Other Endorsed Bills (2025-2026)

With thousands of bills filed each legislative session, and only so many hours in the day, we can’t include every bill we care about on our Legislative Agenda. We wanted to highlight these as additional bills we’re supporting this session, even if not on our priority agenda.

Our Shared Prosperity Agenda

$20 Minimum Wage (HD.3850 / SD.382

  • Title: An Act relative to the minimum wage
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Carmine Gentile & Dan Donahue; Sen. Jason Lewis
  • Title: Raises the minimum wage to $20 per hour over four years and indexes it to inflation to better align the minimum age with a living wage

State House Unionization (HD.2970 / SD.919)

  • Title: An Act relative to collective bargaining rights for legislative employees
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Carol Doherty; Sen. John Keenan
  • What It Does: Extends collective bargaining rights to State House staff

PILOT Reform (HD.3727 / SD.2153)

  • Title:  An Act relative to payments in lieu of taxation by organizations exempt from the property tax
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does: Enables cities and towns with nonprofits owning total property valued at or above $15 million to require them to make payments in lieu of taxes (PILOT) equal to 25% what they would have owed without the exemption

Corporate Tax Disclosure (HD.3385 / SD.2291

  • Title:  An Act requiring public disclosures by publicly-traded corporate taxpayers
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Dan Donahue; Sen. Liz Miranda 
  • What It Does: Makes publicly accessible reports that are already filed annually by publicly-traded corporations, detailing their sales, profits, taxable income, and taxes paid

Public Bank (HD.2541 / SD.1213)

  • Title: An Act to establish a Massachusetts public bank
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Mike Connolly & Antonio Cabral; Sen. Jamie Eldridge
  • What It Does: Creates a public bank that would be able to offer lower-interest loans to local governments, small-and medium-sized businesses, and farmers

Access to Counsel (SD.1771 / HD.3912

  • Title: An Act promoting access to counsel and housing stability in Massachusetts
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Dave Rogers & Mike Day; Sen. Sal DiDomenico
  • What It Does: Provides legal representation for low-income tenants and owner-occupants in eviction proceedings 

AHEAD Bill (HD.2997 / SD.846

  • Title: An Act providing for climate change adaptation infrastructure and affordable housing investments in the commonwealth
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Sam Montaño; Sen. Jamie Eldridge
  • What It Does: Increases the deeds excise tax on home sales to provide a funding stream for affordable housing and climate resilience 

Ending Broker’s Fees (HD.238 / SD.35

  • Title: An Act eliminating forced broker’s fees 
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Tram Nguyen; Sen. Lydia Edwards
  • What It Does: Bans the ability for landlords to require renters to pay broker’s fees 

An Act to Lift Kids Out of Deep Poverty (HD.1353 / SD.1818)

  • Title: An Act to Lift Kids Out of Deep Poverty
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Marjorie Decker; Sen. Sal DiDomenico 
  • What It Does: Raises cash assistance grants by 20% per year until they reach 50% of the federal poverty level and then increase grants each year to keep up with inflation

Community Schools (HD.1108 / SD.2060)

  • Title: An Act to establish a community schools special legislative commission
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Chynah Tyler; Sen. Paul Mark 
  • What It Does: Establishes a commission to study the community schools model, which is characterized by increased service provision, parent engagement, and community partnerships 

Adjunct Bill of Rights (HD.1827SD.2009

  • Title: An Act promoting an Adjunct Bill of Rights 
  • Lead Sponsors: Sen. Paul Mark; Reps. Pat Duffy & Sean Garballey 
  • What It Does: Makes adjunct faculty who teach half-time or more at one or more public institutions of higher education eligible for a state pension and health insurance

Fair Wages for Faculty & Staff (HD.4041 / SD.1511)

  • Title:  An Act to provide fair wages to employees of public institutions of higher education
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Andy Vargas; Sen. Pavel Payano 
  • What It Does: Ensures that future wages of public higher education employees are at or above the national average when adjusted for cost of living

Green & Healthy Campuses (HD.3796 / SD.2107

  • Title: An Act to provide green and healthy public colleges and universities and address their deferred maintenance needs
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Manny Cruz & Rep. Aaron Saunders; Sen. Jake Oliveira
  • What It Does: Creates a commission relative to energy and environmental improvements on public higher education campuses and a fund to support the commission’s recommendations

Full-Spectrum Pregnancy Care (HD.1456 / SD.1199

  • Title: An Act Ensuring Access to Full Spectrum Pregnancy Care
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Lindsay Sabadosa; Sen. Cindy Friedman 
  • Description: Requires health insurance plans to cover all pregnancy care—including abortion, prenatal care, childbirth, and postpartum care—without any kind of cost-sharing

Community Immunity Act (SD.2117)

  • Title: An Act promoting community immunity
  • Lead Sponsors: Sen. Becca Rausch
  • Description: Creates statewide consistent immunization policy and provides residents throughout the Commonwealth the data necessary to prevent future outbreaks of vaccine-preventable infectious disease

Our Racial and Social Justice Agenda

Dignity Not Deportations (HD.3596 / SD.1107

  • Title: An Act relative to immigration detention and collaboration agreements
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Christine Barber & Dave Rogers; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does: Bans collaboration agreements between state/local law enforcement and ICE and bans ICE detention beds in Massachusetts 

Juvenile Diversion (HD.3434 / SD.246

  • Title: An Act promoting diversion of juveniles to community supervision and service
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Brandy Fluker-Reid; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • Description: Helps keep youth out of the prison system by allowing for community supervision or community service as a non-incarceration alternative in more cases 

Ending Life without Parole (HD.348 / SD.1006)

  • Title: An Act to reduce mass incarceration
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Chris Worrell; Sen. Liz Miranda
  • What It Does: Repeals mandatory sentences of life without parole, which have strong racial biases and have been deemed human rights violations by international courts

Overdose Prevention Centers (HD.4212 / SD.2483)

  • Title: An Act relative to preventing overdose deaths and increasing access to treatment
  • Lead Sponsors: Sen. Julian Cyr; Reps. Marjorie Decker & John Lawn
  • What It Does: Creates a ten-year pilot programs for overdose prevention centers that use harm reduction strategies to address the opioid crisis

Regulating Facial Surveillance (HD.794 / SD.503)

  • Title: An Act to implement the recommendations of the special commission on facial recognition technology
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Orlando Ramos; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • Description: Implements the recommendations of the commission created by the 2020 police reform bill to create a tight regulatory framework for facial surveillance

Healthy Youth Act (HD.947; SD.1777)

  • Title: An Act relative to healthy youth
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Jim O’Day & Vanna Howard; Sen. Sal DiDomenico
  • What It Does: Requires school districts that provide sex education to ensure that it is comprehensive, age-appropriate, and LGBTQ-inclusive, with an emphasis on consent

Language Access Bill (HD.3876  / SD.1757)

  • Title: An Act relative to language access and inclusion
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Adrian Madaro & Carlos González; Sen. Sal DiDomenico
  • What It Does: Builds the capacity of key public-facing state agencies to meet the language access needs of an increasingly diverse population 

Our Good Government & Strong Democracy  Agenda

Hybrid Meeting Access (HD.368

  • Title: An Act to modernize participation in public meetings
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Antonio Cabral 
  • What It Does: Requires that all public bodies have options for hybrid participation and creates a trust fund and competitive grants to help municipalities with the technology needed to do so

Voting Rights Restoration (HD.407 & HD.408 / SD.1414 & SD.1416

  • Title: An Act relative to voting rights restoration &  Proposal for a legislative amendment to the Constitution relative to voting rights
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven; Sen. Liz Miranda
  • What It Does: Ends remaining incarceration-based disenfranchisement in Massachusetts

