Episode 247: Mass. Exodus
This week on The Horse Race, people are leaving Massachusetts in droves since the start of the pandemic. Why are they leaving? Where are they going? Also, Lisa Kashinsky gives us an update on the cash-strapped MassGOP. Then, we’ll take a closer look at Governor Healey’s early track record on transparency with Boston Globe political reporter Samantha Gross.
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Steve Koczela [00:00:02] The Horse Race is brought to you by Benchmark Strategies. Benchmark is setting a new standard as Boston's fastest growing public affairs consulting firm. To know more, connect with Benchmark on Twitter at Benchmark Boston.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:00:26] This week on The Horse Race, people are leaving Massachusetts in droves since the start of the pandemic. Where are they going? And is the grass really greener on the other side? Then we'll take a closer look at Governor Maura Healey's early track record on transparency. It's Thursday, February 23rd.
Steve Koczela [00:01:03] Welcome back to The Horse Race, your weekly look at politics, policy and elections in Massachusetts. I'm Steve Koczela here this week with both of my co-hosts, Jennifer Smith and Lisa Kashinsky. That obviously hasn't happened for a while, so I'll just say it's good for us all to be here together again today. And even better, we're all here in Massachusetts, which according to a Boston Globe article that we've been reading this week, is not as common as it used to be.
Jennifer Smith [00:01:26] I am worried that when we talk about why people are leaving Massachusetts and we're going to get into this, Steve, because I know you have a billion like excellent nit picks about this. Like very interesting recent article in The Globe by Janelle Nanos, which argues that we are in the middle of a oh, God pardon the pun, Mass migration.
Steve Koczela [00:01:48] Mass exodus, Mass.
Jennifer Smith [00:01:50] Exodus. Part of the thing that's interesting is you have to talk about, you know, the different categories of people that make up Massachusetts. Is it in fact, just that every podcaster has fled the state to go and record from their own bunker? Is that actually what we're seeing?
Steve Koczela [00:02:06] I mean, as you point out, there are a whole bunch of different categories of people to kind of think about here. And when you read the articles about, you know, population movement in and out of Massachusetts in recent years, there's a whole bunch of interesting things. So that image that is sort of portrayed, if you just think about it at the most basic level or, you know, just read about the numbers is Massachusetts is expensive. As soon as people were given the opportunity, everybody got up and left. You know, there was COVID, there's remote work and so forth. But even before that, we had seen residents in Massachusetts leaving in larger numbers than domestic migration came into Massachusetts. But our population kept expanding because, you know, people are also born in Massachusetts and also people immigrate into Massachusetts. So our population still kept rising. And then COVID happened and, you know, the Trump administration happened and that changed a bunch of dynamics, not least of which was immigration. But then also, of course, the thing that COVID changed was students. And that's another big factor that I think really plays into the analysis that, you know, the Globe had another article. Lisa, what do you think?
Lisa Kashinsky [00:03:18] I think that New Hampshire Governor Chris Sununu is a great salesperson, you have a state to the north that has no sales tax, no income taxes. And that's where, according to this article, most people are going, the highest number of people are going to New Hampshire and they know it and they milk it. And, you know, bye-bye.
Steve Koczela [00:03:41] I think in some sense, we're just going to have to wait a little while to see if this is part of a long term trend. You know, and part of the reason I say that is because if it is about college students and, you know, people going remote and, you know, a lag in terms of people coming back, then it's not it's not exactly the same deal as it's sort of portrayed. If it really is just everything's expensive and now we can work remotely, so we might as well all go live in New Hampshire. You know, for instance, you look at Amherst and you see a huge drop in Amherst, which is, of course, where the main UMass campus campus is located. You see drops in Boston, you see drops at Framingham, Lowell and other places where there's obviously a lot of other things going on. But one of the things that's happening in those locations is there's large colleges and universities. So not saying these issues that the article turns up aren't real because they definitely are real. This place is way too expensive, housing is way too scarce. And, you know, we have a knowledge economy where people can work from anywhere. But we also, I think, just need to keep in mind, like immigration policies have changed, the number of people leaving Massachusetts has always been greater. There's this college student thing and just kind of put it all in there when we're thinking about is living in Massachusetts really that much harder than it was just two years ago?
