 Hello, everyone, and welcome. I'm James Milan. I am with Jennifer Freese, who is candidate for 24th Middlesex District, State Representative, and we are here for a one-on-one conversation in which we are just going to get to know Jennifer, the person, and Jennifer the candidate a little bit better. First of all, Jen, thanks so much for carving the time out. I know this is a busy time leading up to the election for you, obviously. There's always time to talk to the voters. That's what it's all about. All right, so let's do that. Let's make sure that the voters know more about you than they, you know, at the end of this conversation than they do at the start. And let me ask for that. Why don't you just before we start delving into your professional background and how that, you know, has a lot to do with your running for office, I'm curious about why you would take this kind of thing on. This is a one of my colleagues called this a brave thing for you to do, and I don't think that she was I don't think she was off with that. I do think it's brave to take on the challenge of running, especially in the current circumstances for public office. So what motivated you to do so? Is it something that's been on your mind a while or something recent? What is that? So I am a lifelong Democrat and I I was a public policy major and both undergraduate and I have my master's in public administration. So in some ways it's not that crazy that I would run for office. I'm the kind of person that people tend to ask who are you voting for and that kind of thing because they know I'm I'm paying attention but on the other hand, I also just I always saw myself as being the supporter to campaigns and I would have been a volunteer. I've done lots of things on lots of different campaigns for candidates for office and also just for issue campaigns that I cared a lot about. And so yeah, this is very different for me and out of the comfort zone and I think like a lot of people after the 2016 election I felt like whatever I was doing I needed to do more and um when I looked around I felt like there was a lot that was broken on the state level that our state politics just had so much in the way of just delaying dragging their feet on really important policy obstructing it. I felt like it was really hard for the average person to know what's happening on things policies that they really care about and just day-to-day services that really mean a lot like schools being funded adequately, the tea running well I also have been hearing people worry about their future because of climate change or the future of the children and grandchildren and housing all the things that I know a lot about from my career in the nonprofit world and so I had a group of people over my house to do postcarding for Stacy Abrams and it was the weekend that we knew it was the Friday night that we knew that Brett Kavanaugh was going to be appointed to the Supreme Court and it was a really raw conversation because that news was just really hard to take and we also just been hearing more and more about families being separated at the borders and people were talking about just how we needed more people in office that knew about on the direct level how these policies were impacting people and I was also sharing with some people just my frustration. I had visited my rep about an issue I really cared about the red flag law and He said he was with us, but he spent the whole time playing devil's advocate. He literally said he wanted to play devil's advocate and he did and um I just left really disheartened and somehow out of that, you know, a lot of people were there from the neighborhood um, they encouraged me to to run for the seat and the next day I actually applied to a candidate training program uh that encourages democratic women to run for office and even then I it was very um preliminary because I ran a nonprofit that had a state contract and um is pretty important in the camers community and I didn't want to Have it be seen that my nonprofit was tied up in politics So I told my board of directors. I was entering this program and at the end of six months I would let them know if I was going to run for office and uh, I came out of it still feeling like I could make a difference and I did I left that job. I took another job that's more compatible. Um with campaigning and um Yeah, I sometimes say that running for office is my midlife crisis I'm 50 and And um, yeah on the same age as or just um the train that derailed on the red line is just a little bit older than me And it was supposed to be 25 years in service. So All right, so no wonder your your the mbta is one of your one of the you know, obviously your key issues and concerns Which we will talk about a little bit more Further on in the conversation, but you did reference your career in nonprofits. So tell us about that and especially with an emphasis on You know voters understanding how it is that that career would be relevant to and perhaps An excellent preparation for You know the the job of state rep Yeah, so I started my career as a volunteer I was a volunteer on a suicide hotline in college And that led to volunteering also on the domestic violence Shelter hotline at the shelter and on the hotline and in the family courts in Providence, Rhode Island I ultimately wrote my thesis my honors thesis on prosecution of domestic violence misdemeanors In the case when a witness the victim is hesitant to go forward And it really makes a difference in terms of policy how the prosecutor approaches that hesitant witness that turns out And so I did original research on that and presented my findings to the attorney general in Rhode Island And so then I worked for many years in domestic violence shelters and programs And made a slight shift when I took a job at In a statewide capacity at the massachusetts legal assistance corporation That is a quasi state agency. So it was funded by statute and you know, there's certain things in the statute That says who can be on the board and how it runs Um, but it is an independent nonprofit. So it's a little one of those strange So that's what quasi means in that case is that it's kind of gets some of its funding from Yeah, yes, but okay. Yeah, not just funding with some of its authority to operate. It was not A 501 c3. It's it's a little different. Um And so I was second in command there and while I was there I was able to Be part of a founding coalition That the equal justice coalition that started something called walk to the hill for legal aid We were able