C. Mark DelSesto
Overview
Software Product Manager
MBA, DePaul University; BS Math/Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University
20 Flying Rock Rd
Hudson, NH
United States
History
Position on Issues
Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Do you support the “Education Freedom Account” program, which gives students access to the per-pupil share of state school funding to spend on private school or home school expenses?
"No. The state hasn't met its obligation to fund the public schools it already has, and until it does, routing per-pupil money to private and home school expenses is spending money we haven't accounted for. The program has also cost significantly more than projected, and a lot of that money went to families who were already paying for private school. I'd rather put those dollars into the classrooms Hudson kids actually sit in."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire’s anti-discrimination law allow segregation based on biological sex in some settings, such as bathrooms and locker rooms?
"No. We settled this in 2018 with bipartisan support and a Republican governor's signature, and the problems we were warned about never materialized. I'd rather spend my time in Concord on why Hudson's property taxes keep going up."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire ban abortions during the first trimester (e.g. after 6 weeks gestation)?
"I'm pro-choice. This decision belongs to a woman and her doctor, and I don't see what a legislator in Concord adds to that conversation. I'd protect access before 24 weeks in statute. I'm opposed to the proposed 15-week and 6-week bans."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire ban abortions during the second trimester (e.g. after 15 weeks gestation)?
"I'm pro-choice. This decision belongs to a woman and her doctor, and I don't see what a legislator in Concord adds to that conversation. I'd protect access before 24 weeks in statute. I'm opposed to the proposed 15-week and 6-week bans."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should NH add an income tax on earned income?
"I'm not going to campaign on lowering the property tax burden and then hand people a new tax on top of it. What I want is for the state to pay its share of what it already requires towns to do. Hudson taxpayers are covering costs that belong to Concord, and fixing that is a spending and obligation problem, not a reason to open a new revenue stream."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire lower business taxes?
"No. I work in the private sector and I want New Hampshire to be a good place to run a company, but we've already cut business taxes repeatedly over the last decade and the promised growth hasn't made up for what the state walked away from. The need doesn't disappear when Concord stops collecting the money. The obligation slides down to towns like Hudson and shows up on our property tax bills. Before we cut again, I want the state paying its share of what it requires our schools to do. If we get there and a targeted cut helps small employers here, I'm open to it."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should the state do more to encourage municipalities to remove zoning barriers to housing development?
"We have a genuine housing shortage in this state, and it's why young families can't buy here and why our own kids leave. Encourage is the right word, though. The state should be reducing the obstacles and offering towns real reasons to build, not overriding local planning from Concord. Hudson should decide what Hudson looks like. And a bigger tax base spreads the cost of running this town across more households, which is one of the few ways property tax pressure actually comes down."Other| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire do more to encourage the development of nuclear power, including small modular reactors (SMR), in the state?
"I'm open to it, but not at any price. Nuclear is carbon-free and it runs around the clock, which solar and wind can't do on their own, so I don't want it off the table. The problem is cost. Recent projects in this country have come in enormously over budget and years late, and small modular reactors are still largely unproven at commercial scale. Ratepayers usually end up absorbing that. Given how high our electric rates already are, I'm not going to put New Hampshire families on the hook for a payback that's decades out. Show me a project where the numbers work and the cost risk doesn't fall on ratepayers, and I'll look at it seriously. In the meantime we should spend our effort on the things that lower bills now."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Do you support legislation to expand the net energy metering system capacity cap from 1 MW to 5 MW for all residential and commercial customers in New Hampshire?
"Net metering is how a business, a school district or a town gets a project big enough to actually cut its power bill. A 1 MW ceiling is small enough that it rules out the projects with the best economics. Raising it doesn't cost the state anything. It lets private money build generation here in New Hampshire, and the savings land on the electric bills of the people and institutions that build it. Our rates are among the highest in the country. I'll take any tool that brings them down."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire restore funding for the Office of the Child Advocate?
"We created that office because children in state custody were being harmed and nobody outside the agency was watching. Defunding the watchdog doesn't make the problem go away, it just means we stop hearing about it. And the state has already paid out an enormous amount over abuse at the youth detention center. Eliminating independent oversight to save a rounding error in the budget is exactly the kind of decision that costs us far more later. This is a small office doing work that protects both kids and taxpayers."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire guarantee the right to access abortion before 24 weeks?
"I'm pro-choice. This decision belongs to a woman and her doctor, and I don't see what a legislator in Concord adds to that conversation. I'd protect access before 24 weeks in statute. I'm opposed to the proposed 15-week and 6-week bans."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire reinstate the interest and dividends tax?
