Ask any second grade student what we can do to protect the environment, and her first response will likely be “recycle.”  Today, this new generation is already aware that we need to do more to protect our earth, including recycling.  Unfortunately, government doesn’t do enough to make it easy for people to recycle, despite the fact that much of the public is supportive and interested in finding ways to do their part.

In these difficult economic times, I understand that recycling can seem trivial in comparison to the more dire issues facing us today, from rising unemployment to soldiers coming home from war.   The benefits of recycling are many, however - for the environment as well as for the economy. It’s for this reason I’ve sponsored a number of bills this session to encourage recycling and make it easier for people to do.

Perhaps the most obvious advantages of recycling are energy and state resource conservation. In Massachusetts, we understand the importance of reducing our carbon footprint to diminish the effects of global warming.  Recycling helps Massachusetts residents reduce our carbon output by 2 million metric tons annually, the equivalent of taking 1.6 million passenger cars off the road for a year.

And the benefits of recycling reach far beyond promotion of a healthy environment.  Currently, Massachusetts residents throw away 1.5 million tons of paper every year.  If we begin to recycle just half of this paper, we will save nearly $52 million in disposal costs.  These savings could be used to fund programs that have suffered cuts due to the current fiscal crisis.

With tens of thousands of jobs lost since the recession began in March 2008, job creation is another timely benefit of a statewide commitment to recycling.  Nineteen thousand Massachusetts residents are currently employed in recycling businesses and organizations. Increased recycling and subsequent greater demand for employees in this field would be another step towards economic stability within the Commonwealth.

To improve recycling rates, I have sponsored several bills to make recycling easier and more accessible.   One such bill is the “E-Waste” bill, otherwise known as An Act to Require Producer Responsibility for Collection and Recycling of Discarded Electronic Products. This bill would make it easier for the public to recycle products such as computers, televisions and printers, which often can’t be recycled through normal municipal pick-ups.  As a result, they often end up in landfills, where they leach hazardous chemicals into the soil. It would also require the producers of this waste to be financially responsible for their proper disposal, removing the burden from municipalities.

A second bill, An Act to Increase Recycling by Landlords and Tenants, is a testament to the fact that small acts can make a significant difference in pollution reduction. This bill will encourage recycling in multi-family units by requiring the owner of any apartment building with three or more units to provide the means and materials necessary to allow tenants to recycle paper, glass containers and certain common plastics. This will make it much easier for renters across the Commonwealth to recycle.

I’m also proud to be a supporter of  An Act to Improve Recycling Rates in the Commonwealth, which will expand the our container deposit system to include drinks such as non-carbonated beverages, water, iced tea, juice, and sports drinks. This would add approximately $20 million to state revenue through projected unclaimed deposits in addition to decreasing litter and increasing recycling.  At a time when the state has had to cut important state programs, including those protecting the environment and encouraging recycling, it is maddening that the Legislature has not yet passed this legislation, which would help reduce the cuts to these or other programs.

Making it easier for everyone to toss our cans and bottles, cardboard, scrap paper, and even TVs and computers into recycling bins rather than into the trash will lead to an improved environment for current and future generations to enjoy, a more robust economy and overall a more sound society.  I hope that you will all join me in supporting these bills, and supporting Massachusetts through daily recycling.

With revenue in decline, the Massachusetts state government has been forced to make substantial cuts to programs and services, including local aid, public safety, health care, and services for the homeless and those with disabilities.

To mitigate the impact of these cuts, the Legislature has been looking for ways to make government operate more efficiently. It began this spring with overhauls of our pension and transportation systems to eliminate waste and streamline services.

More recently, the Massachusetts State Senate took a significant step in reforming our criminal justice systems, including reforms to the Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) system and sentencing guidelines for non-violent criminal offenders. These reforms will help reduce crime and recidivism rates while lowering criminal justice costs.

But these reforms are just the beginning; there are many more proposals on the table for ways we can improve our state government.

As the Senate chair of the Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government, I’ve been focused this year on putting together a “Municipal Relief” package to reduce costs for towns and cities. Included in this legislation will be measures to make intermunicipal agreements easier to enter into, to allow for joint purchasing agreements between communities, to reduce costly state mandates, and to encourage regionalization of services, such as emergency dispatch services, public health departments, or public school districts.