to secure break a logjam and secure millions of dollars of funding for legal assistance for people who are facing things like eviction elder law crises employment issues housing issues of other kinds Immigration cases and in a separate effort while I was there I also was able to secure several million dollars of funding annually for victims of domestic violence Who that's actually the most effective intervention In terms of reducing homicides for against victims and their children is legal assistance It's kind of strange. Do you think shelter would be the thing that would be the most effective? But there's good research that shows that Um providing legal assistance because it allows the victim to maintain her independence And potentially get income and support that otherwise she wouldn't get Um, he or she um That it actually legal assistance is the thing that makes it less likely that a victim will be killed and their children Um, so anyway, I I was successful in that it was um hard work We had a very conservative speaker who was opposed to funding those kinds of things and it took uh assembling an unusual coalition of people to Change his mind at least to let it go forward. It wasn't that he was a fan of legal services But it just like now it's very hard to get a vote on important legislation. You can't even get it to the floor And that's one of the things that I've seen over the years It's just been broken on on beacon hill is that really good legislation goes into committee And on a secret vote it dies. So we never see an unpublished vote. We never see why things don't come out um, and then sometimes things are just stuck there like the roe act, which um is About reproductive health care and abortion rights that it has been stuck in committee for more than 18 months and um, You know, that's that's kind of typical of a lot of really good and important laws um, they're I mean, what do you? Excuse the interruption, but what do you? um What do you attribute That phenomenon that you're You know describing to um, why is it that that happens with more regularity than you or maybe all of us would like it to I think that there is um, a consolidation of power in leadership, which can happen in any institution um, however What I I'm afraid I see happening is that people who can afford to hire lobbyists Know exactly what's going on on beacon hill And people who can't which is everyone else you and me and everybody else all the voters We we can't even figure it out like it's very opaque and it's opaque by design um, and so As a result you have things like uh corporate tax cuts and loopholes created and um Just it works the system works pretty well for people who are Wealthy enough or corporations usually or people who are wealthy enough to hire lobbyists um, but it does not work well for the rest of us And I I I think that that is by design to a certain extent. That's who they want to hear from And I think that we need to open it up. It could use some sunshine as a cleanser And um, we could use some transparency in the house rules I've taken a transparency pledge from act on mass in part. Um, it's not something that just I'm Passionate about there's a whole movement around transparency right now And trying to increase transparency because people are realizing much like campaign finance reform Transparency is a block something that would correct A whole lot of things that are wrong with the system and help us produce better governance good governance For people and centered around the people so you And again, I'm mindful of the fact that I interrupted your your Describing your you know the build up um professionally to to here and we can certainly get back to that but just to follow up on this a little bit more What you describe in terms of the problems or the the systemic issue with Uh in perhaps the in the state house here Sounds like that's the problem with the way that government functions on all levels which is that those who have access or tend to be those who are Best financed and best, uh, you know, just have the deepest pockets and they know how to get things done As you said and they have the ears or they could get their phone calls Answered etc. Um, and that just again seems like That's the way that things work in general Do you think that the situation in massachusetts and in the state house is Uh, it is is as as bad as it is for instance in people's perceptions on the federal level Um, and that we you know that it's broken in many of those same ways That's a good question. Um I think that one thing that people don't realize because we think of massachusetts as being a very blue state is that The the house in particular the senate actually has better rules and better transparency um than the house and um massachusetts actually has um a very secretive culture compared with other state houses in uh on the in the house level and um So it is unusual that way and it can be hard for for instance committee votes are secret so there Is something that you hear about all the time from um lobbyist So the lobbyists I know are people who lobby for things like homelessness And maybe there's like one person in the whole state who does that work or a legal aid person Who's lobbying on behalf of the needs of? um People who can't get unemployment or something like that um But you know, so those people are there are they are registered lobbyists. Um, so um, what I hear from people like that who Really know about the system is that um Raps will tell you to your face if you're a constituent that they support a bill and sometimes they'll even sponsor it And then they vote against it in committee um And you know, that's really frustrating and we should be able to have honest open debates about what we support and I guess I'm at a place in my life where I feel like I can be very Transparent just personally too about what I support and why it may not be the most popular thing everything I support but I can ground it in my lived experience of Several decades of personal and professional experience living in the district and helping Um secure funding and you know provide programs and work with people to improve their lives And so, you know, there are things that may be controversial like the safe communities act um Which if people don't know the safe communities act another thing that's been stuck in committee is something that sets limits and boundaries around how our state authorities work with immigration the federal authorities And the the way I've explained it to voters is I've worked with many