 Hello, everyone. I'm James Milan and welcome to this talk of the town, a legislative update with not one, but both of our state representatives. That is Sean Garbley and Dave Rogers are joining me and thanks to you both for being here. Good to be here. Great to be here. We do appreciate it. We love to chat with both of you individually or together whenever we can. And generally we've settled on a rhythm of, you know, once per season of four times a year. We certainly work to get an update from the state house from both of you. And with that in mind, because as we were discussing before we went, we started recording, you know, things have happened since we last spoke to you, but we're also very interested in kind of looking forward, especially as we're at the kind of, at the point where we're looking towards the 2021-22 legislative session. So what I'd like to do is ask each of you to briefly just pick a couple of highlights or particularly compelling issues you've been working on or bills that have been passed from these last months and share those with us. And so in other words, a focus from the last time we talked to you up to now. And then we'll shift our focus for the balance of the conversation to what's to come. So let me ask you, Dave, to go ahead and start with, again, two or three of the things that you'd really like to share with our audience that have happened since we last spoke to you. Sure. And thanks for the opportunity. I guess, you know, despite the pandemic and having to vote from home, like, like all other aspects of society, the legislature has been disrupted by everything going on. And despite that, we've been able to get a lot done. A few of the things I'd highlight is a sweeping climate change bill. The governor vetoed it. So we had to come back in this session. And we teed it up as one of the very first things we did. It's a sweeping bill referred to as the roadmap. It gets the Commonwealth to net zero emissions by 2050. It does so through lots of different methods, one of which is to increase the renewable portfolio standard. That's the percentage of clean power that our large utilities have to get from clean power. We increased the amount of authorized offshore wind to its grand total now of 5600 megawatts. And to frame that number in a perspective the audience could understand, that's enough to power over 3 million homes. Now that won't happen overnight. These are large complicated projects to get the permitting and the regulatory piece of it done and actually construct the windmills and then the run underground cable from... We lost... So these are large, the groundwork, late the groundwork for Massachusetts to have really a booming offshore wind. We increased appliance efficiency standards and really many other things. So that's a wonderful bill in the wake of another thing I'd highlighted in the wake of killing of George Floyd and many other acts, tragic acts of violence by the police around the country who passed a sweeping police reform bill. Like the climate change bill, that's a comprehensive bill, has lots of different provisions. The main one I'd highlight is an independent civilian review board. And so while the new law has many features, one of the most important, I would say probably the most important is there'll be a brand new state agency completely independent, so not controlled by law enforcement but independently managed that has pretty sweeping powers to certify and decertify police officers, has subpoena power, the public can lodge complaints directly with the commission. And that new bill also has significant limits on the use of force and many other features on police training. So it's a sweeping bill. It was difficult, you know, even many Democrats voted against it but we got it through and that was another key recent development. The election bill we passed is a big deal. It led to record shattering turnout. So we passed a vote by mail law obviously with the pandemic wanting people not to vote in person. So from a public health perspective, having safe elections as well as elections where we could get a lot of participation. And it led to literally record breaking turnout even in the middle of a pandemic and we just extended it for town elections like we're just held in Arlington and Belmont. So that's another major development and we'll probably make many of those changes permanent. Certainly I'll be pushing for that. And so I don't want to go on at too great a length. Those are three major bills. There are many others but I think that that'll give you a flavor for some of the big things we've done and happy to collaborate with my partner, Representative Garvely, in getting those things done. Absolutely. And before I let Sean speak for himself, I will just add that as you said, Dave, each of those three pieces of legislation is really sweeping and you could have picked a whole bunch of different provisions to highlight. We could have talked the whole show about nothing but one of those bills. They're large. They're complicated. Absolutely. But my conversations with local officials also show how much those bills dovetail with lots of what's going on here in town. For instance, the net zero action plan that we've developed in town really has some aspects and facets of it that are informed by but also connected to the larger goals of the legislation you were just saying. And of course, we know what you just said about the town voting, having more of that option of voting, absentee voting, and then making that permanent is something that people are really interested in and have responded to here in town in an active way. So I appreciate you kind of pointing out a number of things that really connect to our community as well as being effective