Happening Today
Fuel assistance, Forcepoint, and more
— The Massachusetts chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations will host its second annual Muslim Lobby Day, State House, 9 a.m.
— Union of Minority Neighborhoods hosts a press conference to demand the release of the $30 million appropriated by the Legislature last year for fuel assistance to the poor, outside Governor’s Office, 11 a.m.
— Boston City Council President Andrea Campbell is interviewed on ‘Boston Public Radio,’ WGBH-FM 89.7, 12 p.m.
— Public officials will gather for a reading of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘A Letter From Birmingham Jail’ outside Boston City Hall, hosted by El Mundo’s Boston publisher Albert Vasallo III, with Suffolk District Attorney Rachael Rollins, Massachusetts AFL-CIO President Steve Tolman and others expected to attend, Boston City Hall Plaza, 4 p.m.
— U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley participates in an ‘Equity Agenda Forum’ on transportation inequities, 227 Marginal St #1, Chelsea, 6 p.m.
— Gov. Charlie Baker, U.S. Sen. Edward Markey, former National Security Agency Director Admiral Mike Rogers, Raytheon CEO Dr. Tom Kennedy and Forcepoint CEO Matt Moynahan gather for the Forcepoint Cyber Experience Center launch and ribbon cutting ceremony, Raytheon Forcepoint, 22 Thomson Place, Boston, 6 p.m.
For more calendar listings, check out State House News Service’s Daily Advances (pay wall – free trial subscriptions available) and MassterList’s Beacon Hill Town Square below.
Today’s Stories
Notre Dame fire: ‘We will rebuild this cathedral’
The Washington Post has a good, straight-forward report this morning on what was saved and not saved as a result of the shocking inferno that consumed the iconic Notre Dame cathedral in Paris yesterday.
The Boston Globe also has photos and videos of the heartbreaking fire that had so many glued to their TV, cell and computer screens yesterday. Some good news amid the sorrow: Hundreds of millions of dollars have already been pledged to rebuild Notre Dame. … Now on to all things local.
Weld: ‘I’m in!’
Saying it was his duty to challenge President Trump, former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld made it official yesterday: He’s running for president as a Republican, reports Kimberly Atkins at WBUR. “I really think if we have six more years of the same stuff we’ve had out the White House the last two years, that would be a political tragedy and I would fear for the republic,” Weld said. “So I would be ashamed of myself if I didn’t raise my hand and run.”
Danny McDonald at the Globe and Melissa Hanson at MassLive have more on Weld’s announcement.
Warren’s latest policy-wonk proposal: Protecting public lands and seas
U.S. Elizabeth Warren continues to set the public-policy pace in the Dem contest for president, yesterday unveiling a major proposal to protect public lands and block offshore drilling, reports the NYT. The Globe’s Jess Bidgood notes Warren’s latest policy-wonk proposal comes as she heads to Colorado and Utah to campaign.
She may not be doing well in polls, but we continue to believe these proposals will help Warren in the long run. We’ll see.
Wait: Biden no longer on top?
Speaking of Elizabeth Warren and polls, a new Emerson survey shows Bernie Sanders now leading the Democratic pack for president, overtaking former Vice President Joe Biden. So maybe the touchy-feely controversy has indeed hurt Biden? Btw: Warren is still far back in the pack at 7 percent.
Memo to Moulton: Start cranking up your fundraising if you’re serious about running for president
With two Massachusetts pols now in the race for president (Warren and Weld), the Herald’s Hillary Chabot writes that the third Bay State politician thinking of running, U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, might want to glance at his campaign bank statements before making any announcement. He has only $722,000 in his coffers, not nearly enough to run a credible campaign, Chabot writes.
‘Stop and Strike,’ Part III: The stores are mighty quiet
Steph Solis at MassLive reports that U.S. Sen. Ed Markey is predicting that striking Stop & Shop workers are “gonna win” in the end. Why? Because Stop & Shop’s stores are either closed or largely empty, as patrons appear to be honoring picket lines, Markey says. And he seems to be right. Some samples from around the region – Patriot Ledger: “Stop & Shop stores quiet as strike continues.” Cape Cod Times: “Stop & Shop customers flock to Cape competitors.” South Coast Today: “Striking Stop & Shop workers picket stores in Dartmouth, Fairhaven and New Bedford.”
