Beacon Hill Update: Monday, June 28th, 2021
June 30, 2021Monday, June 28, 2021:
- As of Sunday night, DPH reported a total of 663,625 cases of COVID-19.
- The state reported 31 new confirmed cases.
- The state has now confirmed a total of 17,626 deaths from the virus.
- The House and Senate both meet in informal session Monday at 11am.
- A new state budget is due by this Thursday, the first day of the new fiscal year.
- This Wednesday also marks the expiration date of mail-in and early voting laws and the current iteration of the MBTA’s oversight board.
- It’s possible and perhaps likely that those deadlines will come and go without final action on those measures.
- Governor Baker has filed an interim budget this week (H 3905) to prevent a government shutdown in the absence of a final budget accord, so lawmakers could push that bill through to work around another missed annual budget deadline.
- The interim budget funds government programs and services through July, the first month of fiscal 2022, and Governor Baker wants action on it by Tuesday so the state can pay its bills.
- Governor Baker is unlikely to wade into the Boston mayoral contest, he suggested late last week.
- Senate President Karen Spilka on Friday described herself as a “huge proponent” of voter options like mail-in and early voting, five days before pandemic-era expansions of those measures are set to lapse.
- The House and Senate have each approved extensions of mail-in and early voting measures beyond June 30, but in different bills and for different time periods.
- While the Senate used a pandemic-policy extensions bill to propose keeping them through Dec. 15, the House added language to a supplemental spending bill that would make them permanent.
- Two more mass vaccination sites are set to come down, in Boston at the Reggie Lewis Center on Sunday and in Danvers at the DoubleTree Hotel on Wednesday.
- Registration for the state’s “VaxMillions” lottery opens up to the public this Thursday.
- Fully vaccinated residents age 18 and older can enter for a chance to win one of five $1 million cash prizes or $300,000 scholarship grants for residents between 12-17 years of age.
- The state plans to hold giveaway drawings once a week for five weeks starting Monday, July 26 and continuing every Monday through Aug. 23.
- Winners will be announced later in the week following each drawing.
- Residents must have received all vaccine doses, two for Pfizer or Moderna and one for Johnson & Johnson, before entering the drawing
by David Gauthier
