Can public pressure head off major changes to Head Start programs?

Beacon Hill already this year has drawn its lines in the sand on immigration enforcement and abortion access. The arena for Massachusetts’ next battle with the Trump administration is the early education classroom. 

Or at least the government inbox receiving public feedback about proposed new rules affecting some early education classrooms. 

The federal government is accepting public comments through next Thursday on major changes to the regulations governing Head Start, the longstanding program that provides free early education and support services to low-income families, including more than 10,000 kids in Massachusetts. The Trump administration says the move would cut costs and red tape, giving programs more flexibility and ultimately letting them serve more children.

Massachusetts pols disagree. Gov. Maura Healey and U.S. House Minority Whip Katherine Clark visited a Malden Head Start program in August to decry the proposed changes, which Healey panned as a bid to dismantle Head Start “from the inside out” by weakening standards and creating barriers. 

Twenty-five state senators joined the chorus Monday with a letter urging Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. to drop the revisions. 

Ludlow Democrat Jake Oliveira, who led the Senate push, said he's concerned about the cumulative effect of changes like removing requirements for vision, hearing and developmental screenings, eliminating teacher-child ratio limits, and cutting the required number of hours programs would need to be open.

Oliveira said Boston Rep. Christopher Worrell is leading House lawmakers in a similar letter. Rep. Tara Hong of Lowell posted an Instagram video laying out his own concerns and encouraging people to speak out. 

Local officials are weighing in, too. The Boston City Council in August adopted a resolution affirming its support for Head Start and the existing standards, and calling on residents to submit their own comments standing up for the programs.

A Waltham city councilor and Salem School Committee member are among the Bay Staters who have written in opposing the changes, along with Head Start staff, parents and graduates, the Commonwealth Children’s Fund and the Massachusetts Academy of Family Physicians. 

"It's my hope that if there's enough of a groundswell of support to push back against these proposed changes that the administration will see the light and remove some of these programmatic changes," Oliveira said. 

Oliveira says he’s seen public pressure work with the Trump administration before, pointing to an injunction that kept open Job Corps programs like the Chicopee one in his district. But the outpouring around Head Start might also be one of the few concrete options state and local policymakers can actually exercise on behalf of a federal program. 

Healey, asked at her event last month if Massachusetts could adopt some sort of state-level policy maintaining current standards for Head Start programs here, suggested that wouldn't be a full fix. 

“Massachusetts already has some excellent standards in place. It won’t cover everything,” she said.

Which leaves it to state lawmakers to be the ones doing the lobbying this time. 

Have you heeded the call from Mass. politicians to send in comments on Head Start? Send them my way, too: [email protected].

Gov. Maura Healey’s reelection campaign is out with a new ad laying out her vision for Massachusetts as a place with the best schools and healthcare, where rights are protected and people who work hard can afford to raise a family. The 30-second spot is less Mike Minogue-focused than the ad Healey's team launched earlier this month accusing her GOP rival of trying to buy the election, but references Minogue at the end as someone who "stands with Donald Trump." The new ad, which will air on broadcast, cable, digital and streaming platforms, lands after the University of New Hampshire released a poll last week showing Minogue up 8 points with voters but still trailing Healey 54-38.

Two new ads from No on 8, the campaign against the marijuana repeal ballot question, cast the issue as a public health and safety matter. In one, former Brookline public health commissioner Alan Balsam warns a repeal could drive cannabis consumers back into the illicit market. In the other, a chorus of people identifying themselves as a doctors, veterans, business owners and local leaders (including former Boston city councilor turned cannabis CEO Tito Jackson) say voting against the repeal keeps marijuana safeguards in place.

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