The Fight for Racial Justice and Equity is Year-Round

Yesterday, on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, politicians across the Commonwealth (and the country) honored Martin Luther King, Jr., for his commitment to racial equity and social justice.

It was a reminder of how much work we still have to do here in Massachusetts to deliver on his vision, and how we need to demand that elected officials follow through with their rhetoric from yesterday all 365 days of the year.

Three Quick Actions You Can Take Today

(1) Write to Your State Rep in Support of the VOTES Act

While Congress remains stalemated on voting rights action due to Republican and conservative Democratic (we’re looking at you, Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema) opposition, we have important action to take here in MA.

Last fall, the MA Senate passed the VOTES Act, which would make pandemic voting reforms like expanded mail-in voting and expanded early voting permanent as well as enact Same Day Voter Registration and stronger protections for jail-based voting. But the House needs to take action too. Write to your state representative today — and if you already have recently, follow up with them.

(2) Write to the Public Safety Committee in support of the Safe Communities Act.

Immigrant justice and racial justice are deeply intertwined. Longstanding state and local involvement in deportations discourages immigrants from seeking medical care, and prevents immigrant victims and witnesses from seeking police and court protection. Many immigrants—and their children—fear that seeking help from local authorities will result in deportation and family separation.

That’s why we need the Safe Communities Act. Send an email to the Joint Committee on Public Safety about why it’s time to pass the SCA.

(3) Pledge to be a Fair Share Voter: For years, Massachusetts’ communities of color have been harmed by inequitable and inadequate access to transportation and public education. Now, the pandemic has heightened these economic and racial inequities that prevent shared prosperity.

The Fair Share Amendment is a transformative opportunity to raise revenue to build a more equitable commonwealth by investing in public education and transportation. Pledge your support for Fair Share today!

Wednesday, Jan 19, 4 pm: Legislative Briefing on No Cost Calls

This Wednesday, the MA Legislature’s Criminal Justice Reform Caucus is hosting a “NO COST CALLS” legislative briefing, open to the public. RSVP here.

They are partnering with the No Cost Calls Coalition and Prisoners’ Legal Services to explain how this legislation will remove barriers to communication between incarcerated people and their loved ones as Connecticut, New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego Counties have already done. Join this briefing to hear firsthand accounts of the hardships that phone charges impose and the benefits of facilitating family contact. Worth Rises, based on its experience in jurisdictions that have already eliminated charges, will present a fiscal analysis showing how cost-effective this legislation would be.

Thursday, Jan 20, 7 pm: #NoNewWomensPrison Virtual Forum

Join this Thursday to learn more about S.2030/H.1905, An Act Establishing A [5-year] Jail and Prison Construction Moratorium, and how to take action to support it. The forum will discuss what this bill does and doesn’t do, how it would be implemented, and what it would mean for Massachusetts to invest $50 million into communities, instead of incarceration.

Featured speakers include bill sponsors Sen. Jo Comerford and Rep. Chynah Tyler along with Mahtowin Munro of the United American Indians of New England, and Andrea James of Families for Justice as Healing and The National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls.

RSVP here.

No New Womens Prison Event Graphic

Whether or not you can make it, take a moment to email your legislators about the prison moratorium bill here.


In solidarity, Jonathan Cohn
Policy Director
Progressive Massachusetts

PS: Our annual member meeting is THIS SATURDAY, 1 PM TO 4 PM. Have you RSVPed?

Request that A&F Revise Upwards Goals on Minority and Women’s Hiring on Construction

Progressive Mass signed on to this letter organized by the Coalition for Equal Access to Jobs / Massachusetts Communities Action Network.

January 13, 2021
Michael Heffernan
Secretary of Administration and Finance
State House
Boston, MA 02133
Dear Secretary Heffernan,


The last time the Executive Office of Administration and Finance set goals on hiring of people of color and women on construction jobs was on March 18, 2009. At that time it was set for 15.3% for minorities and 6.9% for women. This was in Administrative Bulletin #14 issued by A&F at www.mass.gov/administrative-bulletin/equal-opportunity-and-non-discrimination-on-state-and-state-assisted-construction-contracts-af-14

Today more than 11 years later, 2020 census data for our state shows it’s 67.6% White, 12.6% Hispanic, 7.2 % Asian, just under 7% Black and 4.7% identifying with two or more groups. SO WE NOW HAVE DOUBLE THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE OF COLOR THAN WHEN A&F LAST SET THESE FIGURES IN 2009.