Still, Janelle Nanos at the Globe reports on why Stop & Shop seems to be digging in its heels on this one, to wit: It’s the last union grocery chain in the region – and it’s competitively hurting the company. Then again, union members are digging in their heels precisely because it’s the last union supermarket chain in the area. Btw: Ex-Bruins star Ray Borque was recently caught shopping at a S&S – and he’s apologizing profusely, reports Universal Hub.
Report: One of three MBTA retirees last year was under 55
This is one of the many reasons why the T desperately needed massive reforms. From the Globe’s Matt Stout: “Nearly one-third of the employees who retired from the MBTA last year were under the age of 55, and dozens were still in their 40s, adding to the flow of younger retirees state lawmakers had hoped to stem years ago.”
Eventually, a state law passed in 2009 will reduce and eliminate this ridiculous outrage. But we’ll be paying for it for yet a few more years, it seems.
The Boston Marathon: Campaign started for a stamp honoring Martin Richard’s words
The Globe’s Brian MacQuarrie and Andy Rosen report on the wet and dramatic finish to yesterday’s Boston’s Marathon. But we wanted to draw your attention to a new campaign started for a U.S. stamp to honor the words of Martin Richard, the 8-year-old who was killed six years ago by terrorist bombers at the marathon, as reported by Universal Hub. Check out the proposed stamp. It’s simple, elegant and poignant.
The Boston Marathon, II: They were prepared for the worst
With memories of the 2013 marathon bombings still fresh in people’s minds, Boston police chief William Gross admits he got ‘no sleep’ the night before the big event out of concern for public safety, reports Amanda McGowan at WGBH.
Meanwhile, Shira Schoenberg at MassLive takes a look at the extensive – and we mean extensive – effort by MEMA and others to make sure yesterday’s marathon proceeded without major incidents.
State expanding treatment for addicts and mentally ill
From the Globe’s Felice J. Freyer: “Massachusetts health officials are significantly expanding addiction treatment, adding nearly 400 long-term recovery beds devoted to people who suffer from both addiction and mental illness. The recent move aims to address a major failing of the current system: Addiction programs typically lack the expertise to also treat the depression, anxiety, and trauma that often underlie and perpetuate drug use.”
Shark buoy project clearly bit off more than it could chew
Donors who kicked in $36,000 for a crowd-funded effort to deploy an Australian shark-detection system off Cape Cod beaches will be getting their money back after the project ran into schedule and logistics hurdles, Doug Fraser reports at the Cape Cod Times. Organizers wanted to raise $250,000 by April 8 in order to get the buoy-based system up and running this summer. They also faced reluctance from local communities who worried about liability issues.
The Boston Herald: Tilting toward the ‘older, pro-Trump crowd’?
The BBJ’s Don Seiffert takes a look at the Boston Herald’s new pay wall for its online content – and a few media watchers wonder if the struggling Herald’s next move will be to crank up news coverage appealing to the “older, pro-Trump crowd.” Well, desperate times require desperate measures, as they say.
In Washington, they see subway-car spies too
It’s not just state Rep. Shawn Dooley who’s concerned about potential espionage tricks pulled by the Chinese maker of the T’s new Orange Line subway cars. Lawmakers in the Washington D.C. area are concerned about the same thing with the Metro’s new subway cars – and they’re trying to block funding for new cars made by China Railway Rolling Stock Corp., reports Drew Hanson at the BBJ. Lawmakers have other concerns as well, it should be noted.
Congestion pricing gains momentum
Here they come, sticking it exclusively to Pike and Tobin drivers again, leaving the vast majority of motorists to drive for free and contributing nothing to solving the congestion problem. From Sean Phillip Cotter at the Herald: “Momentum is building for congestion pricing as lawmakers say the traffic heading into downtown Boston is backing up into their neighborhoods and paralyzing their roads ‘Doing nothing for this problem is only exacerbating this problem,’ said state Sen. Joseph Boncore, D-Winthrop, the Senate chairman of the Joint Committee on Transportation.”
