COVID-19 Massachusetts State House Update
- As of Monday night, DPH reported a total of 79,332 cases of COVID-19. The state has now confirmed a total of 5,141 deaths from the virus.
- Governor Baker’s latest extension of his essential work order and stay-at-home advisory is due to expire next Monday, May 18th.
- Governor Baker is asking the Legislature to authorize $1 billion in state spending related to the COVID-19 pandemic, but expressed confidence that the federal government will reimburse Massachusetts for the cost of things like personal protective equipment and temporary field hospitals.
- The Governor said Tuesday that he had filed a supplemental budget because it “gives us the leverage that we need to utilize federal financial support, like aid from FEMA, which can only reimburse state spending resulting from eligible disaster response activities.”
- The bill’s passage, he said, will also “ensure that adequate state spending has been authorized to allow the Commonwealth to continue to support our communities, until additional federal reimbursements are provided.”
- The expenses include payments for many of the areas where the state has been spending during the pandemic: personal protective equipment, rate adjustments for human service providers, incentive pay for state employees on the front lines at certain facilities, costs of temporary field hospitals and shelters, National Guard pay, costs associated with the state’s contact tracing program, emergency child care for essential workers, and increased costs of local housing authorities and of the family and individual shelter system.
- Governor Baker said he expects that the supplemental budget bill (HD 5083) will carry no additional cost for state government in Massachusetts.
- The bill will be referred to the House Ways & Means Committee for further consideration.
- The legislation is attached.
- The House is scheduled to have a remote formal session for Wednesday to enact Governor Baker’s short-term borrowing bill (H 4677) to help the state cover pandemic-related revenue shortfalls for FY 20.
- Roll call votes in the House are scheduled for after 1 p.m. on Wednesday.
- Speaker DeLeo’s office also informed House Democrats on Monday to be prepared to discuss a committee rewrite (H 4039) of Gov. Charlie Baker’s IT bond bill during a remote caucus on Wednesday.
- The Baker administration has been pressing for the bill’s passage for months.
- The speaker’s office did not outline explicit plans or a timeline for consideration of the bill by the full House, but the bills that are the focus of caucus talks often emerge for House consideration shortly thereafter.
- The Senate meets on Thursday in its first formal session since Feb. 27, and new emergency rules will be in effect to allow senators to vote on a short-term borrowing bill while maintaining social distancing.
- The MBTA on Monday afternoon awarded the second-largest contract in the South Coast Rail project, clearing the way for work to begin on the commuter rail spur that will bring service to Freetown and Fall River.
- The $1.1 billion commuter rail expansion project has been years in the making and is designed to bring commuter rail to Taunton and the South Coast cities of Fall River and New Bedford.
- Passenger service is currently expected to begin in November 2023.
- Warning that public health precautions are impossible with prisons and jails at their current population levels, a coalition of legal aid and community groups increased their calls Tuesday for the Baker administration to reduce incarceration and limit COVID-19 risks in correctional facilities.
- Advocates have warned since the start of the outbreak that correctional facilities are vulnerable to the highly infectious disease because of frequent close contact, but public safety officials so far have not taken large-scale steps to release inmates in significant numbers.
- The coalition, which includes groups ranging from the New England Innocence Project to the National Association of Social Workers’ Massachusetts chapter, unveiled new demands that the administration act, arguing Gov. Charlie Baker has broad clemency powers he could deploy while plaintiffs seek relief in the courts.
- Congressional Democrats unveiled the most expansive COVID-19 relief legislation to date Tuesday, calling for nearly $3 trillion in spending to support Americans in dire financial straits and assist state and local governments facing extreme budget pressures.
- Stretching across more than 1,800 pages, the legislation that emerged from the Ways and Means Committee would direct massive amounts of federal dollars toward hospitals, education, tracing the spread of infections, unemployment programs, election funding, direct aid to individuals and families, and more.
- The bill, which would serve as the “Phase Four” of federal relief, would surpass the $2.2 trillion CARES Act as the largest stimulus package in U.S. history if it passed in its entirety.
- That outcome appears unsure at this time with Republican Senate leaders and the White House not supportive at this time.
- Among the largest proposed allocations would be $500 billion to help state governments grapple with the financial impacts of the pandemic.
- Local governments would also receive $375 billion for the same reason, with another $20 billion going to tribal governments and $20 billion more for territories.
- A comprehensive summary is attached.