Local Option RCV (SD.2194)

  • Title: An Act providing a local option for ranked choice voting in municipal elections
  • Lead Sponsors: Sen. Becca Rausch
  • Description: Enables cities and towns in Massachusetts to adopt ranked choice voting for municipal elections

Ending Foreign Corporate Influence of Local Elections (HD.984  / SD.1152)

  • Title: An Act to Limit Political Spending by Foreign-Influenced Corporations
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven; Sen. Mark Montigny
  • What It Does: Requires corporations seeking to make independent expenditures to attest, under penalty of perjury, that they are not a foreign-influenced corporation and labels them as such if they do not 

Our Sustainable Infrastructure & Environmental Protection Agenda

Zero-Carbon Renovation Fund (HD.3171 / SD.1325)

  • Title: An Act establishing a zero carbon renovation fund
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Andy Vargas & Manny Cruz; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does: Creates a fund for green and healthy home retrofits, with a prioritization of affordable housing, low-to-moderate-income homes, gateway cities, and environmental justice communities

No Ratepayer Money for Utility Lobbying (HD.1833/SD.742)

  • Title: An Act prohibiting the use of ratepayer funds for utility lobbying, promotions or perks
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Steve Owens & Jenny Armini; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • What It Does: Prohibits utility companies from using customer money for lobbying, promotions, and perks 

Air Quality Bill (HD.1924 / SD.1086)

  • Title:  An Act to ensure cleaner air for communities overburdened by outdoor air pollution
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Christine Barber & Mike Connolly; Sen. Pat Jehlen
  • Description: Improves indoor and outdoor air quality, especially for Environmental Justice populations and those communities burdened by air emissions from highways, ports, airports, and congested roadways by expanding outdoor air monitoring for key pollutants, setting ambitious targets for 2030 and 2035, requiring better ventilation systems in medium and large buildings, among other measures

Plastics Reduction Act (HD.2592 / SD.2134

  • Title: An Act to reduce plastics
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Ted Philips; Sen. Becca Rausch
  • What It Does: Reduces single-use plastics in the Commonwealth, including a uniform plastic bag ban, disposable food service ware limits, and the creation of fund to support transitions to environmentally friendly products

Our 2025-2026 Legislative Agenda

Our Shared Prosperity Agenda

Large corporations need to pay their fair share so that we can protect essential services and continue to invest in our Commonwealth. 

Corporate Fair Share (HD.3390 / SD.1684)

  • Title: An Act combating offshore tax avoidance 
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Carlos González; Sens. Jason Lewis & Liz Miranda 
  • What It Does: Makes large global mega-corporations pay the state’s existing corporate tax rate on a higher share of the excess profits they conceal in offshore tax havens 

All students deserve well-resourced, supportive schools that set them up for success

Thrive Act (HD.4328 / SD.1401)

  • Title: An Act empowering students and schools to thrive 
  • Lead Sponsor: Rep. Sam Montaño; Sen. Adam Gomez 
  • What It Does: Ends state takeovers of public schools/districts, establishes a commission to shape the future of student assessments, and curbs the privatization of public education 

Funding Our Public Schools (HD.2334 / SD.1719

  • Title: An Act to fix the Chapter 70 inflation adjustment 
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Orlando Ramos; Sen. Robyn Kennedy 
  • What It Does: Makes a technical fix to the state education funding formula so that state funding to public school districts keeps pace with inflation over time

Debt-Free Public Higher Ed (HD.1473 / SD.300

  • Title:  An Act relative to debt-free public higher education
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Natalie Higgins & Carmine Gentile; Sen. Jamie Eldridge
  • What It Does: Creates a higher education system where every Massachusetts resident has a right to attend any public college or university free of tuition and fees 

We need to empower our cities and towns to take action to address our housing crisis. 

Real Estate Transfer Fee (HD.1112 / SD.1216)

  • Title: An Act granting a local option for a real estate transfer fee to fund affordable housing
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Mike Connolly & Rep. Carmine Gentile; Sen. Jo Comerford
  • What It Does: Enables cities and towns to levy a modest fee on high-end residential and commercial real estate transactions to create dedicated funding for affordable housing 

Rent Stabilization (HD.2501 / SD.1084)

  • Title: An Act enabling cities and towns to stabilize rents and protect tenants 
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Dave Rogers & Sam Montaño; Sen. Pat Jehlen
  • What It Does: Enables cities and towns to pass rent stabilization ordinances to fight displacement

Tenant Opportunity to Purchase  (HD.1925 / SD.1068)

  • Title: An Act to guarantee a tenant’s first right of refusal
  • Lead Sponsors:  Reps. Jay Livingstone & Rob Consalvo; Sen. Pat Jehlen
  • What It Does: Enables cities and towns to give tenants the right of first refusal to purchase a building when the owner puts it up for sale 

We are all healthier when we all have access to high-quality care without cost burden. 

Medicare for All (HD.1228SD.2341)

  • Title:  An Act establishing medicare for all in Massachusetts
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Lindsay Sabadosa & Margaret Scarsdale; Sen. Jamie Eldridge
  • What It Does: Establishes a single payer system, in which the state provides health care to all residents as a right

Our Racial and Social Justice Agenda

A fair, humane criminal legal system is one that allows for second chances and focuses on investing in economic opportunity, not in incarceration. 

Raise the Age (HD.3632 / SD.2115)

  • Title: An Act to promote public safety and better outcomes for young adults
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Jim O’Day & Manny Cruz; Sen. Brendan Crighton
  • What It Does: End the automatic prosecution of older adolescents as adults by gradually shifting 18- to 20-year-olds into the juvenile justice system

Clean Slate (HD.1788 / SD.949)

  • Title: An Act requiring clean slate automated record sealing
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Mary Keefe; Sen. Cindy Friedman
  • What It Does: Creates an automated system in Massachusetts to seal criminal records as soon as people are eligible

Prison Moratorium (HD.523 / SD.671

  • Title: An Act establishing a jail and prison construction moratorium
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Chynah Tyler; Sen. Jo Comerford
  • What It Does: Enacts a five-year pause on new prison and jail construction in order to provide time to develop more effective, community-based approaches to public safety

The family separation of deportation and incarceration weakens our communities. Families belong together. 

Safe Communities Act (HD.3816 / SD.1670)

  • Title: An Act to protect the civil rights and safety of all Massachusetts residents
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Manny Cruz & Priscila Sousa; Sens. Jamie Eldridge & Liz Miranda
  • What It Does: Limits local and state police collaboration with federal immigration agents, bars law enforcement and court personnel from inquiring about immigration status, protects access to justice in our courts, and ensures due process protections

Immigrant Legal Defense Act (HD.4072 / SD.2057)

  • Title: An Act ensuring access to equitable representation in immigration proceedings
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Dave Rogers & Frank Moran; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does:  Creates a funded program for legal defense of immigrants facing deportation proceedings, especially those in federal detention

Visitation Bill (HD.3241 / SD.985)

  • Title: An Act to build restorative family and community connection
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Marjorie Decker; Sen. Liz Miranda
  • What It Does: Eliminates arbitrary, unnecessary restrictions on visitation rights in prisons and jails

Privacy rights are essential to protect abortion patients and providers, trans people and their families, journalists, and more from attack by bad actors. 

Location Shield Act (HD.2965 / SD.501

  • Title:  An Act to protect safety and privacy by stopping the sale of location data
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Kate Lipper-Garabedian; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • What It Does: Prohibits companies from selling cell phone location data

An inclusive society is one where we celebrate our diversity, not seek to ban books or whitewash history. 

