Tag: Healey

The Rundown – March 2023

I would apologize for not writing a February edition of “The Rundown”, but honestly there wasn’t enough to write about at the state and mainly the federal level to justify a rundown.

Federal Recap

At the federal level, over the last month and a half, Members of Congress have basically spent their time creating sounds bites for news stations and click bate twitter posts. For an example, On Presidents Day, Georgia Rep. Marjory Taylor Greene, wrote a tweet saying “We need a national divorce. We need to separate by red states and blue states and shrink the federal government. Everyone I talk to says this. From the sick and disgusting woke culture issues shoved down our throats to the Democrat’s traitorous America Last policies, we are done.” And she doubled down after on Fox news saying that a national divorce would be better than a civil war. Now as a child of divorced parents I can say from experience that while it’s great in the beginning for the child (U.S. citizens) beginning when both parents fight to show that they love their kids more by showering them with presents (tax cuts, tax relief etc.), that part ends quickly and the child is just left with a broken home (divided country) and a new bike. Have we not learned from history that, that never works. Yugoslavia in the 90s, Korea and Ireland in the early 1900s, and let us not forget……. The U.S. and the civil war. How would it even work? Where would purple states like Georgia, Arizona and Nevada, go?? What about interstate commerce. Anyway, I feel like that sums up what Members of Congress have been up to the last month and a half.

Look Ahead

Having to think about what lies ahead at the federal level honestly scares me The Republican will continue to use their majority in the House to hold hearing after hearing on topics that would make the Biden administration and Democrats look bad in the run up to the next presidential election. Democrats will continue to get nothing passed in the Senate where they hold a slim majority, and we will probably continue to hear rumors about more people entering the field for the Republican presidential race. Which all means more hearings and sounds bites from members such the human equivalent of a rat with hair gel, Rep. Matt Gaetz, and the growing example for why we need mandatory cognitive test for senior members, Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

I would recommend that people stay away from the news for a couple of months and just enjoy that both the Celtics and the Bruins are the best teams in their sports. As for me, as a born and raised New Yorker I can’t enjoy Mass sports teams so I will keep track of the non-sense and will keep you all updated if anything is noteworthy. I will be using the federal section over the next couple of months to vent my frustrating that we actually pay these people 100,000s of dollars to do nothing but be on fox news and MSNBC. So keep that in mind and maybe just skip to the State section of these rundowns

State Recap

Finally, to the state level where for the first time this year things are actually happening. For a brief recap before we get to the Governor’s budget and tax relief packages, the legislature finalized leadership and committee position in the Senate and the House. It took the legislature almost a full 2 months to finalize the positions, which means that the legislature could finally get down to business and start voting on bills that could have a real impact and not just legislation that names a bridge.

The House passed its first significant bill of the session, voting 153-0 to pass a House Ways and Means redraft of Governor Healey’s FY2023 supplemental budget, includes elements of her $1 billion “immediate needs” bond bill. The $353 million billon, which also includes $585 million worth of bond authorizations, temporarily extends pandemic-era programs such as enhanced food assistance and free school meals. It also gives $44 million to the emergency shelter system to help offset medical costs for migrant families. The Bond authorizations include $400 million for the MassWorks grant program and $104 million for the Clean Water Trust, among other initiatives. 27 amendments were filed but quietly disregarded behind closed doors, which included $50 million in bond authorization for the Massachusetts Technology Park Corporation.

Governor Healey Tax Relief Package

Governor Healey jumped into the game as well in the end of February when she released an aggressive $859 million tax relief proposal, restarting a heated debate on Beacon Hill on tax relief. The plans main focus is to help keep people in the state by relieving the growing cost of living in Massachusetts and boost the state’s economic competitiveness. Healey included in her package a couple of proposals that were previously recommended by former Republican Governor Charlie Baker, including lowering the short-term capital gains tax from 12% to 5% and creating a new estate tax credit of up to $182,000, which would effectively eliminate the estate tax for all estates valued up to $3 million, higher than the current level of $1 million.

The largest share of the proposed relief, about $458 million, would come in the form of a new child and family tax credit, which would create a $600 refundable credit for each qualifying dependent, including children younger than 13 years old, adults who are disabled, and seniors. To help with rising rent and housing cost in Massachusetts, Healey is reviving a proposal to boost the maximum rental deduction from $3,000 to $4,000, which would affect 880,000 renters, and to double the maximum allowable credit for the senior circuit breaker credit, assisting 100,000 households. The package also includes a number of smaller proposals including increasing the apprenticeship tax credit to $5 million, including an exemption for employer assistance with student loan repayment, expanding the dairy tax credit from $6 to $8 million, expanded commuter transit benefits, and more.