throughout the Commonwealth. Sean, let me ask you to just weigh in from your perspective in the same way that Dave just did. Great. Well, first, thank you so much for interviewing both myself and Representative Rogers. And this certainly has been an exciting start to the session. Representative Rogers mentioned several pieces of legislation that we took up early. All three of those pieces were absolutely critical. And I'm proud to have worked with him and the rest of my colleagues to make sure they became law. And when the governor sent them back with some amendments that we rejected many of those amendments and kept with the legislative intent on all three of those important pieces of legislation. Rep Rogers mentioned the roadmap bill. Certainly an incredible piece of legislation, especially on the matter of offshore wind that's really going to set Massachusetts apart from the rest of the country. We really will be the leaders on offshore wind, which is just so very, very important for our future economy here as a Commonwealth. One of the great things about being the chair of the Global Warming and Climate Change Committee is we're having several oversight hearings to make sure that we hold accountable this administration for meeting each of those important goals that the legislation mandates. That is going to be a really important task. I was here in the legislature in 2009 when we passed the Global Warming Solutions Act, which was an outstanding piece of legislation as well. But it's really, really important just as much the theory of the legislation as the implementation. And so it really is going to be critical that we hold this governor, this administration, and quite frankly future administrations to the legislation and what the legislation mandates in terms of lowering emissions and other important standards. And now with a friendly administration at the federal level on the issue of procurement of offshore wind, I think Massachusetts will be in a position to lead on offshore wind and other important areas. He mentioned the police reform bill. I don't want to just parrot what Rep. Roger said, but I associate myself with his remarks. These are just outstanding bills. And he also mentioned the voting piece of legislation. As he mentioned, we extended the vote by mail provisions until the end of June because most of the local elections are done by the end of June. We do have municipal elections in September and November, the preliminary and the general in many areas. So my hope is, and I fully expect, that we will be taking up a further progressive and omnivist voting rights bill that will extend mail in voting, as Rep. Rogers mentioned, permanent. And I think that is really, really important. The only other bill, well, two other bills I will mention. One is, you know, we have all watched in great horror and much disbelief. That is what has happened with the Department of Children and Families recently in the news with the death of David Allman, 14-year-old boy who was sent home, not ready to go home, and it led to his death. And so the House of Representatives actually, before that atrocity, that tragedy took place, passed a really comprehensive children protection bill around strengthening DCF and really mandating that DCF do more to protect children in the care of the Commonwealth. I serve on the foster care caucus. As you know, I was adopted, so these issues are really important to me. No child ever in the custody of the supervision of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts life should be threatened, let alone taken as David Allman was. We have a committee on children and families. They've just had a 10-hour oversight hearing with Commissioner Spears of DCF and a number of other stakeholders to find out what went wrong and to make sure that this never happens again. And it's not a pretty picture. DCF failed in many, many ways. And it's coming out now that there were staff, social workers in DCF arguing that David should not have been returned to his home, that the setting was not appropriate in care, that his life would be in jeopardy, and that the family was not ready to be reunified with David. And because of management or other types of situations that will arise with further investigation, David was reunited with his family inappropriately. And this would be due to very unsafe conditions in his home, not healthy conditions. These conditions not fit for human habitation, let alone a 14-year-old boy. This led to his death, and it just should not have happened. So the legislation that we have passed around the Department of Children and Families, I believe is a strong one, and I believe the legislature is going to take further action on the negligent care in this case, but also making sure that kids are protected not only during this pandemic, but in the future as well. And the only other really piece of legislation I'll mention, and I'll be quick about it because I think we're going to go into further detail about it, and that is the 47-something billion-dollar budget that we just passed that is really a great achievement for the legislature during very difficult times. Revenues continue to grow in the month of March, in the month of April, which has allowed us to make some very key investments on things like the Student Opportunity Act and on mental health, disability services, and increasing state support for the first time in many years around the UGA, which is the Unrestricted General Government Aid, which is really, really important. So I can go on further on the budget, but I also want to be mindful of Representative Rogers' time as well. Yeah, so just like we lost Dave's audio briefly during when he was speaking earlier, I'm afraid we have lost his image as