The last nine weeks have brought change to everyone across the Granite State. Our lives are different than they were nine weeks ago. Parents are doing double-duty. They’re working alongside dedicated educators to monitor their children’s remote learning, hosting virtual play-dates, and washing an unimaginable amount of dishes. All this while simultaneously maintaining their own careers, or for many, managing the stress of a job loss or health concern.

Children of all ages, from kindergarteners to high school and college seniors, approach milestones of graduation with no feasible ceremony. Birthdays and weddings are postponed, even funerals are tragically limited.

New Hampshire’s unemployment rate has sky rocked and all Granite Staters are looking forward to life returning back to “normal” — whatever that may mean.

When the COVID-19 pandemic reached New Hampshire, the House had to make the difficult choice to temporarily suspend legislative activity. We knew, as leaders of the New Hampshire House, with 400 members, and an average age of 63 years young, that it was crucial to make that decision for the safety of our members and staff. We also knew that public input is crucial to the work we do, and we could not safely ask members of the public to come to the State House.

The first few weeks of the pandemic your state representatives were busy making sure you all were connected to the agencies you needed and were receiving the information and benefits you needed but we always knew we would want to get back to the legislative work you elected us to do. This proved to be no easy task.

In the 200-plus years of the New Hampshire House we had never held a remote meeting. I am so proud of our staff and legislators who stepped up to make sure we could get back to work even if that meant meeting remotely, which had never been done before. The Legislature has always had dedicated staff at the State House but they have gone above and beyond to make sure our work could continue.

Many nights and weekends were and continue to be put in to ensure we had a system that was up and running and that every legislator could participate and your voice in Concord could be heard. The State of New Hampshire owes them a debt of gratitude. We have been sure to take things step by step so we can be confident the process is still fair and the public can still participate.

To date, the meetings have been successful with House committees taking up bills and voting on them in much the same way as if we were still in the State House together.

Our next step is for the House to get together a full session. This is no small task. The Constitution mandates that we meet in person and with 400 members, the New Hampshire House is the third-largest legislative body in the world. With the ongoing risk of COVID-19, that means we cannot meet in Representatives Hall.

This will be the first time since the Civil War that the House has met outside of Representatives Hall but we know it is what we must do to get our work done. We plan to meet in June to finish much of the work we started this session and pass important bills that will help Granite Staters during this crisis and better prepare for a potential second surge of the virus.

New Hampshire should be proud of its representatives from both parties for stepping up during this crisis and should be proud of the House for adapting to a new challenge in its long-vaunted history. I am hoping for many, the House returning to session will help make life feel more normal again – if only for a few moments.

Stephen Shurtleff represents Penacook and is the Speaker of the New Hampshire House.