Photo by Frank Curran Lowell and UMass Lowell signed a master agreement in August, committing the university to providing nearly $8 million in cash and in-kind contributions for the community […]
Flying without a PILOT
Posted inEconomy
Panera Cares, but for how long?
FOUR YEARS AFTER the Panera Cares community café opened at Center Plaza in Boston, it’s still in business. But the restaurant’s unorthodox approach to addressing hunger isn’t working out exactly […]
Posted inGambling
Watching the games people play
SECRETED ON THE 12th floor of 101 Federal Street in Boston’s Financial District is a windowless command center, manned 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Keycard entry is […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
Time to put pedal to the metal
WE GENERALLY THINK of Eversource, National Grid, and other utilities as the providers of the electricity we need to keep the lights on. That they are, but over the next […]
Posted inOpinion
Are homes only for the upper-class?
HOMEOWNERSHIP HAS TRADITIONALLY been a marker of middle-class life, and a tool for vaulting families solidly into the middle class. Sustainable homeownership builds family wealth, and helps stabilize neighborhoods. But […]
Posted inOpinion
A new breed of advocacy
THIS ISSUE HIGHLIGHTS a new breed of advocacy that appears to be emerging here in Massachusetts, an advocacy driven more by data than ideology. Our Conversation introduces you to Marc […]
Posted inPolitics
Pushing ranked choice with beer (and pie)
AMERICANS ARE ALL too familiar with the divisive saga of the 2016 presidential contest, but few are aware of the quiet revolution that blossomed in Maine and is now taking flight […]
Posted inPolitics
Challenging DeLeo
HOUSE SPEAKER ROBERT DELEO has a challenger—but it’s not a member of the chamber he oversees. The insurgency is coming instead from a 27-year-old Franklin resident who says he’s grown […]
Posted inOpinion
Mass. critical hub for autonomous systems
IT’S AN EXCITING TIME to be in the Commonwealth’s innovation sector. There’s a technological revolution taking place around the world and Massachusetts is ground zero as an emerging new industry […]
Posted inTransportation
Is Baker’s commission another delay tactic?
LIKE RED LINE TRAINS, the state’s efforts to address transportation funding are constantly bedeviled by fits and starts in a seemingly endless quest to reach the destination. In the latest […]
Posted inEnvironment, Opinion
Fuel cell vehicles need more support
NATIONAL HYDROGEN & FUEL CELL DAY is just around the corner on Sunday, and there’s no better place than Massachusetts – the state declared the nation’s “most innovative” by the […]
Posted inTransportation
Group sees regional rail potential
IT WAS BILLED AS A LOOK at the real estate opportunities associated with an underground rail link between North and South Stations, but the presentation ended up centering more on […]
Posted inThe Codcast
Episode 69: Brownsberger tees up criminal justice reform bill
The tough-on-crime era of the 1980s and 90s has given way to what some are calling the smart-on-crime era, a time in which policymakers and politicians are rethinking what it […]
Posted inThe Download
The Codcast: Brownsberger tees up criminal justice reform bill
The tough-on-crime era of the 1980s and 90s has given way to what some are calling the smart-on-crime era, a time in which policymakers and politicians are rethinking what it […]
Posted inEconomy
Chinatown residents protest short-term rentals
RESIDENTS MARCHED through the streets of Chinatown to the Massachusetts State House on Thursday to protest a short-term rental industry that they say is squeezing out residents of the downtown […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
Middlesex DA Ryan backs mandatory minimum repeal
MIDDLESEX DISTRICT ATTORNEY Marian Ryan said she supports many pieces of the Senate criminal justice bill unveiled last week, including the repeal of some mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenses. […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
Middlesex DA Ryan supports repeal of some mandatory minimum drug sentences
Here is the statement released by Middlesex County District Attorney Marian Ryan on October 5, 2017, on the Senate criminal justice reform legislation: “As a prosecutor for more than thirty […]
Posted inOpinion
Sound lessons from Seattle
MASSACHUSETTS IS ABUZZ with talk about whether Amazon might choose one of our communities for its second North American headquarters. Just days after Amazon announced a nation-wide search for “HQ2,” […]
Posted inThe Back Story
MBTA still having problems with some contracts
Two years ago, when the Green Line extension ballooned in cost from $2 to $3 billion, the project highlighted the MBTA’s inability to hire competent contractors and to oversee their work to a satisfactory […]
Posted inThe Download
Telling Amazon a good story
The countdown clock is ticking for delivery of proposals to host a second Amazon headquarters.The plans are due two weeks from today, and there is wide agreement that Boston is […]
Posted inTransportation
Senators grill T officials on privatization
IN APRIL, THE MBTA’S Fiscal and Management Control Board approved a budget that counted on millions of dollars in savings from bus maintenance operations, and the five members unanimously approved […]
Posted inOpinion
Could electricity become too cheap to meter?
YEARS AGO, DURING AN ERA in which nuclear power had great promise, advocates for this energy form said that it would produce electricity “too cheap to meter.” While that prediction […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
Conley opens the door to repeal of some mandatory minimums
Here is the statement provided on October 3, 2017, by Suffolk County District Attorney Daniel Conley on the Senate criminal justice reform bill: “Massachusetts has among the lowest violent crime […]
Posted inThe Download
No laughing matter
Nothing is more responsible for televisions in bedrooms than late-night talk shows and the comedians who hosted the programs that generations of Americans tuned into at the end of a […]