Beacon Hill Update: Tuesday, July 27th, 2021

Tuesday, July 27, 2021:

• As of Monday night DPH reported a total of 669,647 cases of COVID-19.
• The state reported 1,243 new confirmed cases and 7 new deaths.
• The state now has 17,685 deaths from the virus.
• These numbers reflect data from Friday, Saturday & Sunday.
• Days before simulcast and horse racing wagering are scheduled to expire, the Legislature on Monday sent Governor Baker a bill (H 3976) extending the betting options until next summer.
• The branches in recent years have opted for annual extensions of these laws and passed on opportunities to create a system for licensure and oversight of racing and simulcasting that makes sense in the current marketplace and for the future.
• While the state’s casino law still spins off millions of dollars for racing purses, thoroughbred racing has disappeared in Massachusetts and harness racing is still offered but only at Plainridge Park Casino.
• The most recent extension runs through July 31.
• During its session Monday morning, the House also approved local bills dealing with Somerville, Fairhaven, Westford, Springfield, Deerfield, Longmeadow, Natick, Randolph, Northampton, and Cambridge.
• The House plans to hold a formal session on Wednesday.
• The Senate worked with the House on Monday to get a reauthorization of simulcast wagering laws to Governor Baker’s desk, along with a bill setting terms for state borrowing to finance construction of a new Holyoke Soldiers’ Home and stabilization of the unemployment insurance trust fund.
• The Senate also gave initial approval to a bill validating action at Nahant’s Sept. 26, 2020 town meeting, “notwithstanding any error or omission with respect to the calling of such meeting including the posting of the meeting warrant.”
• As the Legislature breezes toward its summer recess, the docket this week may include processing some of Governor Baker’s budget vetoes.
• The House holds a formal session Wednesday followed by a Senate formal Thursday.
• President Joe Biden on Monday nominated Suffolk County District Attorney Rachael Rollins to serve as the state’s top federal prosecutor.
• If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Rollins could be poised to bring the same reform-minded approach to the U.S. attorney’s office that has drawn praise from progressives and criticism from police unions.
• She would become the first Black woman to serve as U.S. attorney for the District of Massachusetts and only the second woman to hold that title, following President Barack Obama appointee Carmen Ortiz.
• Rollins, who has been publicly linked to the position for months, did not remark on the nomination Monday morning and her office could not be reached for immediate comment.
• President Biden announced Rollins as one of eight nominees to serve as U.S. attorneys.
• As legislative leaders try to decide whether to stick with their plan to further delay a 21-year-old voter law, leaders from the state’s non-profit sector are making the case for a “timely and important” implementation of the state’s charitable contributions tax deduction.
• In a letter to legislative leaders obtained by the News Service, Massachusetts Nonprofit Network CEO Jim Klocke said that over 80 percent of nonprofits rely on individual donations, a higher percentage than any other type of funding.
• The letter went out last week after Governor Baker vetoed another delay in the tax law’s implementation, saying a $4.2 billion “tax reforecast” makes the deduction, and other measures, affordable.
• The House and Senate plan at least five more hearings about how to spend close to $5 billion in federal relief funds, with the bulk of the dates after Labor Day, as lawmakers continue to move more slowly than Governor Baker would like to see.
• Governor Baker testified last week before the House and Senate Ways and Means committees and other lawmakers about his plan to immediately begin spending $2.9 billion of the $4.8 billion in remaining stimulus funds.
• It was the Legislature’s first hearing, and the governor emphasized the importance of allocating the funding quickly.
• Rep. Aaron Michlewitz and Sen. Michael Rodrigues, the chairs of the House and Senate Ways and Means committees, said Monday they planned to hold at least five more hearings this year, including one on Tuesday at 11 a.m. focused on housing, labor and workforce development issues.
• Housing and Economic Development Secretary Mike Kennealy and Labor and Workforce Development Secretary Rosalin Acosta are expected to testify, and lawmakers are also expecting to hear testimony from the Massachusets Area Planning Council, Citizens Housing and Planning Association, MassHousing, Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, SEIU 509, the Black Economic Council of Massachusetts, and others.
• Four additional hearings to be scheduled for after Labor Day will focus on health care, public health, mental health and human services; economic development, transportation, arts, tourism, climate and infrastructure; and education, social equity, safety net programs and families.
• The final hearing will be an open public hearing, the two chairmen said.
• Governor Baker sat down face-to-face with the House speaker and the Senate president for the first time in over a year on Monday, but had no more luck in person than he’s had virtually in trying to convince Democratic leaders that a two-month sales tax holiday and rapid deployment of federal aid are needed.
