Today marks Phase 3 of Republican Governor Charlie Baker’s reopening plan. That means that movie theaters (??), casinos (??), and gyms (??!?) are allowed to reopen today — even as states around the country are seeing resurgences of the COVID-19 outbreak.
And to make matters worse, this reopening is happening without any new, enforceable protections for workers.
If we want to have a successful, equitable recovery, then workers who are sick or are taking care of loved ones need to be able to stay home without fear of losing their job. Massachusetts’s 2014 earned sick time law does not provide enough hours to meet the scale of the crisis, and the federal Families First Coronavirus Response Act has big coverage gaps that leave millions of front-line workers without paid sick time.
Massachusetts needs to pass Emergency Paid Sick Time legislation to ensure that all workers can take paid sick time during this crisis.
And for people to be able to stay home, they need a home to go back to. The eviction and foreclosure moratorium signed in April is set to expire next month, August 18. That means that, if the Legislature does not take action, working-class families across the state could face a wave of evictions during a possible COVID resurgence.
Evictions and foreclosures are bad for public health in the best of times. They are even more dangerous now, and the instability and insecurity is likely to hit Black and Brown families the hardest.
But, again the Legislature can take action here by extending the eviction/foreclosure moratorium, expanding mortgage deferment protections, and stabilizing both renters and small property owners.
And time is short. The Legislative session is set to end at the end of the month. If the Legislature does not finish the vital business of protecting workers and addressing the backlog of important pre-COVID legislative priorities, then legislators should stay in session until they finish.
Here’s where you come in.
(1) Call your legislators in support of these two bills & call on them to support extending the legislative session:
S.2701 / H.4700: An Act relative to emergency paid sick time
SD.2992 / HD.5166: An Act to guarantee housing stability during the COVID-19 emergency and recovery
Unless anything changes, four weeks from today — Friday, July 31st — the formal part of the 191st Legislative Session of the Massachusetts General Court will come to an end.
That means that there are four weeks for the MA Legislature to up its game on pretty much every single front.
Four weeks for them to take action in support of immigrants’ rights, such as passing the Safe Communities Act and the Work & Family Mobility Act.
Four weeks for them to take action in support of reproductive justice by passing the ROE Act.
Four weeks for them to tackle the systemic racism in policing and the criminal legal system.
Four weeks for them to tackle our affordable housing crisis (and just over a month for them to take action before the eviction moratorium passed earlier this year expires).
Four weeks for them to take action to address climate change because Mother Nature doesn’t care about self-imposed deadlines.
Four weeks for them to pass Emergency Paid Sick Time so that workers don’t have to choose between their health and their job security in a global pandemic.
Four weeks for them to pass a budget that lives up to our values by raising progressive revenue to avoid deep, harmful cuts in public services.
None of this will happen unless your legislators hear from you — loud and clear — that they can’t keep procrastinating. That they can’t keep punting issues to later and later in the session until each session runs out. And then the cycle of excuse-making and delay continues.
Can you call your legislators to demand action in these final four weeks?
With the outbreak of COVID-19, Massachusetts is facing a crisis.
We have a public health crisis, as the number of those infected grows every day. We have an economic crisis, as the threat of a recession looms larger every day and workers risk weeks (or months) without a paycheck. And we have a democratic crisis, as the virus outbreak challenges our ability to hold traditional in-person elections.
And this is on top of the crises we already face, such as the inequality that affects all aspects of our society.
And our Legislature needs to respond with the requisite urgency and comprehensiveness.
Here’s what a comprehensive response must include:
✅Passing HD.4935 (Connolly-Honan): An Act Providing for a Moratorium on Evictions and Foreclosures During the COVID19 Emergency because, in a state of emergency in which people are being asked to stay at home, people need to have homes. Evictions and foreclosures exacerbate our public health crisis and strain our already weak safety net.