Right to Learn Bill (HD.625 / SD.141) 

  • Title: An Act regarding free expression 
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. John Moran & Rep. Adam Scanlon; Sen. Julian Cyr
  • What It Does: Ensures that public and school libraries can offer diverse and inclusive books, media, and materials without political interference

CARE Bill (HD.2271 / SD.1289)

  • Title:  An Act to promote comprehensive and inclusive curriculum in schools
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Tram Nguyen & Rep. Steve Ultrino; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does: Sets standards of accuracy and comprehensiveness in public school instruction for all students to learn about the histories, experiences, perspectives, heritages, and cultures of all Americans

Our Sustainable Infrastructure & Environmental Protection Agenda

We need to leave fossil fuels in the ground and ensure that the major polluters who have caused the climate crisis pay for the cost of climate action. 

Put Gas in the Past (HD.3428 / SD.2088)

  • Title: An Act preventing gas expansion to protect climate, community health and safety
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Bud Williams & Adrianne Ramos; Sen. Adam Gomez
  • What It Does: Prevents the expansion of gas infrastructure near Environmental Justice communities and requires gas companies and the Commonwealth to undergo planning for a just transition to green energy 

Make Polluters Pay (HD.3369 / SD.1674)

  • Title: An Act establishing a climate change superfund 
  • Lead Sponsors: Reps. Steve Owens & Jack Lewis; Sen. Jamie Eldridge 
  • What It Does: Requires major polluters to pay a fee based on historic emissions to pay for the costs of climate resilience

Our Good Government & Strong Democracy Agenda

Our democracy is strongest when everyone can participate, whether in elections or the legislative process. 

Same Day Registration (HD.856 / SD.667

  • Title: An Act establishing same day registration of voters
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Carmine Gentile; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • What It Does: Enables eligible citizens to register to vote at the polls, eliminating the arbitrary  10-day voter registration window

Decoupling the Municipal Census from the Voter Rolls (HD.2673 / SD.636

  • Title: An Act decoupling the municipal census from voter registration
  • Lead Sponsors: Rep. Shirley Arriaga; Sen. Cindy Creem
  • What It Does: Ends the use of the municipal census to remove voters from the active voter lists 

Sunlight Act (SD.467

  • Title: An Act to provide sunlight to state government
  • Lead Sponsor: Sen. Jamie Eldridge
  • What It Does: Promotes transparency in state government by removing the Governor’s exemption from public records law, requiring committee votes and legislative testimony to be public, and requiring 2 weeks notice for legislative hearings 

30 Advocacy Organizations Call on Beacon Hill to Adopt Suite of Transparency Reforms

Wednesday January 22, 2025

Speaker Ron Mariano

24 Beacon St.

Room 356

Boston, MA, 02133

Senate President Karen Spilka

24 Beacon St.

Room 332

Boston, MA, 02133

Speaker Ron Mariano and President Karen Spilka,

The citizens of Massachusetts have made it clear: we expect our legislature to be transparent, democratic, and accountable to its constituents. 

We write to you as advocates and concerned citizens who have a vested interest in such a legislature. Building on a rich democratic history that pre-dates our federal democracy, Massachusetts ought to be a leader in just democratic rule and civic action. Instead, national rankings in recent years place us towards the bottom with regards to public ease of access to information, competitive elections, and financial transparency.  

Massachusetts distinguishes itself by being the only state in the entire country in which all three branches of government hold themselves exempt from public records law. This means that for most citizens of the Commonwealth, their municipal governments and town meetings are held to a higher standard of transparency and accountability than their state representatives and elected officials.

Calls for transparency and accountability in recent years have also been paired with demands for a democratization of power structures within the General Court. Testimony from former representatives confirms that meaningful debate– even outside of the public eye– is increasingly rare and openly breaking ranks is punished. The vast majority of Democratic representatives vote with leadership 100% of the time. These realities run counter to key democratic principles, which hold that open and robust processes of lawmaking, including disagreement, are essential to produce the best outcomes and ensure proper representation. 

Concentrating the meaningful work of lawmaking in fewer and fewer powerful hands benefits paid lobbyists and corporate interests at the expense of grassroots advocates and everyday citizens. It also creates bottlenecks– a fact that was made all the more evident in this most recent legislative session. The first year of the 193rd session saw a record low number of votes or bills passed. At the July 31st deadline, advocates and rank-and-file electeds alike were left blindsided by the failure of nine major bills that had taken months to construct because negotiations stalled in closed-door committees, away from the eye of the public and fellow electeds. 

While the legislature made commendable progress on these bills in informal sessions, it was at the cost of representative democracy. Informal sessions are poorly attended and most lawmaking was in closed-door conference committees. The overwhelming majority of outstanding legislation since July then passed without a recorded vote. 

Regardless of the ultimate passage of versions of these bills, the fact remains that the processes by which they were passed exemplify the legislature’s existing problems with transparency, accountability, and democracy. The public’s demands for reform continue not in spite of but in no small part because of the events of the most recent session. 

In the wake of the recent national election, we need Democratic officeholders to focus on rebuilding public trust in government and the ability of government to deliver for people. Essential to rebuilding that trust is a robust and open process where people feel that they can participate and that if they participate, they will be listened to.

We were encouraged to hear in both of your opening remarks last week that you are considering transparency reforms as a serious priority in revising the legislature’s rules. Although rules changes alone will not suffice to truly correct the power dynamics and climate at the State House, they are a tool by which the legislature could be made immediately more transparent. To make a meaningful difference, such rules changes must increase transparency of multiple phases of the legislative process. Piecemeal changes that do little to tackle the deep underlying problems will not sufficiently respond to the public need for reform. 

As advocates, we have clocked years of experience helping fellow citizens navigate the legislative process, participating in discussions about process reform, and generating ideas about what it would take to make it the democratic, accountable, and transparent legislature it ought to be. Building upon this experience, we offer the following list of rules reforms to serve as a benchmark for meaningful change. 

These changes would improve public access to information, increase opportunities for public engagement in the legislative process, create a more robust and open committee process, provide legislators with more time to read bills and amendments, and share power. Taken together, they constitute necessary steps along the path towards the very legislature which the people of Massachusetts have clearly demanded.

While you discuss and adopt changes to the legislative process, we also stress the importance of not adopting any that would, in fact, take us backwards in terms of transparency and public participation. Any normalization of last session’s practice of extending conference committees past July 31st in the second year of session would further limit the ability of rank-and-file legislators and constituents to make their voices heard in the legislative process and is unacceptable. 

Improving Public Access to Information 

  1. Make committee votes public: all votes taken in House, Senate, and joint committees, including electronic polls, should be made publicly available on the Legislature’s website on the page of the relevant bill.
    1. This helps everyday people better understand the mechanics of the legislative process, as a bill moves forward from filing to passage. 
    2. Non-binding ballot questions on this issue have passed in 36 House districts over the years with an average of 87% of voters in support.
    3. A majority of US state legislatures already publish such votes, including states like California, Connecticut, Maine, and New Jersey.
    4. The technology to do this already exists, as Senate Committees post such votes. 
    5. A committee vote should include a list of those who vote in the affirmative, those who vote in the negative, those who opt to reserve their rights, and those not voting. 
  1. Make testimony submitted to committees public: all testimony submitted to committees should be made public, with appropriate redactions for sensitive information
    1. Seeing the arguments being put forth both for and against any piece of legislation provide a clearer picture of why a bill is or is not advancing and what is at stake. It increases the ability of everyday people to participate and empowers rank-and-file legislators to understand what is happening outside of their given committees. 
    2. This is already standard practice in such states as Alaska, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Ohio, Oregon, and Wisconsin. 
    3. The technology to do this already exists, as the House did so during the police reform debate in 2020. 

