Action Alerts

NEXT WEEK: Fair Share Vote, CD-08 Hearing, SCA Phone Bank

Yesterday, the Massachusetts Legislature announced that the Fair Share Amendment will be on the agenda and up for a vote during their Wednesday, June 9th Constitutional Convention!

Before the Fair Share Amendment can be placed on the 2022 ballot, it must be brought up for a vote in a Massachusetts Constitutional Convention twice and receive YES votes from 50% +1 of the legislature.

In 2019, the Fair Share amendment passed its first Con-Con with a 75% YES vote. Next Wednesday’s Constitutional Convention vote is the LAST hurdle before the Fair Share Amendment is OFFICIALLY placed on the ballot.

Here’s what you can do:

1. EMAIL YOUR LEGISLATORS – It is incredibly urgent that every legislator hears from their constituents about how important it is that they vote YES to advance the Fair Share Amendment. Take 30 seconds to email your legislators now!

2. ATTEND A FAIR SHARE KICKOFF EVENT – Over the next few weeks, the Fair Share 2022 Campaign is hosting Fair Share Amendment kickoff events in every corner of the state. Find one near you and urge your friends, family, and social networks to attend these events as well. RSVP for one near you at https://raiseupma.us/events!

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Phone Bank for the Safe Communities Act! 📞📞📞

The Safe Communities Act achieved major progress last year. Building on that momentum, we’re ready to fight for a victory this session.

But we need a supermajority of House and Senate votes to overcome an expected Governor’s veto. That’s two-thirds of each chamber: 107 House votes and 27 Senate votes.

Help us engage constituents in purple districts, so that swing legislators can be confident they have public support when they take that vote.

Join us for a Zoom Phone Bank next Wednesday at 6 pm to constituents in swing districts to generate calls to their legislators! Register here—and don’t forget to invite your friends!

We provide a short training at the beginning, log-in information, and lists for phone banking. You’ll need a computer and phone to participate, and we’ll send you Zoom information on how to join when you RSVP.

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CD-08 Redistricting Hearing: Tuesday, 6/8, 12 pm to 5 pm

The Redistricting Committee will be hosting separate hearings for all nine Congressional Districts. These hearings provide an opportunity for area residents to offer their opinions on local and community interests that the Committee should consider when creating the new legislative districts.

Next Tuesday, the Committee will focus on CD-08.

CD-08 includes all or part of Abington, Avon, Braintree, Bridgewater, Brockton, Canton, Cohasset, Dedham, East Bridgewater, Holbrook, Hingham, Hull, Milton, Norwood, Quincy, Stoughton, Walpole, West Bridgewater, Westwood, Weymouth, Whitman, and the neighborhoods of Beacon Hill, Dorchester, Downtown, Jamaica Plain, South Boston, Roslindale, and West Roxbury in Boston.

Sign up to testify here.

Strengthening Democracy at Home

Each day, we seem to be hearing about new brazen efforts from reactionary state governments across the US to restrict the right to vote.

Strengthening our democracy requires federal action to protect voting rights, but it also requires action here at home. Indeed, while Massachusetts often leads other states across policy areas, we’ve been a laggard on voting rights.

The VOTES Act would change that The bill would make the reforms that worked for voters last fall permanent, like mail-in voting and expanded early voting. And it will do more to ensure administrative barriers to not bar Bay Staters from making their voice heard, with Same Day Registration, reforms to help eligible incarcerated people vote, and more.

The Election Modernization Coalition will be hosting a virtual lobby lunch on the VOTES Act tomorrow — Tuesday, May 11, from noon to 1:30 pm.

You can RSVP for tomorrow’s VOTES Act lobby lunch here.

Also Wanted: Democracy in the MA State House

Back in February, the MA House and MA Senate both passed sets of Joint Rules to govern how the Legislature operates.

But due to opposition to basic transparency measures from the MA House, the Conference Committee negotiating a final set of rules (behind closed doors) has yet to come to an agreement.

The transparency measures passed by the Senate are both essential and non-controversial:

Publishing full committee roll call votes online
Making testimony accessible to the public with appropriate redactions (as with any other public record)
Extending the notice period for hearings to one week

All of these steps will help legislators do their own jobs better and strengthen the participatory nature of our democracy.

There’s so much work to do this session, and the House needs to stop delaying the passage of Joint Rules.

Can you email your state legislators in support of transparency in the Joint Rules?