✅Passing legislation to provide immediate financial assistanceto mitigate the economic impact of the pandemic, such as HD.4945 (Gouveia): An Act providing for emergency cash assistance in response to COVID-19, HD.4951 (Decker): An Act to provide short-term relief for families in deep poverty, and HD.4950 (Miranda): An Act providing emergency access to equity and justice for all in response to COVID-19
✅Passing HD.4958 (Mark/Sabadosa): An Act relative to COVID-19 emergency unemployment expansion, which would ensure that independent contractors, sole proprietors, partners in a partnership, freelance, and tipped employees are eligible for unemployment benefits and that COVID-19 emergency assistance does not make any worker ineligible for receiving any existing state benefits
✅Passing Emergency Paid Sick Time legislation that guarantees all workers at least fifteen additional work-days (120 hours) of job-protected paid sick time for immediate use during the COVID-19 outbreak or any future public health emergency because no worker should be forced to choose between their health and their economic security
✅ PassingHD.4963(Sabadosa): An Act regarding Decarceration and COVID-19, which would require the release of individuals who are currently in pre-trial detainment or under incarceration if they are a member of a population deemed especially vulnerable by the CDC, are eligible for medical parole, are almost finished with their sentence, or are only being detained due to inability to pay bail or due to minor violations of parole
✅Passing legislation to expand options to Vote by Mail (such as HD.4957 — Mark/Sabadosa), so that no voter is forced to choose between their health and their right to participate in our democracy
✅Providing the necessary funding to ensure that our response does not leave vulnerable communities behind, such as our immigrant population or our homeless population.
Our legislators need to start responding with the urgency required–and fast.
PM Issues Committee chair Jonathan Cohn penned an editorial in CommonWealth about the new Senate Ways & Means chair:
OVER THE PAST few legislative sessions, progressives have looked to the Massachusetts Senate as a beacon of progressive policymaking. Across a range of issues, the Senate has been willing to pass bold and expansive bills that end up watered down—or dead on arrival—in the more conservative, top-down House.
However, Senate President Karen Spilka’s choice of Sen. Michael Rodrigues to chair the powerful Senate Ways & Means Committee should give progressives everywhere pause. Although the Westport Democrat describes himself as part of the “boring middle,” much of Rodrigues’s record locates him squarely on the right.
The following testimony was submitted to the Joint Committee on Housing on Tuesday, January 14, 2020.
Chairman Crighton, Chairman Honan, and Members of the Joint Committee on Housing:
My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the chair of the Issues Committee of Progressive Massachusetts, a statewide grassroots advocacy group committed to fighting for an equitable, just, democratic, and sustainable Commonwealth.
It is because of those values that we write today in support ofH.3924 (An Act enabling local options for tenant protections) and S.773 (An Act supporting affordable housing with a local option for a fee to be applied to certain real estate transactions).
Massachusetts has a lot to offer, but that does little if people can’t afford to live here. The US News & World Report’s annual state rankings put Massachusetts at #41 in housing affordability (and #43 in cost of living).[1] A worker earning minimum wage in Massachusetts would have to work 91 hours a week to afford a modest one-bedroom rental home at market rate (and 113 hours for a modest two-bedroom).[2] Monthly median rents have gone up by more than one-third since 2010, outpacing income growth.[3]
Clearly, Massachusetts has an affordable housing crisis. This is unsustainable. It has led to expanding economic inequality, increased homelessness, and damage to our economy, as talented workers often leave the state for less expensive regions.
Solving this affordable housing crisis will require us to use every tool in the toolbox.
That requires zoning reform that encourages the creation of walkable, sustainable, and inclusive communities.
But it also requires public investment. Over the last ten years, the need for affordable housing has increased, while funds for affordable housing have decreased at both federal and state levels.
And it requires strengthening tenant protections that ensure that communities can remain affordable, inclusive, and stable.
However, municipalities across Massachusetts are blocked from taking the necessary steps to address the housing crisis. The misguided statewide ban on rent stabilization policies and a stringent home rule system that prevents municipalities from passing their own laws to govern the basic aspects of civil affairs hamstring municipalities.
H.3924 provides the appropriate redress. It repeals the outdated and misguided statewide ban on rent stabilization policies and enables cities and towns to pass policies aimed to regulate rents, limit condo conversions, prevent landlords from evicting tenants without just cause (e.g., failure to pay rent, illegal activity), require landlords to inform tenants of their rights, and take other steps to protect tenants and ensure long-term affordability.
S.773 also removes barriers that cities and towns face in addressing the housing crisis. It would enable cities and towns to raise additional revenue for affordable housing by levying a small fee on real estate transactions (with the ability to establish exemptions as appropriate in each municipality).
There is no silver bullet to solving our affordable housing crisis. But if we are to have a chance at solving it, we must empower municipalities to take action. We thus encourage you to give a favorable report to H.3924 and S.773.
