DEERFIELD — It’s “interesting times” on Beacon Hill, state Sen. Adam Hinds told a Franklin County Chamber of Commerce’s annual legislative breakfast Friday.
Among the matters that made it interesting for Hinds and other legislators from the county’s delegation were the state’s highest court’s ruling against a ballot question that would have provided a “millionaire’s tax;” the U.S. Supreme Court decision allowing online retailers to be ordered to pay state sales tax; a “grand bargain” between legislators, the governors and state business groups that will provide for a minimum wage hike; an annual August “tax holiday;” paid family sick leave; and no push for a sales tax reduction.
Among the most “interesting” elements at Friday’s event, attracting more than 100 business, local and regional leaders to Eaglebrook School, was the presence of recently retired state Sen. Stanley Rosenberg. The sight of Rosenberg in the audience — instead of at the head dais as a presenter — drew a standing ovation at the outset.
Hinds, D-Pittsfield, the only senator remaining in the Franklin County delegation, recapped the current year’s legislation highlights, along with Reps. Stephen Kulik, D-Worthington; Paul Mark, D-Peru; and Susannah Whipps, I-Athol, focusing on the legislation that will boost the hourly minimum wage from $11 to $15 over five years and provide a $1 billion paid family and medical leave program backed by a payroll tax while rolling back time-and-a-half pay for working Sundays and holidays.
There’s also a compromise to provide retailers with an annual August sales tax holiday in exchange for not placing an income tax reduction question on the November ballot.
“We left this week with a lot of people incredibly happy on both sides, on all sides, and a lot of people incredibly concerned and disappointed on all sides,” Hinds told those gathered. “So typically, that’s a sign something is going in the right direction. What’s important also is that when you look at the overall impact, and we’re talking about somewhere in the nature of 1 million people experiencing movement toward a living wage.”
Hinds added, “In my position, our position, every single day, people are telling us every single day that they have to have three jobs, and they can’t actually be there for their family, and on and on. Taking these steps and doing it in a careful, methodical way, is critical. And by the way, with people standing behind you with guns to the heads saying, ‘If you don’t do this, we’re going to go ahead with our own ballot initiative,’ which you don’t like. So this is an important process that’s come in for a landing this week.”
Hinds, who also said he’s feeling “pretty optimistic” over the state’s startup, “as we move toward 2020” of a pilot rail connection linking Greenfield with Springfield and Connecticut, which he said could have “tremendous impacts throughout the region,” as well as broadband service to every town in western and central Massachusetts.
A major step forward, he added, is rural sparsity school aid, which he said was included for the first time in the Senate’s version of the budget and is now in conference committee.
Kulik, a member of that committee, said in his remarks that the budget the committee hopes to work out by the July 1 start of the fiscal year appears to be “better news” than in those of the last two years, when Massachusetts was seeing continued revenue declines.
Now, with state revenues ahead of benchmarks, Kulik said, “I think we have a little more robust budget, with common ground between House and Senate figures for local aid and school aid,” even though there are differences in the policy details.
Kulik agreed with Hinds that the “grand bargain” legislation “is so important … I can’t emphasize how good it is for the business community. It’s good for your employees, for sure, for working people, in terms of family leave and the minimum wage,” but it’s also good because of agreements not to proceed with ballot question petitions on those issues and a sales tax reduction to 5 percent.
“I think we know that doing complicated public policy through a popular referendum is not the best way to do it,” he said over what would have been “very contentiously fought” issues. Businesses with fewer than 25 employees are exempt from having to pay into the trust fund, along with their workers, for a family leave trust fund.
The added benefit, he said, was that the state can avoid ballot questions that polling showed had a lot of support, thereby averting an estimated $1.2 billion loss in sales tax — with resulting cuts in education, transportation and human service spending — if the rate had been approved by voters to drop from 6.25 to 5 percent.
Marks, who is House chairman of the Legislature’s Redistricting Committee, offered a more dire warning, with slow population growth in western Massachusetts likely translating to an expansion of the congressional districts that include parts of the region after the 2020 Census results are counted.
“That’s not great news for us, because our members of Congress are going to represent bigger areas, and they’re going to be harder to see … Here in Franklin County, especially, it’s easy to be overlooked,” said Mark, adding that the population losses relative to the rest of the state will also likely translate into larger state House and Senate districts as well.
“So when the census happens in 2020, it is important that we make sure that we all fill it out, that we encourage everybody we know to fill it out and that we get engaged if there are events to try and promote census participation,” said Mark, emphasizing that the results affect hundreds of funding programs as well as representation. “In the (political) climate right now, there are people that might not want to report … We have to encourage them to do so.
“Do not do that; that is a bad idea,” Mark warned for anyone considering not participating in the census as a protest over new questions about citizenship. “You aren’t helping anybody. You’re only hurting all of us.”
Whipps outlined the ways she and other legislators have been asked to help their constituents, through one-on-one assistance and programs that address human services.
She said one of the most frequent calls she receives in her office are from parents “with children who are struggling with substance misuse disorder. Those calls come often; they continue to come on a weekly basis. A lot of parents are raising grandchildren while their children are struggling with substance abuse disorder.”
Whipps praised the work of the Franklin County Opioid Task Force and said, “We’re light years ahead of what other agencies are doing, as far as reducing the stigma, making sure that people have access to treatment as well as recovery options.”
She also pointed to the Greater Athol Area Mental Health Association’s peer recovery home, the Quabbin Retreat day program and residential program in Petersham, along with an adolescent and young adult treatment center that’s planned.