Home sweet home: Stop trashing affordable manufactured housing
Jack Sullivan, a former reporter at CommonWealth magazine, takes umbrage to John Oliver’s recent pot shot at manufactured homes, formally known as mobile homes. Sullivan and his wife retired to one in Florida – and love it. And he says a lot of other people in Massachusetts who can’t afford ‘stick’ homes would love them too – if more were built in Massachusetts as part of the solution to the affordable housing crisis here.
Catching their zzz’s: Scituate may join other towns with later-start school times
Mary Whitfill at the Patriot Ledger reports that Scituate is the latest town to consider starting school later in the morning for middle- and high-school students, citing health studies that say later starts are better for teen learning. If the Scituate school board adopts later school starts, Scituate will join Duxbury, Hanover, Hingham and Sharon in experimenting with later-start education, she writes.
Foster parents: The state is making it too hard on us
Over the weekend, the Globe’s Kay Lazar continued with her look at the state’s foster care system – and the frustrations foster parents encounter along the way. And Shira Schoenberg at MassLive is taking her own look at the system and finding roughly the same thing: Intense frustration among foster parents who believe they’re being “repaid with disrespect, a lack of information and bureaucratic hurdles.” Schoenberg also has a side piece on lawmakers who want to fix the system.
Walsh on Trump’s sanctuary city plan: ‘Crazy’
Tori Bedford at WGBH reports that Mayor Marty Walsh thinks President Trump’s plan to dump migrants in sanctuary cities is “crazy.”
It’s crazy indeed, but crazy-as-a-fox crazy, writes the Herald’s Jaclyn Cashman and the Herald’s Michael Graham, both of whom lampoon local Dems for falling into the political trap in the first place.
In age of Trump, ‘it’s a moment for women’s colleges’
Thanks, President Trump. Traditional women’s colleges Smith and Mount Holyoke say they have experienced a surge in applications in recent years, bucking a trend that has many small colleges suffering financially, Dusty Christensen reports at the Daily Hampshire Gazette.
UMass Lowell sells once envisioned ‘west campus’ for $3.2M
From the BBJ’s Catherine Carlock: “The University of Massachusetts Lowell has sold its 34-acre west campus (in Chelmsford) for $3.245 million to Alice Cui of Lexington. Shrewsbury-based Zekos Group Auctioneers facilitated the sale earlier this month. UMass Lowell’s share of the purchase price is $2.95 million, and the total $3.245 million purchase price includes a 10 percent buyer’s premium, a university spokesperson said.”
Fyi: UMass once envisioned using the property for an expansion into Chelmsford – an expansion that obviously never materialized.
MGM Springfield trims facilities staff, blames over-hiring
Five workers at the state’s only operating full-fledged casino are out of a job after MGM Springfield said over-hiring it did ahead of the casino’s opening last fall was not corrected by attrition as expected, Jim Kinney reports at MassLive.
Lawmakers poised to complete override of Baker veto on family cap
Advocates are cheering and Democrats are expressing confidence they have enough votes in the state Senate to override Gov. Charlie Baker’s veto of a bill that would lift the cap on welfare benefits to families, Christian Wade reports at the Salem News. The House voted last week to override with just one vote against and the Senate is expected to take up the measure soon.
Africa & the World
Join us for an evening with Zoe Marks to discuss “Africa and the World!”
“NOVA Wonders” Cambridge Science Festival Exhibition
From the mysteries of astrophysics to the secrets of the human biome, explore exhibits, presentations, and activities from local STEM organizations based on the NOVA Wonders miniseries.
The Humanitarian Crisis at the Border and Beyond
A hallmark of President Trump’s tenure has been the demonization of immigrants and asylum seekers at the US-Mexico border. Earlier this year, partly in response to a caravan of refugees hoping to seek asylum in the United States, President Trump declared a National Emergency. Before that, he effectively shut down lawful avenues for asylum for bona fide refugees.
Boston University School of Law
Hacking Public Health
Join us at the first-ever hackathon at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health! A hackathon is a time-bound “invention marathon” where people come together to learn, build, and share their creations in a supportive setting. We seek graduate and undergraduate students from diverse personal & professional experiences to cultivate a dynamic, inclusive, and innovative environment.
