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Nov 16, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Amanda Middle |Sam Drysdale
A THIRD OF ALL UMASS students will qualify for free tuition paid for by the new income surtax on the state’s highest earners, under a plan the Healey administration rolled out Wednesday to spend an expansion of state financial aid.
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Nov 10, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Amanda Middle
On October 25, as New Englanders tuned in to watch the Celtics tip off their NBA season against the Knicks, many of us were switching to the news or glued to our phones wondering if a friend or loved one could’ve been bowling or dining in Lewiston, Maine as a gunman attacked two establishments that evening, killing 18 people and wounding over a dozen more. On an otherwise typical Wednesday night, an horrific act broke the peace, shattered lives, and tore a community apart.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Steve Koczela |Amanda Middle
IN 2020, Massachusetts handed Joe Biden a 35-point victory over then-President Donald Trump, the second largest margin for the Democrat of any state. So it’s all the more remarkable that a new CommonWealth Beacon poll (topline, crosstabs) finds now-President Biden looking shaky in the Bay State, where just 47 percent of residents say they approve of the job he is doing in the White House. Nearly the same number (46 percent) say they disapprove.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Paul A. Hattis |Amanda Middle
The Supreme Judicial Court this week hears a case about a group of tenured bench scientists at Tufts University Medical School who lost lab space and saw their salaries reduced when their individual fundraising efforts were not sufficient to hit newly imposed target levels. Already, a few have seen their pay cut by as much as 50 percent as they were reduced to half-time status.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Amanda Middle
A Superior Court judge on Wednesday denied a bid to block Gov. Maura Healey from capping the state’s emergency shelter program, saying the governor was only taking steps to live within the appropriation provided by the Legislature.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Michael Jonas |Amanda Middle
DETAILS OVER THE inner workings of the Boston Police Department are not the usual focus of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce. But after watching a two-year standoff over whether the department should accept millions of dollars in grant funding from the state, the group’s president, Jim Rooney, is stepping into an issue that has been mired in controversy over charges of racial profiling and civil rights violations.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Amanda Middle
An MBTA EMPLOYEE who was indicted and suspended six years ago for leveraging his job as a buyer to solicit kickbacks and illegal gifts pleaded guilty on Monday and was sentenced to a year in jail and required to pay restitution of $37,860. Timothy Dockery of Plymouth pleaded guilty to 13 charges related to misuse of his job procuring office supplies and small construction contracts.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Michael Jonas |Amanda Middle
AFTER REJECTING state funding for a Boston police intelligence unit multiple times over the past two years because of concerns that a gang database it maintains has racially profiled Black and Latino residents, the Boston City Council voted on Wednesday to accept the funding. In a 7-5 vote that broke along racial lines, the council voted to accept $3.4 million in funding for the Boston Regional Intelligence Center, or BRIC.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Jennifer Smith |Amanda Middle
WHEN A YOUNG PERSON is convicted of a crime, Massachusetts and the federal government agree that they shouldn’t be put into the same custody as adult convicts. But one state law seems to treat young people charged with murder, but not convicted, like adults, requiring that juveniles who are facing trial on serious charges be held in custody with adults – something the state agrees is not acceptable even for those young people actually convicted of crimes.
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Nov 1, 2023 | 
commonwealthbeacon.org | Jim Jordan |Amanda Middle
CAN POLICE TURN a perceived nuisance into an opportunity? Can they benefit from the efforts of smartphone-wielding “cop watchers” who dog them at crime and emergency scenes? The answer is yes. The images and words captured from these encounters could, as part of a larger reform, help to improve police practice. Police are on camera as never before.