Representation Matters! Redistricting Training for Trainers

Training Dates: Thursday, May 13, 1 pm to 3 pm & Wednesday, May 19, 6 pm to 8 pm

Join the Drawing Democracy Coalition to learn about the impact of redistricting on your community and how you can help ensure that your community has the power to elect representatives of choice for the next decade.

These workshops will prepare community groups and leaders to engage their members in the redistricting process. Topics covered will include:

How to communicate the importance and process of redrawing district lines with your community
Defining and mapping your community of interest
How to support the Drawing Democracy Coalition’s goal to create a state-wide unity map that empowers immigrants, people of color, and low-income voters.

redistricting transparency voting rights

Charlie Baker Wants to Deny Teachers Emergency Paid Sick Time

Last month — around the one-year anniversary of the declaration of emergency in Massachusetts due to the COVID pandemic — the MA Legislature finally passed a law to allow all workers to access five days of emergency paid sick time for COVID-related sickness, quarantine, caregiving, and vaccination.

Enter: Republican Governor Charlie Baker.

Rather than signing the bill, Baker sent it back with amendments to deny Emergency Paid Sick Time benefits to municipal employees – workers who are on the frontlines of the pandemic response and deserve the same protections as private-sector workers.

At the same time that he is requiring schools to reopen, he is trying to take away vital protections for teachers and staff. And trying to put countless other public workers at risk.

Fortunately, your state senator and state representative don’t need to listen to Baker and can reaffirm their commitment to an equitable recovery.

Please take 2 minutes right now to email your legislator, asking them to oppose Governor Baker’s changes to the Emergency Paid Sick Time legislation.

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A Stunning Degree of Disconnect

Yesterday, when Governor Charlie Baker testified before the Legislature about his administration’s vaccine rollout, there was a stunning degree of disconnect on display.

Baker refused to take any ownership for the failures to date and denied the lack of planning and equity that has been seen and documented across the commonwealth.

As Sen. Jo Comerford said, “This is where we were in two worlds. The committee was in one world. The Baker administration was in another.”

Fortunately, the Legislature can do something about it: they can pass laws.

The Vaccine Equity bill (SD.699 / HD.1283), filed by Senators Becca Rausch and Sonia Chang-Diaz and Representatives Liz Miranda and Mindy Domb, would ensure that equity is prioritized in the vaccine rollout in Massachusetts, recognizing that we can only have a successful recovery if it is an equitable one.

Can you write to your state legislators today about the urgency of passing the Vaccine Equity bill?

Playing by the Best Rules

If the Legislature is going to start diving into the work of the new legislative session in earnest, they need to pass a set of Joint Rules. These Joint Rules govern how committees operate and how bills can proceed.

But due to opposition to basic transparency measures from the MA House, there is no agreement yet on these basic operating procedures.

The transparency measures embraced by the Senate are both essential and non-controversial:

Publishing committee roll call votes online
Making testimony accessible to the public with appropriate redactions (as with any other public record)
Extending the notice period for hearings to one week

All of these steps will help legislators do their own jobs better and strengthen the participatory nature of our democracy.

A Conference Committee of three senators and three representatives is currently negotiating what that final set of Joint Rules will look like.

Can you email the Conference Committee today in support of an open and transparent process?

(If the auto-fill email above doesn’t appear, you can use the template here.)

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A Quick Action for You to Take Today

Today, the MA House will be voting on a bill (H.89) that will provide workers with access to emergency paid sick leave and offer targeted tax relief to unemployed individuals. Both of these are vital parts of an equitable economic recovery and pandemic response and should be celebrated. And the achievement of emergency paid sick time is only possible because of the work of activists like you across the commonwealth.

Unfortunately, the bill also contains a misguided “Double Dip” tax break for profitable businesses.

Under current law, businesses that receive Paycheck Protection Program funds won’t pay taxes on that money. Under proposed language, they would be able to deduct expenses paid for with those funds. In other words, profitable corporations would be able to write off expenses they paid for with money they didn’t have. Even former Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin (!) recognized the problem here, once referring to the issue as “Tax 101”: “you don’t get to deduct expenses that someone else paid for.”

The cost of this tax break could be upwards of $330 million — money that we could be investing in our public schools, our public transit, and our public health infrastructure instead.

Fortunately, Representatives Erika Uyterhoeven (D-Somerville) and Mike Connolly (D-Cambridge) filed two amendments to address this: