THE QUASI-INDEPENDENT board tasked with overseeing the state’s driver’s license database asked for a little help from the inspector general on Wednesday, and took some steps towards hiring a new permanent director. It was only the second meeting of the Merit Rating Board in several years and the first since the organization publicly fired […]
Andy Metzger
Andy Metzger is currently studying law at Temple University in Philadelphia. Previously, he joined CommonWealth Magazine as a reporter in January 2019. He has covered news in Massachusetts since 2007. For more than six years starting in May 2012 he wrote about state politics and government for the State House News Service. At the News Service, he followed three criminal trials from opening statements to verdicts, tracked bills through the flumes and eddies of the Legislature, and sounded out the governor’s point of view on a host of issues – from the proposed Olympics bid to federal politics.
Before that, Metzger worked at the Chelmsford Independent, The Arlington Advocate, the Somerville Journal and the Cambridge Chronicle, weekly community newspapers that cover an array of local topics. Metzger graduated from UMass Boston in 2006. In addition to his written journalism, Metzger produced a work of illustrated journalism about Gov. Charlie Baker’s record regarding the MBTA. He lives in Somerville and commutes mainly by bicycle.
Posted inTransportation
At last: Red Line back to normal
ONE HUNDRED AND SIX days after a Red Line train derailed and smashed into signal equipment, the MBTA announced Wednesday afternoon that it has finally restored service to normal on the transit authority’s busiest subway line. The crash forced the T to shift to a manual signal system, where workers located at each station using […]
Posted inTransportation
Poll: Most biotech workers angry about commutes
THE STATE’S BIOTECH workers are stressed out and strapped for time because of bad traffic and unreliable transit, and that is spurring some to consider changing how they get to work or even moving somewhere else. A survey conducted in July by the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council of 2,133 professionals in the industry found that 79 […]
Posted inPolitics
Industry sets stage for film tax credit fight
THE STATE’S CONTROVERSIAL film tax credit is due to expire on December 31, 2022, and that would mean curtains for several job-creating local businesses that have sprung up around the celluloid gravy train. The film tax credit debate should be interesting. It’s a maxim on Beacon Hill that it’s easier to block legislation from passing […]
Posted inArts and Culture
Orr statue now front and center at TD Garden
THE STATUE OF BRUINS GREAT Bobby Orr has a new home right in the middle of the new entrance to TD Garden dubbed The Hub. It’s a prominent spot for the sculpture of the defenseman depicted in mid-celebratory-dive after scoring the goal that clinched the Stanley Cup in 1970. The statue was moved on Sunday […]
Posted inCriminal Justice
A stark view from inside MCI-Framingham
In 2013, Lee Unitt was sentenced to four consecutive two-year terms in prison and up to 20 years of probation, but according to an ongoing lawsuit, the real punishment she received was far worse than that. At the state’s women’s prison in Framingham where she was incarcerated for six years, Unitt claims she was confined […]
Posted inPolitics
MassGOP rips Reps. Omar and Tlaib
THE MASSACHUSETTS REPUBLICAN PARTY took aim at the only two Muslim women in Congress, officially condemning Congresswomen Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib for alleged anti-Semitism in a resolution that passed overwhelmingly Tuesday night, according to one of its sponsors. The resolution was inspired by a similar resolution passed by the Alabama Republican party, according to […]
Posted inArts and Culture
The Hub: An impressive front door to Garden, N. Station
NOT LONG AGO, attending a game at TD Garden or taking a train out of North Station meant you would need to come and go through a nondescript side door. There was no real front entrance, and little besides the sheer size of the two facilities to distinguish the sports arena and transit center from […]
Posted inTransportation
MBTA: Weakened steel ring led to June derailment
This story has been edited to include additional comments made after the findings were first disclosed. A BRITTLE STEEL AXLE on the front of the third car of a 50-year-old Red Line train snapped on June 11, according to engineers who on Monday disclosed their findings about the cause of the subsequent derailment that has […]
Posted inPolitics
Warren targeted by former donor
ED RENDELL got his money’s worth. The former Pennsylvania governor co-chaired a couple fundraisers for Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s 2018 re-election bid, and also donated a total of $4,500 to her campaign. While those sums hardly let Rendell call the shots, they add some crucial attention-grabbing heft to the Keystone State Democrat’s claim that Warren is now […]