• Governor Baker, Speaker Ron Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka gathered in the Senate Reading Room for over an hour, discussing Baker’s push for more urgency to begin spending American Rescue Plan Act funding, the recent rise in COVID-19 infections, and mask-wearing for children.
• The governor said he made a pitch to Beacon Hill’s top two Democrats on his stalled plan to spend $900 million of expected state budget surplus on a sales tax holiday in August in September, but it fell flat.
• The state has a two-day sales tax holiday scheduled for the weekend of Aug. 14-15, and it appears the longer tax holiday will die without a debate on it in the Legislature.
• The meeting came almost a week after Baker testified before multiple committees exploring how best to spend nearly $5 billion in remaining ARPA funding controlled by the state.
• The governor and members of his Cabinet have been pushing for rapid deployment of $2.9 billion for housing, environmental infrastructure and job training investments, but legislative leaders have made clear they prefer a more deliberative approach.
• ARPA funds don’t have to be allocated until 2024 or spent until 2026, but Governor Baker said he heard some of those same experts testify that there were areas where money could be used immediately and effectively.
• The governor specifically mentioned housing projects that will take years to be designed, permitted and built, and he pointed to the stormwater runoff from the heavy rains in July as a reason to act quickly to fund new culverts and dams.
• Governor Baker said he and other governors are waiting from more guidance from the Biden administration and the Centers for Disease Control on whether to recommend the resumption of mask-wearing, particularly in schools this fall for children under 12. He plans to participate in a call with the White House on Tuesday.
• Speaker Mariano said he thought it made sense to wait for more specific guidance from the CDC before deciding on masks in schools, while Senate President Spilka said if the number of infections continues to rise and the Delta variant remains prevalent the state would “seriously need to think about having children who have not been vaccinated, whether they be under 12 [and] not able to be vaccinated yet or older but not vaccinated, to wear a mask.”
• A vaccine for children under 12 will not be ready until at least the fall, according to experts, but Governor Baker said the state continues to try to vaccinate adults who have not yet gotten their shots, and on Monday the state drew the first winners of the VaxMillions Lottery.
• Quentin Palfrey, the last Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor in Massachusetts, has left his job in the Biden administration to begin laying the groundwork for a campaign for attorney general in 2022, a person close to Palfrey confirmed.
• Palfrey ran in 2018 for lieutenant governor on a ticket with Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jay Gonzalez, but the pair failed to gain traction with voters, including Democrats who were mostly happy with the job Gov. Charlie Baker had been doing.
• Four years later, Palfrey is now eyeing the attorney general’s office should Attorney General Maura Healey leave to run for governor next year, or not seek a third term for another reason.
• Palfrey would not run if Healey decided to run for reelection, the person close to Palfrey said.
• His intention to seek the office was first reported Monday afternoon by The Boston Globe.
• This month’s heavy rains follow a year in which coastal communities in the United States experienced record high-tide flooding, a trend that federal ocean researchers say is expected to continue into the future “without improved flood defenses.”
• The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, in a report released this month, said years of rising sea levels have made high-tide flooding, which the agency also calls nuisance or sunny day flooding, increasingly common, occurring when tides rise 1.75 feet to 2 feet above the daily average high tide.
• That means more common occurrences of the kind of flooding that affects shorelines, streets and basements.
• This type of flooding, which has traditionally been associated with storms, is now occurring during full-moon tides or with a mere change in prevailing winds or currents, the agency said.
• Roosevelt Circle and a southbound stretch of Interstate 93 in Medford are once again operating at full traffic capacity after days of delays, but it could take up to a full year to finish repairing the overpass damaged in last week’s truck crash, the state’s highway chief said Monday.
• Crews had reopened all four I-93 southbound lanes and Roosevelt Circle itself by Friday, more than three days after a truck over the allowable height struck the bridge and inflicted “an incredible amount of damage,” Highway Administrator Jonathan Gulliver told the Department of Transportation’s Board.
• Workers placed shoring towers to stabilize the bridge while they removed the damaged beam and sections of the deck.
• The effort created significant delays for the tens of thousands of drivers who travel through the area on a typical weekday.

by David Gauthier

Madeleine Clement

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