by EDITH TUCKER

LITTLETON - The mayor of Portsmouth came to have dinner with activists in the Grafton County Democratic Party on Thursday evening at the Eastgate.

Steve Marchand, who was elected mayor in November 2005 and sworn into office in January 2006 as the youngest mayor in the Granite State, is now laying the groundwork for his campaign to become the Democratic nominee who will challenge Sen. John E. Sununu for his seat in 2008. Only 33 years old, Mayor Marchand pointed out that Sen. Sununu, then a congressman, was also very young in 2002 when he came out of the blocks to defeat incumbent Sen. Bob Smith for the Republican nomination and then incumbent Gov. Jeanne Shaheen, the Democrat's standard-bearer, to become the youngest member of the U. S. Senate.

Mr. Marchand wears a lapel pin that features crossed flags - the stars and stripes of an American flag, and the red-orange maple-leaf Canadian flag.

Born in 1974 in Manchester, he is a first-generation American whose parents - Normand and Suzanne - moved in the 1960s from their hometown villages - St. Isadore and Coaticook - in Quebec, just south of Sherbrooke.

"We need representation in Washington that reflects the values of the people of New Hampshire," the mayor said. He noted that he has many relatives on both sides of the Canadian border and spent time as a boy in Pittsburg, West Stewartstown, Canaan, and Beecher Falls.

"I spent a lot of time in Coös," he said. The Portsmouth mayor said he plans to visit his two aunts - Louisette Thibault of Pittsburg and Muegette Marchand of Canaan, Vt. - this summer with his wife, Sandi Hennequin, and their two young daughters, Abigail and Margaret.

Mr. Marchand explained that he had adopted the late Sen. Paul Tsongas of Massachusetts as his political role model because he, like the Bay State senator, is fiscally conservative and socially liberal. In 2000, Mr. Marchand served as the Northeast (New England and New York) Regional Director of the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan, grassroots organization that advocates for fiscal and generational responsibility, including working to ensure that Social Security, Medicare, and the American economy remain secure into the future.

Sen. Tsongas, a Democrat, in partnership with two-term Republican Sen. Walter Rudman of New Hampshire, founded the Concord Coalition.

Both men, Mayor Marchand pointed out, stand for fairness, leadership, and taking a multi-generational approach to problems, challenges, and issues.

"I learned at the Concord Coalition that those who take both a thoughtful and principled approach, get away from labels, and focus on interests instead can be very effective," Mr. Marchand explained.

Looking specifically at Coös County, Mayor Marchand said that if elected to the U. S. Senate he would work to move forward its agenda of diversifying its economy. He noted that the ATV Park now underway in Berlin could add another piece to the tourist industry, expanding motorized recreation in addition to snowmobiling. The tourist-based economy should continue to build on the county's natural resources and beauty, he said, but without turning the county into a theme park.

Mayor Marchand said he envisions the county playing a positive and important role in developing more renewable sources of energy to help the nation lessen its dependence on imported crude oil and reducing greenhouse gases as well as in conservation.

Producing cellulosic ethanol from wood fiber holds great promise, he said. But investors and producers must be given appropriate incentives to take the risk associated with working with new technology and establishing new business enterprises. The state and federal government must provide stable and predictable markets, Mr. Marchand said.

"You just can't change the rules every five years," he said. "Deregulation (of the electric industry) must be allowed to move along and incentives and competitive pressures will do the rest. Only then would the best company build the best plant to provide the best jobs." Deregulation will allow the free market do what it does best."

Like many, Mr. Marchand said that he wholeheartedly supports American troops in Iraq but would like to see them out of that beleaguered country within the next year or two. He blames the Bush administration for holding a "uni-dimensional view of the situation" before deploying American troops.

"Senator Sununu, perhaps as much as any other senator, has enabled the president to take his course of action," Mr. Marchand said. "It's time for a change; the surge was a bad idea. The Iraqi people see our troops - through no fault of theirs - as occupiers - and not as liberators."

Mayor Marchand said that neither of his parents had had the economic resources to allow them to earn a high school diploma, but that they worked hard and played by the rules to secure the benefits of the American dream. Unfortunately, he said, his mother suffered a heart attack when she was only 39 years old. Since his father was a self-employed carpenter, they were not covered by health insurance and were forced to declare bankruptcy to deal with $80,000 in unpaid medical bills. This turn of events severely constrained their future choices, and his father had to give up working as an independent contractor to work in the maintenance department at St. Anselm College in Manchester, which provides health insurance. His parents and only sibling, Joanne, now live in Goffstown. His parents' searing experience, he said, gave him a first-hand look at the reasons why solving the nation's healthcare financing crisis is so important.

Mr. Marchand earned a B.S. in International Relations and a B.A. in Public Relations from Syracuse University in 1996. He went on to earn a Master's in Public Administration (M.P.A.) from the Maxwell School of Syracuse University in 1998. He began his professional career at Andersen Consulting (now Accenture), working with public and private sector clients to implement database management systems. He later joined Maximus, a government management consulting firm, in its state and local government division.

The firm that Mr. Marchand started, Pembroke Strategies, attracted clients interested in public policy at the federal, state and local levels and also works with international delegations to promote democracy and emergency management systems in developing nations, many in the former Soviet Union.

Mr. Marchand noted that even in his home life he is able to look at "common interest" and to avoid being stalled by giving undue attention to labels. Thinking that his family would acquire two pet dogs, he and his Republican wife named their first Pembroke Welsh Corgi "Reagan." He explained that they had planned to name another "Truman." So far, however, the couple has only one dog, and he is named after the late Republican president.

Reprinted with permission of the Coos County Democrat, Lancaster, NH