Increasing Opportunities for Public Engagement in the Legislative Process

  1. Provide adequate notice of hearing schedules
    1. Several committees have played a leadership role in improving public access to hearings by establishing a clear hearing schedule, with dates and topics designated. All committees should adopt this practice and should post such a schedule by April 1st of the first year of the legislative session. 
    2. House, Senate, and Joint committees should be required to announce the full details of said committee hearings, replete with brief summaries of the bills being heard, with at least two weeks’ notice.  
    3. This would improve the accessibility of committee hearings to working people, so that it is truly possible for all citizens to participate in the legislative process and offer testimony. 
    4. The recent advances in hybrid hearings have been an important and much-appreciated tool to expand participation, but many people are unable to change their work schedules on just a few days of notice. 

2. Limit the number of bills per hearing. 

  1. Public hearings are a critical opportunity for everyday people to make their voices heard in the legislative process; however, when too many bills are heard at the same time, hearings can get inordinately long, making a 3-minute testimony into a full-day affair. 
  2. All testifiers should be able to make their voice heard, and the best way to ensure this is to limit the number of bills per hearing to a reasonable number. The current 50-bill limit in Joint Rule 1D is too high. A limit of 20 bills per hearing would be more reasonable and provide greater focus. 

3. Provide speaking order for hearings to testifiers

  1. This is common practice in some, but not all, hearings. When people are traveling from across the Commonwealth and losing or adjusting wages at hourly jobs to testify in person because of the importance of an issue for them, they should be able to have an approximate understanding of when in a multi-hour hearing they might speak. 

4. Guarantee of the Ability of Incarcerated Individuals to Testify at Hearings

  1. Hybrid hearings have allowed for expanded accessibility of hearings in myriad ways, including enabling incarcerated individuals to testify at hearings. This began in the summer of 2023 when women from MCI-Framingham were able to testify on the prison moratorium bill.
  2. When legislators craft policy, they need to hear from those most impacted by such policy decisions, and the inclusion of incarcerated individuals’ voices is vital, especially around prison conditions and the criminal legal system.
  3. The Legislature must ensure that this right to testify is preserved and that there is no limit on the number of incarcerated individuals from any facility who are able to testify at a given hearing, the same right afforded to the general public.

Creating a More Open, Robust, and Timely Committee Process

1. Require public committee markup sessions. 

  1. The public is not able to see how and why a bill changes from its filing to its report out of committee. To empower all members of a committee to affect legislation and to build public trust in the decision-making process, committees should hold public markup sessions as they used to decades ago. Votes to report legislation favorably, report legislation adversely, or send legislation to study should occur only in such sessions. 

2. Publish committee reports with summaries, rationales, and other information. 

  1. Committee staff are already doing impressive work compiling information on a bill, so that information should be made available to all legislators and the public. It helps rank-and-file legislators better understand what is happening in other committees and the public to better understand legislators’ rationale behind bills and to understand what those bills would do and how they might benefit. 
  2. Bills reported out of an “issue area” committee should be accompanied by substantive reports with a) a summary of the bill; b) a summary of the arguments advanced pro/con at the bill hearing and in written testimony submitted; c) a list of organizations and individuals that testified pro/con on the bill; d) a list of organizations and individuals that met or otherwise communicated with the Committee Leadership. And when a bill gets reported out of a committee like Ways & Means or Third Reading, those reports should also include an explanation of any changes made to the bill.
  3. A gold standard of such reports is the California state legislature. Other legislatures that make public the summaries of bills in committee reports include Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Oregon.

3. Start hearings early and move up the reporting deadline. 

  1. In our neighboring states in New England, committees are already scheduling or hosting hearings. As the urgency of action rises due to the incoming Trump administration, Massachusetts must be able to act quickly and flexibly to respond to threats. This requires an expedited hearing timeline, with hearings not delayed until the summer, fall, and winter, but occurring on a robust timeline starting March 1st in parallel to the budget process, not after. 
  2. The reporting deadline for committees (Joint Rule 10 deadline) should also be moved up, from its current date in February of next year to December 19 of this year, matching the last date of possible formal sessions for the calendar year. By reporting bills out earlier, the Legislature would more clearly set the agenda for the second year of work and guard against future bottlenecks. 

4. Expedite process for bills reported out favorably in the prior session

  1. Committees put significant work into bills that get reported out, with conversations with advocates, experts, and the public, but if those bills do not get passed, then they start right back at square one in the next session. This slows down the legislative process and requires significant duplicative work. 
  2. Refiled bills that were reported out last session should have hearings by July 31 of the first year of the session. 

5. Require Conference Committees to meet in open session. 

  1. Conference Committees should be meeting in the open, providing an opportunity for the House and Senate members to lay out the clear rationale for their respective chamber’s preferences on a given bill. 
  2. This openness benefits both rank-and-file legislators and the public, who are left in the dark for months as Conference Committees can sometimes last up to a year. 

Provide More Time to Read Legislation 

  1. Provide at least 72 hours to read bills. 
    1. When the legislative process gets rushed, the odds of drafting errors rises, even under the best of intentions. 
    2. With ample time before receiving a bill and floor debate, legislators, experts, advocates, and engaged community members then have the opportunity to more thoroughly evaluate a bill, and legislators will better understand what they are actually voting on.
  2. Provide at least 30 minutes to read floor amendments. 
    1. During floor debates, amendments are routinely redrafted or consolidated/bundled. Legislators should be granted the courtesy of at least a half hour to read the text of what is being brought to the floor. 

Adopting these reforms in the upcoming rules debate will be an important step forward in creating a more open and transparent legislative process. However it is not the end. We also urge you to comply with the audit requested by State Auditor Diana DiZoglio. The State Auditor’s power to audit the legislature was confirmed by 72% of voters and the majority of voters in every city and town in Massachusetts. Improving public confidence in the Legislative process must entail respecting the clear will of the voters. 

We look forward to working together towards our shared commitment to a legislature that is transparent, accountable, and democratic.

Sincerely,

350 Mass / Better Future Project 

Act on Mass 

American Federation of Teachers – MA 

Asian American Resource Workshop 

Berkshire Environmental Action Team 

Boston Catholic Climate Movement 

Climate Action Now, Western MA 

Climate Code Blue

Fairmount Indigo CDC Collaborative

Franklin County Continuing the Political Revolution Climate Task Force 

Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility 

Families for Justice as Healing

Food & Water Watch

Homes for All Massachusetts 

Massachusetts Climate Action Network 

Massachusetts Peace Action 

Massachusetts Sierra Club 

Mass-Care: the Massachusetts Campaign for Single Payer Health Care

Our Climate 

Our Revolution Massachusetts 

Pipe Line Awareness Network for the Northeast, Inc.

Progressive Democrats of Massachusetts

Progressive Massachusetts 

Reclaim Roxbury 

RESTORE: The North Woods

Save Massachusetts Forests 

Springfield No One Leaves 

Third Act MA 

Trees as a Public Good Network 

UU Mass Action

Statement from Progressive Massachusetts on Governor Healey’s Proposed Restrictions on Emergency Shelter

Fearful of what will happen on the federal level over the next four years, the residents of the Commonwealth are looking for state leadership. Unfortunately, Governor Maura Healey is using this moment to sound Trumpian in her approach to emergency shelter. Her proposed restrictions on shelter, especially a ban on undocumented residents from access, are straight out of the playbook of the soon-to-be-president and the right-wing Republicans in Congress. 

Beacon Hill rejected some of the most extreme limits on emergency shelter last year when Republicans in the House and Senate pushed for them last year. We urge them to do so again. 