Harvard Chan Public Health Innovation and Technology Student Forum (PHIT)
MIT-Harvard Conference on the Uyghur Human Rights Crisis
This conference aims to present the police state in China, where over one million innocent Uyghurs and other Turkic Muslims have been forced into concentration camps; explore China’s use of technology to escalate the crisis by conducting surveillance on the Uyghur; introduce the biopolitics of China’s “war on terror”; and open a dialogue on our role in engaging with China.
MIT Center for International Studies (CIS)
Community Conversation: Local Experiments in Land Trusts
Land trusts are an important way to make land and housing permanently affordable and to begin undoing centuries of housing segregation and discrimination. Join local leaders in activism, finance and public policy for a community conversation connected to the new Undesign the Red Line interactive exhibit.
City Life / Vida Urbana, Boston Impact Initiative, & the Coalition for Occupied Homes in Foreclosure
The Environmental Science & Policy Impacts of Remote Sensing on Governance & Land Use in Tropical Forests
The Frederick S. Pardee Center for the Study of the Longer-Range Future and the Land Use and Livelihoods Initiative at the Global Development Policy Center invite you to attend an upcoming series of keynote lectures titled “The Environmental Science & Policy Impacts of Remote Sensing on Governance & Land Use in Tropical Forests.”
Harvard Healthcare Debate
US Healthcare & Drug Pricing Debate with Moderator Vivek Ramaswamy, Founder & CEO, Roivant Sciences and Panelists Peter Kolchinsky, Ph.D., Co-founder, Portfolio Manager, & Managing Director, RA Capital Management; John Maraganore, Ph.D., CEO and Director, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals; and Shawn Bishop, Vice President, Controlling Health Care Costs and Advancing Medicare, The Commonwealth Fund.
Retail’s Changing Landscape
The reports of the ‘retailpocolypse’ are far from true. Join NAIOP to learn how retail is evolving and thriving while dispelling some of the myths. Hear from expert panelists on what they are seeing here and across the country and learn how architects are helping to transform malls for the future.
Government Affairs Speaker Series featuring Congresswoman Katherine Clark
Join us for our second Government Affairs Speaker Series featuring a conversation with Congresswoman Katherine Clark. Congresswoman Clark has served as the United States Representative for Massachusetts’ 5th Congressional District since 2013.
Cannabis 101: Molecules, Markets, … Mayhem?
In 2016, Massachusetts voted to legalize recreational marijuana. We wanted laws that empower disenfranchised communities and grow a healthy stream of taxes. But not all of our dreams came true. Now that stores are opening, many of us are wondering about weed…
Offshore Wind: Power, Policy, and Promise
This is a free presentation seminar and discussion event hosted by the Center for Student Coastal Research (CSCR), a non profit organization located in Cohasset on Boston’s South Shore. CSCR educates students in environmental sciences, encourages environmental awareness, and promotes activism. Details are available at www.ccscr.org.
John Rogers, Center for Student Coastal Research
Public Service Symposium
The purpose of this symposium is to bring together a cross-sector of participants and their organizations to discuss the role of individuals, universities, nonprofits, and the private sector in best practices around engaging our respective populaces in civic life.
The Smart, Connected Commonwealth: Data-Driven Research and Policy Across the Region
BARI’s 2019 Spring Conference will bring together academics, policy makers, and practitioners to highlight work being conducted throughout Greater Boston as a way to share insights and methods, catalyzing inter-disciplinary, intercity collaboration in the use of data and technology.
Boston Area Research Initiative
Harvard Neurologist Rachel Bennett on the Science of Dementia
Everyone knows someone who is experiencing serious cognitive decline. Harvard neurologist Rachel Bennett will speak on the current science of Alzheimer’s and other dementias, including diagnostic and treatment options, and will take questions afterward. 60 minutes, FREE, as part of Nahant Public Library’s Dementia Friendly Nahant project.
Today’s Headlines
Metro
30 Brockton employees in $200,000 club; in a first, one tops $300,000 – Brockton Enterprise
Massachusetts
Students’ campaign to oust Worcester superintendent grows – Telegram & Gazette
Stockbridge ex-fire chief sues to be reinstated – Berkshire Eagle
Baker administration increases heating funds after legislators protest – WAMC
Nation
Sen. Bernie Sanders released his tax returns. He’s part of the 1 percent – New York Times
About 1 in 8 Americans think men are ‘better suited emotionally’ for office, survey finds – Politico
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