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Getting To Yes: The Makings Of Paid Leave In Massachusetts, Christa Kelleher, Laurie Nsiah-Jefferson, Priyanka Kabir, Lillian Hunter, Cassandra M. Porter, Center For Women In Politics And Public Policy, University Of Massachusetts Boston

Publications from the Center for Women in Politics and Public Policy

Considered one of the strongest paid family and medical leave laws in the nation, the paid leave law adopted in Massachusetts in 2018 was notable for the depth and range of robust caregiving supports and protections for workers. But just as notable is how the law came to be. After all, paid leave bills had been filed for years in Massachusetts. Decades in fact. Yet until 2018, there had been limited movement in the legislature to establish a statewide program. What led to the passage of paid leave legislation in Massachusetts with approval from a Republican Governor? What factors influenced …

Sustainable Pathways For Successful Small Businesses In Chelsea, Massachusetts, Fabián Torres-Ardila, Lorna Rivera, Carolina Rojas-Pion, Daniela Bravo, Henry Chavez

Gastón Institute Publications

This report focuses on the critical role that small business owners and entrepreneurs play in the socioeconomic development of a predominantly Latino community like Chelsea, Massachusetts.

This report compiles the key findings and recommendations that resulted from conducting a qualitative study with small business owners and other individuals who play important roles in advocating for and supporting this community. Assuming an asset-based approach rather than a deficit-based one (Green & Haines, 2011), our study focuses on the skills and knowledge of small business owners and identifies a myriad of possibilities for City administrators to build upon existing practices and behaviors …

Reinforcing The Safety Net: A Collaborative Survey With The Massachusetts Nonprofit Network, Heather Macindoe, Lindsay Morgia, Erynn Herman

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

The more than 35,000 nonprofit organizations in Massachusetts employ 20% of the state’s workforce and serve as a vital part of the social safety net. Many of these organizations face challenges concerning fiscal sustainability. Funding often covers current services with little surplus to address organizational capacity issues. Successful public-nonprofit partnerships are key to building a resilient nonprofit sector. This study contributes to the nonprofit sector’s knowledge of how best to engage with policymakers at the state and local level.

Changing Patterns Xvi: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underseved Borrowers & Neighborhoods In Boston, Greater Boston And Massachusetts, 2008, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

This is the sixteenth in the annual series of Changing Patterns reports prepared for the Massachusetts Community & Banking Council (MCBC) by the present author. The series is aptly named: mortgage lending since 1990 has indeed been characterized by “changing patterns.” In recent years, the major focus of the series shifted from concern for fair access to credit for traditionally underserved borrowers and neighborhoods to concern for access to fair credit for these same borrowers and neighborhoods. This reflects the extent to which the problem of redlining had become overshadowed by the problem of reverse redlining, whereby areas that …

Changing Patterns Xiv: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underseved Borrowers & Neighborhoods In Boston, Greater Boston And Massachusetts, 2006, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

This is the fourteenth in the annual series of Changing Patterns reports prepared for the Massachusetts Community & Banking Council (MCBC) by the present author. This year’s report, for the first time, includes the analysis of subprime lending that was previously presented in a separate annual series of Borrowing Trouble reports. The report presents information for the city of Boston, for Greater Boston, and for Massachusetts, as well as for each of the state’s fourteen counties and each of its thirty-three largest cities and towns.

The analysis is based on federal Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) data for 2006, as …

Changing Patterns Xiii: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underserved Borrowers And Neighborhoods In Greater Boston, 1990-2005, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present study is the latest in a series of annual updates of the original report, Changing Patterns: Mortgage Lending in Boston, 1990-1993. Beginning in 1998, the reports’ geographic scope was expanded to include an examination of mortgage lending patterns in 27 cities and towns surrounding the city of Boston. In 2003, the report’s geographic coverage was further expanded to include a total of 108 communities. This year’s report extends coverage to all counties, regional planning areas, and federally-defined metropolitan areas in Massachusetts.

The text that follows this introduction highlights some of the most significant findings that emerge from …

Changing Patterns Xii: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underserved Borrowers And Neighborhoods In Greater Boston, 1990-2004, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present study is the latest in a series of annual updates of the original report, Changing Patterns: Mortgage Lending in Boston, 1990-1993. Beginning in 1998, the reports’ geographic scope was expanded to include an examination of mortgage lending patterns in 27 cities and towns surrounding the city of Boston. In 2003, the report’s geographic coverage was further expanded to include a total of 108 communities.

The text that follows this introduction highlights some of the most significant findings that emerge from the extensive set of tables and charts that constitute the bulk of the report. Part I, together …

Changing Patterns Xi: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underserved Borrowers & Neighborhoods In Greater Boston, 1990-2003, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present study is the latest in a series of annual updates of the original report, Changing Patterns: Mortgage Lending in Boston, 1990-1993. Beginning in 1998, the reports’ geographic scope was expanded t o include an examination of mortgage lending patterns in 27 cities and towns surrounding the city of Boston. In last year’s report, the geographic coverage was further expanded to include a total of 108 communities.