Healey’s office said the tax package would carry a total cost in fiscal year 2024 of $859 million. It said the measure has a net cost of $742 million because the $117 million in affected short-term capital gains tax revenue by law would need to be placed into reserves and could not be spent as part of the annual budget. Healey also said that the relief package will be factored into her recently released budget proposal for FY24. It is now up to the legislature to decide if they want to increase or decrease the Governor’s tax proposal. The legislator previously shut down their own tax relief bill last year after they realized that Massachusetts owed nearly $3 billion in excess tax revenues back to taxpayers under a voter-approved law known as Chapter 62F. Since then, the legislature has shown little interest to re-address a tax relief package.

Governor Healey FY24 Budget Proposal

To kick off the month of March with some flare, Governor Healey released her first state budget proposal. Healey’s administration described the proposal as a “downpayment” on its goals of making Massachusetts a more affordable place to live, tackling climate change, and preparing students for careers in an evolving economy. The $55.5 billion budget proposal would increase spending by 4.1% over the current year (FY23) budget, which would account for the expected the growth rate in state revenues in FY2024 when accounting for $1 billion from the state’s new millionaire income surtax. Healey plans to use the $1 billion from the new surtax to increase funding for education ($510 million), including $100 million in childcare grants to providers, and transportation ($490 million), which includes $181 million in MBTA capital investments. The budget would also pump new money towards energy and environment initiatives, human service provider rates, housing programs and much more.

The proposal also includes a $3 billion increase for funding for EOHHS, compared to what former Governor Charlie Baker proposed in his budget proposal last year. Though MassHealth, would be funded in Healey’s budget at $19.8 billion, which would have a net cost to the state of $7.9 billion. That’s a decrease of $1.9 billion on a gross basis or $254 million after reimbursements compared to fiscal year 2023 spending projections. The decrease is driven, the administration said, by “caseload decline and intentional distribution of funds across fiscal years to mitigate a revenue cliff due to the end of the federal COVID Public Health Emergency.” As expected, Healey’s proposal did not include funding for the Enough Pay to Stay rate add-on. The Enough Pay to Stay rate add-on has never been included in a Governor’s proposal, if it were to be included, it would be added in later by the legislature.

Look Ahead

The release of Governor Healey’s budget recommendations marks the beginning of a long budget cycle that will see a lot of Healey’s proposed budget items be either changed or taken out. The House generally puts out, debates, and passes its own budget proposal in April, followed by the Senate in May. Those two budgets then typically spend much of June in a conference committee before lawmakers agree to a compromise version. Fiscal year 2024 begins July 1, but Massachusetts lawmakers seldom have the budget done in time for it to be in place for the start of the fiscal year, which could result in supplemental budgets being passed till they pass a full budget for FY24.

It is also now up to the legislature to decide if they want to increase or decrease the Governor’s tax proposal. The legislator previously shut down their own tax relief bill last year after they realized that Massachusetts owed nearly $3 billion in excess tax revenues back to taxpayers under a voter-approved law known as Chapter 62F. Since then, the legislature has shown little interest to re-address a tax relief package. We will have to wait and see what happens next.

The Rundown – January 2023

Federal

Apologies for the delay with the January edition of “The Rundown”, but if the federal government could delay swearing in their members, then I can be late with my report. To put it mildly, things got a little crazy since November at the federal level.

Federal Budget

To put it mildly, things got a little crazy since November at the federal level. Let’s start off with the least complicated stuff that happened. In December, the government passed a massive $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill that would fund the government through September 2023. The spending package includes language that would increase transparency of the payment rate-setting method employed by CMS. We were disappointed that the package does not include language that would suspend the entirety of the behavioral adjustment cut to the CY 2023 home health payment in CMS’s CY 2023 Final Rule. Additional provisions that were included that are noteworthy include:

  • Two-year extension of Medicare telehealth provisions
  • Two-year delay in implementing the Medicare tele-mental health in-person requirement.
  • Paygo waived 2 years (was a 4% Medicare cuts across the board for 2023 and 2024)
  • Rural add on extended at 1% for 1 year for frontier counties
  • Medicaid Money Follows the Person program and spousal improvement protections extended to 2027
  • Modification of the 2023 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule that will increase payments by 2.5% in 2023 and 1.25% in 2024.

