The MA Senate Can Pass a Better Budget Than the House

Last week, we highlighted the good, the bad, and the very ugly of the MA House’s budget.

This week, the MA Senate will be voting on its budget. And they have the opportunity to make it better.

The Senate Can Pass Stronger Language on Reproductive Rights

The House passed a slimmed down version of the ROE Act, which — although not as comprehensive as the ROE Act — has been celebrated by reproductive rights advocates as a major step forward.

Sen. Harriette Chandler’s Amendment 180 (ROE Act) offers even stronger protections for reproductive rights.

So far, Senators Jo Comerford, Cindy Creem, Julian Cyr, Jamie Eldridge, Cindy Friedman, and Becca Rausch have signed on.

If one of those senators is yours, thank them. If not, urge your senator to co-sponsor and vote for Amendment 180. (Find their contact info here.)

The Senate Can Pass Emergency Paid Sick Time

If you follow the news, you know we’re in store for a dark winter, as COVID-19 case numbers and death tolls are expected to rise.

Low-wage workers are our first line of defense against COVID-19, but they are feeling the greatest economic impact of the outbreak. Healthcare and long-term care workers, janitorial workers, food service workers, child care workers, municipal workers, adjunct faculty, gig workers, and others on the front lines are critical to supporting our communities during the OVID-19 outbreak.

But many of these front-line workers are struggling economically and lack basic economic protections including adequate paid sick time. No one who is sick should feel like they have to go to work or else they will lose their job. That’s bad for the economy and bad for public health.

Sen. Jason Lewis’s Amendment 360 (Emergency Paid Sick Time) would make sure that all workers have access to at least 10 days of job-protected sick leave during the COVID emergency. 

So far, Senators Jo Comerford, Diana DiZoglio, Paul Feeney, and Michael Moore have signed on.

If one of those senators is yours, thank them. If not, urge your senator to co-sponsor and vote for Amendment 360.

The Good, the Bad, and the Very Ugly of the House Budget

Late last night, the MA House passed a much-delayed budget for FY 2021.

Let’s dive in.

The Good

The House last night voted to pass a slimmed down version of the ROE Act, which — although not as comprehensive as the ROE Act — has been celebrated by reproductive rights advocates as a major step forward.

The amendment, which passed 108 – 49, would do the following:

  • Expand access to abortion after 24 weeks of pregnancy in cases of a lethal fetal diagnosis, allowing pregnant people facing serious medical obstacles to their pregnancy to make the decision that’s best for them in consultation with their doctor and receive care here at home.
  • Allow 16 and 17 year olds to make their own decisions about abortion care without having to go before a judge.
  • Streamline access for those under 16 years old by allowing remote hearings, eliminating the need for young people to travel to a courthouse and stand before a judge.

How did your state representative vote? Find out here.

11.12.20 House Vote on ROE

Want to thank them if they were one of the 108 YES votes? You can do so here.

The Bad

If we want to have an equitable recovery from the pandemic and the related recession, we need to invest in our public schools, our public infrastructure, our public health system, and our social safety net in all its forms.

And that requires money.

Unfortunately, the MA House hasn’t gotten the memo. The House budget fails to deliver on the promises made in the Student Opportunity Act last year and shortchanges public services across the state, especially public transit.

Legislators had a chance on Tuesday to push back against these cuts and vote to raise additional revenue.

Unfortunately, the House voted 127 to 30 against doing so.

In a time when the billionaires in our state keep getting richer, these representatives overwhelmingly voted against a common-sense amendment from Rep. Mike Connolly (D-Cambridge) to tax unearned income (income from non-retirement investments and other forms of asset ownership, such as stocks, bonds, and dividend and interest income) at a higher rate than earned income (income from wages and salaries, as well as pensions, annuities, 401k, IRAs, and other similar retirement accounts). Unearned income goes overwhelmingly to corporate shareholders and other high-income individuals, and a modest increase could generate significant sums of money to fund public services.

Here was the vote.

The Ugly

If you follow the news, you know we’re in store for a dark winter, as COVID-19 case numbers and death tolls are expected to rise.

Low-wage workers are our first line of defense against COVID-19, but they are feeling the greatest economic impact of the outbreak. Healthcare and long-term care workers, janitorial workers, food service workers, child care workers, municipal workers, adjunct faculty, gig workers, and others on the front lines are critical to supporting our communities during the OVID-19 outbreak.

But many of these front-line workers are struggling economically and lack basic economic protections including adequate paid sick time. No one who is sick should feel like they have to go to work or else they will lose their job. That’s bad for the economy and bad for public health.

Unfortunately, even though a super-majority of state representatives signed onto a budget amendment to grant two weeks of job-protected emergency paid sick time, the House punted, choosing to leave workers behind again. Emergency paid sick time didn’t even get a vote or a debate.

Want to tell your representative how you feel? Find their information here.

We plan to keep fighting — for better results in the Senate next week and better results in the session next year.

