PM in the News: Earmarks in the Senate Budget

Matt Stout and Samantha Gross, “$1.5m for a wedding venue and conference center. $250,000 for historic ships. Here’s what top Senate brass put into the budget.,” Boston Globe, May 17, 2024.

“It really is a fundamentally broken process where you have pet projects of specific legislators getting designated funding outside any kind of rationale or equitable analysis of whether or not that is a worthy use of public funds,” said Jonathan Cohn, policy director for the group Progressive Massachusetts. The approach, he said, means that earmarks are doled out “not based on need, but rather on power and proximity to power.”

PM in the News: “Are Massachusetts politics on immigration changing? Strategists, activists weigh in”

Cassandra Dumay, “Are Massachusetts politics on immigration changing? Strategists, activists weigh in,” The Sun Chronicle, May 12, 2024.

Jonathan Cohn, policy director of the activist group Progressive Massachusetts, said Democrats who choose to “appease” “the most stridently anti-immigrant voter” pose a more important threat to their party than Republican campaigning.

“Too many Democrats have adopted a conservative framing of an increased number of immigrants and refugees as being a terrible burden — rather than viewing them as people who we should feel so blessed want to live here,” Cohn said. “The bigger issue is Democrats demoralizing their own base by abandoning them than Republicans being energized.”

PM in the News: “Healey’s No New Taxes Talk”

Gintautas Dumcius and Bruce Mohl, “Political Notebook: Healey’s no-new-taxes talk | Rollins pay adjustment | Who is Jeanne Louise?,” CommonWealth Beacon, May 3, 2024.

Jonathan Cohn, policy director for Progressive Massachusetts, said Healey’s “clichéd ‘no new taxes’ line is out of step with her own promises and the needs” of the state. He pointed to high child care costs, health insurance premiums, and traffic as forms of taxation that hit working and middle-class residents.

PM in the News: “What was the point of Massachusetts’ new tax break for renters?”

Nik DeCosta-Klipa, “What was the point of Massachusetts’ new tax break for renters?,” WBUR, April 17, 2024.

“Nobody is going to complain about getting $50 back, but it doesn’t mean very much,” Jonathan Cohn, the policy director for the left-leaning group Progressive Massachusetts (and a renter himself), told WBUR. “Given that many people’s rents will go up by more than $50 each year, that’s not even combating one-twelfth of an annual rent increase for people.”

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Cohn credits the Healey administration for pursuing other, more “meaningful” measures to address the housing crisis in the multi-billion-dollar bond bill, which is primarily aimed at funding and encouraging more affordable housing. (Whether — or how much of — the bill passes before the end of the legislative session this summer remains to be seen.) Healey’s administration has also moved to aggressively enforce the state’s MBTA Communities Act, which requires cities and towns near the T to zone for additional multi-family housing.

PM in the News: On Healey’s Hiring Freeze

Colin A. Young, Michael P. Norton, and Chris Lisinski. “Healey Plans To Reduce Gov’t Hiring, Critics Say It’s Coming Too Late.” State House News Service. April 3, 2024.

Blowback came from the left, too. Progressive Massachusetts Policy Director Jonathan Cohn castigated Healey and the Legislature for having approved a series of targeted tax cuts last year after voters in 2022 “made clear that they support higher taxes on the rich and greater investment in our commonwealth.” He said the governor’s January budget cuts and her hiring restrictions “are the result of such decisions.”

“The Legislature should not operate from a standpoint of scarcity. Whether that means putting a pause on the regressive tax cuts from last year’s bill or finding new ways to raise money (e.g., by closing corporate loopholes or ending misguided corporate tax incentives), the Governor and Legislature can’t pretend there isn’t money available,” Cohn said. “Even more, the rainy day fund remains flush, and adding more money to it each year is not a badge of honor if it can never be used.”

He added, “When voters gave Massachusetts a Democratic trifecta, it was not out of a desire for tax cuts for the rich and hiring freezes; it was to make the Commonwealth better for all.”

Lisa Kashinsky, Kelly Garrity, and Mia McCarthy. “The fallout from Healey’s ‘hiring controls’.” Politico. April 4, 2024.

