Gov. Charlie Baker and his top deputies continue to push lawmakers to advance their bill that would lower the voting threshold required for local zoning changes, a measure that’s failed to gain traction among lawmakers.
The state needs to fundamentally alter housing market dynamics to address an emergency shortage, Housing and Economic Development Secretary Mike Kennealy said Tuesday.
Sharing personal stories of financial strain and housing uncertainty, Massachusetts tenants argued Tuesday that a controversial proposal to revive local rent control options could help them avoid displacement.
Progressive lawmakers, advocates and local officials gathered Wednesday to promote a bill they said would give cities and towns a new tool to fight the state’s housing crisis – an option to impose a new fee on real estate transactions above the median home sale price.
State legislators could soon have a chance to consign one real estate trend of 2019 to the scrap heap: inaction on the state’s housing crisis.
With a vote possible in the House next week on a transportation revenue bill, the details of such a package remain in development and its possible components include measures dealing with the gas tax and ride-share fees.
In a lengthy note posted to his official Facebook page, Somerville Mayor Joe Curtatone came out in favor of rent control bills in the state legislature positioned by progressive legislators as an essential part of any deal to pass Gov. Charlie Baker’s proposed housing production bill.
Cambridge state Rep. Mike Connolly has offered a preview of what House progressives may push for if and when the House finally puts a housing production bill on the floor for debate.
As the state’s housing crunch rages on, opinion at Tuesday’s hearing on key zoning reform legislation is still split over whether the bill goes far enough to help those most affected by the situation.
Demands that the city of Cambridge pull the plug on plans to redevelop a 22-story Cambridge ex-courthouse are an ill-conceived, unfair attempt at an end run around the developer’s good-faith engagement in the city’s permitting process.
Attempts to redevelop Cambridge’s former Sullivan Courthouse could culminate early this summer – or potentially roll back to the starting gate. Leggat McCall Properties plans 430,000 square feet of office space and 24 affordable apartments, but must secure a lease on 420 parking spaces in a nearby municipal garage.
House members from both parties on Monday folded their cards on revenue amendments, deferring to House leaders and their call to debate revenues later this year and not as part of the annual budget debate.
A state representative from Cambridge wants to raise the state’s capital gains tax in order to generate more than $1 billion in new revenue for the state each year, but at least one fiscal watchdog worries that could backfire by discouraging investment.
As frightening as the prospect of a rent control proposal on Beacon Hill may be to some the issue is a red herring that threatens to distract everyone from efforts to get Gov. Charlie Baker’s Act to Promote Housing Choice passed as soon as possible.
Overnight, a new push by a pair of progressive state lawmakers to bring back rent control would pull the rug out from under the apartment boom, one that has seen a bevy of new rental high-rises take shape in Boston and Cambridge.
More than two decades after voters banned local rent control, Gov. Charlie Baker signaled Tuesday he would not support a nascent push from several lawmakers to allow cities and towns to implement tenant protections, such as a limit on rent increases.
A pair of progressive legislators are planning a push on Beacon Hill to legalize local rent control laws.
Not taking action to address a housing shortage in the state could drive an “enormous amount” of young workers and families out of Massachusetts, Gov. Charlie Baker said Tuesday as he announced plans to propose a tweaked version of a housing production bill he advocated for last session.
