An Act Relative to Neighborhood Stabilization and Economic Development

The Gateway Cities Journal

Gateway City legislators gathered yesterday to unveil An Act Relative to Neighborhood Stabilization and Economic Development. Filed by Representative Antonio Cabral (House Docket 3507) and Senator Brendan Crighton (Senate Docket 1578), the bill furthered the ideas for strengthening blighted and distressed neighborhoods that MassINC and the Massachusetts Association of Community Development Corporations assembled last fall

Unveiling Gateway City Neighborhood Stabilization Bill

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Last week the Gateway Cities Legislative Caucus filed an omnibus bill to provide communities with more powerful tools to address blighted and abandoned property and stabilize distressed neighborhoods across the Commonwealth. This legislation includes all of the major tools described in a neighborhood stabilization policy blueprint that we developed collaboratively with Gateway City housing leaders over the

House bill quietly filed on education funding

Added payments for low-income students emerging as key difference

WHILE BIG EDUCATION funding bills filed by Gov. Charlie Baker and a key state senator have garnered lots of attention, a third school financing bill was quietly filed in the House last week that also proposes a sweeping update of the state’s 26-year-old education aid formula. Rep. Paul Tucker, a Salem Democrat, submitted legislation hours

New CommonWealth Hires

Betancourt and Metzger will join Mohl and Executive Editor Michael Jonas at CommonWealth

MassINC’s CommonWealth magazine is hiring two reporters – Sarah Betancourt and Andy Metzger. “At a time when most news outlets are shrinking, these two new hires affirm CommonWealth’s commitment to local journalism,” said Bruce Mohl, the editor of the online magazine. Betancourt is a bilingual journalist (English-Spanish) who has previously been a reporter for the

Riley proposes novel solution to charter school battle

Education officials hope agreement on New Bedford school will be a model

WHEN JEFF RILEY was named state education commissioner a year ago this month, he vowed to try to heal the divisions that have plagued the education world — between charter school advocates and foes, between those in favor of high-stakes testing and those looking to end the state’s testing regime. In his first big stab

Building Communities of Promise and Possibility

The Gateway Cities Journal

Housing leaders gathered with members of the Gateway Cities Legislative Caucus on Wednesday for a breakfast forum on neighborhood stabilization policy. Together they reviewed a strategy blueprint for comprehensive state and local neighborhood revitalization efforts that we hope will become a major focus in the 2019-2020 legislative session. The arguments for making neighborhood stabilization a

Study suggests Massachusetts’ “other” housing problem is worsening

Blighted and abandoned housing presents serious challenges for Gateway City neighborhoods

Boston – Skyrocketing costs and lack of affordable homes in Greater Boston’s strong housing market absorb the attention of policymakers and political leaders, yet Massachusetts also has many weak real estate markets, where low home values make it uneconomical to maintain older housing stock. This results in blighted and abandoned property, triggering further disinvestment and

Momentum growing for ed funding bill

Will measure include other reform provisions?

SIX MONTHS AFTER the clock ran out on negotiations to revamp the state’s education funding formula, a broad coalition of lawmakers, mayors, and school leaders unveiled legislation on Wednesday to finish that work in the new session now underway on Beacon Hill. “There are no more excuses,” said Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, co-chair of the Legislature’s

State and Local Blueprints for Comprehensive Neighborhood Stabilization

New report calls attention to Massachusetts’ “other housing problem.”

In recent years, much attention has been trained on Greater Boston’s tight housing market and the increasingly severe difficulty residents have finding affordable housing in the region. There is much less awareness of the very different challenge faced by residents of weak market neighborhoods, where housing is much less expensive but conditions are physically, socially,

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