The emergency shelter crisis is a result of our housing crisis. New affordable apartments will not magically appear after six months, as long as we face rapidly growing rents, limited housing production, insufficient state investment, and high up-front costs for new rentals. The state needs to tackle these issues and listen to experts and providers to achieve the goal of safe, affordable housing for everyone, not search for quick fixes that will only lead to higher costs elsewhere and push mothers with babies onto the streets. The people of Massachusetts expect better.

Beacon Hill 101 Video & Follow-up

Thank you to everyone who joined our Beacon Hill 101 Session! You can find the link to the video below.

You can find the slide deck for the presentation here.

There were a lot of great questions in the chat, and we compiled them and put together answers below (you can find a printable version here):

Do late-filed bills have any better or worse chance of getting passed?

  • Given that most bills face long odds, I’m tempted to say that it’s the same regardless, but a late-filed bill lacks a burst of early momentum. However, at the same time, late files may be responding to a particular hot-button issue and gain momentum that way. 

What can we do about the lack of transparency?  Ask the news media to cover this? / I imagine that the lack of transparency has been an ongoing issue – have there been efforts to change that and is there hope?

  • In 2016, when the Legislature voted to update the public records law, they created a commission to look into whether the law should reply to the Legislature and Governor. That commission dissolved because the House and Senate couldn’t agree, but the Senate released their own report, recommending several changes that they have adopted in their own rules since. 
  • Although this has been a long-standing issue, the latest wave of rules-related progressive advocacy around transparency dates to 2018, when a number of female candidates signed a pledge calling for more transparency. Several of them won their elections. That was followed by advocacy from groups like us at Progressive Mass and others in early 2019 around the rules, where we worked with progressive representatives in the House to get votes on a few rules changes. The votes were not successful, but they raised the profile of the issue. You can read about that in our 2019 archive. (Here is our response to common excuses from legislators.) 
  • Act on Mass started soon thereafter, with the founders having worked on State Rep Nika Elugardo’s campaign and having been active in that 2019 push. Act on Mass spearheaded a transparency push (“The People’s House” campaign) in 2021, as well as a transparency pledge during the 2020 election cycle.
    • See our roundup of the House debate from 2021, which was pushed to the summer when legislators freaked out about advocacy early in the session. 
    • Last session, Sen. Jamie Eldridge filed these rules reforms in a bill known as the Sunlight Act, and Sen. Becca Rausch and Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven filed other bills to open up the legislative process. 
  • In their opening remarks for the session on January 1, both Speaker Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka spoke about an intent to take up some kind of legislative process reform, with Spilka naming concrete proposals. This was likely a result of the large win for Question 1 (Audit the Legislature) and negative press about the end of the legislative session. Your legislators need to hear from you about support for pro-transparency reforms: https://www.progressivemass.com/jan2025action. Expect to hear more from us on this soon. Legislators often say that the issue doesn’t matter to their constituents, and they need to hear otherwise. 

Do you advise submitting oral testimony also in written form?

  • Yes. Not all legislators on a committee attend the hearings, so submitting written testimony increases the likelihood that all members of the committee and their staff would read it. 

Does anyone go through the hearing videos and track who testified? Can you know who submitted written testimony?

  • There are no public services that provide that of which I’m aware, although MAPLE is exploring how to track the testifiers from video. 
  • There is no public record of written testimony, in contrast to states like Alaska, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maine, Ohio, Oregon, and Wisconsin. Arizona, California, Illinois, Kansas, and West Virginia post a list of testifiers but do not link to testimony. 

What if you have a testimony that has to do with slumlords and Horrible housing conditions? 

  • If there are things that the city/town could do to enforce better conditions, I would recommend contacting local officials. On the state level, there are various pieces of legislation that could improve this. Currently, testimony is not a public record, but if it was, there would be provisions for confidentiality if you needed that to prevent retaliation. 

I’m thinking of training an AI on MGL to interpret proposed bills. I wonder if anyone else has already done this. 

  • MAPLE is working on AI summaries of proposed bills and have been error-checking the quality of the summaries produced. 

“2026?” So if someone presents a bill now nothing happens until next year?

  • The February 2026 deadline, written into the Joint Rules by Joint Rule 10, is the deadline for joint committees (with the exception of Health Care Financing, which has a later deadline of March 25) to take action on legislation. Given that nothing inspires action like a deadline, the joint committees often wait until then to decide on bills, but they can report bills out at any time before then. 

Has the organization considered sponsoring a potential constitutional amendment superseding the OML/public records exemptions for the legislature? Would PM endorse and campaign for such an amendment if someone else initiated it?

  • There has been chatter about a ballot question around public records reform, and we will keep people posted on that. 

What about when a bill is just passed by the presiding officer even with no one else in the chamber?

  • This happens when bills are passed by voice vote, where the presiding officer calls for YEAs and NAYs and then announces the result immediately (so fast that it is suspect that there were even any votes to listen to). The House and Senate can operate in this way under unanimous consent: as long as no one is present to object, they do not need to prove the presence of a quorum to conduct business. As soon as someone objects and calls into question the absence of a quorum, then Legislative Leadership needs to bring people back (although the House has tested the boundaries of that rule). 
  • There are many bills for which a voice vote makes sense: for example, a home rule petition to change a Board of Selectmen to a Select Board. But such bills should never even need a vote from the Legislature in the first place–a sign of the need for a reform of the home rule process. 

How do you find the members of a conference committee? Is it on the Legislature’s website?

  • The names will be posted on the page of the corresponding bill. See, as an example, the climate bill from last fall: https://malegislature.gov/Bills/193/S2838. You will also likely hear about it via action alerts to contact the Conference Committee / your own legislators. 

Why ‘compromise’ on something that was just passed?

  • Conference Committees are appointed to reconcile the differences between what the two chambers pass. If they pass the same exact legislation, then they do not need to appoint a Conference Committee. In larger bills, each chamber might have specific priorities, and the other chamber sometimes chooses to intentionally exclude said priorities to get bargaining power. 

Does each bill get a separate conference committee?

  • Yes, every bill that is passed in different forms in each chamber will get a conference committee. However, when the Legislature creates many conference committees at the same time, as happened last summer, the conference committees likely blur into one giant negotiation in an informal way, with provisions traded across bills. 

Spilka and Mariano have been talking about changing the calendar. Is it likely?

  • Both of them have started talking about changing the legislative timeline and making reforms to the legislative process, following from the bad press they received for blowing past the July 31 deadline as well as the demand for accountability demonstrated by the 72% public support for Question 1 (Audit the Legislature). One of the main changes proposed by Spilka was an earlier reporting deadline for bills, moving the February deadline to December. That would be a welcome change, but if the committees rely on perpetual extensions, it will not do that much. We would love to see them take steps to accelerate the hearing process, especially fast-tracking hearings for bills already reported out favorably in the last legislative session. Definitely make sure that your legislators hear from you about the need to not push all important work until July of next year (or even later). With the Trump administration coming soon, there is so much urgent work necessary to be done here in Massachusetts to protect our residents, and we should not tolerate such delays. 

If a legislator votes against my preference, is it worth it to call and complain?

  • Yes! It is always worthwhile to contact your legislators to express displeasure. They work for you and should hear from you. Constituent pressure can encourage them to vote better–or encourage them to find another job. 

Very thorough explanation of the official process and clear about the outsized power of the leaders. I’m curious about the in-between politics. Clearly reps and sen have to not step on leaders’ toes. But can you say more about the ‘back room’ or unofficial politics and processes? How are deals done? How are compromises built? How do they make effective alliances? Etc.

