In a letter to Speaker DeLeo, Rep. Stanley and his colleagues requested that H.763, An Act to protect Massachusetts pollinators, which is currently in the House Committee on Ways and Means, be brought to the floor for a vote. For the past four years, federal inaction on urgent matters of environmental and public health has put our residents and communities at risk. Now that our Commonwealth faces the dual threats of accelerating climate change and an ongoing pandemic, it’s critically important that we act to respond to threats to our natural resources and our food supply, including those caused by misuse and overuse of chemical pesticides. Passage of this legislation would be a meaningful step toward limiting these environmental hazards and their wide-ranging impacts.

Attorney General Maura Healey announced major initiatives to ensure election integrity in the weeks leading up to November 3. She convened an internal task force to coordinate election protection related priorities across the office and with state attorneys general across the country. The task force includes attorneys in the AG’s Office with expertise in civil rights, civil litigation, and criminal prosecution. Its work is focused on ensuring that every ballot cast is counted and preparing to respond to and prosecute voter intimidation, which includes staffing the office’s civil rights hotline to address concerns of interference at the polls.

The AG’s Office has launched a new website with resources available for voters, including important dates, information about voting options, and how the AG’s Office is protecting your right to vote. For more information, visit mass.gov/protectthevote.

This summer, the Massachusetts Legislature took swift action by passing legislation to improve voting options for citizens during the COVID-19 pandemic. This law also ensures individuals with disabilities can safely and independently vote-by-mail. This is the first election where an individual can receive this kind of accommodation for voting and won’t have to rely on others to help them vote. The law requires reasonable accommodations in the vote-by-mail process including an electronic ballot that can be filled out electronically and printed; clear and electronic instructions to complete and return the ballot; an envelope provided by the Secretary of State to return the ballot; and, hole-punched markers on one of the return envelopes to easily locate where a wet signature is required for the affidavit.

Learn about what Massachusetts is doing to support accessible voting for people with disabilities here. 

Rep. Stanley signed onto a letter supporting H1599, legislation he cosponsored relative to compliance with the prevailing wage laws of the Commonwealth. H1599 extends the prevailing wage laws to encompass all workers on a public works project. Currently, prevailing wage laws only apply to onsite construction and fabrication and not offsite fabrication. This allows unscrupulous companies to avoid paying a prevailing wage by moving a portion of their construction work offsite. These companies are able to increase their profits at the expense of workers. There has been a rapid movement to more offsite fabrication where the state has less direct oversight and workers are paid less.

As the Commonwealth continues to experience the fallout as a result of the pandemic, public works projects have become even more important as private projects slow down. The Commonwealth has an obligation to its workers to ensure they are being afforded a living wage so they may live in the communities they have helped build.

Rep. Stanley co-sponsored of HD5306, a bill to accelerate improvements to the local and regional public health system to address disparities in the delivery of public health services. HD5306, widely known as SAPHE 2.0, the Statewide Accelerated Public Health for Every Community Act, will ensure minimum public health standards for every community, increase capacity and effectiveness by encouraging municipalities to share services, create a uniform data collection and reporting system, and establish a sustainable data funding mechanism to support local boards of health and health departments. The legislation builds on H4503 relative to strengthening the local and regional public health system, which was passed unanimously in the House and the Senate earlier this session and signed into law by Governor Baker in April. Learn more about the bill.

Rep. Stanley cosigned a resolution to petition the President of the United States to designate a state funeral for the last Medal of Honor recipient from World War II. Currently, there are only two surviving Medal of Honor Recipients from WWII in the country. As a salute to the 16 million men and women who served in our armed forces from 1941 to 1945, this Resolution requests a state funeral for the last surviving medalist. Passing this Resolution would add Massachusetts’ voice to a growing coalition seeking to honor our brave Veterans from WWII.