Jennifer Smith [00:05:00] And one thing that really struck me as well that the Globe article hit right up top is the way that this is being framed by the governor. It's not just people who want, you know, lower taxes or, you know, want to, you know, very reasonably adjust the cost of living here. She was framing it as people were leaving at some of the highest rates in the country, giving up on the Massachusetts story. So there's this really interesting question here about, like, how can Massachusetts not just sell itself as a place that people want to be able to come? You know, I, of course, know a lot of people who came here mostly for college to start out, and then some of them would have liked to stay. But then you have to deal with, well, are people leaving? Because people usually end up leaving the place they go to college? Or is there something about Massachusetts that's really hollowing out where, you know, educated professionals might want to live they certainly can't live in Boston.
Steve Koczela [00:05:54] Yeah. We have two former beloved co-hosts of this here podcast that don't live in Massachusetts anymore. Yeah, college students is another great point, Jenn, because another point that often gets tracked in this analysis is the percentage of college students that come to Massachusetts and then leave. And that gets compared with other states where the main difference is that those states have more public universities and a higher percentage of their students are from in-state. You know, to begin with. So they go to college a few towns over and then they come back or they stay in California, for instance. Whereas here we've got students coming in from all over the world to go to all of the different private universities and then, you know, decamping from wherever they came from or wherever they want to go next. So a lot to kind of think about that, you know, add some complexity to what I think is a very real set of challenges.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:06:40] Well, I was one of those people who came here from another state for college. And, you know, when I graduated even a decade ago, which gosh, I can't believe I'm saying that roughly a decade ago, I'm still young, I swear. But, you know, even then, the affordability issue was so bad, like I could have made more money and lived more cheaply, I guess, for lack of a better way to say that if I had taken jobs in Pennsylvania, back home in New York and, you know, that's even in a career that we all know doesn't pay well, but even with that, you could see a huge difference. And so that was a competitiveness issue again a decade ago. And now that's just compounded through multiple gubernatorial administrations, pandemics, you know, fluctuations in the economy, etc.. And that's now going to be one of the huge things that we're going to have to watch Maura Healey deal with.
Steve Koczela [00:07:32] Well, Lisa, we're very glad you did stay here because you've got a big story out in Politico this morning which covers one of our favorite topics, the MassGOP. So, Lisa, what's new there?
Lisa Kashinsky [00:07:43] All right. So we are now getting a fuller accounting of exactly how much in the red that the MassGOP might be at this point. The party we knew going into the chair election at the end of January that there was more than $100,000 in unpaid bills. Now we're up to possibly more than $600,000. Not all of that might actually be the party's liability. You know, there's questions of whether candidates need to cover some of this, you know, like advertising for Geoff Diehl's gubernatorial bid. But that's probably half a million dollars in the red potentially. You know, at the very least, on top of ongoing legal battles that are sure to cost more money.
Jennifer Smith [00:08:27] What do they even do with this? I mean, every time we look at these numbers, it seems more and more bleak. You know, do they are they openly strategizing about next steps?
Lisa Kashinsky [00:08:38] So the new chair, Amy Carnevale, is trying to kind of turn on the fundraising facet again. You know, that's something that she had pledged. You know, it's going to be like an early test of her as chair. You know, she kind of said that she could bring these donors back to the party that had fled under Jim Lyons. And now we're going to find out if she's able to do that because they need the money to pay these bills and then keep carrying on as a party. So, you know, she's doing that in part to start by not taking a salary as chair. Let's say it was about $100,000 a year. That's not going to help make too much of a dent in these bills. She is also planning events, you know, fundraisers and stuff to help raise that money like this Worcester area unity event, they're calling it, with the county sheriff there.
Steve Koczela [00:09:26] And I have to say two names we never thought, I never thought that I would see up here in the same article, Jim Lyons and Whitey Bulger. What on earth is happening there?
