Senator Hassan Holds 5th Annual Innovate New Hampshire Forum

NEW HAMPSHIRE - In case you missed it, the Union Leader and WPTZ highlighted U.S. Senator Maggie Hassan’s Fifth Annual Innovate New Hampshire Entrepreneurship Forum that she hosted yesterday. The forum is part of her efforts to support New Hampshire’s entrepreneurs and ensure that they have the tools that they need to launch innovative businesses and thrive. 

WATCH coverage from WPTZ here.

READ coverage from Union Leader here, or see below for highlights:

Union Leader: Workforce shortage biggest obstacle to NH innovation

By Kevin Landrigan

December 5, 2022

Business, education and government leaders told Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-N.H., Monday the chronic workforce shortage is the greatest obstacle to taking full advantage of new incentives to help companies better compete with China and invest in renewable energy.

Hassan hosted online her fifth annual Innovate NH Entrepreneurship Forum with much of the focus on climate change provisions in the Inflation Reduction Act and the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act that will encourage building state-of-the-art chip manufacturing in the U.S.

“We have more work to do to support entrepreneurship and business and promote a brighter economic future for everybody,” Hassan said at the outset of the forum.

Dan Weeks, vice president of business development with Revision Energy, said solar companies cannot keep up with the number of homeowners and small businesses looking for renewable options as electric power production charges double for consumers this winter.

The Inflation Reduction Act provides bigger tax credits for those who convert to solar and promotes apprenticeships to train more installers.

“We have never seen this level of demand before with the monthly leads (for new business) coming in,” Weeks said.

[...] During the forum, several said the other pressing workforce obstacle is affordable housing in New Hampshire, a state facing a .5% vacancy rate when 5% vacancy is considered a healthy market.

Hassan said Congress could reach consensus next year on expanding a popular federal tax credit program for developers of low and moderate-income housing projects.

[…] Hassan said she is proposing a federal grant that would provide an equal match for state government spending on workforce housing initiatives. [...]

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