Ben Berke of The Enterprise wrote about the upcoming hearing on rent control on Beacon Hill — as well as the state of housing politics in MA:
Jonathan Cohn, who helps lead the advocacy group Progressive Massachusetts, said the bill will likely need broader support than it currently has to pass.
However, with House leadership considering plans to pass an omnibus housing bill this session, Cohn said legislators could force a vote on rent control and other tenant protections by adding them to the broader piece of legislation as amendments.
Chairman Eldridge, Chairwoman Cronin, and Members of the Judiciary Committee:
My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the chair of the Issues Committee of Progressive Massachusetts. Progressive Massachusetts is a statewide grassroots advocacy organization that fights for shared prosperity and racial and social justice.
Shared prosperity is impossible in a state where people cannot afford to live or are barred from opportunities for housing. Tackling our affordable housing crisis requires action on a wide variety of fronts, and curbing the outsize role of eviction records in access to housing is an important part. We urge you to give a favorable report to the HOMES Act (S.824/H.3566).
Having an eviction record is creating a devastating barrier for tenants looking for housing. Since 1988, over 1 million eviction cases have been filed in Massachusetts. Records are created as soon as a case is filed and are publicly available forever––regardless of the outcome. These records impact people’s ability to obtain housing, credit, and employment, harming many, especially women and people of color.
Regardless of whether one does anything wrong or is actually evicted, being party to an eviction or housing case is being unfairly held against tenants when they try to rent a new place. Even winning in court hurts tenants. If an eviction case is not the fault of the tenant, is dismissed, or ends with a tenant satisfying an agreement, these records should not be made public.
Even worse, under the current system, children being named in eviction proceedings and burdened with eviction records that follow them into adulthood, complicating their efforts to obtain housing and credit.
Moreover, under the current system, mistakes, errors, and common names result in incorrect information being reported to landlords. Housing should be viewed as a human right, and no one should lose their rights due to a clerical error.
With the HOMES act, Massachusetts has the opportunity to be a leader in ensuring that housing is accessible for all. We hope that you take it.
PM Issues Committee chairman Jonathan Cohn penned an editorial for CommonWealth on the need for the MA Legislature to be bolder in its policy ambitions, especially around taxes and housing. Read the full piece here and an excerpt below:
LAST SESSION, one of the only significant bills that Massachusetts legislators passed before budget season was sweeping legislation to raise their own pay. By contrast, this year, the Legislature has already passed important bills to lift a retrograde welfare cap and ban the homophobic and abusive practice of conversion therapy.
This could be a sign that the Legislature is interested in being more proactive this session, and that would be a welcome change indeed.
There are plenty of issues that the Legislature can—and should—tackle this session, all of which require bold and comprehensive policy solutions and all of which face the same risk: that the Legislature lets the business lobby set the limits of its ambitions.
In January of 2017, Progressive Massachusetts unveiled our legislative agenda for the 190th legislative session — 17 items for 2017 (and 2018). As we near the end of the year — and the start of the next legislative session, it’s the perfect time to take stock of how the various bills fared.
Clear Victories
Reproductive Rights
The ACCESS bill, which updates MA’s contraceptive coverage equity law to require insurance carriers to provide all contraceptive methods without a copay, passed overwhelmingly in the Legislature and was signed by the Governor.
Democracy
Massachusetts became the 13th state to adopt Automatic Voter Registration. In this reform pioneered by Oregon in 2015, eligible voters who interface with select government agencies (here, the RMV or MassHealth) are automatically registered to vote unless they decline. With more than 700,000 eligible citizens in MA unregistered, AVR will increase the accuracy, security, and comprehensiveness of voter rolls.
The bill also enrolls Massachusetts in Electronic Registration Information Center, a coalition of states founded by the Pew Research Center that enable states to synchronize their voter rolls. ERIC has increased the comprehensiveness and accuracy of the voter rolls in participating states.
[Note: The original bill included smaller social services government agencies as well. The final bill allows for their later inclusion but focuses on the two largest sources of possible new registrants.]
Steps Forward
Criminal Justice Reform
The comprehensive criminal justice reform bill passed by the Legislature in April incorporated some elements from our priority bills (Read our write-up here):
Eliminating most mandatory minimums for retail drug selling and drug paraphernalia and limiting mandatory minimums in school zones to cases involving guns or minors. [Note: PM and advocates had sought the elimination of all mandatory minimums. The bill, however, left in place mandatory minimums for Class A drugs (like heroin), expanded this definition to include opioids like fentanyl and carfentanil, and created a new mandatory minimum for assaulting a police officer, an overused charge wielded as a threat against protesters.]