Rep. Stanley cosponsored a letter to Labor and Workforce Development Secretary Acosta asking her to retroactively raise the minimum unemployment assistance for eligible claimants to meet the $100 threshold to allow these claimants to qualify for the federally funded Lost Wages Assistance program. Currently, claimants who receive even $1 less than $100 threshold in unemployment benefits have been missing out on an additional $300 in assistance per week over a course of 6 weeks. Rep. Stanley believes this would be a very small cost and would provide an enormous benefit to residents who are struggling with unemployment through no fault of their own.

Rep. Stanley cosigned a resolution designating October 7, 2020 as Energy Efficiency Day in Massachusetts. This resolution is part of a nationwide effort among business leaders, advocates and elected officials working to educate people about the benefits of reducing energy waste and saving money. Massachusetts ranks #1 in the nation for Energy Efficiency and has held that distinction for the past nine years. This Resolution builds off of the great work done by the House this session in advancing energy efficiency legislation.

Rep. Stanley joined his colleagues in a letter to Governor Baker and Secretary Heffernan in support of the Massachusetts Office of Public Collaboration (MOPC) and the Community Mediation Center (CMC) grant program. In light of budget uncertainties, MOPC was able to extend their existing FY20 grant awards to CMCs into FY21 subject to appropriation. Unfortunately the delay of the FY21 budget has interfered with this plan, and the interim budgets that have been passed has caused a financial crisis as no funding has been allocated for the Community Mediation Grant Program. The letter to Governor Baker and Secretary Heffernan encouraged them to allocate funding for CMCs under their existing authority from the interim budgets to allow these critical services to continue.

The courts and public agencies are currently relaying on MOPC and the centers to provide essential mediation services under ongoing public programs for pending cases and backlogs due to COVID-19 impacts. Additionally, courts and public agencies are working on plans to expanded mediation services delivered by MOPC and the CMCs to address the expected flood of eviction cases in the upcoming months when the housing moratorium is lifted.

The Baker Administration announced a comprehensive set of resources, known as the Eviction Diversion Initiative, to support tenants and landlords during the financial challenges caused by the pandemic. The goal of this initiative is to keep tenants safely in their homes and to support the ongoing expenses of landlords once the Commonwealth’s pause of evictions and foreclosures expires on Saturday, October 17th. The Administration is making a $171 million total commitment this fiscal year, with $112 million of new funding to support new and expanded housing stability programs during the remainder of the fiscal year, including:

·        $100 million commitment this fiscal year to expand the capacity of the Residential Assistance for Families in Transition (RAFT) program to provide relief to renters and landlords impacted by COVID-19;

·        $48.7 million to HomeBASE and other rapid rehousing programs for when tenants are evicted and are at risk of homelessness;

·        $12.3 million to provide tenants and landlords with access to legal representation and related services prior to and during the eviction process, as well as community mediation to help tenants and landlords resolve cases outside of court;

·        $6.5 million for Housing Consumer Education Centers (HCECs), the “front door” for those facing a housing emergency; and

·        $3.8 million for the Tenancy Preservation Program (TPP), to provide case management support and to act as a neutral party to help tenants and landlords come to agreement.

The Baker Administration announced over $5.5 million in grants to address urgent food insecurity for Massachusetts residents as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This funding is being awarded as part of the third round of the new $36 million Food Security Infrastructure Grant Program, created following recommendations from the Administration’s COVID-19 Command Center’s Food Security Task Force, which promotes ongoing efforts to ensure that individuals and families throughout the Commonwealth have access to healthy, local food.

The goal of the Food Security Infrastructure Grant Program is to ensure that individuals and families throughout the Commonwealth have equitable access to food, especially local food. The program also seeks to ensure that farmers, fishermen and other local food producers are better connected to a strong, resilient food system to help mitigate future food supply and distribution disruption.

The third round of the grant program includes 33 awards totaling $5,551,387 to fund investments in technology, equipment, increased capacity, and other assistance to help producers distribute food, especially to food insecure communities. When evaluating the applications, considerations included equity, economic impact and need, sustainability and scalability of efforts, and ability to support producer readiness to accept SNAP and HIP benefits. In the program’s first two rounds, the Administration awarded a total of $6,266,187 to 60 recipients.