Lisa Kashinsky [00:09:35] All right. So, yeah, that those are two names I never thought that I would write in the same sentence either, but I did for Wednesday morning's Playbook. Basically. Amy Carnevale has tapped Brian Kelly, who is one of the federal prosecutors who had prosecuted Whitey Bulger's case. He specializes in white collar crime, was involved in defending a parent in the varsity blues scandal that's been going through courts more recently. He has now been hired to kind of help the party with its ongoing legal headaches. There's a handful of lawsuits. The one that most prominently people know about is the one that Jim Lyons had filed against the party, Treasurer Pat Crowley, on behalf of the party. Very complicated, tangled weave. So they're basically trying to get an independent assessment on that one and kind of what's going on with it. And then also just kind of wrap up and finalize some of these other outstanding lawsuits.
Jennifer Smith [00:10:37] Well, on that note, I think it's time we ask the age old question Horse Race fans have been asking themselves for centuries, which is how long we've all been living in Massachusetts at this point. But why are we here today? What are we doing? Do we feel transparent about our mission?
Steve Koczela [00:10:55] Difficult to say, Jenn. It's hard to say why we're here. But since we're here, since we're gathered here today, we are going to talk about transparency, an issue that Governor Healey was asked about a lot during the campaign. A Boston Globe reporter will join us to discuss the early days of the Healey administration and how she's handling the public records laws so far. So are we ready?
Jennifer Smith [00:11:15] Let's go. Massachusetts is only one of two states in the country where the governor claims a blanket exemption from public records law. And for decades, that's allowed governors here to basically hide the bulk of their daily activities and conversations, either by claiming some sort of allowed exemption or getting a little bit more creative, which is why we're here today. Maura Healey, new governor, said she'd handle things differently once elected to the corner office. But a recent article in The Boston Globe takes a look at Healey's early record on transparency. And fortunately for us, the reporter who co-wrote that story is here with us now, Samantha Gross, political reporter for The Boston Globe. Thanks so much for being here with us.
Samantha Gross [00:12:00] Thanks for having me.
Jennifer Smith [00:12:01] So maybe to start us off here, what does it actually mean to presumably have a blanket exemption from our public records law and at least in the way that has been employed by governors in Massachusetts? Is it a really big deal?
Samantha Gross [00:12:14] Yeah. As you had mentioned, kind of at the start of the show, governors for decades have claimed a public records exemption. And what they mean by that is they're citing a 1997 Supreme Judicial Court decision, which basically said that the public records law in Massachusetts doesn't specifically name the governor, the legislature or the judiciary. So governors have used that as a justification for not complying with public records laws. But it's not necessarily an exemption. It's more of a omission from the law that exists right now.
Steve Koczela [00:12:49] I feel like I'm going crazy, though, because, I mean, Maura Healey, before she was governor or perhaps she had just become governor, said that this she was going to see this law as applying to her administration. But now here we are again. Am I crazy?
Samantha Gross [00:13:02] Yeah. No, you're not crazy. And it's actually the reason why we filed a public records request to kind of test this in December, weeks before her inauguration. Maura Healey did go on Boston Public Radio, and when she was pressed whether she was going to not claim the exemption, she said yes. So she did kind of reverse herself, basically saying that she would take public records requests and address them on a case by case basis, basically deciding which requests that she would comply with and which ones she wouldn't. So it is you know, it's the reason that our interest and why we decided her to test her theory by making a request of our own.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:13:46] So tell us what you requested with your colleague maxed out and what you guys got in return from her office.
Samantha Gross [00:13:54] Yeah. So we requested four things. We requested correspondences with leadership of the legislature, House speaker and the Senate president and their staff. And so that includes letters, memos, emails, email chains. The second thing we requested was her daily calendar for the month of January. And the third thing we requested was her travel for the month of January. The fourth thing on that list was a log of all calls she made on her cell phone and on her office phone. These are pretty basic things that, you know, in other states are covered under public records laws. So those are the things that we requested. They responded to us about a month later and denied the release of items one and four, which was the correspondences and the call logs, basically saying it would interfere with her day to day business. It would get in the way of her being able to do her job.
