commonwealth first began investigating patronage at Probation in 2008. We tried to pry records from the Probation Department under the state’s Public Records Law, but the agency, as part of […]
Everybody knew
Posted inPolitics
Robin Hood mayors
Activists in City Hall: The Progressive Response to the Reagan Era in Boston and Chicago By Pierre Clavel New York, Cornell University Press, 225 pages reviewed by don gillisboston’s ray […]
Posted inEconomy
Measurement error
the process currently underway to determine how—not whether—to expand the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center (BCEC) offers yet another example of the need for real public sector accountability. Last year, […]
Posted inEconomy, Education, Opinion
Job action
january 2011 marks the tenth anniversary of MassINC’s New Skills for a New Economy report. The report’s main finding that 1.1 million workers in Massachusetts—a third of the state’s workforce […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Opinion, Politics
A call to reason
since the mid-1990s, legislatures around the country have pursued a continuing and escalating course of action, from registration and community notification laws to civil commitment procedures, targeting individuals who have […]
Posted inEducation
Grade expectations
TO JUDGE BY its demographics, Brockton High School looks like lots of urban high schools that have failure written all over them. The sprawling complex is the largest public school […]
Posted inUncategorized
Winter 2011 Correspondence
Women outpace men in academicsJack Sullivan’s “False Start” (Fall ’10) stated that “women athletes at state schools….still run far behind men in nearly every measure of equal treatment.” Focused as […]
Posted inEconomy
MAP shows the way
“damn, I was doing so good!” Gerry exclaims as he buries his 30-something bald head in his hands. “Then he had to ask that question.” Gerry is one of […]
Posted inEducation
Study says students are good judges of teacher quality
if your child raves about having a great teacher—or rails about a bad one—believe it. That’s the finding from a new report that gives some research backing to an idea […]
Posted inPolitics
Probation scandal spurs calls for public records reform
the patronage scandal at the state’s Probation Department is prompting calls for all sorts of hiring reforms, but there is also a growing chorus of voices pushing for changes in […]
Posted inEconomy, Politics
Piloting through shortfalls
massachusetts communities lead the nation in reaping revenues from tax-exempt properties, but the payments represent pennies on the dollar compared to what municipalities would bring in if the land were […]
Posted inHealth Care
Name that malady
First, The Beatles, now flagellate hyperpigmentation. There’s no limit for the apps someone can download for their iPhone or iPod. The New England Journal of Medicine now has a smartphone […]
Posted inPolitics
Money for nothing
kathryn harper and her husband, Winston, were beside themselves one weekend in early November. The 63-year-old Salem grandmother had just scratched a $5 Massachusetts State Lottery ticket and discovered she […]
Posted inEducation, State House News Service
The little college that could
WILKELSON GEDEON HAD his heart set on majoring in engineering at the Wentworth Institute of Technology in Boston. But the Arlington native, a self-declared procrastinator, missed the application deadline. After […]
Posted inEnvironment, Politics
The meter is running
the south shore town of Kingston is discovering that going green is not only good for the environment but good for the municipality’s bottom line. Kingston is plunging into the […]
Posted inEconomy
Money talks—and delivers
until his arrest last year, few Bostonians had heard of Martin Raffol. Many more people, however, had probably heard of his boss, Arthur Winn—one of the state’s most prolific affordable […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
A son seeks answers
Helen Cadden left her bank and walked up toward the Mattapoisett fire station. The 87-year-old grandmother always crossed Route 6 there when she ran errands because there was a crosswalk […]
Posted inEconomy, Education, Politics, The Download
The Download: Map quest
It’s a decennial dance that makes sausage-making look like an art form. Congressional redistricting, mandated every 10 years by the federal census, is once again playing out in all corners […]
Posted inOpinion, Transportation
Revenue crossroads for transportation
In his recent response to the MassINC report “Next Stop, Massachusetts,” Transportation Secretary Jeffrey Mullan says: “Departure from the cost-cutting, efficiency-finding, and culture-changing approach we have taken would be a […]
Posted inEconomy
Shifting the burden
it’s a cautious dance trying to find the balance between maximizing local revenues and squeezing too much out of property owners. Too much of a burden on homeowners can cause […]
Posted inUncategorized
Feds float Turner perjury charge
Federal prosecutors have stepped up their pressure on former Boston city councilor Chuck Turner, alleging Turner committed perjury while testifying at his corruption trial this past fall. In court documents filed […]
Posted inUncategorized
Sifting through records appeals
First in a series of occasional articles on rulings issued by the Secretary of State’s office concerning appeals of public records requests filed with public agencies. Last March, Boston Globe […]
Posted inEnvironment, Politics, The Download
The Download: Wind resistance
Cape Wind dominates the debate on wind energy, but the push for onshore wind is a study in contrasts. A Cape Cod Times report explains how wind projects proposed for Dennis, Eastham, Harwich, Orleans Wellfleet, West Barnstable, and Truro have gone by the […]