New Hampshire
Want to own a pet squirrel or raccoon? Some NH lawmakers want to make it legal
Peanut the squirrel was euthanized, now his owner wants answers
Mark Longo’s pet squirrel, Peanut, and raccoon, Fred, were seized and euthanized by New York officials in October. Now he is looking for answers.
Last year, New York state authorities seized and euthanized an Instagram-famous squirrel named Peanut and a raccoon named Fred.
In New York, it’s illegal to keep animals like squirrels and raccoons as pets. So after receiving numerous complaints, the state Department of Environmental Conservation took the animals from owner Mark Longo and put them down.
The story prompted national outcry and, to prevent that situation from happening in New Hampshire, Rep. James Spillane, R-Deerfield, has introduced a bill to allow the ownership of some squirrels and raccoons in New Hampshire.
“I wanted to make sure that we don’t get a black eye in the state of New Hampshire with the same sort of bad press,” said Spillane at a hearing on Wednesday.
What would be the rules for owning raccoons or squirrels?
Spillane’s bill would allow rehabilitated raccoons and gray squirrels to be kept as pets without a permit if a wildlife rehabilitation facility makes a determination that the animal cannot survive in the wild and is “up to date” on any vaccines required.
The bill says that the animals cannot be confiscated or euthanized without permission from the owner. But if the animal does not meet the requirements, the fish and game commission may charge the owner with a fine, confiscate the animal for examination, and vaccinate them.
It would also allow people who come to New Hampshire from a state where having a pet raccoon or gray squirrel is legal to keep the animal.
However, the bill would not allow people to buy raccoons or squirrels at a pet store, breed them, or trap and capture them from the wild.
Downsides of a pet squirrel
Representatives from the Humane Society and New Hampshire Fish and Game Department both spoke against the bill, warning the House Environment and Agriculture committee of the dangers of keeping wildlife as pets.
“This bill threatens public health and safety and promotes the dangerous and inhumane trend of keeping wild animals as pets,” said Kurt Ehrenberg, the New Hampshire state director for the Humane Society. “Raccoons and squirrels are wild animals, not domesticated pets.”
They said that keeping raccoons and squirrels as pets come with risks like physical harm from unpredictable behavior and the spread of dangerous diseases like rabies.
Even though the bill calls for making sure the animals have their “required” vaccines, Dan Bergeron, the chief of the New Hampshire Fish and Game Wildlife division, said that there are no statutes that require vaccines for the animals and no approved vaccines for the animals because they aren’t proven to be effective.
Will New Hampshire allow pet squirrels and raccoons?
It’s unclear yet whether this bill will make headway in the legislature, but this isn’t the first time New Hampshire has attempted to legalize alternative pets.
Last year, one bill would’ve allowed Granite Staters to own small-tailed monkeys, raccoons, foxes, otters, skunks, and red tailed kangaroos without a permit.
However, the House voted against the legislation.
“These animals really are not appropriate for home pet ownership. They are essentially wild animals,” said Rep. Peter Bixby, D-Dover, at the committee hearing. “Opening ownership of these up to people who just want them because it’s a cool idea could end up having our shelters dealing with kangaroos and short tailed monkeys that people decide they can’t handle after a short while.”
According to Bergeron, squirrels and raccoons can only be kept currently in New Hampshire under an exhibitors permit, so somewhere such as Squam Lake Science Center. While licensed rehabilitation centers can rescue an injured animal and nurse them back to health, they are not allowed to keep the animals. If they cannot be released into the wild, they must be euthanized.
Do any states allow people to own squirrels and raccoons?
It’s illegal in most states to own a pet squirrel without a permit.
But a few states do allow it, such as Florida.
New Hampshire
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New Hampshire
More businesses would be exempt from a key state tax under a proposal heading to Ayotte’s desk
The New Hampshire House and Senate stopped shy of cutting a major state business tax outright Thursday, but did pass a plan to lift the tax’s filing threshold, and spend $2.5 million to lift Medicaid provider rates at state nursing homes.
“What you have before you is a bill that will protect our nursing homes, and protect our small businesses,” said Republican Sen. Tim Lang of Sanbornton.
Under the bill, the threshold on the state business and enterprise tax would be lifted from $297,000 to $400,000, a move GOP leaders expect will exempt about 4,000 small businesses from having to pay the tax.
The bill’s inclusion of money to boost provider rates for nursing homes was a policy the Senate prioritized, and its inclusion in the bill earned the plan some Democratic support. But that evaporated when Republicans in the House pushed to add a trigger to the bill to automatically reduce the rate of the tax when collections from the levy far exceeded estimates.
“The rate cuts are reckless and irresponsible and would potentially cost hundreds of millions of dollars in the future,” said Sen. Cindy Rosenwald of Nashua.
Under the plan, the tax rate, which now stands at 0.55%, would automatically drop by .005% anytime collections on the tax surpassed estimates by $100 million until the rate of the levy reached 0.25%, equivalent to the rate when the tax was created in 1993. Any reduction would also require the state’s Rainy Day Fund to hold a strong balance.
Cutting business taxes has been a focus for GOP leaders in Concord for years, and they’ve dropped the rate of the Business Enterprise Tax four times since 2016.
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