well for the moment. So let me just carry on with you, Shawn, until Dave returns. By asking or first of all by noting, I'm really glad that you said, and this goes all the way back to the beginning of what you were talking about, that a big part of governing and a big part of legislating is monitoring and staying vigilant about implementation. And so we are all used to out here in the public hearing big pronouncements and legislators after very hard work justifiably and understandably celebrating the achievement of the passage of a bill, etc. And again, taking some some credit for that words do etc. But we hear relatively little about that incredibly essential and vital work that you were describing that goes on that doesn't make the headlines. That simply is you guys doing the job that you need to do in order to make sure that the benefits accrue in the way that you intended from the legislation. So really glad that you just reminded us that that is a huge part of what you do and your responsibility is. So you were just describing some of the aspects of the budget that you passed and we have Dave back. So let me just throw it out to both of you. What are the pieces of the budget picture that are most promising or exciting for you guys as and specifically as they relate to Arlington. So for you guys in terms of the populations you represent and the benefits for Arlington specifically, Dave, we haven't heard from you for a little bit and we thought we'd lost you for a sec. So why don't we start with you? Sure. Well, we were able to get a number of local earmarks in the budget for the Jason Russell house, for instance, for the children's room, which is near and dear to to my heart. Collaborating with Representative Garvely. There was some money for the children's room, which for folks in Arlington who are watching and aren't familiar with it, provides grief counseling to young people who've had a trauma or a tragedy early in their life while their children. And so it could be someone's sibling died or they lost a parent or something of that nature. I lost my father when I was just 12. And I visited the children's room a couple of times. It's a remarkable place, remarkable work they do. And I remember thinking I wish they had something like that when I was young. So it was great that we could get some money for them. And some other local earmarks. And then I think, you know, generally the people that I'm privileged to represent care about a lot of these bigger things that we worked on, for instance, as was as Sean mentioned, the Student Opportunity Act, that's sort of a once in a generation transformative new law, the biggest reformed education since 1993, which invests significantly billions of dollars in our K through 12 our public schools. So we know that, particularly in a sort of ever changing global economy, the young people in our communities are going to be growing up and going out into a world that's a full of opportunity, but also highly competitive. And so education now more than ever, both K through 12 and higher education advanced education is just essential to the success of our of our young people. And the Student Opportunity Act, as I said, is sort of a landmark law that addressed some growing shortfall that we're developing in the way we financed education. There was a big commission that studied the way we finance public education. And because of a number of factors, the rising cost of retiree health care, the cost of educating those where English is a second language, and a whole variety of factors, including and also poverty, low income zip codes, that the state was falling behind and meeting the mark to give adequate or strong funding to public education. So in this budget, we made a down payment and over the coming years, we're going to be funding that environmental protection got strong funding, criminal justice implementing criminal justice reform got a good deal of funding. So and again, the budget has thousands of line items, we could again, devote just the show to talking just about the budget. But those are some of the highlights. And when the final thing I'll say on the budget is when the pandemic hit and the downturn in the economy, the consensus among economists and financial forecasters, what was that there might be a that there would be a precipitous fall off in state revenue, because our state budget and the revenue we the state collects is highly correlated with overall economic conditions. That's not as true, for instance, of local taxes, because you're the property tax you pay, if you own a home in Arlington, stays more or less the same in a good economy, a bad economy. But well, what you really mean is it goes up, no matter what. Right, right, right. But anyway, yes, but we wish it stayed the same. But with state revenue, think about it, income tax, capital gains tax, sales tax, they all go down in a bad economy. So anyway, the consensus forecast was that we would see a massive shortfall and the need perhaps for deep cuts. And it's kind of confounded in a good way, a lot of experts and legislators that state revenues, although there's still a little below the consensus forecast, they've held up okay. And between that and borrowing from the rainy day fund, when we and federal and federal help, we've been able to put together budgets that have been pretty good all in all. Yeah, I have to say a couple of things. One is, you know, talking to both of you a year ago, when we obviously didn't know what was in front of us, the situation just felt so grim on so many levels, but including the fiscal kind of ramifications of what we were doing, entering lockdown and shutting everything down and seeing how things would go and prioritizing understandably public health. But