According to 2003 estimates from the Census Bureau, 126 of the state’s 351 communities (shaded on the larger map below) are now short of their population peaks. In some cases, such as Cohasset, Natick, and Woburn, the high-water mark came in 2002, and the population drops have been tiny. But the cities of Chelsea, Everett, […]
Robert David Sullivan
Posted inState House News Service, Uncategorized
Sense of Loss
Population drop may have been a fluke, but slow growth has its costs By Robert David Sullivan Coming at the end of a year when Massachusetts had more than its fair share of the national spotlight (thanks to football, baseball, and presidential politics), it was disconcerting to learn that we were the only state in […]
Posted inUncategorized
Statistically Significant
Illustrations By Travis Foster CREEPING UP TO HUB HOME PRICES According to the National Association of Realtors, the Boston housing market stood out for not registering double-digit percentage increases in home sales during the last quarter of 2004. The median sales price for a single-family home in the metropolitan area was $389,000, an increase of […]
Posted inEconomy
Risk takings
Dozens of state governments are increasing their dependence on revenues from lotteries and casinos, but even without slots and table games Massachusetts is near the head of the pack. In fiscal year 2002, revenue from gambling activities, almost all of it from the state lottery, accounted for 4.24 percent of the state’s total revenue, up […]
Posted inEconomy
Two and a half decades of Prop. 2 1/2
Souce: Massachusetts Municipal Association (www.mma.org); state Department of Revenue, Division of Local Services (www.dls.state.ma.us) This year marks the silver anniversary of Proposition 2½, the property tax cap passed by voters in 1980. Prop. 2½ essentially limits municipal governments to a 2.5 percent increase in assessed property taxes each year, but officials can bust this cap […]
Posted inUncategorized
Statistically Significant
Illustrations by Travis Foster WOMEN IN THE OFFICE, MEN IN THE CLASSROOM According to the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, Massachusetts ranks second in the percentage of employed women who hold “managerial or professional” jobs. In the Bay State, 38.3 percent of working women are in such positions, second only to Maryland’s 41.3 percent. Every […]
Posted inEducation
Classroom cash
It takes a lot of dough for Massachusetts to be nothing special in terms of staffing its public schools, according to the country’s largest teachers’ union. The National Education Association ranks the Bay State fourth in spending per public school student in the 2003-04 academic year but only 24 th in keeping down its student-to-educator […]
Posted inPolitics
A walk through four centuries of Boston politics
SADLY BOSTON’S DUCK Tours do not pass what former House speaker Thomas Finneran is said to have called “the best goddam bar in the world.” To find such landmarks, it helps to have a copy of Clint Richmond’s book Political Places of Boston, which was published just in time for the Democratic National Convention last […]
Posted inPolitics
Half the battle
Some 50 percent of all Massachusetts voters will get to choose between Democratic and Republican candidates for state representative this fall, thanks to the “Team Reform” slate of GOP contenders being championed by Gov. Mitt Romney. (For where these contests are underway, see Head Count) To the Republican Party, this is a classic case of […]
Posted inPolitics
Field of battle
For the first time in more than a decade, voters in most Massachusetts communities will see a Republican candidate for state representative on their ballots this fall. (Also see State of the States). Republican candidates are filling in gaps where there had been no GOP candidates two years ago just about everywhere except the state’s […]