victims of domestic violence Whose abusers use their status against them and in many cases they were eligible to become american citizens But their american citizen husband who was abusive to them Refused to file the papers because that was something you could hold over her Uh, and so he would say to her i'm going to get you deported And i'm going to keep the kids because the kids are american citizens You don't want the kids meanwhile, but he wants to pressure her to do whatever it is. He wants her to do and so um You know, this is not just one victim I'm talking about I've talked with many victims and survivors that this is one of the pieces of it You know, he marries her while he's you know You know on military duty abroad brings her home It doesn't file the paperwork So and then he threatens her that if you call the police i'm going to get you deported And at least during the prior administration, they had policy Guidelines that said no don't deport that person But our current administration is actually doing the complete opposite anyone that they can they are deporting It doesn't matter if they're a victim of domestic violence a child a an infant Um a victim of trafficking they're deporting them And so when we're in this environment where our federal government is putting children in cages um We really need to stand up and pass the safe communities act and I can explain why Because I have had that day-to-day experience with people In the district You know, I I don't Personally, I can't imagine how many people would argue with the goal of increasing transparency for instance um as You know as a mission that one would enter state office with but I am curious about what What is your hope? Were you to be elected and join? The the the house What is your hope for making change in that area? Is it that you hope to be part of a larger movement of people? You know the others who have subscribed as you have uh Taking that transparency pledge that you because I would think you need Like there are limits to what you could do as one representative. So what is You know, let's just let's just assume for the purposes of the conversation or this part of it. You get in You're voted in What can you do? To address These issues again around transparency in just the way that the this particular state house is So I I am part of a movement of candidates and um some already elected officials who have taken this transparency pledge and um So if there are enough of us, we could actually amend the rules and just make it better permanently But if there aren't we've pledged that we will publish our votes if We'll publish our votes in committee. We will um if we're chair of a committee publish all the votes from that committee So and I If I can tell you a little bit more about the unusual coalition we built for walk to the hill um One of the things that we did we realized that the speaker at the time tom finner and for those who remember when he used to be our speaker um now a felon ex felon um he um Was really determined not to provide any additional funding for legal aid and the funding had just eroded year by year because of inflation And it was really at a crisis point of layoffs and that kind of thing And the coalition that we assembled in the end we realized he didn't care if you brought low-income people up To talk to reps literally that just did not budge anything and so we realized that there was this whole group that was um potentially influential and sympathetic and it was people who went to law school with these legal aid attorneys Really cared about and maybe did a little pro bono law really cared about access to justice But worked at big firms and worked at big companies So we assembled a group of about 35 corporate councils from major corporations based in massachusetts And they we had them do a press conference and that totally got the speaker's attention because it was big name companies And then we also got Attorneys from all these firms and it's an annual event now It really is influential because it's something that an attorney can do If you're billing out by the hour your out your time is just really tight And so it you know if you but if you work on a firm at a firm in boston downtown boston Which a lot of people do it's just a couple hours out of your day Once a year and you walk to the hill and you see your rep and you tell them why access to justice is important to you um as a you know Attorney at foley hoad or something you know and all of a sudden they're like, uh And you know it really has made a huge difference in Having those people listen to and yes, then we do also bring low-income people who can really speak to it but they're speaking you know when we have all those attorneys assembled and You know then the legislators want to come and then the person can speak to the real situation in their lives so Yeah, I think sometimes you have to be a little strategic And I am ready to do that and I um, you know, I've built long-term Partnerships public private partnerships of all different kinds the other thing I've done in my career Is I've done a lot of work in the nonprofit a sector in education And in that role as I would have led the largest nonprofit partner with the Cambridge public schools and it's uh agency There's about a half a million dollar budget and runs programming before during and after school in the Cambridge public schools and we had a number of partnerships with Tech biotech pharma companies engineering firms and these were long-term partnerships that we started You know, I started a partnership with Novartis that I think again It's been about 20 years now since they came to Cambridge Um, and they mentor students in seventh grade in the public schools And it's hard to sustain partnerships. It takes work and it takes trust and Effort and I'm willing to put that time and effort in You know, there are many times when those programs could have failed, you know, the Cambridge public school is totally restructured And in any normal environment Like the the volunteer projects would have just come to a close because that school closed and the teachers were different And we facilitated to make sure that those relationships continued because it was about making connecting the students the children With mentors and it was really important that it keep going so You know, we have um only it's time is flying. It always does. Uh, we have only about seven eight minutes To go. I wanted to give you an opportunity. Uh, you did you did have a chance in a recent debate That you