yeah, it's pretty, it's confounding, like you said, but in a wonderful way that this seems like really good news in this year's budget. The second thing I'd say as I turn it over to you, Sean, is I remember distinctly, particularly with you, Sean, talking repeatedly over these last five years. I think Dave just mentioned the commission that was created to kind of look at the lack of public of adequate funding for our education and hearing the frustration in your voice, Sean, as you would say, yes, these are not being implemented. These recommendations are not being implemented and we need them to be, et cetera, et cetera. So yeah, I'm just happy to share this moment with you, Sean, where I hope that you're happier with the prospects going forward because of what Dave was just describing in terms of the educational provisions in the budget. Absolutely. And as a former member of the school committee, we know that the state was underfunding its commitment to meeting its own mandates on supporting education. And this is a great budget. The FY22 budget makes a big investment in the implementation of the Student Opportunity Act. But let's not get ahead of ourselves. There's a lot of commitments that have to be made in the future in terms of the appropriation of education across the Commonwealth. But this was a big one. And the fact that we were able to meet the full implementation of that one year during a very concerning budget, concerning economy, I think it says really clearly where our priority is. And as Representative Rogers mentioned, the fiscal outlook over the past year, and you mentioned it as well, I remember. I was serving in the legislature in 2009 when the market collapse nationally impacted our budget here in Massachusetts. We lost about $5 billion in revenue between April, between March, April and May. I remember seeing sales tax revenue and particularly capital gains tax revenue just plummeted. And at that point, because there was no hope that the economy would rebound over the year or two years, we decided to just go ahead with the House budget. And the Senate did a similar thing. And the House budget, we literally cut billions of dollars in services. We slashed over 200 line items that were very important to the people of Massachusetts. And with this, we decided during the pandemic that we know revenues because of the shutdown, because of the government policy that revenues were not going to pick up. And we knew that was going to have a negative ramification on our revenues to be able to invest in important programs. But we also knew that we did not know what the future would look like five months, six months a year down the road. So instead of just cutting the budget, as we did in 2009, we decided to take a different approach. In FY 21, we used about 49, 50% of the rainy day fund. And we were very careful on moving forward. But you did not see a huge cut to important services for the people of the Commonwealth. And I think that was a wise decision. I'm very appreciative to Speaker DeLio and now Speaker Mariano, but also Chair Mike Lewis, who really guided the Commonwealth and my colleagues, just very smart policy. Last year, if we had taken a hatchet, if you will, to 200 line items and just cut billions of dollars, we really would be in a far worse off scenario because of when you cut, you are literally cutting safety nets for the people of the Commonwealth who really depend on programs and services. Unfortunately, we did not do that. And we can really get to a place where we build back better to coin a phrase as we move forward into FY 23 and start moving forward. So I am certainly excited for the work that lies ahead. Yeah, you just mentioned build back better. And it does feel like what you reminded us of is lessons learned from the 2008-2009 crisis and different tactics and more effective ones. It feels like taken this time around. And that seems both the case here in Massachusetts, but also on the federal level, at least now with the change of administration, it looks like President Biden, who was right there obviously throughout the decisions made in 2008-10, recognized you got to go big as we know that is happening. And let us hope that just like in Massachusetts, it feels like we are getting the benefits of that right now. Let us hope that we are all feeling that way nationally, now and into the future. Dave, we are quickly running out of time, surprise, but we have about 10 minutes left or so. And I wanted to just ask to, again, to focus, pick a few things that are priorities for you as you look forward to the next legislative session that you can share with our audience. Sure. Well, and I appreciate the opportunity. I filed, I think, 70 pieces of legislation this session, which is the most I have ever filed, and I have a lot of interesting projects in the works. One that I'm pretty excited about, because it seems to be gathering momentum, fingers crossed, is a right to council bill. That is, would grant low income people facing eviction, a legal right, a civil right to a lawyer. As we know, low income defendants in a criminal case are given a lawyer we are all familiar from TV and movies with the Miranda warning, if you cannot afford a lawyer, one will be appointed for you and so forth. But that is not true in civil court. And low income people going to civil court on any issue do not have a right to a lawyer and frequently do not have a lawyer. A matter of fact, we do have civil legal aid societies here in Massachusetts, Greater Boston Legal Services, the Cambridge Somerville Legal Services, with many fine lawyers that provide free or pro bono legal advice to clients, to low income clients. But unfortunately, the budget for these organizations is such that two thirds, two