Speaker Race

Now to when things got crazy. Like a high school student trying to pass their driving test, it took House Republicans more than just a couple tries to elect a Speaker of the House. For about 4 days the public witness what House Republicans called “debating”, but what I would call the manifestation of a twitter comment section. A Speaker being named was mainly being held up by members of the House Freedom Caucus, who are generally considered the most conservative and farthest-right bloc of the Republican party. The Freedom had an extensive list of demands, such as, restore any member’s ability to make a “Motion to Vacate the Chair” and force a vote on removing the Speaker, and Decline to raise debt ceiling without a plan to cap spending and balance the federal budget in 10 years. Finally, late on Thursday night a final agreement was struck between the outliers and Republican leadership to garner their support and to elect a Rep. McCarthy as Speaker of the House and officially swear in the 117th Congress.

Now that everyone has been sworn in, the 117th Congress will see the Republicans in control of the House and the Democrats with a slim hold on the Senate. This will result in a lot of fanfare, twitter feuds, but very little actual legislative bills passed. As part of the agreement with the Freedom Caucus, McCarthy agreed that the House would not pass any budget that would increase spending and that they would look to reduce spending on any spending that is not defense related. This leaves the prospect of Congress passing any federal legislation requiring CMS to delay or suspend their rate cuts unlikely.  

State Update

New Year, new government! This January, Maura Healey was sworn in as the 73rd Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Healey is the first women to serve as Governor of Massachusetts and the nation’s first openly lesbian governor. Healey, previously the states Attorneys General since 2014, is a moderate Democrat with strong union ties. Healey received and endorsement from multiple union groups, including SEIU1199, who represents over 115,000 health care, higher education, public sector, and building service workers in Massachusetts. During her transition period HCA wrote a memo to Healey’s transition team detailing our legislative priorities for her time as governor.

January also marks the beginning of the 193rd Session of the Massachusetts State Legislature. HCA has been in close contact with state legislative champions to have our key bills refiled by the filing deadline (January 20th). We will be refiling both the Licensure, and Rate Setting bills. HCA will also be holding a Home Care 101 seminar on January 7th with members of the Enough Pay to Stay Coalition. During the seminar, HCA and the EPTS will educate state staffers on the ins and outs of the home care industry and the vital role that home care workers play in Massachusetts’ health care system!

We would also like to set up state legislature visits with agencies. If an agency is willing to have their state representative/senator visit their office/operation, please email me at hcollins@thinkhomecare.org, and I will help to set up the visits.  

The Rundown – December

No Time to Waste! Urge Your Member of Congress to Delay CMS’s 2023 Home Health Rate Cuts

While I usually use the first section to cover federal news, this cannot wait. On October 31, 2022, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) released a final rule that will reduce Medicare payments for home health services by $635 million in 2023 and approximately $18 billion over the next decade. It was mandated by Congress in 2018 that CMS develop a payment model that would be “budget neutral”, not one that would reduce funding for home health care by over $18 billion.

Following the release of the final rule, HCA along with the National Association for Home Care and Hospice (NAHC) re-engaged with the sponsoring offices of The Preserving Access to Home Health Act (S. 4605/H.R. 8581) on refining the legislation to delay CMS from implementing their 2023 home health payment cut for one year, as well as strengthen transparency of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) in their rate-setting. Our champions on Capitol Hill are working to substitute this amended language in the negotiations for the year-end package. 

With time running out in the 117th Congress, lawmakers are inching closer to passing a final spending bill to keep the government funded. Home health advocates are pushing hard for a yearlong delay of the 2023 home health payment cut, which would otherwise take effect on January 1, 2023. However, NAHC has informed us that there is significant opposition to delaying these cuts.

We need your help once again and there is no time to spare! 

HCA members sent over 200 emails to members of the Massachusetts delegation urging their support ofS. 4605/H.R. 8581. Your continuous outreach resulted in Massachusetts Rep. Jim McGovern and helped to persuade CMS from backing off their initially proposed 7% rate cut. We must continue our aggressive outreach in order to persuade Congress to include the revised language in the year-end budget!

Helping out is as easy as clicking on the this ACTION ALERT link, filing in your information which will send a pre-written email to your member of Congress urging them to support a year-long delay (2023) of CMS’s proposed home health rate cut and call for added transparency in CMS rate-setting practices.