We also need to come up with a solution for the rising health care costs many municipalities face, whether that’s finding a way for more towns and cities to join the state General Insurance Commission, or other health care reforms.

In the coming months, my colleagues and I will be continuing to look for ways to cut costs in government while maintaining or improving service delivery. Your ideas are always welcome - please contact me at 617-722-1120 or James.Eldridge@state.ma.us any time with your thoughts.

On the morning of October 7^th, 2009, I suffered a one-minute seizure that broke many of the bones in my back, strained my spine, and tore my right shoulder out of its socket.  Given the seriousness of the injuries that I sustained, I was rushed to Mass. General Hospital.

I don’t remember any of the above — but I do remember that once I was conscious, I was relieved to be at MGH, because I knew that I’d be getting arguably the best medical care in the world to fix my injuries.

The reason I had access to this care was because I am lucky enough to have comprehensive health care through my job, which would cover the three surgeries, extended care, and rehab necessary for me to recover from my injuries.  It is impossible to overstate what peace of mind this gave me, my family and loved ones.

But what about those patients at MGH, and across the country, who don’t have health insurance as comprehensive as mine, or health insurance at all? What peace of mind is there for their families at an incredibly difficult time?

As I lay in bed, knowing that I was lucky enough to have excellent health insurance that would cover my treatment, I couldn’t help but think over and over about those who weren’t so lucky. How many of my fellow patients already realized that because of their poor health care coverage, their lives would never again be the same?

After two weeks at MGH, I was transferred to the Spaulding Rehabilitation Center. One day while resting in bed from physical therapy, I overheard a young, permanently disabled man hanging out in the hallway inform a fellow patient that he was being discharged a week early from Spaulding.  It wasn’t that his therapy team had decided he was ready to go to the next level - it was that his insurance company had determined that they would not pay for any further comprehensive therapy at Spaulding.  He was headed home, and he really wasn’t sure what he would be able to do to improve his current physical limitations.

When I spoke with one of my nurses about this reality, she told me how things had changed in health care over her twenty-three years at Spaulding.  When she first started, a patient with such injuries could stay for 9 to 12 month. Today, insurance companies push for an early discharge, or simply include in their policies a cut-off date for paying for such services.

As an elected official, I’ve heard many stories like this before. But being there at the rehabilitation center as a patient myself, and observing the cruel realities of the American health care system right before my eyes, really drove the point home.  How is it that in the richest country in the world, this is how our health care system works?

I’ve been a strong proponent of a “Medicare for All” health care system since first joining the Massachusetts Legislature seven years ago. I believe a single-payer system like this will best achieve the health care reform goals that many of us share, from providing health care coverage for the uninsured to improving coverage for current health insurance members, reducing health care costs, and simplifying the country’s health care delivery system.

But over the past month, as I have been focused on health care as a patient, rather than just as an elected official, I’ve become more and more convinced that any health care reform we make - single payer or otherwise - must start with the agreement that access to quality health care should be a right in this country.

There is a basic quality of care we all deserve when we are sick or injured. Yet without establishing health care as a right, there is no guarantee that every other Massachusetts citizen would be treated like I have been. In fact, absent government intervention, there are strong market, financial, and societal incentives that make it highly likely that no basic standard of treatment will exist. After all, that young disabled man was being denied proper treatment for no other reason than to save his health insurance company money.

As a society, we all benefit when individual members have access to quality health care. In my case, had I not received the right treatment within a relatively short amount of time, my life would have been changed dramatically, limiting my ability to be the most productive citizen that I could possibly be, and my ability to contribute to society and lead a happy life. It’s the same for anyone else in a similar situation.

Until we define health care as a right, there will continue to be Americans like those I have met over the past month, whose lives will be irreversibly thrown off-track by an accident or illness, whose financial insecurity will lead to greater physical problems, whose lives will be changed forever because they lacked access to quality health care.

I can think of few other instances of government action that would have as dramatic an impact on people’s lives as establishing a right to health care, or that would more positively impact every community in the country.

Visit Senator Eldridge’s website at www.senatoreldridge.com. You can contact also contact him at 617-722-1120, or via email at James.Eldridge@state.ma.us.

