Michael DiTommaso

A lifelong New Hampshire citizen, Michael cares deeply about fairness in New Hampshire's tax system, school funding, and establishing New Hampshire as an attractive place for people to start and raise families.

• Michael seeks to ease our onerous property taxes and figure out a smarter way to fund the needs of our municipalities.
• Michael cares deeply about the people and culture of New Hampshire, and wants young people to stay in the state.
• Michael is a champion of economic fairness-in wages, taxation, and affordable housing.

When it comes to public policy, Michael is a passionate advocate for repairing our broken system of taxation, establishing a minimum wage, and addressing our affordable housing crisis. He brings experience from his time on Raymond's municipal budget committee, where he was able to witness first hand how interlocked the problems of this state are. The cost of living in New Hampshire is so disconnected from wages in the state that young people are forced to leave. Our near complete reliance on property taxes to fund our municipalities means that land poor towns are forced to drive taxes up much faster than stagnating wages in the state. This has been compounded by state government reliably down-shifting its own costs to municipalities in the guise of reducing taxes, when all they're doing is shifting the burden to regular people.

Michael is also outspoken about the sanctity of our democratic process. He believes that restoring faith in democracy means safeguarding our process to ensure the will of the people is heard. And he knows that means being open to changes that shore up faith in the execution and outcomes of our elections. New Hampshire must be a national leader and model for the rest of the country. Our state has long held a revered spot in national politics, and we must live up to the deference we receive.

Michael has great admiration for Sen. Bernie Sanders, who proved that one can be stalwart in their convictions and survive the area of politics without having to compromise on their values. He hopes to remain as true to himself as a person who works for a living and knows what it's like to have to make rent and car payments, and who has a vision of a more perfect union that he strives toward every day.

Honesty, empathy, and egalitarianism.

Michael is an autodidact who constantly seeks out new information. He has years of experience in games and game design, which he has primarily viewed through the lens of systems analysis. His interest in systems and love of learning are qualities that perfectly marry with the process of writing new legislation. Good legislation should be supported by data, and its interaction with the larger system of laws as well as our economic and social systems should be considered and modeled at length, to the extent that it is possible to do so. This is the best way to prevent unintended negative consequences.

Anyone elected to serve as a representative must take it upon themselves to educate themselves on any issue on which they are writing legislation, or any issue that pertains to their subcommittee, so that they can make informed decisions that serve both the interest of their constituents, as well as do so in ways that their constituents want.

Michael would be proud to leave a mark on our elections system and be known for having had a hand in increasing our faith in the electoral process.

The first historical event that Michael remembers was probably President Clinton's impeachment, when he was 9, though that wasn't something he was entirely aware of the significance of. The first historical event that he truly experienced was 9/11, at age 11.

Michael's first job was working at the Silver Center for the Arts at Plymouth State University, where he worked for four years as a theatrical carpenter.

The last song stuck in Michael's head was "My Shot" from the cast album of the musical Hamilton.

Michael's early life was marked by economic instability. His father was a union laborer, and his mother was on disability. When they divorced, it left Michael and his two siblings to be raised by a single mother. Not having access to familial wealth, Michael was able to go to college on the strength of his academic performance, which gave him access to grants. He still graduated with a considerable amount of student loans into a hostile job market. Though he was able to conquer the majority of his student debt, after nearly a decade in the work force, he still hasn't been able to afford to buy a home.

It was through programs such as food stamps and education grants that he was able to improve his condition and eventually get the college education that neither of his parents could. Now, he wants to keep New Hampshire on the right track and make sure it's the kind of place where he and people like him can set down their roots and live for the rest of their lives.

Fundamentally, the biggest difference between our chambers in New Hampshire concentration of power. Our House of Representatives, with its 400 members, is one of the largest representative bodies in the entire world. This means that a large number of people must deliberate and come to consensus before any legislation can move forward. Whereas in our Senate, we have merely 24 people to make decisions with as much weight behind them. Thus, every vote of a senator carries a very large weight.

Michael believes that previous experience in government and politics is useful for understanding just how our system of government works. However, all politicians are, at one point, not yet politicians. If government is to be by the people, then there must always be some number of people new to the process, bringing with them their perspective as citizens. It is in the conversations between those with experience as legislators and those with experience as the citizenry affected by that legislation that a more holistic understanding of our system of laws can be reached, and through it, better legislation may be crafted in the future.

New Hampshire is the mostly rapidly aging state in the US. If this trend continues, as people age, older folks move to the state, and younger folks leave it, New Hampshire will find itself with a rapidly dissolving economy, and a disconnect in its long and storied cultured.

Michael believes that it is the Governor's job to execute the will of the voters of the state. He believes that no one person should take it upon themselves to obstruct the operation of the government by refusing to execute the duties of their office on merely partisan grounds. The power of the veto pen must be exercised with great restraint, lest it become simply a tool for partisan gain and political silencing.

Michael believes that, by definition, legislators must work with and understand each other. Legislation is a cooperative endeavor. It has built into it the need to reach consensus and mutual understanding, as well as the benefit of many minds applied to a single problem, to attack it from many angles, until it is well understood, its potential effects and side effects considered, balanced, and, where necessary, mitigated. And to accomplish these goals, legislators must be able to work with each other.

It's true that personal relationships should not be the reason that legislation is advanced, but instead, relationships should develop which allow people to talk frankly, and really hear criticism in a constructive light, and not reject it out of hand.

Michael believes that redistricting should be an independent process. He doesn't think that people in power should be able to give themselves more power. As long as the people drawing the lines have the ability to be self-serving, some non-zero number of people will do just that. Elections should represent the people voting in them. Districts should therefore accurately reflect their electorates, and not be skewed to favor one party or another.

The three committees which Michael is most interested in being a part of, are, in no particular order, Election Law; Finance; and Labor, Industrial, and Rehabilitative Services.