This Just In: Manchester Files Question 2 Recount Petition, 21 Votes Short

MANCHESTER, N.H. — A recount petition for Manchester’s Ballot Question 2 was filed today, Tuesday, November 10, 2026 — the last day of the seven-day window the law allows after the November 3 election. Former at-Large School Committeeman Rich Girard and nine other registered Manchester voters signed the petition, which asks the Manchester Board of School Committee to recount the vote on the school tax cap measure. The petition was addressed to Angela Carey, Clerk of the Board of School Committee, and district attorney Matt Upton received the petition and the $10 filing fee on the board’s behalf.

Ballot Question 2 asked Manchester voters to adopt a cap on the amount of property taxes that can be raised from one year to the next, and to limit spending on school administration to no more than 6% of the overall school budget — the measure enacted this year as HB 1300 (Chapter 324). Adoption required a 60% supermajority of the votes cast on the question. According to the unofficial election results released by the Office of the City Clerk, the vote was 20,827 in favor and 13,919 opposed: 59.94% Yes, which leaves the measure 21 votes short of the 60% it needed. Out of 34,746 ballots cast on the question, the margin is 0.06%.

The recount itself is the school board’s job. Under RSA 32:5-i, VII(a) — the provision the petition cites — the Board of School Committee conducts the recount, not the Secretary of State and not the City Clerk. The board must hold it no sooner than five days and no later than ten days after the petition was received, which puts the recount between Sunday, November 15 and Friday, November 20, 2026. No date has been announced. According to Girard’s account of the filing, district attorney Matt Upton said meetings were scheduled with City Clerk Matthew Normand to work out how the recount will run, and the statute provides no separate certification step after it: the board’s recount tally is the operative result.

Two questions sit underneath the recount, and both are genuinely open. First, the 3,740 ballots on which no vote was cast on Question 2 were not counted in the percentages — a determination that school districts across the state, including Manchester, are questioning, according to the filing. Second, the statute does not say how the ballots themselves move from the City Clerk’s custody to the school board that has to count them. Neither question changes the arithmetic on the unofficial count; either could shape how the recount is run.

Girard, in a statement issued after the filing and published on his own site, Girard at Large, pointed to the margin and to the machines: “It is entirely reasonable to ask for a recount when just 21 votes out of 34,746 cast is the difference between the cap being adopted or not.” He also noted that Manchester used new voting machines in this election. Those are the petitioner’s stated reasons; the recount will test the count itself.

For now, Manchester’s Question 2 result reads: failed on the unofficial count, recount pending. That matters beyond Manchester — Question 2 tax caps were on ballots across New Hampshire this fall, and Manchester was the closest call in the state. Education Across the States is watching for the recount date, which must be announced inside the November 15–20 window, and will report the board’s tally when it lands.

Takeaway: A 21-vote margin out of 34,746 is now in the school board’s hands. Watch for the recount date between November 15 and 20 — and for how the board handles the two questions the statute leaves open: the 3,740 blank ballots and the chain of custody from the City Clerk to the board.

Sources: Petition for Recount, Manchester Ballot Question 2, filed November 10, 2026 under RSA 32:5-i, VII(a) and addressed to Angela Carey, Clerk, Manchester Board of School Committee (copy published by the filer); RSA 32:5-i (recount of votes on a school district tax cap question); unofficial election results released by the Manchester Office of the City Clerk, as reported with the filing; Girard at Large, “Recount of Tax Cap ballot question filed in Manchester,” November 10, 2026 (the petitioner’s own account of the filing).