The death of Senator Ted Kennedy has set off a wave of emotions amongst Massachusetts residents, including myself.  Senator Kennedy, who served as an elected official for 47 years, was such a presence on so many fronts, it’s hard to fully fathom how much he did for the people of Massachusetts and the country.  Given the outpouring of grief from citizens who spent hours to pay their respects to Kennedy last week, there is no questioning the impact Senator Kennedy had on the lives of thousands of Massachusetts residents.

I met Senator Kennedy just once, in 2004 at a young professionals’ fundraiser for his re-election campaign.  We spoke briefly before his remarks, about the fact that his grandmother on his mother’s side grew up in Acton, my hometown.  Despite the relatively small crowd and the informal nature of the event, Kennedy gave an inspiring speech, standing up for Democratic values, talking about the need to improve health care and education for Americans, and ending the Iraq War.

Senator Kennedy was known as the “Liberal Lion.”  The term liberal has become so misused, abused, and shunned by some, however, that it is hard to know exactly what it means to highlight Kennedy’s commitment to liberal values.  To be a liberal means having a basic belief that government can make a positive difference in people’s lives — but in Kennedy’s work it meant so much more.

Senator Kennedy, through hard work, dedication, and determination, made sure that people’s lives were markedly better than how they started out — improving health care for families, serving the poor, improving access for the disabled, or giving more immigrants across the globe a chance at a better life.  Legislation spearheaded or passed through shear will by Senator Kennedy -including the Mental Health Parity Act, the COBRA Act giving workers the ability to continue health insurance after leaving employment, Title I funding for poor schools, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Immigration and Nationality Act — made sure of that.

What is not appreciated as much is the economic impact of his work.  By including more Americans in mainstream society, worker productivity has dramatically increased. His work in expanding access to health care massively increased the investments that the federal government has made into health research, helping transform the economy and employing of tens of thousands of Massachusetts residents in health care.  Making the United States a more welcoming country to people from all five continents helped ensure that the innovation, hard work, and entrepreneurship of so many immigrants made the country even more vibrant and strong.  All of this work reinforces part of the liberal vision, which recognizes that in order to create more innovation in our economy, and ensure that new industries continue to thrive in the U.S., government often has to take the lead.

As a legislator, I experienced the same thing as many constituents, legislators, municipal officials, and community groups across the Commonwealth - quite simply, that Senator Kennedy’s office was the place to go to get something done.  The senator’s staff was legendary both in Washington, D.C. and Massachusetts for handling thousands of requests for federal funding, social security, immigration problems, and often times with that nice personal touch, no matter the request.  My mother reminded me of this recently, when she pointed out that every year when we invited every statewide politician to Acton’s Democratic summer picnic, Senator Kennedy’s office was the only one that would call to explain that the senator could not attend. While this was of course good politics, Senator Kennedy and his staff’s responsiveness to every request reinforced his view that all citizens were to be treated equally, and no call for help was too minor for Kennedy.

As the race to succeed him heats up, we know that there will never be another Ted Kennedy.   But as the public begins to consider who will be the state’s next U.S. Senator, Kennedy’s commitment to liberal values, and what that has actually meant for Massachusetts citizens, is an excellent guide for what we should expect in all of our elected officials.

Over the past few months, the State Legislature has been working to create our state’s budget.  This annual routine of drafting, revising and eventually passing a budget - never an easy process - has become even more complicated this year, thanks to rapidly changing revenue predictions and the economic crisis we currently face. As a result, we are looking at one of the toughest, leanest budgets we’ve seen in a long time - and the effect of these dramatic budget cuts will, unfortunately, impact every member of the Commonwealth.

As your State Senator, I’ve been working hard to protect as many of the priorities for our district as possible, while crafting a budget that is responsible and balanced. I want to take a moment to explain the work we’ve been doing, as well as some of the new things that have happened with the budget this year.

The extremely tight budget this year is a result of the massive, and unexpected, drop in revenues resulting from the fiscal crisis. Based on current revenue projections, we are starting with $3 billion dollars less in revenue than when we crafted the budget this time last year. At the same time, costs are going up, and more and more people are in need of temporary help from our state government due to the economic recession.

Balancing the budget this year has required a mixed approach of budget cuts, new revenues, and major reforms.