Your State Rep Probably Took a Bad Vote Yesterday. But They Can Take a Good One Tomorrow.

If we want to have an equitable recovery from the pandemic and the related recession, we need to invest in our public schools, our public infrastructure, our public health system, and our social safety net in all its forms.

And that requires money.

Unfortunately, the MA House hasn’t gotten the memo. The budget that it’s currently debating fails to deliver on the promises made in the Student Opportunity Act last year and shortchanges public services across the state.

Legislators have a choice of whether to invest in an equitable economic recovery or accept a dangerous trajectory that leaves the most vulnerable behind.

Yesterday, 127 state representatives chose the latter, voting against a common-sense amendment from Rep. Mike Connolly (D-Cambridge) to tax unearned income (income from non-retirement investments and other forms of asset ownership, such as stocks, bonds, and dividend and interest income) at a higher rate than earned income (income from wages and salaries, as well as pensions, annuities, 401k, IRAs, and other similar retirement accounts). Unearned income goes overwhelmingly to corporate shareholders and other high-income individuals, and a modest increase could generate significant sums of money to fund public services.

Here was the vote.

You should let your legislator know what you think of their vote. But there’s an opportunity for them to do better.

Your representative may have voted the wrong way yesterday. But they can still take progressive votes if the following amendments are brought to the floor.

Emergency Paid Sick Time 

Urge your state representative to support Amendment #231 — Emergency Paid Sick Time, which would provide ten additional work-days (80 hours) of job-protected emergency paid sick time for immediate use during the COVID-19 outbreak to workers not covered by federal emergency paid sick time protections.

Strengthening Reproductive Rights

Amendment #759 — Improved Access to Health Care would remove medically unnecessary barriers to abortion care. It doesn’t contain everything from the ROE Act, but it contains many vital provisions and would be a significant step forward. Voters have made clear that reproductive health care matters, and with abortion and other health care under threat from an anti-abortion Supreme Court, it’s time for Massachusetts to act.

You can also join the ROE coalition in a phone bank tonight or tomorrow night.

Find your state representative’s contact information here.

Eight Months of Emergency without Emergency Paid Sick Time

Tomorrow marks eight months to the day since Governor Baker issued a state of emergency.

And our Legislature still hasn’t passed emergency paid sick time legislation.

Low-wage workers are our first line of defense against COVID-19, but they are feeling the greatest economic impact of the outbreak. Healthcare and long-term care workers, janitorial workers, food service workers, child care workers, municipal workers, adjunct faculty, gig workers, and others on the front lines are critical to supporting our communities during the OVID-19 outbreak.

But many of these front-line workers are struggling economically and lack basic economic protections including adequate paid sick time.

The MA House has the opportunity THIS WEEK to take action via the budget.

But there’s more. 

The proposed budget by the MA House fails to deliver on the promises made in the Student Opportunity Act last year. Our Governor and our Legislature made a promise to students, teachers, and community members that they would fully fund public schools. In a wealthy state like ours, they can’t punt on this obligation and hide behind manufactured budget constraints.

Legislators have a choice of whether to invest in an equitable economic recovery or accept a dangerous trajectory that leaves the most vulnerable behind.

Can you call or email your legislators in support of these four amendments? Find their contact info here.

  • Amendment #231 (Donato) — Emergency  Paid Sick Time
  • Amendment #524 (Sabadosa) — Increase the Tax Rate on Corporate Profits
  • Amendment #675 (Connolly) —Increase  the Tax Rate that Investors Pay on Unearned Income
  • Amendment #719 (Gouveia) —Tax Profits Shifted Overseas by Increasing the Tax Rate on ‘GILTI’

More about the amendments below

Amendment #231 (Donato) — Emergency Paid Sick Time. Would provide ten additional work-days (80 hours) of job-protected emergency paid sick time for immediate use during the COVID-19 outbreak to workers not covered by federal emergency paid sick time protections. This would allow workers with COVID symptoms to stay home so they can recover and not risk infecting others. As we enter a difficult winter with increasing rates of infection, Emergency Paid Sick Time is urgently needed to limit the spread of COVID19.

Amendment #524 (Sabadosa) — Increase the Tax Rate on Corporate Profits. Would raise the current corporate profits tax rate of 8.0% to the pre-2010 rate of 9.5%, generating $375 to $500 million annually for investments in an equitable recovery. Businesses that are turning a profit should be expected to contribute more to support the public goods on which their profits are based, especially during a public health and state fiscal crisis.  

Amendment #675 (Connolly) — Increase the Tax Rate that Investors Pay on Unearned Income. Would tax unearned income (income from non-retirement investments and other forms of asset ownership, such as stocks, bonds, and dividend and interest income) at a higher rate than earned income (income from wages and salaries, as well as pensions, annuities, 401k, IRAs, and other similar retirement accounts), generating millions annually for investments in an equitable recovery. Unearned income goes overwhelmingly to corporate shareholders and other high-income individuals, who should be expected to contribute more to support the public goods on which we all depend.  