  • Excellent question! Some of this is simply hard to know because of the closed-door nature of the process. However, this interview with Rep. Jay Kaufman was a useful window into what happens, backed by a group of former staffers and advocates.
  • During the amendment process on a bill, most of the decisions to adopt or reject amendments are made before the amendments get to the floor, with a Leadership team (Speaker/Senate President, Ways & Means chairs, and a few others) determining which will pass and which won’t. There is frantic internal lobbying from legislators (as well as external lobbying) to try to show support behind their measures and to make their case to Leadership, but those debates rarely make it into the public view. I have heard anecdotes of legislators being told to withdraw amendments or deal with Leadership whipping votes against them. There are few close votes, but whenever any vote gets remotely close without Leadership blessing, that’s an indication of a strong whip operation against its passage behind the scenes to ensure that legislators do not vote for it. An example of this is the Election Day Registration fight in the House in 2022, where the vote was left open for a long time and Leadership allegedly called representatives to ask them to change their votes. Another behind-the-scenes example, but in the Senate, would be the fate of the real estate transfer fee local option from this past session, where I was told by several people that there was a majority support for it but a few high-ranking senators opposed it and blocked it from inclusion. 
  • Conference Committee negotiations are harder to understand. The conferees’ own opinions obviously hold outsize influence, as will the Speaker’s and Senate President’s. 
  • Ensuring that legislative sponsors organize internally to put pressure on colleagues, conferees, and Leadership, and ensuring that we, as activists, are keeping up a drumbeat of pressure on our legislators, is the best way to attempt to break through such a process. The process can be somewhat hard to follow, but it’s our job to follow every step of it to the best we can and give you the tools you need to take effective action throughout the session. 

Can the House vote on a bill during the 1st year?

  • Yes, the Legislature typically passes many more bills in the second year of the legislative session; however, nothing prevents them from passing more legislation in Year 1. Spreading work across the session would help eliminate a bottleneck effect. Indeed, they are a full-time Legislature, unlike most. 

Does the House stay in session during the whole first year?

  • For much of the year, they will be in informal session, i.e., legislators are not asked to come in person. However, the last possible date for a formal session (i.e., where legislators are asked to come in person and take votes) this calendar year is December 19. 

Let’s say you have 100 co-sponsors on a House bill and you are past February of the second year.  Can you force a vote on a bill?

  • By early February, a committee will have made a decision on whether to report out a bill, vote down a bill, or send a bill to “study” (i.e., tabling it). Having a large number of cosponsors does not mean that a bill will advance out of committee; it could still be voted down or granted an extension. 
  • The House does have discharge petitions (i.e., a majority of representatives can sign to bring a bill forward), but this tool is rarely, if ever, used. 

What are ways to influence the House Speaker and Senate president?

  • Constituents in their district have an important role to play in influencing them, so organizing in their districts is especially valuable. (This can include phone banking into their districts, canvassing constituents, organizing events, etc.) However, unless they are especially passionate about an issue, the Speaker and Senate President do not advance “controversial” issues without a strong base of support in the Democratic caucus in their respective chamber. As such, pressure on rank-and-file legislators is also important since they will be making asks during caucus meetings, during budget meetings, at other times, and we need them to be using those opportunities to push the issues we care about. 
  • Although they are not always responsive to media coverage, both Spilka and Mariano complained about negative media coverage in their opening remarks in the session, an indication that they do, in fact, pay attention to it and that it can have influence. 

Please say something about how citizen lobbyists can compete with business/paid lobbyists on bills.

  • This is a matter of numbers and intensity. There are more of us than there are of them (people over money), and this speaks to the need to continue to expand the number of people reaching out to their legislators and showing up to things to put pressure on them. Legislators like to take the “path of least bother,” and constituents have power in shaping what that is for them. 
  • To give an example from the past session, we saw the influence of a flood of real estate spending against the local option real estate transfer fee, especially in how they were able to text voters with lies about what the proposal would do. We need to be talking with, mobilizing, and organizing more people to counteract that. 

Does Progressive Mass publish the historical voting patterns of legislators? 

When are we going to talk about 99% of bills not getting passed, and that those that do are mostly from being redrafted as amendments to the budget and bonding bills?

  • There has been an unfortunate tendency in recent years to move toward fewer and larger bills, with bills only advancing as riders (or, in technical terms, “outside section”) of “must-pass” bills like a budget or a bond authorization. This reduces accountability because most of these bills will pass unanimously, but we know that many legislators opposed and/or fought individual pieces within it. 

If there are 6-7000 bills filed and most don’t get passed, why do legislators  file all these bills?

  • To put it simply, the best way to ensure a bill never passes is to never file it. More expansively, some bills are filed as discussion starters, some are filed to build momentum across several sessions, and some are filed with the hope of attaching them to a larger bill. You never know when external events will raise the profile of an issue, so having legislation ready for when that happens is critical.

How would you work with legislators who say they are “rethinking” their policy of co-sponsoring; i.e., won’t co-sponsor bills? 

  • You should still ask them to co-sponsor bills because by asking them to do so, you are raising the profile of the bill to them. That is helpful if the bill starts to move and Leadership wants to gauge where members are. And don’t let them feel content about doing less! 

Always ask for receipts — receipts for what?

  • When you ask your legislators to take an action, make sure to follow up with it to ensure follow through. That could mean a co-sponsorship of a bill, a recorded vote, a signature on a letter, or other steps. It is always good to ask to see evidence of an action since, even if there are the best of intentions, things can fall through the cracks! 

The power that leadership has — and reinforced with their access to the $$ — is a terrible system.  How could it ever change, given that they are unlikely to support anything that reduces their power/$.  Not a very good model if one was designing a democracy, one where each rep/sen has the same power….   Is there any historical precedent for challenging this terrible system?  Any hope?

  • The folks at the Committee for Reform Our Legislature and Act on Mass plan to file legislation to reform the stipend system to raise the profile of the issue; however, ultimate change would likely have to occur by ballot initiative. 

Sounds like we need to apply some serious pressure. Think our Dems feel “safe” because of all that’s going on nationally?

  • Yes, we do! We understand the urgency on the ground around so many issues, and that urgency will get so much greater under the second Trump administration. The Democrats in the MA Legislature need to understand that it is incumbent upon them to be bolder, both to protect MA residents from the worst of the Trump administration’s policies and to demonstrate how government can make a positive difference in people’s lives and build back public trust. Many of them don’t feel urgency because they are never challenged and become insular to the State House itself, and that means they need to be hearing from constituents much more. 

How do we effectively put pressure on Gov. Healey?

  • Calling/emailing the Governor’s office is important, and calls/emails will be tracked. Elected officials are always attuned to intensity levels because that influences their electoral fortunes. The higher an office is, the more important media can be, and that makes events like rallies or efforts like editorials/letters especially important to shape what the Governor views public opinion to be. You can also try to put together a group of people to demand a meeting with a specific cabinet official; they might be harder to reach, but it is still worth trying. 

Does your organization have enough money to achieve its goals? Do you grow or support alternative candidates?

  • We have only two-part time staff and are hoping to grow capacity. You can support our work here (thank you!). We strive to have a strong grassroots funding base. 
  • Our chapters have often contributed to candidate recruitment work, and I am always willing to talk with people interested in running for office. Progressive Mass is also on the board of Mass Alliance, which runs excellent candidate trainings. 

I’ve worked on bills where a legislator cosponsors it to get us off of them, then goes to leadership to have him kill the bill in the committee process, so they never have to vote on it.

  • Yes, I’ve heard of many stories like that too. That is why it’s so important to treat co-sponsorship as just the first ask to make of legislators. We need them to do more than that! 

Do we have any progressive state cheerleaders? Like Warren at the fed level. 

  • Check out our Scorecard to see the top-performing legislators, especially ones that reliably co-sponsor progressive priorities. 