Additionally, women comprise over 50% of the workforce but less than 4% of building trades workers in Massachusetts. Two recent disparity studies in Springfield and Worcester suggest that at least 9% of women workers have skills transferable to the construction trades. And, we have now seen a rise of women apprentices in union building trades programs to over 10%. We are calling on you to issue a new Administrative Bulletin increasing hiring goals for people of color and women and we would like to meet with you on this issue.

Massachusetts will soon be getting an estimated over $9.3 billion in funds under the Bi-Partisan Infrastructure bill. So let’s get a new Administrative Bulletin so with the increase in jobs from this new funding that will benefit all, so people of color and women could get a fair share of the jobs, if you make and enforce new goals.

We as community groups, unions, civil rights, and social service agencies, local governments call on you to issue a new updated Administrative Bulletin on Equal Opportunity and Non-discrimination on State and State-Assisted Construction Contracts and meet with us on this.


You can reach us at (617) 470-2912, LewFinfer@gmail.com


Sincerely,
NAACP, New England Conference
Greater Boston Building Trades Unions
Building Pathways
La Collaborativa (Chelsea)
Massachusetts Association of CDC’s
Project Right (Boston)
Essex County Community Organization
Pioneer Valley Project (Springfield)
Progressive Resistance Boston
Worcester Interfaith
I Have A Future (Boston)
MA Communities Action Network
YouthBuild Boston
Madison Park Development Corporation
The Neighborhood Developers
350 Mass
Progressive Massachusetts
Action for Equity

cc Jamey Tesler, Secretary of Transportation
James Cowdell, Deputy Chief of Staff at A&F
Gary Blank, Chief Adminstrative Officer, DOT

Public Testimony of 53 Organizations Submitted to The Special Commission on Department of Correction and Sheriff’s Department Funding

Prison

Progressive Mass was a signer to the following testimony organized by Prisoners’ Legal Services – MA. Read the full testimony here.

The mission of the Correctional Funding Commission is a critical one for the good of the Commonwealth. We spend approximately $1.3 billion each year to incarcerate 13,000 people. This means that we are spending approximately $100,000 a year to incarcerate each person currently behind bars – and the Executive Branch projects $732 million to repair, renovate, or replace prisons and jails on top of that. The critical question we must collectively ask is: what is the purpose of this spending, and is this purpose being served?

The charge of the Correctional Funding Commission is, in part, to conduct a comprehensive study to determine the appropriate level of funding for incarceration in the Commonwealth. Unfortunately, as of the public hearing on January 4, 2022, the Commission had not yet discussed “potential ways to increase efficiencies and reduce fixed costs,” a critical component of the analysis. The undersigned believe the Commission can only advance the public interest if its recommendations on spending for the Department of Correction (DOC) and Sheriffs’ Departments are backed up by robust independent oversight mechanisms that provide transparency and accountability to Commonwealth residents.

For decades, we have been attempting to incarcerate our way out of social problems while failing to comprehend crime as primarily driven by poverty and structural racism. Abundant research shows that high levels of incarceration do not increase public safety. Conversely, investing in communities has proven to be extremely successful in reducing violence and the risk of incarceration. The current and long-standing reality is that the Legislature awards ever-larger budgets to the DOC and Sheriffs without requiring measurable and meaningful outcomes for public safety, public health, or the public good. 

“I can think of nothing more disruptive to a child’s education than an unexpected move because of a large increase in rent.”

Rent Control Now

The following testimony is from Keith Bernard, Malden School Committee Member and co-chair of Mystic Valley Progressives.

Thank you, Chairs Rep Arciero and Senator Keenan and all the members of the joint committee on Housing. I’d also like to thank and appreciate my  fellow elected officials activists and renters in Massachusetts that have testified already in favor of these bills.

My name is Keith Bernard, a member of the Malden School Committee and I am here to state my support for the following bills:  H.1378/S.886, sponsored by Reps. Mike Connolly and Nika Elugardo and Sen. Adam Gomez, H.1440/S.889, sponsored by Rep. Dave Rogers and Sen. Patricia Jehlen.

