Adam Thompson

The New Hampshire Council on Autism Spectrum Disorders provides an important structure for coordination, expertise, and lived experience input across systems that affect autistic residents and their families. Autism policy touches education, healthcare, employment, housing, and developmental services. The council helps inform state agencies and legislative bodies so they understand the real world needs, service gaps, and policy impacts affecting autistic residents and their families. Without a dedicated advisory body, that coordination risks becoming fragmented. Advisory councils are not symbolic. They create a formal pathway for families, self advocates, clinicians, educators, and service providers to inform policy decisions and identify gaps before they become crises. Eliminating the council removes a consistent mechanism for that input at a time when demand for autism related supports continues to grow. Many individuals on the spectrum navigate complex service systems throughout their lives. A centralized advisory body helps ensure policies are responsive, aligned, and informed by real-world experience. Repealing it will reduce visibility, accountability, and collaboration across agencies. This bill raises a broader question: how New Hampshire ensures that autistic residents and their families continue to have a structured voice in state policymaking. If improvements or restructuring are needed, those conversations should occur with stakeholders at the table, not through elimination of the forum itself. For these reasons, I respectfully urge the committee to find HB 1337 inexpedient to legislate.