THE MASSACHUSETTS HOUSE on Wednesday is expected to vote on the rules it will operate under the next two years, but don’t expect the usual ho-hum debate. A group of progressive dissenters are planning to use the rules to challenge the House’s power structure, a Republican is calling for term limits and the right for […]
Politics
Posted inPolitics
State leaders preparing if federal government shuts down again
AFTER THE LONGEST government shutdown in the nation’s history strained the finances of federal workers going without pay, state leaders say they now have some plans in hand to help those caught up by dysfunction in Washington. Gov. Charlie Baker, who met with the leaders of the House and Senate on Monday, expressed confidence that the […]
Posted inOpinion
A Kafkaesque health care assessment
EVEN FRANZ KAFKA would be taken aback by the state’s convoluted and self-defeating health care assessment on human service providers. Imagine the following: A non-profit organization provides critical services to the blind and disabled under contracts with the state. The state effectively pays only $13 an hour for the direct care workers hired by the […]
Posted inPolitics
Mass. lawmakers, businesses step up for furloughed federal workers
WHILE WASHINGTON and the Trump administration continue their disastrous handling of the federal government’s partial shutdown, legislators, municipalities, and businesses across the Commonwealth are searching for short-term solutions to the financial plight of the impacted workers. As we enter day 35, many of the 47,000 federal employees living in Massachusetts are feeling the strain. Gov. […]
Posted inEducation
Baker calls for more school funds — and accountability
THE STATE’S SCHOOL reform efforts, beginning with the landmark 1993 Education Reform Act, have always involved a combination of spending increases and new accountability measures aimed at helping drive school improvement, especially among students at the bottom end of the achievement gap. Gov. Charlie Baker’s education funding proposal, unveiled on Wednesday alongside his 2020 budget […]
Posted inEducation
Baker unveils school funding plan
STATE HOUSE NEWS SERVICE GOV. CHARLIE BAKER on Wednesday rolled out a seven-year plan to boost school funding by more than $1 billion dollars, including what his education secretary described as a “historic investment” in communities where students are facing achievement gaps. Baker said his plan, which also includes reforms around charter school reimbursements and […]
Posted inHealth Care, Politics
Baker backs rate-setting for high-cost drugs
THE BAKER ADMINISTRATION is seeking legislative authority for MassHealth to negotiate prices directly with the manufacturers of high-cost drugs that have little or no competition and, if that effort fails to produce savings, to put the companies through a rate-setting process followed by regulatory and legal penalties if the firm fails to charge the target […]
Posted inNews Analysis
Shutdown sending Trump poll numbers down
“IF WE DON’T GET what we want … I am proud to shut down the government for border security, Chuck.” That, of course, was President Donald Trump in an unexpectedly televised Oval Office confrontation with now House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. No one but Donald Trump knows for certain why […]
Posted inOpinion
Ranked choice far superior to top-two
In “Let’s get off the ranked-choice bandwagon,” Paul Schlichtman argues that the growing calls for Massachusetts to adopt ranked choice voting are misguided. Instead of ranked choice, he wants our state to use the same top-two system as California. As the policy director for Voter Choice Massachusetts, the 26,000-member movement to enact ranked choice voting, […]
Posted inOpinion
Union chief: Grid workers did not break
UNIONS MATTER. That’s the lesson of National Grid’s six-month lockout of 1,250 United Steelworkers. Withstanding the latest in a series of attacks on workers nationally, the men and women of Locals 12012 and 12003 held firm for 28 weeks against the hardships imposed on them and their families by a multinational, multi-billion dollar corporate behemoth. […]