It is so easy thatmy 6-month-old golden retriever Daisy was able to do it and she got her nose stuck in a peanut butter jar the other day. I will be sending out numerous reminders to reach out to your member of Congress over the next couple of weeks! You will not be able to escape me as I try to get as many people to help us in our mission to stop CMS. We need you and anyone that you know to reach out!

Federal Recap

Now back to the recap. This edition will be lighter than previous editions due to the holiday season. The time between mid-November and the new year is notoriously slow due to the holiday season, but there is still some stuff I would like to update you all on.

Campaign season has officially come to a close! Ralph Warnock won the Georgia run-off election this week, defeating Republican challenger and self-proclaim Texan (his words) Herschel Walker. Warnock’s win gives Democrats a 1 seat majority in the Senate, wrapping up 2 years of 50-50 split in the Senate. Though this may not seem like a large enough margin to matter, it will have a big impact over the next two years. With a 1 vote majority, Democrats can take much more operational control of the Senate, easing the confirmation of contentious nominees, clearing the way for investigations and availing themselves of breathing room on a variety of matters. Democrats will now hold a one-seat advantage on congressional committees that are now evenly split. This will prevent Republicans from being able to block confirmation nominees while in committee if Democrats are able to hold together on a nominee. The Biden Administration will likely use this opportunity to pack the lower courts with Democratic judges. Many judicial nominees only require a one vote majority to be passed through committee and the Senate. Democrats will still be blocked from passing sweeping legislation in the Senate due to the risk of a filibuster by the Republicans.

Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer both announced that they will be stepping down from their position as Speaker of the House and House Majority Leader respectively. Pelosi and Hoyer’s announcement marks the end of the era for the number 1 and 2 in the Democratic party and will usher in a new era in Democratic politics. Democrats moved quickly to fill their leadership vacancies, electing Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (NY-8) to be party leader, Massachusetts own Katherine Clark (MA-5) to be minority whip (number 2) and Rep. Pete Aguilar (CA-31), to Jeffries current position of Democratic caucus chairman (number 3). Pelosi and Hoyer both stated that they will still serve in the House the remainder of their terms, which I will imagine will result in them still holding puppet power till they retire. The new leadership will have their hands full in the new year when Republicans take over control of the House. Current Republican Leader, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (CA-23) is expected to be elected Speaker of the House in the new session. McCarthy has already signaled that he plans to make the House into a TV spectacle for the next two years. McCarthy has been setting up a the potential for congressional investigation into the Hunter Biden laptop scandal, which will be sure to make great TV.

Look Ahead

The only thing that we will be looking at in December is a potential year-end budget deal to fund the government for the next year. As I wrote before, it is imperative that you use this ACTION ALERT to urge your member of Congress, for some will be the now immensely powerful Katherine Clark, to urge them to support a year-long delay (2023) of CMS’s proposed home health rate cut and call for added transparency in CMS rate-setting practices. Congress could decide to punt negotiations on a 2023 budget by deciding to pass a continuing resolution (CR), that would fund the government at the current levels for a specific amount of additional time. That amount of time could range from additional month to a full year. CR’s have become common practice over the last decade and will likely be used at some point in this process. It is imperative that we ask that they include in any deal to stop CMS from implementing their rate cuts. Please use the ACTION ALERT to do your part. I am happy to help anyone if they would like to reach out to their member in a different way, whether by phone, fax, hell the pony express! Ill take anything. Your voices matter!

Urge Congress to Reject Cuts Hospice Cap

We are also asking that our Hospice members use this ACTION ALERT to urge their member of Congress to reject a major hospice payment cap cut from being included in any end-of-year legislative package that Congress is currently negotiating. As is often the case with large, year-end spending bills, there are many programs and policies Congress wants to “stuff in” to an omnibus funding package before the close of the year. In order to pay for all these priorities, lawmakers must identify “offsets” to fund them.

A significant reduction of the hospice aggregate cap, as has been recommended by MedPAC in the past, is being considered for one such “offset”. We need your help as hospice leaders to tell Congress that cutting the cap in a major and rushed way is bad policy.

It is imperative that we all do our part to make sure that there are no major hospice payment cap cut included in the end-of-year budget!! 

