Viewpoint: Bill Frantz – Immigrants are part of New Hampshire’s landscape
Josée Vachon and fiddler Peter Ross perform at Jaffrey Woman’s Club as part of Fête de la Riviére, a celebration of the region's French-Canadian heritage that was part of Jaffrey 250 events in 2023. FILE PHOTO
| Published: 04-22-2025 2:49 PM |
On Wednesday, April 23, at 7 p.m., the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript and Monadnock Center for History and Culture will host “Immigration and the Monadnock Region,” a Community Conversation about the current immigration situation.
The event will be at the Monadnock Center, 19 Grove St. in Peterborough.
The three “conversation starters” will be David Blair, former English as a Second Language director at ConVal and co-founder of Mariposa Museum who has extensive experience working with Cambodian immigrants in Peterborough; state Rep. Peter Leishman; and Ciaran Nagle, an Irish immigrant and Irish tenor who is the owner of Foundation Kitchen - Share Commercial Kitchen.
Each will make a brief presentation, and then the rest of the hourlong event will be devoted to questions from the audience.
Adar Cohen of Adar Cohen & Associates will moderate the conversation. Cohen holds a doctorate in conflict resolution from Trinity College Dublin, has led conversations in Chicago, Belfast in Northern Ireland, Washington, D.C. and Kanglung, Bhutan. He is a co-founder of Civic Leadership Foundation, which supports young people in their education and careers, and as citizens.
The conversation is free, and all are welcome.
Join us for a Community Conversation discussing immigration and the Monadnock region on Wednesday, April 23, at 7 p.m. This conversation is sponsored by the Monadnock Center for History and Culture and the Monadnock Ledger-Transcript. It will be held in Bass Hall at the Monadnock Center, 19 Grove St. in Peterborough.
This conversation was triggered by the raid by U.S. government's Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers on the Mi Jalisco restaurant in the Peterborough Shopping Plaza. Much of what happened during this raid is still unknown, but it did trigger a discussion at a meeting of the Peterborough Select Board. We hope a discussion of immigration and immigrants will help people put our policies in perspective.
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While working to organize this conversation, I noticed how many foreign-born people I associate with in my daily life. Many live in the same retirement community where I live. However, I even noticed that my primary care physician was also an immigrant while we were discussing the results of my annual physical. I also meet immigrants in my church and as members of some of the community committees I work with.
I became curious about our foreign-born population here in New Hampshire. I found information on the state’s Economic and Labor Market Information Bureau website, nhes.nh.gov/elmi/products/documents/immigration-and-nh.pdf, In 2023, foreign-born residents accounted for 6.8 % (95,000 residents) of New Hampshire’s population. Among foreign-born New Hampshire residents, 61% were naturalized citizens.
The top countries of birth for New Hampshire’s foreign born residents included Canada (7,600 residents), India (7,600 residents), the Dominican Republic (5,800 residents), China (3,800 residents) and the United Kingdom (3,800 residents).
Foreign-born workers accounted for 7% of New Hampshire’s workforce, although they accounted for a larger share of the workforce in several industries. In the manufacturing sector, 9.7% were foreign-born, followed by professional, scientific and technical services at 9.2%. Other sectors with a large share of foreign-born workers included accommodation and food service (8.5%), information (8.5%), administrative and support and waste management and remediation (8.4%), other services (8.0%) and health care and social assistance (7.3%).
As usual, we will start the conversation with background information from three “conversation starters.” Then the floor is open for questions, thoughts and discussion. This conversation is free and all are welcome. Adar Cohen will act as the moderator.
The conversation starters for this conversation are:
-- David Blair, former director of English as a Second Language for the ConVal School District and co-chair of the board of directors of the Mariposa Museum. He has long experience working with immigrants, including a large group of Cambodians living in Peterborough.
-- Peter Leishman is a representative from Peterborough and Sharon to the New Hampshire House of Representatives. He will bring his experiences with legislation affecting immigrants in our state and region to our conversation.
-- Ciaran Nagle is an immigrant who deals with immigration regularly. In addition, he is an Irish tenor and owner of the Foundation Kitchen-Share Commercial Kitchen. He will talk about his and other's experiences when coming to the United States as immigrants. He became a naturalized citizen in 2017.
Bill Frantz is a member of the Community Conversations board, and organized the speakers for the April 23 session.
