Bradley says Stephen helped raise property taxes

Jeb Bradley with state reps and county commissioners: Photo Credit: PolitickerNH.com

CONCORD-- Flanked by state reps and county commissioners former U.S. Rep. Jeb Bradley (R-Wolfeboro) alleged that his primary opponent raised property taxes.

Bradley says that while he was head of Health and Human Services John Stephen (R-Manchester) shifted the cost of operation nursing homes onto counties which resulted in higher taxes for property owners. Stephen's campaign manager denies the charge by saying "facts are troubling things."

"My opponent in the primary, Commissioner John Stephen, when he was commissioner of the Health and Human Services routinely underpaid the required state portion of the cost of nursing homes," Bradley said at a Concord press conference. "As we all know the 4,400 New Hampshire seniors that are in nursing homes  today, in order to keep the doors open, someone else had to pay the bills and that somebody else was, has all of these folks will attest to here today, are property tax payers."

Greg Moore, Stephen's campaign manager, said state reimbursements to counties for nursing homes increased while Stephen ran the state's largest department.

"Facts are troubling things and Jeb Bradley should work on getting his facts straight," Moore told PolitickerNH.com. "In 2003 the county reimbursement was $69 million and in 2007, when John Stephen left HHS, the reimbursement was $83.8 million. That's a 20 percent increase and that's not a cost shift."

In New Hampshire the state pays 25 percent of the cost of running nursing homes and Bradley supporters said that Stephen only paid 20 percent of the cost, which resulted in budget shortfalls for counties.

"The agreement was that the state would pay 25 percent of the cost, the counties would pay 25 percent of the cost and the federal government would pay 50 percent," said Christopher Boothby, a commissioner for Belknap County. "Unfortunately John Stephen, as Commissioner of Health and Human Services decided that he wasn't going to meet his obligations to seniors, he wasn't going to pay 25 percent as agreed. Depending on the year he'd only want to pay 20 percent of the cost and that extra five percent was cost shifted back down to local county taxpayers."