Wednesday, February 17, 2016
By George Donnelly (@geodonnelly) and Keith Regan
|
Today: Presidential politics on State House steps
Hillary Clinton supporters to gather on State House steps, 9:00 am, to tout her plans to addresssystemic racism and economic opportunity. Sen. Linda Dorcena Forry, Boston City Councilors Tito Jackson and Ayanna Pressley, Suffolk County Sheriff Steven Tompkins, former Massachusetts Secretary of Public Safety Andrea Cabral, and Eastern Massachusetts Urban League President Darnell William are expected to participate.
"Massachusetts Latinos for Bernie": Latino community leaders supporting Democratic presidential candidate Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders hold an endorsement news conference. According to the campaign the news conference will also kick-off an organizing drive to reach Spanish-speaking voters in Massachusetts; outside the State House, 11:00 am.
More than a dozen community and faith groups gather at the offices of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to protest recent deportations by the Obama administration of Central American immigrants. 10 New England Park, Burlington, 3:30 pm.
Republican presidential candidates take part in a two-night live town hall event in South Carolina hosted by CNN. Candidates will be split into two groups of three, who take the stage Wednesday and Thursday nights. Ben Carson, Sen. Marco Rubio and Sen. Ted Cruz are part of the first group, CNN, South Carolina, 8:00 pm.
Clinging to Widett Circle fantasies
It emerged from almost complete geographical obscurity into the centerpiece of the Boston 2024 movement: Widett Circle, the industrial area on the edge of South Boston. Just think of the elevated concrete platform that could have been. While the Olympic dream is dead, the idea of developing Widett Circle into a new neighborhood, replete with a massive deck to create an 8-million-square-foot complex, still lives on. But as Shirley Leung of the Globe writes in her column, the state Department of Transportation has more practical ideas for the area: an area for parking trains to accommodate the expansion of South Station. The city, which is still weighing big plans for Widett Circle, is concerned for that use may make it impractical to develop the area. And that may be just fine with incumbent businesses there. http://bit.ly/1TnFS6M
DCF hiring spree
The Department of Children and Families could hire as many as 600 new personnel over two years, Linda Spears, the head of the agency told legislators in Springfield yesterday. "Spears said Gov. Charlie Baker's budget proposal -- which would give the child protection agency an additional $30.5 million in a lean budget year -- would support a director for each of the department's 29 area offices," Andy Metzger of the State House News Service reports. http://bit.ly/20YYlMZ
Aloisi: Put T riders first
Writing in CommonWealth magazine, former Transportation Secretary James Aloisi calls on MBTA management and its unions to set aside their differences and direct their energies toward improving the experience for T riders. "We ought to be in this together. T riders, T union officials, T employees, and T managers should all be pulling on the rope in the same direction. Our common, shared objective should be building a modern reliable public transportation system that is responsive to our needs and worthy of our city and region. It shouldn't have to be this hard," Aloisi writes. http://bit.ly/1oG46hr
GE pushes back on new EPA demands
More on Boston's new favorite company: General Electric. We learned last week that GE aggressively contests real estate assessments, which form the basis for its property tax bills. GE's is also in a dispute with the Environmental Protection Agency over its pollution of the Housatonic, into which the company dumped polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs, for 50 years. The company already has spent $500 million cleaning up the river; a recently announced EPA plan would cost GE an additional $613 million, writes the Globe's David Abel. Part of the dispute stems from the EPA wanting GE to remove polluted sediment out of Massachusetts, which GE claims is not necessary. http://bit.ly/1QliIJd
Suffolk President McKenna: 'Totally astounded' by board
Suffolk University President Margaret McKenna, who recently agreed to leave the school next year after a faction of the board of trustees pushed to have her resign, said she would sometimes be "totally astounded" by some of the board's decisions, which has been criticized for its tendencies to micro-manage university business. McKenna decided to exchange board of trustees reform for her own position. "It was very clear that the deal could not be had unless I was part of the deal," McKenna told the Globe. More details from McKenna in Laura Krantz's Globe story here: http://bit.ly/1mH5K0P
Plainridge has strong January
Revenue at Plainridge Park Casino rose by 12 percent in January, ending a five-month trend of declines, Sean Murphy of the Globe reports. Plainridge brought in $12.5 million in January, its best month since October. Even on the new pace, however, and with business expected to pick up as spring arrives, the state's only casino will likely fall well short of original projections that it would see $300 million in revenue for its first full year. http://bit.ly/1KW7H4L
Retirements may stress Mass. economy
A wave of Baby Boomer retirements -- delayed by the recession that began in 2007 -- may pose the biggest threat to the continued health of the Massachusetts economy, Deirdre Fernandes of the Globe reports. Already older than the rest of the nation, Massachusetts' aging workforce may begin bogging down the Bay State economic by the second half of 2018, the New England Economic Partnership has predicted. http://bit.ly/1WrfrN2
Indy race supporters circulate petition
Hoping to counter vocal opposition, IndyCar Boston organizers have begun circulating a petition in favor of the planned Labor Day race in South Boston, Travis Andersen of the Globe reports. Grand Prix of Boston said it has collected 1,000 signatures in favor of hosting the event. http://bit.ly/1WrfQ25
Moulton explains motivations as he launches re-election bid
U.S. Rep.Seth Moulton launched his re-election campaign to Congress on Tuesday night, and tells Bob Oakes of WBUR Radio he wants to continue work he began on improving care for military veterans and fostering local economic development, such as combined efforts with the state to boost the prospects of the city of Lynn. "I ran to bring a new generation of leadership to Washington ... we have so much more work to do." http://wbur.fm/1Kpqc1E
Healey: 'Strongly opposed' to legalizing pot
Attorney General Maura Healey told the editorial board of the Patriot Ledger she remains "strongly opposed" to legalizing recreational marijuana. Healey said her concerns are focused on the state's young people and pointed to the issues marijuana edibles have created in Colorado, where weed is legal. http://bit.ly/1RMFdMq
Meanwhile, a new medical marijuana dispensary has opened in Brookline Village, as Gintautas Dumcius of MassLive reports. http://bit.ly/1Og4CHN
Dukakis weighs in on Scalia, 2016 race
In an interview with Isaac Chotiner of Slate, Former Gov. Michael Dukakis says late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia -- a law school classmate -- was "to the right of Marie Antoinette" and lacked a consistent political philosophy, says he's backing Hillary Clinton and not rooting for Jeb Bush, and decries the state of American foreign policy. http://slate.me/1TmIRN5
|
| TODAY'S TOP STORIES |
National headlines
Local headlines
|
No comments:
Post a Comment