HOUSE SPEAKER RON MARIANO was having a bit of fun with the press corps Wednesday when he named “fortune-telling” as part of his own personal “fun agenda,” a phrase senators have been deploying to describe their host of policies aimed at energizing nightlife and socialization.
His other comments in the same scrum seemed to showcase his divination skills.
Earlier in the week, Sen. Jason Lewis appeared to have the votes on paper to eliminate a voter-approved tax cap law that in 2022 forced Beacon Hill to return nearly $3 billion to taxpayers. The Lewis proposal would have effectively mooted a question on the November ballot that seeks to reshape the rebate system.
CommonWealth asked Mariano if that was something he’d like to do, too.
“Of course I’d love to be able to do that,” Mariano said of axing Chapter 62F.
Top legislative Democrats have made no secret over the years of their disdain for the law and its potential to upend government spending plans. Describing the massive rebates Beacon Hill owed four years ago, Mariano said, “We got hit with an unexpected bill in a very difficult financial time.”
But because the topic is a live political issue this fall, with a question further tweaking the tax cap already locked on the ballot, Mariano said he is not sure whether the House would embrace a repeal, especially with lawmakers facing reelection on the same November ballot.
“It’s controversial for voters, so that’s why I want to talk to the membership,” he said. “Folks who have races are going to be questioned directly about their position on this.”
As it turned out, Lewis and his allies in the Senate decided that going all-out to repeal the law wasn’t the right move after all, likely after considering the same electoral factors that the often blunt-talking Speaker showed no hesitation to float publicly.
By the time Lewis stood up Thursday evening to speak in favor of his amendment, he’d redrafted it into something else: Instead of spiking the tax rebate law altogether, the measure would raise the bar for when the revenue cap gets hit and triggers payments back to taxpayers.
Lewis said in a speech from the Senate floor his updated proposal “would have no bearing” on the ballot question — a contrast from his interview with CommonWealth on Tuesday, in which he said repealing Chapter 62F would render the ballot measure ineffectual even if it passes.
“This test would sit alongside existing language or any future changes to Chapter 62F that may or may not be made by the voters later this year or by future legislators,” he said Thursday of the new threshold limiting when rebates would be paid.
What is a Gateway City? Beacon Hill just got closer to figuring it out
Sen. Bill Driscoll, a Milton Democrat who has been railing against what he sees as the state’s dysfunctional process for designating communities as Gateway Cities, finally saw progress as his colleagues adopted a measure he’s been pushing to reform the system.
The term “Gateway City” was first coined in 2007 and originally described just 11 cities outside of Greater Boston that were, and still are, struggling regional economic centers. The list was later expanded through legislation to include 26 cities that are eligible for certain state funding opportunities.
These cities have a population greater than 35,000 but less than 250,000, a median household income below the statewide average, and a rate of educational attainment of a bachelor’s degree or higher that is below the state average – or at least 23 of them do.
Salem, Quincy, and Methuen no longer meet all three criteria, yet they continue to receive funding and grants reserved for Gateway Cities, mainly because Beacon Hill hasn’t made changes to the list of qualifying cities since 2013. Since then, oversight of the designations seems to have been lost because the vague state statute defining Gateway Cities does not charge an office or agency with regularly reviewing the designations based on annual census data.
But now, that could all change with Driscoll’s amendment – tacked onto the economic development bill – which tasks the Executive Office of Economic Development with determining which communities meet the criteria every three years.
A community may also petition the executive office to be deemed a Gateway City, which could work out well for the three cities that no longer meet the three criteria, especially given that two of the four most powerful people in state government have ties to the cities. (Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll served for 17 years as the mayor of Salem, and House Speaker Ron Mariano represents Quincy.)
In the past, Driscoll has relentlessly made attempts to alter the statute through standalone legislation and spending bill amendments, though none have been successful. In 2025, he unsuccessfully attempted to change the Gateway Cities criteria altogether to include Randolph, a town he represents that has long hovered near the threshold of the state’s three criteria.
This time around, Driscoll’s amendment also establishes a definition of “similarly situated communities” – a parallel set of gateway-like municipalities that have, on some occasions, been considered for select Gateway City grant programs. The designation was first created through the 2018 economic development bond bill and is comprised of seven cities and towns – Agawam, Framingham, Gardner, Gloucester, Greenfield, Randolph, and West Springfield – that meet some, but not all of the Gateway Cities criteria, though there is no established guidance, criteria, or regulations for the designation.
Driscoll has long argued that more cities and towns should be added to this list. The amendment defines similarly situated communities as cities or towns that have either a median household income below the state’s average or a rate of educational attainment of a bachelor’s degree or higher that is below the state’s average.
The amendment was adopted by the Senate on Thursday and is now a live issue for the House-Senate conference committee that will negotiate a final version of the economic development bill.
Playing both sides on AI
The state Senate seems to want to have it both ways on artificial intelligence. The economic development bill it passed on Thursday includes language that would impose strict regulations on the emerging technology, but it also would send a rush of cash into the sector as part of the state effort to juice Massachusetts’s standing in the fast-growing AI world.
During floor debate on the bill Wednesday, state Sen. Barry Finegold, the Senate’s economic development chair, noted that an OpenAI model went rogue and hacked into another AI company the day before. These programs are transformative, Finegold said, but “come with serious risks.”
“Our challenge is simple: we want Massachusetts to be the best place to innovate while ensuring that AI is deployed ethically and responsibly,” he said. He described the Senate’s plan as “sensible guardrails” with transparency frameworks to “ensure that catastrophic risk never happens.”
Senators passed a bill on Thursday night that would require large AI companies to publish risk-mitigation safety frameworks and allow the state’s attorney general to sue them for violations. The Senate plan would also create a commission to study requiring the companies to hire third-party auditors.
House leaders decided not to include AI regulation in their chamber’s version of the bill, passed on July 8.
But both versions include $75 million for AI development and application and $100 million for a grant program to support innovation in defense-related technologies, including artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, and robotics and autonomous systems. The House also proposed $250,000 for Northern Essex Community College to establish an artificial intelligence workforce navigator and apprenticeship innovation pilot program.
The Senate’s proposal sparked dueling responses from artificial intelligence giants Anthropic and OpenAI. OpenAI would prefer to see consistent national AI regulations, but would settle for states passing similar frameworks. Anthropic is pushing for Massachusetts to go even further than California and implement stricter state standards, in line with its self-branding as a safety-conscious AI company.