Malden is the 5th most diverse community in the state and our high school is the most diverse in the state.  We speak over 60 different languages in our school systems.  Malden also has a large population that do not own their home but rent.  Over 55% of housing in our city is rental properties, our rental rates have nearly doubled in the last ten years, and it is getting more difficult for our working families to stay in Malden.

I can think of nothing more disruptive to a child’s education than an unexpected move because of a large increase in rent.  If a family is lucky, they may be able to find housing in our city, but that is unlikely.  When a student leaves us, it means that the family needs to go through the stress of re-enrollment and the child acclimating to a new school system.  If the child has an IEP or other necessary services, that family has the additional stress of getting those services in place.  Finally the emotional impact that a child experiences being uprooted from their friends and neighborhood that not only affects that child, but the children and community around them.

On a personal note, I’ve been volunteering with many of the mutual aid community groups that arose during these last two years.  There is nothing more heartbreaking than finding out a neighboring family that I had an opportunity to help had to move because of an unexpected rise of housing costs.  

Most families are not looking for a hand out but a hand up.  We are looking to you, the members of this committee, to allow municipalities to sculpt solutions that work for their community.  What works for Boston may not work for Malden or Medford or Worcester or Pittsfield.  Each community has its own officials and local representation that can “right-size” a solution for their town or city.

I ask that the committee please keep these thoughts in mind when considering implementing rent control.  By stabilizing the cost of rentals, we stabilize those families, we keep our children safe and we protect our communities.  And by implementing these bills we allow the people who know best, our local cities and towns the ability to implement the best solution for our individual towns & cities.  

I strongly encourage the committee to support and endorse passage of  H.1378/S.886, sponsored by Reps. Mike Connolly and Nika Elugardo and Sen. Adam Gomez, H.1440/S.889, sponsored by Rep. Dave Rogers and Sen. Patricia Jehlen.

Respectfully,

Keith Bernard

Malden School Committee, Ward 7

(Photo credit: Boston Globe)

MA Needs to Lift the Ban on Rent Control

Rent Control Now

Today, most Massachusetts residents will be experiencing subzero temperatures due to wind chill.

And too many working-class people will have to decide whether they can afford sufficient heating (or sufficient winter clothing) and still afford next month’s rent, a decision no one should have to make.

At the same time, we’re in the midst of a pandemic that has made clear that quarantining at home is impossible if you don’t have a home to go back to, and that too many workers are faced with the dire choice of going into work while sick or not having enough money to pay rent.

What both show is that we need to be doing far more for housing stability in our state amidst escalating rents and the displacement that results.

This morning, the MA Legislature will hear testimony on the Tenant Protection Act (S.886/H.1378), a bill from Sen. Adam Gomez and Reps. Mike Connolly and Nika Elugardo that would lift the statewide ban on rent control and enable municipalities to take action to support housing stability in line with the needs and conditions of each community.

No one policy is a silver bullet, but local leaders need to have every tool in the toolbox to address our housing crisis.

Here are ways that you can show support for the bill:

(Photo credit: Boston Globe)

Take Action: We Need to Strengthen Democracy Here in MA

One year ago today (Jan. 6, 2021), right-wing extremists, aided by our ex-president, assaulted the Capitol building in an attempt to overturn the election results and subvert our democracy.

It’s a timely day to reflect on democracy and how it needs strengthening at all levels. And, yes, that means here in MA, too.

The central principle of democracy is that every person’s voice matters. And far too often, communities of color and working-class communities face unnecessary, arbitrary, and sometimes insurmountable barriers to making their voice heard. And we are all worse off because of it.

In Massachusetts, we haven’t been a leader on voting rights. The COVID elections package from 2020 finally brought us up to where many other states have been for years, with expanded options to vote by mail and to vote early. But the Legislature let that expire.

Our neighbors in Maine and New Hampshire have had Same Day Registration for decades, but Massachusetts still has an arbitrary voter registration cutoff, rooted in anti-immigrant sentiment from a century ago.

And despite the fact that many individuals incarcerated in prisons and jails maintain the right to vote, that right often doesn’t exist in practice due to misinformation and indifference from correctional officers.

We can do better. And we need to do better.