Reforms: The State Senate has passed reforms to our transportation and pension systems, which I was proud to support and will produce significant savings. The differences between the reforms passed by the House and Senate are now being reconciled, and it is my hope that they will be completed before the finalized budget is sent to the Governor.

Cuts: We have made dramatic cuts in every area of our budget, with many worthy programs deeply cut or even eliminated. The impact of these cuts - to health care, education, local aid, home care for seniors, public safety, services for the disabled, homeless shelters and emergency assistance, and much more — will be felt by every resident of Massachusetts, and they will significantly affect the quality of life in our state.

Revenue: As deep as these cuts are, however, without new revenue they would have been far worse. To preserve core services and prevent the worst of the cuts, the Massachusetts Senate voted to increase our state sales tax from 5% to 6.25%, while eliminating the sales tax exemption for alcohol and giving local cities and towns the option to raise the local meals tax by 2%.

None of these were easy votes, but I supported the increases because we need this additional revenue to adequately fund the essential government services we value — our schools, our police and fire departments, our transportation systems, and services to protect children, the disabled, and the elderly, among others.

My support for the sales tax allowed me to successfully advocate for funding for a number of programs of great importance to the Middlesex & Worcester District, such as increased funding for education (including a “pothole” fund to help schools with unforeseen, uncontrollable expenses), a special education circuit breaker, family shelters, domestic violence and sexual assault prevention programs, mitigation funding for communities containing a prison, and local aid.

I also proposed and passed an amendment to create a commission to examine the comprehensive long-term water infrastructure finance plan for the municipalities of the Commonwealth, to help cities and towns currently dealing with aging water systems.

Because different versions of the budget were passed by the House and Senate (as typically happens), the budget now goes to a Conference Committee, which will have the difficult task of reconciling the two versions and reporting out one final budget to be voted on by both chambers of the Legislature. Ultimately, it will go to the Governor for his signature or veto. Although I am not a member of the Conference Committee, I will continue to advocate on behalf of the priorities of our district to my colleagues who are serving on that committee.

This was a difficult budget to put together, and there were no easy choices. But it is a responsible budget, one that prioritizes critical funding for core government services, particularly those for our most vulnerable citizens, and makes the most out of the revenue we have to work with.

I want to thank all the constituents who wrote in, called, emailed, or visited me at the State House to tell me about your concerns regarding the budget and new revenues. It’s very helpful to hear from you about your priorities — please continue to contact my office anytime.

By Jamie Eldridge & Sonia Chang-Diaz
May 17, 2009

MASSACHUSETTS is facing a budget crisis of epic proportions. Based on current revenue projections, we are starting with $3 billion less in revenue than when we crafted the budget this time last year. Meanwhile, costs are going up, and more and more people are in need of temporary help from the state due to the recession.

It’s a difficult situation, and there are no easy solutions. But the tool to solve this budget crisis does exist, if we are willing to show the political leadership to use it: an increase in the personal income tax.

Of course, reforms are still necessary, and it’s up to the Legislature to examine every expenditure and measure it against our priorities for public spending. Every bit of waste needs to be cut - but cutting alone will not get us out of this budget crisis.

“Taxes” is often thought of as the dirtiest word in politics. Yet taxes are the way that we, as a society, pay for the things we value: education, police and firefighters, and public transportation. Each day we rely upon government services, public infrastructure, and state regulation, paid for by our taxes, in order to allow us to work and raise a family. What’s so dirty about that - and why are we so afraid to talk about it?

A fair tax system asks residents to contribute to the cost of government services based on their ability to pay - and few people would consider a tax system to be fair if the poorer you are, the greater proportion of your income you pay in taxes. But that’s exactly what more regressive taxes - such as a sales or cigarette tax - do. They ask those who can least afford it to pay more.

Of course, there is nothing more regressive than a budget cut, particularly to programs that help the most vulnerable among us. For that reason, we applaud the House on its tough vote to raise the sales tax, because any means of raising revenue right now is a better solution than drastic cuts to vital services.

Still, a better solution exists - and it’s the role of the Legislature to find the best, most fair solution for preserving the things we believe in as a state.