"Repealing it took a real chunk of state revenue off the table, and the need didn't disappear. The obligation just slid down to towns like Hudson, where we pay for it through our property tax bills. I'd rather restore a tax that fell on investment income than keep shifting the load onto people's homes."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Do you support New Hampshire’s current system of public school funding, with about two-thirds of total funding coming from local property taxes?
"No, and this is the reason I'm running. Pegging two-thirds of school costs to local property taxes means your school's budget depends on your neighbors' assessed home values, and it means a retiree in Hudson on a fixed income is carrying a share of a bill the state constitution says the state is responsible for. The courts have told us this repeatedly, and the legislature keeps kicking the can down the road. I want the state to meet its obligation so the pressure comes off Hudson homeowners."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire legalize the recreational use of marijuana by allowing home-growing and private use without sales?
"The model matters. We're the only state in New England that hasn't legalized, and all that accomplishes is sending Granite Staters across the border to spend their money. I'd let adults grow a small amount and use it privately at home, and handle sales through state-run stores the way we already do with liquor. What I don't want is licensed private retail. Look at Maine and Vermont, where there are dispensaries on every corner. State-run sales keep it controlled and keep the revenue here, and that's revenue that isn't coming out of somebody's property tax bill."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire legalize the recreational use of marijuana by licensing growers and private retail locations?
"The model matters. We're the only state in New England that hasn't legalized, and all that accomplishes is sending Granite Staters across the border to spend their money. I'd let adults grow a small amount and use it privately at home, and handle sales through state-run stores the way we already do with liquor. What I don't want is licensed private retail. Look at Maine and Vermont, where there are dispensaries on every corner. State-run sales keep it controlled and keep the revenue here, and that's revenue that isn't coming out of somebody's property tax bill."For| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire legalize the recreational use of marijuana by establishing state-run cannabis stores?
"The model matters. We're the only state in New England that hasn't legalized, and all that accomplishes is sending Granite Staters across the border to spend their money. I'd let adults grow a small amount and use it privately at home, and handle sales through state-run stores the way we already do with liquor. What I don't want is licensed private retail. Look at Maine and Vermont, where there are dispensaries on every corner. State-run sales keep it controlled and keep the revenue here, and that's revenue that isn't coming out of somebody's property tax bill."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire require new voters to provide proof of U.S. citizenship, such as a birth certificate or passport, when registering to vote?
"We already require new voters to prove citizenship. The question is whether a sworn affidavit, signed under penalty of voter fraud, counts as proof for someone who can't put their hands on a birth certificate. It should. Our own Secretary of State testified that noncitizen voting here is essentially nonexistent. I won't make it harder for legitimate voters to register to solve a problem our election officials say we don't have."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire allow at least 10% of students in each school district to enroll in a different public school, regardless of where they live?
"No. Two reasons. First, when students leave Hudson the funding leaves with them, but our buildings, our buses and our staffing costs don't shrink to match, so the shortfall lands right back on Hudson property taxpayers. Second, and this matters more to me: a mandate like this turns neighboring public schools into competitors for students. Competition produces winners and losers, and a losing public school is a real school full of real kids who can't leave. Our job is to make every public school in New Hampshire one that families want their kids in, not to sort them."Other| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should New Hampshire repeal the ban on abortion after 24 weeks gestation?
"I'm pro-choice. This decision belongs to a woman and her doctor, and I don't see what a legislator in Concord adds to that conversation. I'd protect access before 24 weeks in statute. I'm opposed to the proposed 15-week and 6-week bans."Against| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should state law cap how much local school districts can increase their budget each year?
"No. Hudson already has tools to control its own school budget, and we use them. That's what our budget committee and our town meeting are for. A cap written in Concord would apply the same ceiling to a district with a growing student population as to one with a shrinking one. And it's backwards to underfund districts from the state level and then legally forbid them from making up the difference locally. Control the budget here, in Hudson, where people can show up and vote on it."Other| Read My Position
Citizens Count Issue Survey, 2026
Should NH pass stricter gun control laws?
"New Hampshire has a long tradition of responsible gun ownership, and I won't support laws that treat lawful owners as the problem. But the Second Amendment doesn't end the discussion. Start here: the leading cause of gun deaths in this state is suicide, at a rate above the national average. That's a public health problem, and it's one gun owners and safety advocates can actually work on together. I'll vote for a bill that saves lives and respects lawful ownership."