thirds of people seeking that help are turned away and must face our legal system without the advice of a lawyer. The way I always say is every school child in America is, and all of us familiar with, residing the pledge to allegiance and at the end, of course, we say, and justice for all. But the sad fact is, it's not true. We have a legal system that does not really afford equal justice to everyone. I've been working on this for six years now, and it's gathered momentum. The Chief Justice of our State Supreme Court endorsed it, former Chief Justice of the Boston Globe, our flagship newspapers endorsed it, over 100 organizations have endorsed it. Believe it or not, even including some property owners, some landlords who find that housing court would be more orderly, more efficient, more rational if the tenants had counsel. So I was pleased to pick up support of some landlords. By no means, all landlords are necessarily a majority of landlords, but some. And so I jointly filed it with Representative Mike Day from Winchester Stonem, who's now the Chair of the Judiciary Committee, where the bill traditionally has been heard. So there's no guarantee, but I'm hopeful. We have some momentum. Another thing I've been working on was partly wrapped into the police reform bill that is facial recognition technology. Part of the police reform is to put limits on facial recognition technology. What we found out is that the registry of motor vehicles here, the police were rifling through their database looking at individual citizens' driver's license photos without warrant, without any regulation whatsoever. So I filed a bill to put some sensible, you know, rational limits on that. And we got part of my bill included in the police reform, and then we formed a commission to study the issue further. And so police now will have to have proper notice, some safeguards, but we're going to study it further to see if other limits are appropriate. And I was appointed to the commission to study it. That's quite an honor. I'm looking forward to the work of the commission as a retired Supreme Court justice on there, some Boston area legal experts and others. And we're looking at that. I have a number of bills in the housing area to prevent discrimination in housing that I'll be working on. I did file a rent control bill to look at the issue of rent control. You know, it was banned 27 years ago on the ballot, but I think it was 51-49 in a statewide ballot. So it's been a quarter century. It was razor thin when it was banned. Only three cities had it, Cambridge, Boston and Brookline. So the other 348 cities and towns in the Commonwealth got to vote on it. It barely was defeated. And so I say, well, let's kick off that debate. Anyway, I know you have limited time. I have 60 some odd other bills. I'd love to come back and discuss with you. But I joined by my colleague, Sean. I want to give him a chance to talk about what he's working on. But those are some of the things I'm working on. Yeah. And absolutely, you know, this is it is really wonderful to you. And I particularly like it and welcome can't wait till we are all in the same room together, because I love that the dynamic of that conversation that when we have those. But we like to get the two of you on together. But I know that it means that you, you know, you don't get to go into the same kind of detail or cover the same amount of material. Each of you, thanks for your patience, both of you with that, that fact. Sean, the last five minutes, the balance of them are yours. And what what's what's on your agenda coming up? Well, I appreciate this time. It's I would say it's an aggressive agenda. I appreciate the comments from my great colleague rep Rogers. We have filed, I think as many pieces of legislation as representative Rogers. So between myself and rep Rogers, the Arlington delegation is certainly taking up all the clerk's time in terms of trying to pass important bills. And I that's a fact that I'm proud of. Actually, rep Rogers and I have authored a bill to add bereavement to the paid family medical leave law, which is just so very important. And we can talk about that at a later date, but I'm happy to partner with him on that important issue. Just today, before the joint committee on public health, I testified in favor, along with about 50 other advocates on a bill that actually passed the house last session didn't pass the Senate, but we're hoping that this session it will and that is to grant adoptees in the Commonwealth access to their original birth certificates. So unbeknownst to me, there is a law or not really sure why this happened, but there's a donor hole in Massachusetts law. And that is if you were adopted in the Commonwealth before 1974, you can get your original birth certificate. If you were born after 2008, you can get your original birth certificate. But if you were born between 1974 and 2008, like I was and so many other adopted young adoptees in the Commonwealth, you cannot get access to your original birth certificates. So we in the Commonwealth have really created three tiered system of people, people who are not adopted and can get their birth certificate, those who are adopted and can get their original birth certificate and those who are adopted but can't get their original birth certificate. So it's time to close the donut hole, if you will, and give all adoptees their vital records, which really is just about being human. You know, it's about restoring that dignity. So I'm really hoping that bill will pass quickly in the house and then have more time to get it passed in the Senate. Another piece of legislation I'm working on is called the Clean Acts, which I have filed with Marjorie Decker, which kind of increases our attention