Increasing the income tax by one percent would raise approximately $2 billion for the Commonwealth. Cuts will still be necessary to balance the budget, but that revenue would go a long way toward protecting core services, such as schools, shelters, public safety, and hospitals.

At the same time, because the income tax is more progressive, it relies more heavily on those who can most afford to pay it. At a time when so many are facing unemployment, the income tax recognizes the difference between the person who has been laid off and the person who still has a job. The sales tax does not. Under such a plan, families making between $40,000 and $60,000 would pay, on average, less than $7 extra a week.

There are also ways we could modify the income tax to make it even more progressive. Over the long haul, an amendment to the Constitution would allow the Commonwealth to join 34 states and the federal government in establishing a tiered, progressive tax rate system. But even this year, we could raise the personal exemption, increase the state Earned Income Tax Credit, or expand the Property Tax Circuitbreaker, so that more of the revenue we raise is coming from taxpayers with higher incomes, while lowering taxes for those near the bottom.

Massachusetts is facing an enormous crisis, but we have the ability to meet this challenge. We are one of the richest states in the country - and, “Taxachusetts” jokes not withstanding, we rank in the bottom half of all states in terms of the overall amount of taxes we pay as a share of personal income.

Increasing the income tax is the one tool we have that could help close the enormous budget gap we face without overburdening those who can least afford to pay. In other words, if we put aside the political calculations for a moment and focus on the facts, raising the income tax is the best solution to our fiscal crisis.

Sonia Chang-Diaz is a Democratic state senator from Jamaica Plain. Jamie Eldridge is a Democratic state senator from Acton.

The economic recession that has hit our nation is having a dramatic impact on the ability of our cities and towns to deliver even the basic services residents of the Commonwealth rely on. As state revenues continue to plummet, the amount of money the state can send to communities in the form of local aid is being cut as well - a situation that has already happened once this year, and may well happen again.

The budgets proposed by the Governor and the House both included large cuts to local aid - and given the most recent revenue projections for the upcoming year, the Senate budget may well be even worse. Although most of us in the Legislature are deeply committed to allocating as much funding for local aid as possible, the simple truth is that cuts to local aid - and nearly every other program in the budget - are inevitable this year.

This is a hit every resident of the Commonwealth will feel. Local aid helps pay for our schools, so our children can receive a quality education. It helps pay for our police and firefighters, who help keep our homes and streets safe. Local aid pays for trash removal, sewer systems, street cleaning, and all of the other programs and systems set up to make our communities safer, healthier and more pleasant places to live. Reduce local aid, and you’ll see a reduction in all of those services, and more.

At the same time as local aid is being cut, costs are going up for many cities and towns. Healthcare costs continue to skyrocket, and services that could be delivered jointly with other communities are instead being performed separately - at greater cost - by each town.  The combination of falling revenues and increased costs puts our cities and towns in an extremely difficult position.

This week, the Special Commission on Municipal Relief, of which I am a member, issued its final report. This comprehensive report contains a wide-ranging list of recommendations for ways our state government can offer relief to our local communities, from programs to encourage reforms and regionalization efforts to additional opportunities to raise much-needed revenue.  Not every recommendation will benefit every town, but taken as a package they will offer a “Municipal Relief Toolkit,” for cities and towns to use as needed to reduce costs, increase efficiency, and raise revenue.

These tools include provisions to encourage joint purchasing and provision of services and the merging of administrative functions among adjacent communities, as well as regionalization incentives, in the form of funding support for feasibility studies, planning, and transitional aid for communities looking to regionalize services. These ideas have the potential to drastically increase efficiencies in local service delivery.

The steep rise of healthcare costs is another major problem the state government can help cities and towns address. The Commission recognizes that there is no “one size fits all” approach that works for every community. Instead, the report recommends the implementation of a system and schedule that would help municipalities achieve an acceptable level of affordability for their health care plans in whatever way would work best for that community.

Finally, the Commission report recommends that the state government approve a series of “local option” taxes that cities and towns can use - at their discretion - to raise additional revenue without over-relying on the property tax or state aid. These local option taxes include expanded room and meals taxes, as well as finally exempting the antiquated telecommunications loophole, which is currently preventing municipalities from collecting property taxes on land used by telephone companies. Removing the telecommunications exemption alone could raise cities and towns $52 million dollars. These are a few commonsense ways to help our communities pay for vital local services with a minimal impact on consumers.