Raising the felony-larceny threshold from $250 to $1,200 [Note: PM and other advocates had sought $1,500.]
Reducing fines and fees [Note: PM and other advocates wanted probation and parole fees fully eliminated.]
Establishing a process for expunging records, especially for juveniles convicted of minor offenses
There is still work to be done–from raising the age of criminal majority to severely curtailing (or outright abolishing) solitary confinement. That said, the bill, despite its shortcomings, was a step in the right direction.
Fight for $15
At the start of the session, we supported legislation to raise the minimum wage from $11 to to $15 by 2021, raise the tipped minimum wage from $3.75 to $15.75 by 2025, and require the minimum wage to increase with inflation starting in 2022.
The Raise Up Massachusetts coalition’s ballot initiative was slightly more modest in its ambition, extending the full phase-in date one year (due to a later start) and raising the minimum wage for tipped employees to only $9 (60% of the minimum wage) by 2022.
What passed in the ultimate “Grand Bargain,” an effort of the Legislature and the Governor to avoid three ballot initiatives ($15 minimum wage, paid family and medical leave, sales tax reduction) was more modest still. It raised the minimum wage to $15 by 2023, raised the tipped minimum wage to only $6.75, and dropped indexing. Unfortunately, the Legislature included a further concession to the business lobby, agreeing to phase-out time-and-a-half on Sundays and holidays. Although the bill is a net win for workers in Massachusetts, it’s possible that, due to the phase-out of time-and-a-half, some workers will be left worse off.
Paid Family and Medical Leave
The version of paid family and medical leave passed in the aforementioned “Grand Bargain” was less robust than the original legislation and the ballot initiative text, but still more robust than the programs that exist in other states.
Senate Victory, House Opposition
Several of our priority bills succeeded, or made partial progress, in the Senate, only to flounder in the House amidst fierce opposition from the conservative House leadership.
Fully Funding Our Schools
Massachusetts’s 25-year-old education funding formula is short-changing our schools $1-2 billion per year due to outdated assumptions about the costs of health care, special education, ELL (English Language Learners) education, and closing racial and economic achievement gaps.
The 2015 Foundation Budget Review Commission recommended a path forward for fixing it. The Senate unanimously adopted a bill to implement them. The House, however, insisted on leaving English Language Learners, Black and Brown students, and poor students (not mutually exclusive categories) behind.
Protecting Our Immigrant Friends and Neighbors
Despite Massachusetts’s liberal reputation, our Legislature has been historically hostile to strengthening protections for our immigrant community.
The Senate included four provisions from the Safe Communities Act, a bill that our members fought strongly for, in its FY 2019 budget: (1) a prohibition on police inquiries about immigration status, a prohibition on certain collaboration agreements between local law enforcement and ICE, (3) a guarantee of basic due process protections, and (4) a prohibition on participation in a Muslim registry. The amendment was a win-win for both rights and safety, but House Leadership opposed its inclusion in the final budget.
Bold Action on Climate Change
Many elements from our priority environmental legislation were incorporated in the Senate’s impressive omnibus bill:
Building on the Global Warming Solutions Act by setting intermediate emissions targets for 2030 and 2040
Establishing a 3% annual increase in the Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) to accelerate our commitment to renewable energy
Prohibiting a “pipeline tax” on energy consumers
Instructing the governor’s office to develop carbon pricing for the transportation sector by the end of 2020, for commercial buildings and industrial processes by 2021, and for residential buildings by the end of 2022 (not as strong as a revenue-positive carbon pricing scheme, but still in the right direction)
However, the House proved a roadblock yet again. The ultimate compromise energy legislation included only a 2% increase from 2020 to 2030, after which it would fall back to the current 1%. This would take us to only 56% renewable energy by 2050 instead of 100%.
Loss…But a Battle Not Over
Revenue & Reinvestment
Progressive Mass members played a major role in the signature collection for the Fair Share amendment (or “millionaires tax”), which would have created a 4% surtax on income above $1 million (inflation-adjusted) to fund education and transportation investment.
