The legislature is back for the final six months of the 2023-2024 session, and the FY 2025 budget process is in full swing. On Wednesday, Gov. Healey presented her second budget. While managing through the first difficult fiscal year in a long time, the administration’s blueprint makes bold investments in Gateway Cities. Here’s a quick
Sec. Augustus hits stride with new plans and policies to combat the housing crisis
The Gateway Cities Journal
With housing front and center for state leaders in 2024, MassINC’s policy team hosted Housing Sec. Ed Augustus for a virtual discussion with Gateway City leaders. Participants included 15 mayors and managers along with 60 senior municipal staff representing 23 municipalities. Highlights of the discussion: “Do more, quicker.” Augustus said Gov. Healey charged his team
GC Journal: Gov, Legislature deliver big for Gateway Cities
The Gateway Cities Journal
Wednesday, Governor Healey signed into law a tax cut package negotiated by the House and Senate that includes some big wins for Gateway City residents, businesses, and investors. Most notably, An Act to improve the Commonwealth’s competitiveness, affordability, and equity (H.4104) includes a longstanding MassINC policy recommendation to scale up the wildly successful Housing Development
Beacon Hill Roars Back to Life
The Gateway Cities Journal
Summer recess is a distant memory as Beacon Hill roars back to life. Monday featured two prime-time hearings with major implications for Gateway Cities. Lynn Mayor Jared Nicholson appeared before the education committee to testify in support of legislation to remedy inequitable flaws in school construction funding. Filed by Lynn Rep. Dan Cahill and Sen. Brendan Crighton,
Celebrating summer in the city
Last weekend the Latin American Festival returned to Worcester Common for its 31st annual run. The event is a bookend of sorts, as Worcester started the summer by hosting the largest and oldest Albanian Festival in America. These revelries are by no means unique to New England’s second-largest city. Summer in the Gateway Cities stands out for its full blossom
Midsummer/midsession updates from the Gateway Cities Innovation Institute
The Gateway Cities Journal
With the first post-Question 1 budget under development and major tax reform packages moving through the legislature, these last few weeks leading up to the summer recess have been especially consequential for Gateway Cities. Here is our take on where things stand as we turn the corner into the second half of the 2023-2024 legislative
Secretary Hao Meets with Gateway City Leaders
The Gateway Cities Journal
Last week, MassINC hosted a wide-ranging virtual conversation with Yvonne Hao, the Secretary of Economic Development, together with mayors and senior staff from Gateway Cities across the state. Given the critical importance of sustaining the very positive collaborative working relationship that Gateway City leaders established with the Patrick Administration and built upon through the Baker
Senate tax bill spurs mixed-income housing production
The Gateway Cities Journal
This week the Massachusetts Senate revealed its much-anticipated tax relief package. Mirroring language from Governor Healey’s proposal, the bill includes provisions increasing the Housing Development Incentive Program (HDIP) to $57 million in FY 24 to clear a lengthy backlog of pending projects, followed by $30 million annually each year thereafter. MassINC anticipates that this expansion
The Senate makes bold investment in regional transit
The Gateway Cities Journal
Inadequate public transportation has long been a shared concern for Gateway City leaders across the state. Many of their residents are simply trapped on nights and weekends, when bus service is either extremely infrequent or entirely unavailable. This has serious implications for individual health and wellbeing. It also reduces the available workforce, and regional economic
Amendment to House budget seeks to untap Gateway City housing reservoir
The Gateway Cities Journal
The House Ways & Means Committee unveiled its FY24 budget and an accompanying tax package last week. The pair of bills call for investing more than $1 billion to respond to the state’s housing crisis. This is roughly double the state’s annual housing spend pre-COVID. Unfortunately, the House departed from the Healey administration and left