The MA Senate played its part, passing the VOTES Act in October. The VOTES Act not only makes vote-by-mail and expanded early voting permanent but also goes further by eliminating our arbitrary, exclusionary voter registration cutoff and strengthening protections for jail-based voting.

Tell your state rep it’s time to pass the VOTES Act now.

MA Needs a Decisive, Equity-Centered Response to the Winter COVID Surge

COVID graphic

With the onset of a new COVID-19 variant, we are seeing a frightening rise in Covid-19 cases, including growing hospitalizations and deaths. We need decisive action and communication at the State level to prevent much more avoidable illness and death.

Thankfully, nearly two years into the pandemic, we have a range of public health tools, including vaccines, that can reduce the spread of COVID-19 and enable us to have a safer New Year. Stopping the spread of COVID is essential to the safe and consistent functioning of our schools and businesses.

Can you write to Governor Baker and your legislators in support of bold, equity-focused action?


Please use your voice to support a comprehensive public health approach — along the lines of the Massachusetts Covid19 Action Plan. Last month, Senator Becca Rausch (D-Needham) and a dozen state legislative colleagues delivered a letter to Governor Baker urging the administration to adopt a slate of data-driven public health policies set forth in a Massachusetts COVID-19 Action Plan, crafted and endorsed by a coalition of over 100 public health and medical professionals and 36 community organizations, to curb the spread of COVID-19 in the Commonwealth.

Can you write to Governor Baker and your legislators in support of bold, equity-focused action?

What this includes:

  • Funding and staffing daily mobile vaccination clinics in frontline communities and school-based vaccine clinics
  • Making testing widely available and distributing free rapid tests
  • Implementing a county-based mask mandate according to CDC recommendations
  • Providing free high-quality masks, like KF94, KN95, and N95, to frontline communities
  • Applying safety standards in the workplace that mitigate aerosol transmission through ventilation
    and/or air filtration, appropriate distancing, and masking
  • Applying and enforcing federal and state occupational safety standards and guidelines.
  • Protecting against foreclosures, evictions, and rent increases to decrease home crowding using the
    measures in H.1434 and S.89
  • Adhering to CDC guidance for universal masking in schools regardless of vaccination status
  • Making remote learning options available so infected or ill children do not get left behind.

What You Can Do Next

  • Give Governor Baker a call at (617) 725-4005.
  • And then tweet at him at @MassGovernor and the State House Leadership: MA needs decisive action to address the winter surge. @MassGovernor, @KarenSpilka, and @RonMariano, please listen to & follow public health leaders’ recommendations at https://tinyurl.com/MACOVIDResponse. #mapoli

Redistricting 2021

Curious what your new districts will look like when you go to the polls next year? Here’s an overview of how MA’s legislative districts changed. If you don’t see your district on here, that means it didn’t change.

NOTE: All precinct numbering in the below spreadsheets refer to the precincts as they existed 2012-2021. Go here for the new numbering.


RSVP Now! Progressive Mass’s 2022 Annual Member Meeting

PM 2022 Member Meeting

2022 is going to be an eventful year. We’re kicking it off with our annual member meeting on Saturday, January 22, from 1 pm to 4 pm. We’ll have an update on our work from the past year as well as what’s in store for 2022. We’ll also be featuring interviews with 2022 Gubernatorial and Lt. Gubernatorial candidates.

Progressive Mass 2022 Annual Member Meeting

Saturday, January 22

1 pm to 4 pm

Zoom link upon RSVP

The first segment of the Annual Members Meeting will offer members updates on our organization, plans, and a chance to meet nominees for the Board (to be voted on after). The remainder, the bulk of the meeting, is open to all for the candidate interviews.

Not yet a member? Become one today!

Not sure if you’re a member? Check your status here.

Get to hear from major 2022 candidates!

Gubernatorial candidates confirmed so far:

  • Harvard professor Danielle Allen
  • State Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz

AG Maura Healey has been invited — awaiting final confirmation.

LG candidates confirmed so far:

  • Businessman Bret Bero
  • Mayor Kim Driscoll
  • State Rep Dr. Tami Gouveia
  • State Sen. Adam Hinds
  • State Sen. Eric Lesser

These interviews are going to be key because we will be inviting our members to vote on an endorsement shortly thereafter.