Municipal relief is an area where the legislature and the Governor are closely aligned. Many of these recommendations are also contained in Governor Patrick’s “Municipal Partnership Act II,” and both the Legislature and the Governor are eager to move quickly to enact these much-needed reforms. These bills will be heard by the Committee I co-chair - the Joint Committee on Municipalities and Regional Government - the second week of May, and we hope to move a bill to the floor for a vote soon thereafter.

Our cities and towns need help more now than ever before, and the state government is in a position to offer that help. Now is the time to implement meaningful reforms and offer sustainable revenue solutions.

Visit Senator Eldridge’s website at www.senatoreldridge.com. You can contact also contact him at 617-722-1120, or via email at James.Eldridge@state.ma.us.

As the Legislature considers how to reform our state’s transportation system, it’s important to remember the real question that we, elected officials and citizens alike, must answer.  How do we ensure the safety of our roads and bridges, build and maintain an accessible, reliable public transportation system, and reduce waste and increase accountability in our transportation infrastructure? In answering this question, we should not be mired in the past, but rather committed to improving the present, and dedicated to leaving a legacy that will shape the state’s environment, economy, and public safety.

Years of neglect, taking the easy way out, and a less than honest approach with the public have led us to the transportation crisis that we currently face. Government after government pushed the problem off for someone else to deal with — and now we must come to terms with the fact that that “someone else” is us. It won’t be easy, but the consequences of inaction are high.

Today, our roads and bridges across the Commonwealth are crumbling, some to the point of being dangerous.  Locally, the quality of service on the Fitchburg and Worcester lines is severely lacking, and our towns and cities need more Chapter 90 funding to maintain town roads.

As we consider what a modern transportation system would look like, we also need to consider greater support and expansion of the Regional Transit Authorities, including the Metrowest RTA bus line, so that more people in our local communities can have access to a reliable public transit system. We should also think about ways to improve bicycle and pedestrian paths, including developing rail trails such as the Assabet River Rail Trail and the Bruce Freeman Rail Trail.

However, we also need to look for ways to reduce waste, redundancies and inefficiencies in the system to keep costs downs. Both Governor Deval Patrick and Senate President Therese Murray have proposed solid plans to condense the transportation bureaucracy into one streamlined organization, establish new standards for efficiency and accountability, align the T pension system with the state pension system, and otherwise modernize our system — and the Legislature will be examining both plans carefully in the coming weeks.

A comprehensive transportation reform plan will also include ways to make our system more environmentally sustainable, by promoting the use of more fuel-efficient vehicles in transit and private use, and providing more viable alternatives to driving.

Finally, I strongly believe a transportation reform plan will need to look at new ways of raising revenue to fund our priorities. Even with much-needed reforms to our system, we simply do not have the money necessary to meet our transportation needs.

Revenue is needed to fund our regional transportation systems, reduce the underlying debt pulling down our transportation agencies, renew investment in maintenance and day-to-day operations, and increase investments in our commuter rail.

The debate most recently has focused on raising tolls on the Masspike versus raising the gas tax. I have publicly supported a gas tax over raising tolls because it is the most equitable way to share the cost of maintaining our transportation system.  No one region or group of commuters should be forced to shoulder the burden for the transportation needs of the entire state.

The gas tax has not been increased since 1991, yet since then our transportation needs have grown, and too many of our roads, bridges and public transit systems are woefully inadequate.  Governor Patrick’s proposal to raise the gas tax by 19 cents a gallon, which I support, would cost the average Massachusetts driver just $8 a month.  To put this into context, if a person drives 20,000 miles a year in a car that averages 20 miles to the gallon, that person would pay an extra $190 per year.

I’ve heard from many constituents on both sides of this issue, and I’ve appreciated the opportunity to speak with people about their concerns. I know that families everywhere are feeling the pinch, and that it is a difficult time to ask people to pay more for gasoline. But because the state’s transportation system is in crisis due to past mistakes, bold action is needed.  Investing in and reforming our transportation system now is critical to ensuring public safety and improving our state’s economy; by making these changes today, we will be far better off tomorrow.