were involved into really elaborate pretty well on on the your your particular priorities, but Go ahead and pick one or two Uh of the things that you you know are most important to you about why you're running and what you want to do And tell us some more so My three priorities are fixing the T Addressing climate change and reinvesting in our UMass system and our public schools And I guess I am a public school parent and I'd like to speak a little bit about schools and school funding So, um, when we talk about local aid the funding that flows into cities and towns from the state One of the biggest buckets is chapter 70 money, which is for education public education in our cities and towns and The legislature after dragging its feet and dragging its feet There was this thing called the foundation budget review committee. It said that we were under funding education by one to two billion dollars Back in 2015 And then nothing happened nothing happened. Finally, they passed an act to address this called the student opportunity act and it was supposed to then Over seven years each year one seventh of the funding to get us over seven years to the full funding that would be needed to make up for Things like really rising healthcare costs special education costs The cost of educating low-income students who might need additional services or english language learners And some special stuff for rural districts So all things I might say that we have been wrestling with here in arlington. Yeah, of course. Yeah So, um Finally finally they passed it and now they're saying because of Covid and revenues that they're not going to fund it So it was considered local aid will be level funded, which was good plus a little inflation But they're not going to fund the student opportunity act And here's what I would like to say about spending right now It may seem counter-intuitive and you may feel like well the state should not spend When we're in a recession, but what I will say to you is Recessions get worse if you cut spending if you do austerity measures It actually counter-intuitively makes your recession longer and worse And if the state steps up and provides money for essential services Um of all kinds and I'll just use this as one example You get out of your recession more quickly and I mean, we hope it's not a full recession But it could be if we don't make the right choices And I think funding the student opportunity act is one of the right choices We should be making and I would prioritize that in my work at the state house Well, you know, it does seem from our talk with our chats with you know our our Sean Garberley, Dave Rogers, the state representative Cindy Friedman as the senator that They are really under you know under a lot of pressure to find money when the money is you know So so where would where if if we're going to take that step that you're saying to fund things You know as much or more in in order to you know The effect that that will have where will that money come from? Where would you get it? Where would you get it from? So we've had a number of tax cuts over the years since 1998. We've had about three billion dollars in tax cuts and um We could decide that we are going to raise certain taxes in order to raise revenues Um, they did do a slight adjustment to the corporate taxes, but there could be more I often talk about the corporate tax is As something that should be funding transit because companies are really worried about how other people are going to get to work And I think they're realizing as much as we fought for and ask for these tax cuts Is it really working out for us if our employees can't make it into work? Um reliably on the t and they can't on the roads either because as soon as we go back to work We'll be back in that worst in the nation traffic that we had last fall and into the winter So I think that we can expect our corporations to do more We can expect our wealthy citizens to do more and again, they are benefiting from a good economy if we It's not to stick it to somebody It's listen We all can do better if you would chip in a little more So that we can all have a better quality of life and your employees can too And I think that that's important and I think we can make that case and make that choice So we've got only a minute or two Um, what else would you like to make sure the voters know? I just want to make sure that people know that this year Voting by mail is safe and secure in massachusetts. You have the right to vote by mail and you Um, you may have already returned your postcard. It looks like this. Um, that came You still have time to return that if you want to request a ballot There's also an online if you go to jennifer freeze.com, which is my website Freezes spelled like french fries f r i e s Um, you can click on a link there to go to the secretary of the commonwealth's vote by mail information If you also for the first time will be able to track your ballot So if you do not get your ballot in time Or if you submit your ballot if you mail it back and it is not received in time and counted You have the right to vote in person So a lot of people who vote in primaries are like me I vote in every election and it actually gives me pain to think of not being able to vote for some reason Or having my vote not be counted So I just want to reassure people that your vote will be counted and you also have the right to go and vote in person If your vote is not counted first in time, um, you know, if you're getting your ballot and you realize it's too late Um to mail it back you can go and vote in person and that is your right You can also return your ballot to the drop box at town hall Um, so if you're worried about putting it in the mail, you can go and do that And protocol will be a good place to do that safely. I know yes And I will um, just say I ask for your vote in the democratic primary I believe that I can make a difference for all of us and I am just honored for the opportunity to speak to all the voters and um, thank you for having me today james and Thank you to the voters for tuning in and for doing the work of democracy Well, I agree on all counts. I want to thank you for joining us today jennifer frieze And you the viewers for tuning in Hopefully you got some valuable information. I'm sure you did Um, thank you to everybody for joining us for this one-on-one conversation with candidate for 24th Middle sex district state representative jennifer frieze from kate bridge Um, thanks again, jenn. Thank you. I'm james melanne. Take care You