Representative Jessica LaMontagne Contact information

Jessica LaMontagne is a member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives, representing Strafford 17. She assumed office on December 7, 2022, and her current term ends on December 4, 2024. She is a member of the Democratic Party.

Jessica earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and a master’s degree in nutrition and international agricultural development from the University of California at Davis. Her career experience includes working as a custom tile installer and overall designer/builder, a nutrition researcher and public health nutritionist, and a restaurant cook.

She ran for election to the New Hampshire House of Representatives to represent Strafford 17 and won in the general election on November 8, 2022. She has lived in Dover for ten years, working in the construction industry, mostly as a custom tile installer. She works alongside her husband Doug Dodd, a longtime builder in the Seacoast. Together, they design and build new homes and in that capacity, Jessica does a little bit of everything. They have five adult children and three grandchildren between them.

Jessica was a public health nutritionist for 20 years in community health centers primarily with the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) nutrition program. She has always had a great passion for food and nutrition, spending her young adulthood cooking in restaurants and a homeless shelter in Boston.

She also had a farm in rural North Carolina with her young family for ten years. They grew vegetables and blueberries and raised goats and turkeys, while remodeling the old farmhouse and raising two children at the same time. At the end of the day, she found that working on the house was more fulfilling than her nutrition job and she had a knack for it. She comes from a long line of carpenters on her father’s side so it seems to be her nature. It also gave her a way to work part-time. Being a full-time WIC Director, a part-time farmer, a mother, and doing construction work in her spare time was as challenging as it was rewarding. At age 43, she took the brave plunge to work with her hands and use the creative side of her brain.

Jessica has worked with the most disadvantaged among us who navigate social and community services and struggle to make ends meet. And she has worked on million-dollar homes. She has worked in both white and blue-collar jobs, and believes her perspective will help her find ways forward with creative solutions for our social problems and our economic and environmental future. As small business owners, she and her husband understand the frustration of costs beyond their control, the lack of affordable health care for small businesses and gig workers, and the need for decent living wages and decent affordable housing.