State Recap/Look Ahead

Just like at the federal level, this edition will be lighter than previous editions due to the holiday season. To quickly cover what has happened since the last rundown, Maura Healey has begun her transition process, naming members of her transition team. This marks what will be a long transition period for the Healey team. Healey is in a rare position as opposed to previous Governor-elects; Healey currently holds high office as the current Massachusetts Attorney General (AG). Healey will not only have to manage taking the reins from Governor Baker, but Healey will also have to manage transitioning her AG office over to AG-elect Andrea Campbell. Many legislators that I have spoken with have pointed out that this is no easy task and will likely result in a slower than usual transition period.

HCA is currently drafting several pieces that we will be sharing with the Healey transition team that clearly states our priorities for her time as Governor. We have also been in constant contact with our state legislative champions to advocate to the Governor-elects team on our behalf.

I will be sure to keep you up to date on any on-going developments as it pertains to the transition from Governor Baker to Governor-elect Healey.

The Rundown – November Midterm Election Edition

Federal Recap

Red wave!!!! More like a drizzle, just like meteorologist over-projecting rain fall during a summer storm, everyone over speculated how well Republicans would result in the midterm elections. While Massachusetts went the way everyone thought It would with Democrats holding onto every seat, nationally Republicans did not have the night that anyone could have expected. Republican pundit Ben Shapiro said it another way “from red wave to red wedding.”

Historically speaking a sitting president usually loses big during the midterm election, but that did not happen this election cycle. For the last 2 years pollsters, political pundits and politicians have called for Republicans to win big this midterm season, winning back control of the House and the Senate. Though Republicans are most likely going to win back control of the House, it was not by the margin that they expected nor as it as widespread as people thought. While all races have not been called it is looking like President Biden and the Democratic party lost the fewest number of House seats during a Democratic presidents first midterm election in over 40 years. Democrats went into the night with a large margin to overcome to hold control of the House and Senate. To keep control, Democrats needed to win at least 45 races in competitive districts, where Republicans had to win 19 to gain control. As of this morning, Republicans have only won 7 and Democrats have won 24 of those races.

In key swing states such as Pennsylvania, Georgia, New Hampshire, Ohio, and Arizona, there was massive Democratic voter turnout, largely made up of young voters, impeded the expected red wave. Democrats saw key wins in districts in these states where voters said that abortion rights were their top priority, knocking off some incumbents and far right competitors. Democrats were also able to flip the Senate seat in Pennsylvania where Democratic candidate John Fetterman won by a bigger margin than expected, keeping the Democrats chances of keeping control of the Senate alive. 3 states are yet to fully be decided, with one state (Georgia) going to a runoff election and Nevada and Arizona vote count not fully completed. Democrats are currently leading in the Senate race in Arizona and a closing the gap in the Nevada senate race. There is a chance where Democrats could go into the Georgia run-off election with a chance to take a 1 seat majority in the Senate.

It wasn’t all good bad news for Republicans though. Republicans went down to Florida and came back with a beautiful tan and great beach side condo. Republican Governor and suspected future Republican candidate for President, Ron DeSantis, dominated his competition by over 20 points. The fun in the sun didn’t stop their where republicans rode a red wave through Florida sweeping many house races and dominated in the one Senate race where incumbent Marco Rubio won by almost 18 points. Republicans were also able to defeat New York Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney, a high-ranking Democrat who is the chair of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and is responsible for getting other Democrats reelected. This is a major blow for Democrats who lost their high-ranking comrade in a state where they also just re-drew the district lines in favor of Democrats. Republicans are also still expected to win majority of the House which is nothing to gloss over. Republican control of the House kills any chance of significant democrat agenda items passing without large support from Republicans over Biden’s last 2 years in office. Such as key democratic agenda policy related to climate change and union growth (PRO Act).

It is not fully clear at this moment what caused the lack of a red wave across the country. It is most likely not because of one thing, but likely a collection of reason. Many believe that abortion rights played a large hand, in addition to, bad Republicans candidate chooses, and possibly Bidens policy achievements. When it comes to perceived bad Republican candidates, election day saw a lot of candidates that were vocal 2020 election deniers lose. Alabama was the only state where a governor candidate that was a 2020 election denier win their race. In Georgia, Republicans were not fans of the Republican senate candidate Herschel Walker. While the Republican Governor, Brian Kemp, won his election with over 2.1 million votes, Herschel Walker only received a little over 1.9 million votes, showing that even though Republicans went to the polls to vote for Kemp, they decided to stay out of the Senate race and not vote for either candidate. 