“If the governor believes that the commonwealth is facing an economic downturn that would necessitate such a freeze, she should communicate to the public what she believes is the cause of the revenue shortfall and outline how the commonwealth will protect critical investments,” Progressive Massachusetts’ Jonathan Cohn told Playbook.

PM in the News: The Governor and Transparency

Matt Stout, “‘My personal life is my personal life.’ Healey defends decision not to disclose details of four-day trip.,” Boston Globe, March 18, 2024.

Jonathan Cohn, policy director of the group Progressive Massachusetts, said while Healey shouldn’t be expected to disclose what hotel she’s staying in or other intimate details, “you should be at least willing to tell people where you went.”

“It’s a sense of accountability to the public,” Cohn said. The public “should be able to know when you’re gone for a period of time without it being somehow shrouded in mystery.”

Kelly Garrity and Lisa Kashinsky, “A Controversy of Healey’s Own Making,” Politico, March 19, 2024.

Progressive Massachusetts’ Jonathan Cohn said that while residents “don’t need to know the full itinerary of a private vacation,” it’s better to hear about it from the governor herself “than to only learn of her absence because another official is ‘acting’ governor for a few days.”

SHNS: Sunshine week meets shade on Beacon Hill

Colin Young, “Sunshine week meets shade on Beacon Hill,” State House News Service, March 15, 2024.

As Sunshine Week got underway, Progressive Massachusetts pointed out that the Massachusetts House has taken fewer than half as many recorded votes so far this session than it had in any of the previous six legislative sessions. The House took 202 roll calls by March 11, 2012; 297 roll calls by March 11, 2014; 206 roll calls by March 11, 2016; 313 roll calls by March 11, 2018; 164 roll calls by March 11, 2020; and 155 roll calls by March 11, 2022, the group said.

So far this legislative session, the House has recorded 81 roll call votes.

The trend has been similar, but not quite as dramatic, in the Senate. Progressive Massachusetts said the Senate had taken 186 roll calls by March 11, 2020, then 135 roll calls by March 11, 2022, and had taken 114 roll call votes so far this session as of the start of the week.

“So much of the legislative process occurs behind closed doors, and recorded votes are a critical opportunity for legislators to show the public where they stand. When the House refuses to bring up votes until they are unanimous and when legislators withdraw their amendments without discussion or debate, we lose out on opportunities to make progress on the many critical challenges facing the commonwealth,” Jonathan Cohn, policy director of Progressive Massachusetts, said.

PM in the News: State lawmakers holding fewer recorded votes

Christian Wade, “State lawmakers holding fewer recorded votes,” The Eagle-Tribune. March 12, 2024.

The number of roll call votes by the state House of Representatives has plummeted in recent years, prompting concerns from open government groups about a lack of transparency in Beacon Hill’s often secretive legislative process.

In the current legislative session, which got underway in January 2023, the House has held 81 roll calls that recorded how each lawmaker voted on specific bills, according to voting records from the House clerk’s office.

But the number of recorded votes has been declining for years, with 105 roll calls held during the preceding two-year session in 2021 and 2022, according to the data. In the 2017-18 session, the House held 313 roll call votes.

There has also been a decline of recorded votes in the state Senate, where 135 recorded votes were held during the 2021-22 session, according to the Senate clerk’s office. That’s compared to 186 roll call votes in the 2020-21 session.

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Jonathan Cohn, policy director of the group Progressive Massachusetts, said the lack of recorded votes deprives people of “opportunities to make progress on the many critical challenges” facing the state.

“So much of the legislative process occurs behind closed doors, and recorded votes are a critical opportunity for legislators to show the public where they stand,” he said in a statement.

PM in the News: Solidarity Lowell’s Advocacy for the Unhoused

Melanie Gilbert, “Lowell’s adult homeless shelter at peak capacity,” Lowell Sun, February 21, 2024.

There are more homeless people than available beds in Lowell, leading to people in need of emergency shelter being turned away, said Isaiah Stephens, managing director of the Lowell Transitional Living Center on Middlesex Street.

“People are coming into the shelter faster than we can house them,” Stephens told a group of service providers and advocates attending a remote meeting of Solidarity Lowell on Jan. 28.

Solidarity Lowell is a volunteer group of community members of Greater Lowell working toward social justice in areas such as housing and homelessness.