The text that follows this introduction highlights some of the most significant findings that emerge from the extensive set of tables and charts that constitute the bulk of the report. The …

Changing Patterns Xi: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underserved Borrowers And Neighborhoods In Greater Boston, 1990-2003, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present study is the latest in a series of annual updates of the original report, Changing Patterns: Mortgage Lending in Boston, 1990-1993. Beginning in 1998, the reports’ geographic scope was expanded t o include an examination of mortgage lending patterns in 27 cities and towns surrounding the city of Boston. In last year’s report, the geographic coverage was further expanded to include a total of 108 communities.

The text that follows this introduction highlights some of the most significant findings that emerge from the extensive set of tables and charts that constitute the bulk of the report. The …

Borrowing Trouble? Iv: Subprime Mortgage Refinance Lending In Greater Boston, 2000-2002, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present report is the fourth in the annual series begun by that initial study; it extends the time period covered through 2002, and expands the number of individual cities and towns for which data on subprime refinance lending are provided to 108.

Although motivated by a concern with predatory lending, this study and its predecessors – like all of the other quantitative studies of which I am aware – analyzes and reports on lending by subprime lenders. It is therefore important to emphasize that although all predatory loans are subprime, only a fraction of subprime loans are predatory. While …

Changing Patterns X: Mortgage Lending To Traditionally Underserved Borrowers And Neighborhoods In Greater Boston, 1990-2002, Jim Campen

Gastón Institute Publications

The present study is the latest in a series of annual updates of the original report, Changing Patterns: Mortgage Lending in Boston, 1990-1993. Beginning in 1998, the reports’ geographic scope was expanded to include an examination of mortgage lending patterns in 27 cities and towns surrounding the city of Boston. In this year’s report, the geographic coverage has been further expanded t o include a total of 108 communities.

This introduction is followed by ten pages of text that identify some of the most significant findings that emerge from the extensive set of tables and charts that constitute the …

Access To Capital And Technical Assistance, Richard J. Ward

New England Journal of Public Policy

This article summarizes and analyzes the views of select leaders in business, labor, banking, the government, and academia with regard to the constraints, obstacles, and recommendations to achieve economic growth in Massachusetts. The role of the state government in addressing these issues receives special attention. Access to capital and technical assistance had been regarded by many as the key constraint, particularly during the recession of the early 1990s. The author analyzes inconvenient government systems, bottlenecks, and bureaucracy as throttling the flow of capital to small-business entrepreneurs. The analysis concludes, however, that unless the state cum federal government finds ways to …

Public Benefit And Private Interest: Chronicles Of The Hyde Park Paper Mill, Jeffrey E. Lindenthal

New England Journal of Public Policy

Until it was mothballed and put up for sale in December 1987, a small paper mill in Hyde Park, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Boston 's city limits, was the oldest continuously operating paper mill in the United States. This particular plant closing occurred at a time manufacturing employment in the state had fallen off precipitously. It also coincided with an awareness among some policymakers that recycling programs were urgently needed to combat a garbage glut, in Massachusetts and states across the nation, attributable to an increasingly wasteful society and dwindling landfill capacity. Efforts to reopen the Hyde Park …

Future Issues Facing Boston: The Assessing Department, Janet L. Hunkel

John M. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies Publications

Taxpayers' opinions of municipal government often focus on the property tax. Taxpayers are stingy, and they are critical as to whether their money is purchasing competent services. For citizens to have faith that government is democratic, taxes must be equitable — everyone must pay their fair share. For government to function efficiently, tax administration must be efficient in order to support city services.

The property tax is a complex, difficult tax to administer; it is vulnerable to misuse. However, there have been recent, dramatic changes to the tax laws. Municipal government in Massachusetts now has the political and legal wherewithall …

Future Issues Facing Boston: Financing Of The City's Operating And Capital Construction Program, J. Chester Johnson

John M. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies Publications

This paper reviews the important factors affecting the current status of debt finance and debt management by the City of Boston, including the City's significant credit problems and the financing implications. While significant challenges to Boston's finance and debt management have recently been met in part through a combination of fiscal austerity measures and altered operating and financing approaches, there are important new debt financing challenges facing Boston in 1984 and beyond.

Boston's Fiscal Future: Prognosis And Policy Options For 1984 To 1986, Joseph S. Slavet, Raymond G. Torto

John M. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies Publications

The finances of the City of Boston have been variously affected throughout its long history by regional and national economic cycles, by legal constraints and changes in the state-local tax system and by inter-municipal resource and expenditure disparities.

In more recent years, however, a series of tremors converged to propel Boston's seemingly chronic fiscal problem to the crisis stage. As inflation climbed to unprecedented double-digit levels, an overwhelming majority of the state's populace supported specific limits on property taxes, the primary source of municipal revenue. As a result, Boston was forced to reduce property tax levies by $144 million during …