Our accomplishments from this year’s legislative session

In 2019, the City of Boston, alongside our Massachusetts legislators, filed a comprehensive legislative agenda with a common goal: make Boston a city where everyone has opportunities to thrive.

While our lives look different than they did two years ago, the partnership between the City of Boston, the Massachusetts Legislature and the Governor to resolve our biggest hardship remains steadfast. We’ve created opportunities for engagement and helped move our vision forward, together.

From affordable housing to economic mobility to workforce development to education, we saw major priorities enacted into law this 2019–2021 session:

• Leveraging Boston’s building boom to create more affordable housing and job training opportunities. The new law will add the Inclusionary Development Policy (IDP) to zoning, allowing the City to require IDP even when a development project doesn’t need zoning relief. As the Boston Planning & Development Agency’s neighborhood planning leads to updated zoning, this will help us preserve and expand affordable housing. The new law will also allow Boston to adjust Linkage fees to support job training and affordable housing.

Inclusionary Development and Linkage State House Testimony

• Lifting the “cap on kids” by repealing a policy that denies critical resources to children conceived while, or soon after, a family is receiving benefits.
• Creating a cadet program within the Boston Fire Department, diversifying the force to create opportunities for all Bostonians and ensure our firefighters represent the residents of the city they serve.

Mayor Walsh’s written testimony on creating a Boston Fire Cadet Program.

June 6, 2019 — Mayor Martin Walsh attends the BFD Fire Recruits Graduation. (Mayor’s Office Photo by John Wilcox)

Establishing a commission to explore ways to raise money for sustained investment in the Tourism, Arts and Culture sectors to drive growth, create jobs and generate tax revenue.

Mayor Walsh’s testimony on creating an arts, tourism and culture commission.

• Advocating for education finance reform, which will modernize state education funding to better reflect the reality of educating complex, high need students in the City of Boston and across the Commonwealth.

November 26, 2019 - Mayor Martin Walsh and other elected officials join Governor Baker, Secretary Peyser, Members of the Joint Committee on Education, community members and advocates for the ceremonial signing of the Student Opportunity Act at English High School in Jamaica Plain. (Mayor’s Office Photo by Isabel Leon)

State House hearing on Education

We also made major strides on priority legislation, such as:

• Protecting abortion rights. Signed into law by Governor Baker this year, the ROE Act improves access to affordable reproductive health care n by removing unnecessary, burdensome laws that delay and deny care.

October 1, 2019 - Mayor Martin Walsh and other Massachusetts Mayors meet at the steps of the Massachusetts State House for a rally of “Mayors for ROE” Act, as an opportunity to lead the nation and show Massachusetts’ commitment to reproductive freedom and equality. (Mayor’s Office Photo by Isabel Leon)

• Sustaining community preservation revenue and investing in our communities. The State’s FY20 budget increased the State’s Community Preservation Act match at around 30 percent, or $36 million in revenue. This allows for the City to support and create more affordable housing, historic preservation, and parks and open space.

November 5, 2019 — Mayor Martin Walsh offered remarks during the ribbon cutting for a new playground at the Higginson School in Roxbury. The Mayor recommended the project to receive $500,000 in CPA funding in 2018. (Mayor’s Office Photo by Jeremiah Robinson)

Mayor Walsh’s letter to the Joint Committee on Revenue regarding the Community Preservation Act.

• Protecting our older residents by increasing their access to affordable health care. The State’s FY20 budget expanded the Medicare Savings Program eligibility from 135% to 165% of the Federal Poverty Level (FPL).

Mayor Walsh’s letter to the Joint Committee on Healthcare Financing regarding Medicare Savings Program eligibility.

• Improving public health by standardizing applications for essential food, health, and safety-net programs. The disparity of the estimated 680,000 MA residents who are eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), but are not enrolled is referred to as the “SNAP GAP.” The FY21 budget passed by the Legislature includes the creation of a SNAP Common Application program, which will work to eliminate this gap and connect eligible MassHealth/Medicare recipients with federal nutritional benefits.

Mayor Walsh’s letter to the Joint Committee on Healthcare financing regarding the “SNAP Gap.”

• Protecting our citizens on the roads. An Act requiring the hands-free use of mobile telephones while driving, which was signed into law by Governor Baker in November of 2019 prohibits the use of an electronic device while operating a motor vehicle unless the device is being used in hands-free mode.

October 3, 2017 — Mayor Martin Walsh announces the launch of the Boston’s Safest Driver Competition at a press conference in Copley Square. The competition uses a smartphone-based app to engage drivers in self- reflection of their driving habits. Mayor Walsh also tested out a driving simulator which was provided by Arbella Insurance Foundation. (Mayor’s Office photo by Don Harney)

• Improves racial disparities in maternal health. In Massachusetts, Black women are twice as likely to die from pregnancy-related complications as white women, and face higher rates of maternal morbidity This law was signed by Governor Baker on January 14, 2021. This legislation establishes a 23-member special legislative commission to investigate and make recommendations on how to reduce racial disparities in maternal mortality, barriers to accessing prenatal and postpartum care, forms of structural racism and their relationship to maternal mortality, and the availability of data on maternal mortality.
• Support students in our schools and improve their access to food. The Breakfast after the Bell Act was signed into law in August of 2020 and will be enacted in the 2022 school year. This law will require all public K-12 schools where 60 percent or more students are eligible for free or reduced-price meals to offer breakfast after the start of the school day.

I want to thank the Boston City Council, Massachusetts Legislature and Governor Baker for moving this important legislation past the finish line, and congratulate the many advocates for their tireless work in helping us get there.