to climate change. You know, what we did at the beginning of this session and last session, passing the roadmap bill was outstanding, but we still believe we can do more and should do more. And moving to 100% renewable energy has been a priority of mine for quite some time. The Clean Act installs very important dates and mandates on how to get to clean energy, both in, you know, utilities, electricity, but also in transportation and home heating and housing and buildings, and so really important. But it also talks about transitioning in a just way, both with workers and making sure that no worker is left behind as we transition to 100% renewable energy and to focus on environmental justice communities. You know, this bill is really geared towards making sure no one is left behind. We had our kickoff last week. We had over 150 people on the call. So really a lot of exciting momentum, as Rep Rogers will surely remind you, as he is our great new chair of higher education. And unfortunately for him, most of my legislation is in either the Committee on Children and Families or the Joint Committee on Higher Education. So he hears from me all the time. There's a hearing next Tuesday. There's a hearing next Tuesday. And he was kind enough to tell me that three of my bills, I believe, are coming up for hearing for my bill. So I'm excited that he is leading that effort. One is in the aspect, you know, we have been, I would say, BR, which I would stand for before Rogers. The legislature has underfunded public higher education. We have 29 campuses of higher learning. Over the years, we just have not, similar to public ed, K through 12, we just have not invested in our 29 campuses of higher learning, which I believe is the lifeblood of our economy and of the Commonwealth. So I have filed the bill similar to the Student Opportunity Act for K through 12, known as the Cherish Act, which would support state support for public higher education for about 500 million dollars and hold fees and tuition flat, not grow. This kind of investment would really, really be critical for our, you know, whether it's community college, state universities or the UMass system. Another piece of legislation, I know we've talked about it before, is around the what we call the Inclusive Concurrent Enrollment Bill. And this is also, unfortunately, for Dave, in the committee on higher education. But he's been so good on these issues that I think he's really enjoying them. And that is, I know we've talked on ACMI quite a bit around my belief that students with autism and Down syndrome and other disability should have the civil right to be able to go to a public higher education institution, which is called Macy. And we have a line item in the budget that I work on every year. That's over a two million dollar line item that allows students to attend if the funding is available, but not across the system. And so my bill would really allow students to be able to attend courses to improve the quality of their lives and the prospects of their future and attend one of our 29 institutions of public higher learning. And that's important because if you see, if you look at the research, you know, there's over 300 schools that Prince College is to participate across the Commonwealth. And if you study the results from how students with autism and Down syndrome do in terms of independence, in terms of employment, the level of success for students who are allowed to attend college versus those who are not, it's really like night and day or day and night. So I'm really hoping that we're going to be able to finally pass this legislation this session. I've been working on this for six years. I will say in the line item in the budget that we just passed for the first time, language that I put in there allows for students with autism and Down syndrome older than 22 if the university allows it was adopted. And that is really, really important. And I would thank the my colleague Rob Rogers for supporting that. I know he had a lot to do with it. So it's really, to me, it's a it's a civil right and it's about time we do it. There are several pieces of legislation that I have filed, but those are just kind of a highlight of the bills that I am filing. But also to there is another bill around DCF to try to really hold the Department of Children and Families accountable so we don't have a situation like we did with the unfortunate death of David Albin from Fall River. It just should not have happened. We really need to prioritize the children who are in the care and custody of the Commonwealth. So thanks so much for having both myself and my good friend Dave Rogers on your program today. Yes, and of course, we have gotten to the end of the program as as quickly it seems as as we always do. And we've left lots left to talk about. And, you know, we may well follow up with each of you individually to be able to flush some of those things out a little bit more. Again, we want to thank both of you for both your patience with sharing the mic, which is not an easy thing to do. And also reminding us that we have very active representation, very effective representation and very committed representation from both of you. The themes that both of you hit on today are familiar from previous conversations, and that just shows that your focus remains strong and clear, and we appreciate that. So I have been speaking with Sean Garvely and Dave Rogers, our state reps, and we will talk to them again in the summer for sure, if not before. But thank you guys again for joining us. Thank you for joining us and listening. And I'm James Milan. This has been Talk of the Town on behalf of Representatives Garvely and Rogers. We do thank you for joining us and we will see you next time.