Do committees take minutes? If so, are minutes available by FOIA request?

  • Unlike in municipalities, which are bound by open meeting law, neither House, nor Senate, nor Joint (i.e., House/Senate) committees are required to conduct work in person in front of the public. Beyond a hearing, a committee’s work will be behind closed doors. The Legislature is also exempt from the public records law. Legislation to change that, such as the Sunlight Act by Sen. Jamie Eldridge, is being refiled. 

Follow-up from “What’s Next?” Zoom

Happy Monday!

Thank you for joining us last Wednesday for our “What’s Next?” event! And if you weren’t able to make it, you were missed! One of our opening questions was “What gives you hope?” And for us, that answer is engaged activists like you. 

Missed the meeting? You can watch it here. 

Chapters 

We at Progressive Mass believe that activists on the ground know best how to organize their communities, but they do it best when connecting with people in communities across the state. If you were involved in a campaign (whether issue advocacy, a campaign, a ballot question) this year, a chapter can be a great way to hold your team together for the work ahead and continue the work of organizing and community-building. 

Thank you again to Krista Magnuson from JP Progressives, Marissa Dupont from Soliday Lowell, Rachel Poliner from Progressive West Roxbury/Roslindale, and Lisa Baci from Indivisible LAB from talking about the great work our chapters do. 

Legislative Advocacy 

We are currently in active discussions with our coalition partners about our legislative priorities for the next legislative session starting in January. Stay tuned.

But you don’t need to wait until January to start contacting your legislators. Email them today about why they need to come back into session to address the threat of the second Trump administration. 

Follow-ups from Our Speakers 

We want to thank our amazing speakers from Wednesday: 

  • Kate Glynn from Reproductive Equity Now 
  • Tanya Neslusan from MassEquality 
  • Jessica Tang from AFT Massachusetts. 
  • Jess Nahigian from the Massachusetts Sierra Club 
  • Kade Crockfod from ACLU Massachusetts 
  • Amy Grunder form the MIRA Coalition 

Find helpful links below: 

Reproductive Equity Now: https://reproequitynow.org/

MassEquality: https://massequality.org/

Massachusetts Sierra Club: https://www.sierraclub.org/massachusetts

ACLU Massachusetts: https://www.aclum.org/en

AFT Massachusetts: https://ma.aft.org/ 

MIRA Coalition: https://www.miracoalition.org/

Don’t hesitate to reach out with questions or ideas!

Behind Closed Doors: What’s Wrong with the MA State House

By Eileen Ryan, Progressive Watertown

On Sunday, October 27th, Progressive Watertown hosted a forum, “Behind Closed Doors: What’s Wrong with the MA State House.” The impetus for the forum was the failure of key legislation supported by Progressive Massachusetts to pass in the legislative session that ended on July 31st, 2024, despite wide-spread support and 1,000s of hours of activism by constituents across the commonwealth. Close to 50 people attended, including several Watertown past and present City Councilors. I, as a Progressive Watertown Steering Committee member, had the honor of moderating.

Jonathan Hecht, who served as state representative for Watertown and Cambridge for twelve years and Watertown town councilor for four, was our first speaker. He is a member of the leadership team of Progressive Democrats of Massachusetts and on the steering committee of the Coalition to Reform Our Legislature. Jon gave a brief history of voting rights in Massachusetts, which included some surprising facts: until the 1960s, MA had a rigorous and unfair literacy test required of voters, as well as a “pauper exclusion,” i.e., no one who received public assistance could vote. Jon noted that great progress has been made over the past 60 years to make it easier to vote and more citizens are voting and yet, less is being accomplished at the State House. Public hearings are held by committees, but follow-up committee meetings to discuss the fate of the proposed legislation never happen. There are currently about 750 bills sitting in the Ways and Means Committee that have been heard, vetted, and recommended but have not moved forward, with many of these bills multiple sessions or even decades old. Jon also discussed the stipend system of favoritism at the State House and how it disproportionately affects members of the House of Representatives. People who run for office with the best of intentions become frustrated that they are not able to do the job they were elected to do.

Danielle Allen, professor of political philosophy, public policy, and ethics at Harvard University and the Founder and President of Partners in Democracy, spoke next. Danielle addressed the need for constant democracy renovation at the state level and how it interacts with the looming signs of fascism on a national level. She was applauded when she shared that she had just resigned as a Washington Post columnist due to that paper’s refusal to endorse a presidential candidate. Danielle also highlighted that we are in a moment of intense change technologically and economically and that we are all feeling the effects of great migrations and globalization. She deplored the decline of local news and how it affects voters’ awareness and pointed out that MA is 50th in the number of choices we have in each Massachusetts election cycle due to a high bar to get your name on the ballot.

Both speakers support a Yes on Question 1, the ballot question to enable the State Auditor to audit our state legislature, and are working out other possible ways to change the legislature, including a future ballot question to address the State House’s stipend system.

The audience asked great questions and was motivated to take action. The forum was recorded and will be ready for viewing soon.

Progressive Watertown: “Stewart Udall and the Politics of Beauty”

by Susan Falkoff, Progressive Watertown

Progressive Watertown was proud to sponsor a screening of the film “Stewart Udall and the Politics of Beauty” on October 10. This film tells the inspiring story of Stewart Udall (1920-2010), Interior Secretary under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, and his legacy as an advocate of social and environmental justice.

Udall was a pioneer in environmentalism. The film reveals a time when big ideas could still capture bipartisan attention, and when America awakened to the unfolding destruction of paradise and determined to stop it. He was the first public official to speak out about global warming. In addition, he worked collaboratively with Native communities and fought to win compensation for Navajo Indians and “downwinders” who got cancer from their exposure to radiation during the Cold War without being warned of the dangers. His brother, Senator Mo Udall, was an early critic of the Vietnam War, and Stewart faced the agonizing choice of speaking out and losing his role in the Johnson administration or keeping quiet about the war and continuing his important work as Interior Secretary, an extreme of the kind of heartbreaking moral dilemma that is familiar to anyone who has served as a public official.

Thirty people attended the screening and participated in a lively discussion afterwards. Watertown Faces Climate Change and Race Reels, a local program that shows films related to diversity and social justice, cosponsored. It was a timely event, celebrating both Udall’s work with Indigenous people and why it matters to elect progressive politicians who will facilitate social justice and environmental protection. Those of us who lived through these turbulent years recalled our history of activism but know that striving for environmental justice is ongoing. We want to make the film available to younger audiences as well and will donate the DVD to Watertown High School for future showings.

100+ Climate Organizations: climate bill requirements

10/2024

To Governor Healey and the 193rd General Court of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 

RE: A Robust Climate Bill

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts has made a commitment to environmental justice and to meeting climate mandates in order to ensure a livable planet and a just transition for all. With this letter, the undersigned 108 organizations present elements that MUST be in a climate bill when it lands on Governor Healey’s desk before the end of 2024. 

The Legislature had been poised to take action until the unceremonious end to the 2023-24 formal legislative session on August 1. Despite this delay, there is still time in 2024 to call a special session and pass a climate bill that is broader than siting and permitting reform alone. While it is important to keep the climate bill negotiations alive, the climate-related provisions in the Governor’s supplemental budget bill, H.5049, filed September 11th are far too narrow to represent a reasonable response to the climate crisis in 2024. 

