THE SUPREME JUDICIAL COURT refused to issue a preliminary injunction that would have released convicted prisoners to house arrest on Tuesday, holding that their continued incarceration increased their odds of contracting COVID-19 but did not violate the Eighth Amendment’s threshold of cruel and unusual punishment. The court, in fact, said the Baker administration’s Department of […]
Governor Charlie Baker
Posted inEconomy
Deferred dreams for black, brown business owners
MIGUEL VARGAS runs the Bajucol Dance Studio in East Boston, a business out of step with the social distancing required to fend off COVID-19. The two-year-old enterprise shut down in March. Vargas has tried hosting classes online, but few customers have signed up. His income has vanished, his rent is two months overdue, and his future prospects are iffy in the “new normal” Gov. Charlie Baker is talking about. Vargas’ story is typical […]
Posted inHealth Care
Foreign-trained medical professionals waiting to help
LAITH ALMATWARI has medical experience with respiratory and cardiovascular diseases that he thinks would be valuable in the fight against COVID-19, but bureaucratic red tape is preventing him from jumping into the fray. The 34-year-old Almatwari trained and worked as a doctor in Iraq and Egypt, completed two residencies, and served as a medic for the US Army in Iraq. He now […]
Posted inPolitics
In poll, Baker takes backseat to Trump
GOV. CHARLIE BAKER IS increasingly a man without a party. Four years ago Donald Trump won the Republican presidential primary in Massachusetts with 49 percent of the vote. Now his support among Republicans in Massachusetts is overwhelming. A WBUR poll of 374 likely Republican primary voters found 82 percent of them have a favorable view of Trump, […]
Posted inUncategorized
Opponents fume over Baker vaping ban
FOR SAFIA JAMIL, the owner of vaping shops in Marlborough and Walpole, the one-two punch of Gov. Charlie Baker’s emergency vaping ban and legislation passed this week to ban all flavored tobacco products is likely to be a knockout that puts her out of business. Jamil said she has lost “thousands of dollars” because of […]
Posted inEducation
Legislature should look to private donations to fund UMass
HIGHER EDUCATION FUNDING and the cost of attending the University of Massachusetts generated significant controversy in the budget just passed by the Massachusetts Legislature and signed by Gov. Charlie Baker. While UMass received funding increases in the 2020 fiscal year budget, overall per-student state funding for public higher education has decreased by more than 30 percent since 2001. The result is […]