonable answer.But the public should know what that answer is.

Why "Unused" Matters

This is not just an argument over vocabulary.

Once a building qualifies as an unused school facility, RSA 194:61 establishes procedures involving chartered public schools.

The statute gives approved charter schools certain rights involving the purchase or lease of unused school buildings. Among other things, an outside sale or lease can be subject to a charter school's right of first refusal, and a charter school may initiate negotiations when there is no outside offer. The School Board then has obligations to engage in substantive good-faith negotiations within the statutory time period.

That is why determining whether Danbury Elementary is legally "unused" matters. It can affect what happens next.

Disposition

Only after all of that do we arrive at the question most people have been talking about. What happens to the building?

Sell it? Lease it? Return it to Danbury? Keep it in case the district needs it again? Negotiate with a charter school?

Those are important questions, but they may be questions four, five and six.

We still need answers to questions one, two and three.

• We know the school was closed.

• We need clarity about whether it was discontinued.

• We need clarity about whether and when it became an unused facility.

Then we can have an informed discussion about disposition of the property.

This Is Not About Taking Sides

None of this requires anyone to support the proposed Danbury charter school. It does not require anyone to oppose it.

It does not require anyone to support selling or leasing it. This is about understanding the process before a public asset is permanently disposed of.

The questions are remarkably straightforward.

• Was Danbury Elementary closed? Yes.

• Was Danbury Elementary legally discontinued? That needs to be clearly answered.

• Does the building presently meet New Hampshire's legal definition of an unused facility? That needs to be clearly answered too.

If it does, on what date did it become unused, and was the process required by RSA 194:61 followed?

And finally, once those questions are settled, what law and what provisions of the Newfound cooperative agreement govern what happens to the property?

Why This Matters Now

HB 1374 makes these distinctions more important, not less. Beginning October 8, the Legislature has made it clear that voters have a role in deciding whether an elementary or high school is discontinued. The new statute specifically says no elementary or high school may be discontinued, or its location changed, except by a majority vote of the voters served by the school or district.

The voters of the Newfound Area School District never cast that vote regarding Danbury Elementary. That does not automatically tell us what the legal answer is concerning a closure decision made before October 8. But it certainly gives us a reason to ask the question before making another permanent decision.

Uncharted Territory

At the August 10 meeting, Limanni reportedly described the situation surrounding the building and charter-school law as "uncharted territory."I think that is all the more reason to proceed carefully.

Before it is sold, leased or transferred, or the permanent future of Danbury Elementary is determined, let's first establish exactly where we are.

• Closed is not necessarily discontinued.

• Discontinued is not the same question as unused.

• And unused is the status that can trigger important rules about what happens to the building.

Four different issues.

Four different questions.

The public deserves clear answers to each of them before an irreversible decision is made.

###

CORRECTION: In my previous article I misspelled Diane Blasotto's last name. My sincere apologies!

###

Deborah Aylward is a resident of Danbury, NH, and serves as a State Representative for Merrimack District 5. She can be reached at: deborah.Aylward@gc.nh.gov or 603-217-7842.