Pappas tours police station, Vaughan Learning Center
U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and Chair of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies, U.S. Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-NH), senior member of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, and Reps. Annie Kuster (NH-02) and Chris Pappas (NH-01) helped secure the funding.
"It’s critical that these heroes have the training, equipment and resources they need to do their jobs,” said Shaheen.
During the fiscal year 2025 appropriations process, Shaheen pushed to increase funding to $385 million for both the AFG and Staffing for Adequate Fire and Emergency Response programs following cuts in 2024. If signed into law, the FY 2025 proposal would provide a combined $122 million increase in funding for firefighters over the previous year. Hassan helped advance the bipartisan Fire Grants and Safety Act through the Senate Homeland Security Committee and the Senate to support firefighters. The bill was recently signed into law, renewing and extending until 2028 the AFG and SAFER programs that fund these grants.
As of last year, more than $1 million in AFG grants have been awarded to New Hampshire fire departments.
Other towns and cities receiving grants include Allenstown, Berlin, Effingham, Gorham, Hollis, Hudson, Landaff, Langdon, Newton, North Conway, Nottingham, Portsmouth, Salisbury, Waterville Valley and Windham.
Police Chief Chris Mattei intends to ask voters again in April of 2025.
After the tour, the Sun asked Pappas about the possibility of getting federal money. Pappas called the police station renovation an important public safety project.
“It’s a positive sign to see that the community is supporting that, and that the town officials are supporting it, so we wanted to get a sense of the project, see how we might be able to match up the financial cost of this project with whatever federal grant opportunities are available,” said Pappas.
“We’ll continue to communicate with the chief on that, as we do with many of our communities.”
Pappas continued, “We’ve successfully fought for resources for other local departments. Wolfeboro is making a major upgrade to its public safety complex right now that we secured funding for. So we always enjoy these conversations and take the information back to see how we can help.”
Pappas told Mattei that he helped introduce a federal bill help local help public safety agencies, like police departments, fund infrastructure improvements. Individual projects could get up to $4 million.
The current Conway police station, built in 1989, is 7,800 square feet. Mattei would like a 5,200-square-foot addition with another 3,000 square feet for a basement.
“I’ve been told by the individuals that do the quotes that we’re probably going to be 4 to 6 percent more next year, which is better than we thought,” said Mattei. “We originally told upwards of 10 percent.”
Mattei said the police department is just not big enough for all the things the department needs to do.
There’s a need for a larger conference room, more bathrooms, more storage for things like evidence and seized firearms. Mattei said the rules around keeping seized weapons are particularly stringent. The department has collected about 1,000 guns, and some are still there from the 1970s.
There’s also a need for more space for officers. For instance, Mattei said the officers eat lunch at their desks where they also do things like process seized drugs, which can be dangerous.
“It’s not the best thing,” said Mattei.
The other issue is the cell blocks. The department has five holding cells. One is used for storage. Having the holding cells is important because the jail, in Ossipee, is about 40 minutes away.
“It’s not uncommon for us to have these cells full, especially in the summertime, for holding people have to go to the court the following day,” said Mattei, adding Bartlett and Jackson Police also use the cells.
The cell blozk needs to be secured from the rest of the building, he said.
Mattei was encouraged by the voters’ response to the proposal in April because it got a majority vote and was just shy of the super majority. He thinks the main issue is that the proposal for the upgraded building was first pitched around the same as the results of the revaluation.
“People were really hit by that,” said Mattei. “I mean, I was too. My house went up, I think, 89 percent in value, which is great if I was selling.”
According to the NH Tax Kiosk, Mattei’s house increased from about $408,000 to $764,800, a change of 87 percent.
Seavey agreed that timing was the issue.
Before going to the police station, Pappas went to Vaughan Learning Center in North Conway, which provides child care.
Discussion attendees included Director Heather Ouellette, Assistant Director/Preschool Teacher Kali Rodger, Vaughan Board Member John Colbath and parent Alex Ziko, parent Renee Innes, and grandparent Tracy Leavitt who is raising her four grandkids.
Staffing is a major issue, Pappas learned, especially keeping quality staff on board because, on top of widespread issues across the economy with low staffing.
It’s hard for the non-profit to make pay competitive and there is no health care for staff because of the tight non-profit budget. It also means that while in theory the center could take on over 100 kids, they’re only taking about half of that due to short staff.
The waitlist is currently 40 families, and families typically wait one to two years before they can get into the center.
“We want to do what we can to be helpful, not just to you (Vaughan staff), but to the families that are here and depend on the great care and education that’s delivered to these kids,” said Pappas.
“It’s just really, really important for me to understand what’s going on here and where we can lean in to help support some funding that would make things more sustainable and to assist families.”
During his swing through Conway he also stopped at Ben & Jerry’s and Maine Health Memorial. Those stories will appear in next Wednesday’s edition.