News Clips

Lexington Minuteman

Lexington’s legislative delegation of Sen. Cindy Friedman, D-Arlington, Sen. Mike Barrett, D-Lexington, and Rep. Michelle Ciccolo, D-Lexington, announced that the Legislature and Baker administration have committed to providing a baseline amount of unrestricted local aid and Chapter 70 funding for fiscal year 2021.

This commitment will give municipalities and school districts a critical planning tool as they finalize their budgets.

Under the agreement, Lexington will receive $1,627,400 in local aid and $14,438,034 in Chapter 70 education funding. The town is additionally eligible for federal relief funding of $1,787,737.

“This agreement comes at a time when towns are having to overcome new challenges seemingly every week,” said Barrett. “I’m glad we were able to provide a measure of certainty when so much is still up in the air.”

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Bedford Citizen

Representative Ken Gordon (D-Bedford) and Senator Mike Barrett (D-Lexington) announced today that an agreement between the Legislature and the Governor will ensure increases to local aid and Chapter 70 education funding in Fiscal Year (FY) 2021. The agreement will allow cities and towns to avoid significant budget cuts despite the uncertain conditions brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic.

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WBUR

Sen. Michael Barrett, Golden’s Senate counterpart at the Committee on Telecommunication, Utilities and Energy, said the House’s bill would make it nearly impossible to monitor the state’s progress towards those goals, and said he favors the Senate’s approach of installing interim targets every five years rather than every 10 years.

“Here we have goals widely spaced apart with no accountability back to the public or the Legislature in the House bill,” he said. “There’s a reason the Senate proposed a standalone, independent climate policy commission. That’s because the executive branch charged with realizing the goals cannot also be left to report on whether they’ve achieved them. You’ve got to separate out implementation and monitoring, and I’m deeply disappointed that the early drafts of the House bill leave the two roles together.”

 

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Boston Globe

The chambers will also probably have to reconcile different versions of health care legislation. And a climate change proposal surfaced in the House setting a new statewide goal of meeting “net-zero” emissions by 2050 — months after the Senate passed a similar but more expansive set of bills.

“There’s a difference in aggressiveness,” Senator Michael J. Barrett said of the climate change bills. But he said it’s “good news” the Legislature is likely to pass an extension on lawmaking, giving more time to settle differences on the new emissions goals.

“I don’t think we’re going to work next week. But I think we’ll be back relatively soon,” the Lexington Democrat said of returning to session. “I don’t think we’ll wait until election time.”

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Commonwealth Magazine

Sen. Michael Barrett of Lexington, the co-chair of the Telecommunication, Utilities, and Energy Committee and the sponsor of the Senate climate change bill, said he was disappointed in reading the House bill because of its lack of aggressiveness in pursuing reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.

“It’s going to be a challenging conference when we don’t yet agree on the central task at hand, which is driving down emissions,” he said.

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Lexington Wicked Local

One major component in the bill — sponsored by Sen. Mike Barrett, D-Lexington — provides new transparency and oversight to the purchase of military weapons by local, county and state law enforcement.

After Ferguson, Barrett said, Americans learned that local law enforcement agencies routinely take advantage of massive federal sales and donations of equipment and gear that would otherwise be too expensive for municipal budgets. Deployment of this material occurs disproportionately in communities of color.

“For Massachusetts, the issue is not academic,” Barrett said. “Many cities, towns and regional organizations are heavy users of these federal programs.”

Barrett’s measure is designed to increase state and local accountability for the acquisition of “military-grade controlled property,” like assault rifles and mine-resistant ambush-protected vehicles.

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Waltham Wicked Local

Barrett says that a portion of the money will be used for multi-modal access to Alewife station, an “important change in the fight against global warming.”

“The transportation sector is responsible for roughly 40% of carbon emissions in Massachusetts,” said Barrett.

In addition to allowing more riders to access public transportation, he wants the garage upgrades to allow for “green transportation” like bicycles.

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Lexington Wicked Local

Each year, the Alewife Station serves as an access point for hundreds of thousands of commuters as they travel around Greater Boston. Unfortunately, after years of wear and tear, Alewife’s car garage is in need of repairs and upgrades.

The station opened to the public in 1985. But, Barrett points out, the garage originally provided for 2,733 parking spots. Nowadays at any given moment, 250 may be unusable due to falling concrete and roof leakage.

“I hear from constituents on a regular basis about the poor condition of the garage,” Barrett said. “It’s insecure and, to be honest, a little creepy at night. At times the garage has had the highest reported crime rate of any station on the entire MBTA.”

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Lexington Minuteman

“The story of Quock Walker marks an historic moment for Massachusetts and our country,” Barrett said. “It’s a story that needs to be told. I’m grateful to the Association of Black Citizens of Lexington for sharing it with the people of Massachusetts.”

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Waltham Patch

In January of this year, the Massachusetts State Senate passed An Act Setting Next-Generation Climate Policy, now pending before the House of Representatives. The Senate’s approach to reducing greenhouse gas emissions is radical not in its ideology but in its seriousness; we’re determined to get emissions down across the Massachusetts economy, transportation and buildings included.

We should add that the senators who wrote the legislation sat down with a good many commercial interests, listened to what they had to say, and made changes. At the time of the bill’s final passage — with the votes of both Democrats and Republicans, and with only two dissents in the 40-member Senate — its seriousness of purpose seemed to impress the business community without unsettling it.

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