We believe public policy should be informed by data, evidence, and accurate information, and that policymakers should be transparent and accountable to the public. We do our work across three independent divisions—the MassINC Policy Center, our civic news organization CommonWealth Beacon, and our subsidiary company, The MassINC Polling Group.
Our Mission
MassINC’s mission is to make Massachusetts a place of civic vitality and inclusive economic opportunity by providing residents with the nonpartisan research, reporting, analysis, and civic engagement necessary to understand policy choices, inform decision making, and hold the government accountable.
Our Vision
A commonwealth of Massachusetts in which all our residents have freely available and easily accessible information they need to be deeply engaged in our democratic process and in their communities.
Commitment to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion
We are committed to advancing equitable access to opportunities and to addressing barriers and structural systems that perpetuate inequity. To achieve this, we encourage robust debate, shaped by a wide range of lived experiences and informed opinions.
Core Values
- Impact — We produce work that informs, engages, and makes an important difference in the commonwealth and the lives of its residents.
- Civic-minded — We are committed to wide-ranging public participation and engagement in our community, a value that is strongly aligned with achieving impact.
- Evidence-driven — We believe in the vital role of data, facts, and evidence in public discourse.
- Collaboration — We believe our partnerships, talents, and collective resources help us to fulfill our mission and vision and achieve impact.
- Independence — We aim to carry out our work free from undue influence of outside interests. While we share a common governance, vision, and mission, our Policy Center, journalism enterprise, and Polling Group operate independently of one another.
- Transparency — We hold ourselves accountable to the public by disclosing information on donors, supporters, and other potential conflicts.
Our History
MassINC was founded in 1996 by a small group of civic and business leaders who believed that Massachusetts was missing accurate, thorough, and unbiased information to inform policymaking. They set out to create an organization that met this need with a particular focus on building ladders to the middle class for all Massachusetts residents.
Over the years, we have achieved impact through nonpartisan research from our Policy Center, survey research from The MassINC Polling Group, and independent reporting of politics, ideas, and civic life from CommonWealth Beacon.
The MassINC Policy Center is distinguished by its rigorous research, extensive statewide network, expertise in how state and local government works, and a thoroughly collaborative approach.
The MassINC Policy Center is distinguished by its rigorous research, extensive state-wide network, expertise in how state and local government works, and thoroughly collaborative approach. Our research is accessible to the public and policymakers and provides actionable recommendations that move the needle on long-standing challenges. We have demonstrated a record of achievement in education and workforce development, housing and economic development, transportation, criminal justice and public safety, among other issue areas.
In a seminal 2007 report, the MassINC Policy Center drew attention to the overlooked needs and potential of urban communities outside of Greater Boston. This research coined the term Gateway Cities and launched a statewide movement to strengthen these vital regional economic centers. Since 2010, the MassINC Policy Center has worked to support and sustain these collaborative efforts through the work of the Gateway Cities Innovation Institute.
From 1996 to 2018, CommonWealth Magazine provided must-read long-form journalism covering public policy, politics, and civic life through a quarterly publication in print. In 2009, we launched the CommonWealth website—enabling us to offer readers more frequent articles on a free digital platform with a variety of news and editorial products. These products included long-form journalism, the Download newsletter, and the Codcast, our long-running podcast on Massachusetts politics and policy. Our opinion page became the leading platform for civic dialogue and debate on the issues of the day. In 2018, we stopped printing the quarterly magazine and committed to a fully digital news platform.
In 2020, we began planning for how we could grow our news platform while building a more sustainable revenue model. Like publications across the country, we found ourselves confronting the many challenges of sustaining high quality, nonpartisan journalism in the digital era. We researched best practices around the country, crafted a vision for a larger and more impactful publication, and began raising seed funding to launch. Those efforts culminated on November 1st, 2023 with the launch of CommonWealth Beacon. As part of this rebrand, we hired two new journalists, our first Director of Audience Engagement and a new Director of Development. We’ve committed to building a sustainable, high-quality news publication for the people of Massachusetts.
The MassINC Polling Group, was founded in 2010 as a for-profit subsidiary, to provide nonpartisan polling for MassINC and other clients while generating revenue for our non-profit. Today, The MassINC Polling Group has a range of mission-driven business and nonprofit clients, along with a growing number of government contracts designed to evaluate and improve the delivery of public programs and services. While its roots are in Massachusetts, MPG now serves clients across the country. It is routinely rated as one of the most accurate pollsters in the country by the website 538. MPG’s president, Steve Koczela, is a frequent guest on news programs discussing polls and politics and hosts the podcast, The Horse Race.
MassINC and CommonWealth Beacon continue to be places where voices from all sides and perspectives can be heard, where bold ideas can surface and be debated, and where the answers to Massachusetts’ most pressing questions continue to be sought.