We call on Governor Healey, President Spilka, Speaker Mariano, Chair Barrett, and Chair Roy and the entire legislature to take this opportunity to meet critical environmental justice (EJ) goals and to equitably and rapidly transform the gas industry into one that meets the Commonwealth’s climate goals while keeping gas rates down. We cannot accept a narrow siting and permitting bill that does not do enough for climate justice, reducing climate pollution, or protecting ratepayers as the outcome of 18 months of the legislative process. Delays in climate action do nothing to benefit constituents and only serve to benefit those who profit from the climate crisis. A 2024 climate package must include, at minimum: 

  • Siting and permit approvals tied to a robust cumulative impact analysis. The definition of cumulative impact analysis in the Governor’s H.5049 is the most accurate and complete definition introduced this session and should be the one used in a final bill that includes siting and permitting reform. We applaud its inclusion.
  • Measures to end large-scale gas pipeline expansion and increase the use of non-emitting thermal networks. While the details of the transition away from gas as a heating fuel in the Commonwealth will require future work from the Healey Administration, legislators and other key stakeholders, the legislature must act immediately to ramp down the expansion of gas infrastructure and put gas companies on a path to provide clean, non-emitting renewable energy rather than fossil gas that leaks methane and air pollution into the atmosphere and into our homes and businesses, costing ratepayers significant sums of money.

These are critical components of the evolving climate bill. From a necessary expansion of the electric grid itself (crucial to bringing in the thousands of megawatts of renewable electricity we need), to ensuring that Environmental Justice populations are not overburdened, to protecting gas customers and taxpayers from the ballooning costs of maintaining an expensive, health-harming, and dangerous gas system that will soon be obsolete, our Commonwealth simply cannot afford to wait. We urge the legislature to reconvene for a formal session and demonstrate strong support for environmental justice and rapid decarbonization by passing a robust climate package.

  1. 350 Central Mass
  2. 350 Mass
  3. 350MA Berkshire node
  4. Acadia Center
  5. Alternatives for Community & Environment
  6. All In Energy
  7. Andover WECAN
  8. Arise for Social Justice
  9. Berkshire Environmental Action Team
  10. Beyond Plastics Greater Boston
  11. Boston Catholic Climate Movement 
  12. Boston Climate Action Network
  13. Boston Green Action
  14. Breathe Clean North Shore
  15. Brookhaven Residents’ Climate Change Committee
  16. Canton Residents for a Sustainable Equitable Future 
  17. Cape Ann Climate Coalition Organizing Committee
  18. Citizens Climate Lobby, South Shore & Cape chapter
  19. Citizens’ Climate Lobby, Mass. North Shore chapter
  20. Clean Water Action
  21. Climate Action Group, the Unitarian Society of Northampton and Florence
  22. Climate Action Now Western Mass
  23. Climate Code Blue
  24. Climate Reality Project Boston Metro chapter
  25. Climate Reality Project Massachusetts Southcoast 
  26. Coalition for Social Justice Education Fund 
  27. Coalition to Stop Private Jet Expansion at Hanscom or Anywhere
  28. Concord Area Humanists
  29. Concord Climate Action Network
  30. Conservation Law Foundation
  31. Elders Climate Action Massachusetts chapter
  32. Energy Allies
  33. Energy Efficient Bolton
  34. Fairmount Indigo CDC Collaborative
  35. First Parish in Bedford
  36. First Parish in Cambridge, Environmental Justice Team
  37. First Parish in Framingham Climate Action Team, Chair
  38. First Parish Unitarian Universalist of Arlington Climate Action Working Group
  39. First Parish Watertown, Green Sanctuary Committee
  40. First Unitarian Universalist Society of Newton Climate Action Task Force
  41. Food & Water Watch 
  42. Fore River Residents Against the Compressor (FRRACS)
  43. Gas Transition Allies
  44. Greater Andover Indivisible
  45. Greater Boston Physicians for Social Responsibility
  46. GreenRoots
  47. Green Energy Consumer Alliance 
  48. Green Newton
  49. HEET
  50. HEETlabs
  51. HealthLink
  52. Jewish Climate Action Network
  53. Lexington Climate Action Network (LexCAN)
  54. Local Initiative Support Corporation (LISC) Massachusetts
  55. Longmeadow Pipeline Awareness Group
  56. Mass Peace Action
  57. Massachusetts Climate Action Network (MCAN)
  58. Massachusetts Interfaith Power & Light, Inc.
  59. Melrose Unitarian Universalist Church Climate Action Team
  60. MetroWest Climate Solutions
  61. Mothers Out Front – Arlington
  62. Mothers Out Front  – East Boston
  63. Mothers Out Front – Bedford Chapter
  64. Mothers Out Front – Brookline Chapter
  65. Mothers Out Front – Cambridge Chapter
  66. Mothers Out Front – Newton
  67. Mothers Out Front – Northampton
  68. Mothers Out Front Massachusetts
  69. No Fracked Gas in Mass
  70. North American Indian Center of Boston
  71. North Parish of North Andover Climate Justice Group
  72. North Reading Green Alliance
  73. Northshore Unitarian Universalist Church, Green Sanctuary Team
  74. Our Climate
  75. Our Revolution MA, Climate Crisis Working Group
  76. Partnership for Policy Integrity
  77. Pipe Line Awareness Network for the Northeast, inc
  78. Pilgrim Watch
  79. Progressive Massachusetts
  80. Quincy Climate Action Network
  81. Renewable Renegades 
  82. Resiliency Gardens Project,  Healthy Yards, Needham- Pollinator Protectors
  83. Resist the Pipeline 
  84. Resonant Energy
  85. Salem Alliance for the Environment
  86. Sheffield Saves
  87. Sierra Club Massachusetts
  88. Slingshot
  89. Social Action Committee of First Parish Plymouth
  90. Our Revolution MA, Climate Crisis Working Group
  91. South Coast Neighbors United
  92. Springfield Climate Justice Coalition
  93. Springfield No One Leaves/Nadie Se Mude
  94. Sunwealth 
  95. Sustainable Marblehead
  96. Sustainable Middleborough
  97. Sustainable Wellesley
  98. The Enviro Show
  99. Third Act MA
  100. TownGreen
  101. Trustees Collaborative for Parks & Open Space
  102. Union of Concerned Scientists
  103. Unitarian Universalist Mass Action
  104. Unitarian Universalist Society of Greater Springfield 
  105. Voices for Climate [V4C]
  106. Vote Solar
  107. Watertown Faces Climate Change (a node of 350Mass)
  108. Worcester Congregations for Climate and Environmental Justice

THIS THURSDAY: Learn about the November Ballot Questions

Can you believe that the primary was a week ago already?

Congratulations to our endorsees who won their primaries last week!

  • Mara Dolan (Governor’s Council District 3), who will be the first public defender on the Governor’s Council and defeated a 13-term incumbent
  • Leigh Davis (3rd Berkshire), who will be a progressive housing champion in the State House
  • Tara Hong (18th Middlesex), who defeated a conservative, five-term incumbent state representative
  • Erika Uyterhoeven (27th Middlesex), who defeated her challenger by more than 2:1

We are excited for all the great work that they will do in office.

Not all of our endorsees won their races, but we admire the progressive, issue-focused, grassroots campaigns that they ran, their commitment to their communities, and their willingness to take the step of running for office. We endorsed them because we were impressed by the great work that we have done and know that there is so much inspiring work ahead of them.

The general election is now only eight weeks away. So join us in getting ready for that by attending an info session on the five ballot questions.

2024 Ballot Question Info Session

Massachusetts voters will see at least five questions on the November ballot:

  • Question #1: Auditing the State Legislature
  • Question #2: Eliminating the use of the MCAS as a high school graduation requirement
  • Question #3: Enabling Uber and Lyft drivers to unionize
  • Question #4: Legalizing psychdelics
  • Question #5: Ending subminimum wages for tipped workers

Join us on Thursday, September 12, at 7 pm, to learn more about the five questions, what they would do, and how to get involved. We will have speakers from each of the five campaigns.