As a citizen-originated ballot initiative for a constitutional amendment, the Fair Share amendment had to receive the support of at least 25% of the Legislature in two constitutional conventions. It secured well more than double this amount, but the Supreme Judicial Court struck it from the ballot this June.
Inaction
Medicare for All
Although the Senate took modest steps in the direction of single payer, passing legislation to create a public option (a MassHealth buy-in) and require a study of whether a single payer system would save money relative to the current system, the House took no such action.
Housing Production
Although the Senate passed a comprehensive zoning reform bill to increase housing production in the suburbs last session, no such action was taken in either house this session.
Debt/tuition-free Higher Education
The cost of higher education has grown a lot in Massachusetts, and the Legislature continues to punt.
In Conclusion: We won some, we lost some, and we’ll keep on fighting.
The State Senate will be voting on amendments to its FY 2019 budget next week. The budget makes some modest improvements to education and transit funding, but without new revenue sources, it remains in the same paradigm of underinvestment that has dominated for the past decade and a half.
Passing the Fair Share amendment on the ballot this fall will be a first step toward changing that.
But back to the budget…..
If you have only five minutes this week:
Call your state senator, as well as Senate President Harriette Chandler (617-722-1500) and Senate Ways & Means Chairwoman Karen Spilka (617-722-1640), in support of Amendment 1147 (Eldridge): Civil Rights and Safety.
The Legislature has so far punted and stalled when it comes to their responsibility to protect MA’s immigrant families from Trump’s xenophobic mass deportation agenda. The Safe Communities Act, which Progressive Mass and allies around the state have been fighting for over the past year, has remained stuck in committee.
This amendment contains key provisions of the Safe Communities Act:
The amendment process is an opportunity to further the important causes of…
Housing for All
Quality Education for All
A Clean Environment for All
Justice for All
The following amendments will help Massachusetts tackle our affordable housing crisis:
Amendment 3 (Creem): Community Preservation Act, which creates a surcharge for documentation at the Registries of Deeds to create a stronger and more stable funding source for the Community Preservation Act
Amendment 683 (Eldridge): Alternative Housing Voucher Program, which increases the line item by $2.7m to $7.7m
Amendment 686 (Eldridge): Homeless Individuals Assistance, which increases the line item from $46.18 million to $50 million
The following amendments will help Massachusetts deliver on the promise of quality education for all:
Amendment 176 (Eldridge): Adult Basic Education, which increases the line item for adult basic education, which is of great importance to new citizens, by $3.5m to $34.5m
Amendment 205 & 262 (Jehlen): Fiscal Impact of Charters, which address the important issue of the cost of charter expansion in school districts by ensuring that the state fulfills its obligation to fund charter expansion and to fully analyze charter funding impacts prior to expanding into a community
Amendment 260 (Rush): Recess, which would which would mandate at least 20 minutes of recess for elementary school students
The following amendments will help guarantee our constitutional right to a clean environment in Massachusetts:
Amendment 936 (Barrett): Minimum Monthly Reliability Contribution, which mitigates the negative impacts of a tax Charlie Baker imposed on MA homeowners who install solar panels on their houses
Amendment 968 (Cyr): EnvironmentalJustice, which strengthens the line item for environmental justice coordination by underscoring the importance of public health
Amendment 991 (Eldridge): Plastic Bag Reduction, which bans single-use plastic carryout bags
The following amendments will help deliver on the promise of justice for all:
Amendment 776 (Barrett): Workforce Training for Ex-Offenders, which increases the line item from $150,000 to $500,000
Amendment 992 (Creem): MLAC, which increases the line item from $19 million to $23 million
Amendment 997 (Creem): Data Reporting, which adds juvenile and adult reporting requirements, and requires that all the data (the old and the new) be disaggregated by race/ethnicity, gender, age, etc.
Amendment 1015 (Brownsberger): Prison Re-entry, which increases the funding for community based residential re-entry
Amendment 1042 (Eldridge): Resolve to Stop the Violence Program, which appropriates $300,000 for a restorative justice program in the Department of Corrections with proven benefits for reducing recidivism
Amendment 1125 (Friedman): Criminal Justice and Community Support Trust Fund, which would help boost funding for jail diversion programs for people experiencing behavioral health crises
Amendment 1147 (Eldridge): Civil Rights and Safety, which upholds the constitutional rights of immigrant communities and makes sure that local law enforcement isn’t deputized to ICE
Can you call or email your Senator today in support of these amendments?