While the elections have not been finalized in many states and there is still much anxiety over what the final results will be, there is one thing that is finally done……. Political ads! All those tv ads, texts and emails that have overrun our lives over the last couple months are finally done. We can now breathe a sigh of relief and drop our anxiety for when-ever our phone buzzes dreading a text or email from a campaign trying to ask for our money or get us to vote. I personally received over 45 emails in the last month asking for political donations. Even my Alma Mater, James Madison University, only sent me 10 emails this last month about my tuition payments. So I can now open my email and not want to throw my phone across the room.

State Recap

Governor/High Office Positions

History was made this election cycle as Massachusetts as state attorney general (AG) Maura Healey was elected governor, becoming Massachusetts first elected female governor and the first openly lesbian women elected governor in the nation. Healey dominated her Republican competitor, former state Rep. Geoff Diehl, beating him by almost 30 points. The result comes as no shock to residents as Healey never trailed in the polls and held huge advantages in fundraising and name recognition. Healey, whose stepfather was president of a local teachers’ union, has been vocal about her support for unions. Healey received and endorsement from multiple union groups including SEIU State Council, one of the largest union groups in Massachusetts. In 2016, as AG, Healey lead a multi-state brief in support of federal efforts to provide greater transparency, fairness in union elections. While campaigning, Healey said that she would invest in workforce development and support to help improve behavioral health access, promote the use of community health workers to meet the needs of underserved communities, and expand access to telehealth services.

In addition to the governor race, Democrats swept the elections for attorney general, auditor, secretary of state and treasurer, continuing Republicans’ drought of holding any of those offices. Former Boston City Council president Andrea Campbell, was elected to replace Muara Healey as attorney general, making her the first black women to be elected to the position. Campbell defeated second time nominee Jay McMahon, a Bourne attorney who has a background in law enforcement. Campbell, who previously served as deputy legal counsel under Governor Deval Patrick, received endorsements from the SEIU State Council and said that she is committed to advancing labor rights for residents of the Commonwealth.

Legislature

Democrats rode the coat-tails of Maura Healey’s massive win all the way down the ballot on Tuesday, resulting in Democrats flipping a couple of state House seats and holding on to win highly contested races in the state House and Senate. Democrats will now hold the most seats in House in over 10 years. In what many called “the most competitive race statewide,” incumbent Sen. Becca Rausch of Needham fended off a serious challenge from Republican Rep. Shawn Dooley. Rausch’s district that has historically flipped back and forth between the two parties.

Tuesday’s election will restore both chambers of the Legislature to full strength after seven different House districts sat vacant after representatives resigned partway through their two-year terms. House legislative leaders decided not to call special elections to fill those seats, citing the complexity of hosting contests for the existing district lines just a few months before the midterm elections. At least 21 winners of House races and five winners of Senate races in Tuesday’s general elections will be newcomers to the Legislature, most of whom emerged victorious in contests for open seats with no incumbent on the ballot.

Ballot Questions

This election included 4 ballot questions for voter to decide on, covering controversial topics including taxes to immigration policy. The 2 most contested ballot questions were Question 1 and Question 4. Question 1 asked voters to decide if the state should impose a “millionaire tax”, a 4% surtax on annual personal income above $1 million, while question 4 tried to repeal a new law that would allow undocumented immigrants to apply for Massachusetts driver’s licenses. Residents of the Commonwealth, in a somewhat shocking occurrence, voted in favor of imposing the millionaire tax and to keep in place the driver’s license bill. Question 1 passed with 52% of the vote, while Question 4 passed with a little over 53%. Campaigners on both sides for question spent ABSURDS amount of money to garner support from residents. The opposition spent nearly $13,518,519.82, which is chump change compared to the supportive campaign who spent OVER $27 MILLION DOLLARS. That over $43 million dollars on one ballot question. I wonder if any of that money would be taxed now.

The other two ballot questions, Question 2 and 3, covered dental insurance and liquor licenses. Question 2, which would require dental insurance companies to spend at least 83 percent of premiums on member dental expenses and quality improvements, instead of administrative expenses, received an overwhelming support with 73% of “yes” votes. And lastly, Question 3, which would increase the number of alcohol licenses a single company could hold while gradually reducing the number of licenses specifically allowing the sale of all alcoholic beverages including liquor, did not pass, as a 55% majority voted against the ballot initiative. What does Massachusetts have against alcohol? I think it has something to do with having successful sports teams, if your teams win a lot there is less of thought to drown your sorrows with happy hour alcohol sales.

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