CommonWealth Staff

A TOP CONTENDER for one of Boston’s four City Council at-large seats is drawing heat for stating Black Lives Matter set race relations back 50 years. Bridget Nee-Walsh, a union ironworker from South Boston who is one of eight candidates running for the four seats, made the comments at a Dorchester forum on October 12 put […]

WITH A CRITICAL vote nearing in a divided town, the Healey administration urged officials in Somerset to keep moving forward with a factory at Brayton Point that could become a major supplier to the US offshore wind industry. At a press conference on Monday, Gov. Maura Healey was asked if she has a message for […]

WHEN ROBBIE GOLDSTEIN took the reins as the state’s new public health commissioner in April, he brought national experience dealing with the public health crisis of our time. As senior adviser to Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Goldstein was at the center of the country’s public health response to […]

EVEN BEFORE TWITTER changed hands to its current owner, who insists on calling it by another name, the social networking site was in a state of decline. What used to be a real-time news ticker is overrun with anger and misinformation. But some feeds are still worth following, and that’s the case with @GlobeFPhillips, operated […]

THE IMAGES FROM the Israel-Hamas war have ripped through social media, sparking arguments and proclamations on Facebook, Instagram, and the platform formerly known as Twitter. Locally, the conflict has split the Massachusetts congressional delegation, and Harvard University leaders issued a second statement after the first one drew criticism for appearing to be a “word salad […]

Gov. Maura Healey’s support for allowing municipalities to enact a real estate transfer tax could offer some cover to the cities and towns that have been agitating for the controversial policy change as yet another tool to shore up their affordable housing stock. Her $4 billion five-year housing bond bill, announced in Chelsea on Wednesday […]

The race for a vacant central Massachusetts Senate seat between a Republican and a Democratic state representative could be an early indicator of whether the emergency shelter crisis in Massachusetts will reverberate politically. The issue certainly has potential. Massachusetts has an emergency shelter law that requires the state to provide shelter to homeless families with […]

The value of using MCAS scores to determine graduation readiness and school oversight status is getting several enthusiastic tire-kicks. The state’s largest teachers union is charging away at a ballot measure that would remove the graduation requirement component of the 10th grade MCAS, and similar legislation known as the Thrive Act is being considered on […]

A 16-YEAR INCUMBENT looking for another four-year term. An at-large councilor seeking to harness the votes of young progressives in a bid for the top job. The 2009 showdown between Tom Menino and Michael Flaherty ended as the longtime mayor’s closest race, and his last. Menino won with nearly 60 percent of the vote. If […]