Amendment #719 (Gouveia) — Tax Profits Shifted Overseas by Increasing the Tax Rate on ‘GILTI’. Would adopt a provision of federal law to tax a portion of MA-based corporate profits that are shifted overseas, raising $200 to $400 million annually for investments in an equitable recovery. Many multinational corporations that do business in MA dodge taxes by using complex accounting schemes that make their MA-based profits appear to have been earned in offshore tax havens. A federal provision called ‘GILTI’ identifies this shifted income and allow states to tax a portion of it.

Go Big or Don’t Go Home

In a mere eleven days — on Friday, July 31st, at 11:59 pm — the legislative session in the Massachusetts State House comes to an end.

The bills that didn’t make it past the finish line this year will disappear into the ether or return like a phoenix from the ashes in January next year, only to face the same grueling process.

But there are many policies that can’t wait until January. Indeed, passing them now is already far later than should have been done. And, frankly, the Legislature shouldn’t get to leave session until they finish.

What priorities are we talking about?

  • Passing the Safe Communities Act so that state and local law enforcement aren’t being deputized as ICE agents
  • Passing the Work and Family Mobility Act because mobility is a basic right, regardless of one’s citizenship status
  • Passing the ROE Act because MA needs to strengthen reproductive rights here at home as they remain under attack on the federal level
  • Passing the 100% Renewable Energy Act because we can’t keep stumbling forward into climate chaos
  • Passing Emergency Paid Sick Time so that no worker has to choose between their health and their job security
  • Passing guaranteed housing stability for at least one more year ​because if we want people to stay at home, they need a home to go back to
  • Passing a budget that raises Progressive Revenue by making sure that corporations and the rich are paying their fair share

The Legislature can’t keep punting session after session and patting themselves on the back.

Can you call or email your state legislators about taking real action before the session ends — or staying in until they do?

Go Big or Don't Go Home

Take Action: Extend Sick Time. Extend the Eviction Moratorium. Extend the Session.

COVID graphic

TL;DR: Tell your legislators to extend paid sick time, extend the eviction moratorium, and extend the legislative session.

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 

(2) Email your legislators in support of these bills and extending the session.

(3) Share this email with five friends.

Four Weeks Left….

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?

Find their contact information here, and then save it for next time.

No Worker Should Have to Choose Between Their Job and Their Health

Wednesday, May 26, 2020

Chairwoman Jehlen, Chairman Hay, and Members of the Joint Committee on Labor and Workforce Development: 

My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the chair of the Issues Committee of Progressive Massachusetts. Our organization and our 16 chapters around the state advocate for shared prosperity, racial and social justice, robust democracy, and environmental sustainability. 

We are writing today to urge you to give a favorable report to SD.2918/HD.5039: An Act relative to emergency paid sick time. 

Our top priority over the past two months has been to ensure that the Commonwealth’s response to COVID-19 is equitable and leaves no one behind. A guiding principle of an equitable response is that no worker should be forced to choose between their health and their livelihood. 

There are clear income and class divides in who has access to robust benefits at work and who has the ability to work from home. Healthcare and long-term care workers, janitorial workers, food service workers, child care workers, and many gig workers do not have the luxury to work from home as many in the finance, tech, and media sectors (among other industries) do. And they are also the essential workers that have kept society running over the past few months and have always done so. By having to show up in work in person, they have had to put themselves at risk, or face the risk of greater economic insecurity — an untenable dilemma. 

As our state embarks on a premature, phased-in “reopening,” it is important that we have in place the health and safety measures to prevent a second surge. That requires filling the gaps in paid sick leave legislation so that no worker who is sick (or has a sick loved one) feels compelled to go into work in order to make ends meet. 

Massachusetts’s landmark 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 (FFCRA) has big coverage gaps that leave millions of front-line workers without paid sick time.

Emergency paid sick time legislation would provide ten additional work-days (80 hours) of job-protected paid sick time for immediate use during the COVID-19 outbreak for all workers not covered by recently passed federal legislation. It would be available, with no waiting period, for a worker to care for themselves or a family member, domestic partner, or household member if they or said love one is diagnosed with COVID-19, experiencing COVID-19 symptoms and awaiting a diagnosis, quarantined or self-quarantined, or reasonably believes their health is at risk.

This crisis has shown clearly that the health of each one of us is connected (the mantra of public health professionals for decades). And to have a sound public health response, we need people to stay home if they are sick — and to be able to afford to do so. 

Sincerely, 

Jonathan Cohn

Chair, Issues Committee

Progressive Massachusetts

🚨Actions You Can Take from Home During the COVID-19 Crisis

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. 

Can you email your state legislators to demand quick and comprehensive action? 

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 assistance ​to 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 

✅ Passing ​HD.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.

Can you email your state legislators today?

Did you already email? Then you can follow up with a call. Find your legislators here.