THE BAKER ADMINISTRATION on Thursday unveiled a support package for nursing homes that ties staffing and occupancy reforms to additional, stable long-term funding and short-term aid in the event COVID-19 infection rates begin to rise again this fall. Earlier this year, when COVID-19 deaths were surging at nursing homes, the Baker administration belatedly pumped emergency […]
Bruce Mohl
Bruce Mohl oversees the production of content and edits reports, along with carrying out his own reporting with a particular focus on transportation, energy, and climate issues.
He previously worked at the Boston Globe, where he spent nearly 30 years in a wide variety of positions covering business and politics. He covered the Massachusetts State House and served as the Globe’s State House bureau chief in the late 1980s. He also reported for the Globe’s Spotlight Team, winning a Loeb award in 1992 for coverage of conflicts of interest in the state’s pension system. He served as the Globe’s political editor in 1994 and went on to cover consumer issues for the newspaper.
Bruce is a graduate of Ohio Wesleyan University and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University.
Posted inUncategorized
Contact tracing ramping up hiring again
THE MASSACHUSETTS CONTACT tracing effort, which scaled back its workforce dramatically this summer as the spread of COVID-19 subsided, is ramping up again. The nonprofit Partners in Health, which works with local boards of health across the state to track down those who have been infected with the coronavirus and those they have come in […]
Posted inUncategorized
Communities at high-risk for COVID-19 grow
GOV. CHARLIE BAKER talked up the state’s progress in dealing with COVID-19 on Wednesday, but the latest data using the administration’s most closely watched metric showed the situation worsening on several fronts. The number of cases per 100,000 people statewide over the last two weeks continued to rise, going from 4.2 a week ago to 4.6 […]
Posted inUncategorized
Baker: COVID precautions driving down health care costs
Gov. Charlie Baker said on Wednesday that health care costs overall in Massachusetts are dropping, not because fears of COVID-19 are prompting people to avoid hospitals but because the incidence of such routine health issues as ear infections, sore throats, and strep are way down from previous years. The governor said the wearing of masks […]
Posted inPolitics
Walsh plays hardball on Wu’s announcement
IT LOOKS LIKE the race for mayor of Boston is off to a testy start. City Councilor Michelle Wu called Mayor Marty Walsh as a courtesy on Sunday to tell him that she plans to run for mayor. Most politicians, when they get such a call, say thanks and start preparing for the fight ahead. […]
Posted inTransportation
Red Line train gets a bit close for comfort
I rode in a Red Line car on Tuesday afternoon that was very near the MBTA’s crowding standard, and it felt like passengers were close together. I knew something was different when I walked out on the platform at Park Street Station at about 3:20 p.m. In contrast with similar trips over the last five […]
Posted inEducation
Parent frustration about schools is rising
WITH LESS THAN TWO WEEKS until school starts, parents from Somerville and Newton say they have yet to get any details on what classes will look like for their children and whether remote learning will be better than it was when schools suddenly shut down last spring amid COVID-19. “Families cannot live in a state […]
Posted inTransportation
MBTA: Truck driver had no ‘malicious intent’
THE TRUCK OPERATOR who drove into the restricted access Silver Line tunnel on Friday morning had “no malicious intent,” according to an MBTA spokesman. Joe Pesaturo, a spokesman for the T, said the truck driver, who was not identified, “unwittingly tailed” a Silver Line vehicle onto the ramp and into the tunnel. Pesaturo said an […]
Posted inTransportation
Truck causes damage to Silver Line tunnel
A TRUCK ON FRIDAY morning entered the Silver Line underground transitway that runs to South Station and caused damage to the overhead wires, which had not been fully repaired as of Saturday evening. Lisa Battiston, a spokeswoman for the MBTA, issued a statement saying the truck entered the transitway at approximately 9:30 a.m. by mistake. […]
Posted inUncategorized
Despite pandemic, state tax revenues hold steady
DESPITE A PANDEMIC and record unemployment, Massachusetts tax revenues in August continued to hold fairly steady compared to last year. The Massachusetts Department of Revenue reported on Friday that an apples-to-apples comparison shows tax revenues in August 2020 were down only $7 million, or .4 percent, compared to the same month a year ago. For […]