Jennifer Smith [00:14:57] I'd like to basically pull the same thing Steve pulled, which is the am I crazy question, which is that doesn't even seem to be under the normal kind of category of I'm exempt. I can't recall anyone saying, you know, the governor is able to deny public records request if it would be somehow inconvenient or an interference to what exactly was it she was saying it would be interfering with.
Samantha Gross [00:15:22] Yeah. It said it would interfere with her necessary regular activities and hinder the governor in effectively performing her duties, in their words. So it's not an exemption under the law. And they didn't claim the Lambert decision in that for the other things, the daily calendar and the travel. They did release copies of her calendar that were heavily redacted and they said her travel was included in that calendar. The redactions, they said, were consistent with exemption N of the public records law, which is a pretty broad exemption that is meant to protect like public safety and cybersecurity. So that exempts things like building plans and blueprints. So that was the exemption that they claimed for her travel, basically saying that it would jeopardize safety. So, yeah, that was kind of what we got back from them. And the calendar did show that some certain meetings with people calls that she had, some interesting things such as a call from Secretary Hillary Clinton congratulating her on her election. But, you know, for the most part, it was heavily redacted.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:16:38] So I also want to mention here, too, that a lot of people have been trying to test this records law so far. And there was a blogger who had tried to get some correspondences back from the Baker administration, and Healey's records officer said no, that her policy wasn't retroactive to past governors. I'm curious, have you guys thought about trying that at all? Any thoughts about, you know, kind of what that means that we won't be able to, you know, use this newfangled sort of openness to get information about past administrations?
Samantha Gross [00:17:12] Yeah, it's interesting. I thought that his approach was it was interesting. It wasn't something that we requested of ourselves. But I think that that response just shows that this administration is kind of making their rules, you know, on a case by case basis. So we don't really know what their kind of set of policies looks like. It's not you know, it doesn't exist in law. They're not changing the law or following a law that exists. So it's interesting. I think we're going to see, you know, what what this looks like in the months to come. But we plan on making this request every month. So we'll see if if their answers change. One thing that was kind of interesting that a sports industry reporter pointed out on Twitter to me this week, which was Charlie Baker is not going to be subject to, you know, people looking into his past, their public records, like maybe other like, you know, NCAA presidents have in the past. So it's just kind of interesting. Massachusetts' lack of transparency goes far.
Steve Koczela [00:18:19] Yeah, it sure does. I mean, it's and of course, it's not just the executive branch either. But so given what you've told us about how they're responding to things kind of on a case by case basis and, you know, turning down things from the past and turning down things for reasons, as Jenn points out, that aren't really even part of the exemptions that people have claimed in the past. What is at this point, the functional difference in what the Healey administration is doing compared to what's been done in the past from a reporters standpoint or from the standpoint of people trying to get information from the administration?
Samantha Gross [00:18:52] Yeah, I mean, I think like they're saying that they want to be more open than the Baker administration and offering up more, you know, the calendars, you know, more freely. And I've requested some documents, like some letters that were sent to the Healey administration, on kind of a more like a less formal approach, and I was able to get them. And so I think that they want to pride themselves on being more open. But we don't really know if that's going to be the case yet. I think it's still kind of early. And also, I didn't cover the Baker administration for very long, so I don't have a ton to, you know, to compare it to. But it is you know, that's the message from the Healey immigration is that we're going to be more transparent.
Jennifer Smith [00:19:32] Do you have a sort of whiplash coming from one of the states that has some of the most open public records laws in the entire country, too, kind of running headlong into Massachusetts all over again?
Samantha Gross [00:19:43] Yes, it's very difficult, especially when it comes to the legislature. You know, I got a lot of stories when I was working at the Miami Herald from requesting emails between lobbyists and lawmakers and kind of seeing like who was crafting legislation, like that was a huge part of our job. And same thing, you know, with the DeSantis administration. We, you know, they're very open and basically everything is in the sunshine. You know, just because they have better laws doesn't mean that they were always the most forthcoming and we would have to fight them on it. But it definitely is different in a lot of ways. Committee votes, you know, meetings in Florida, two or more public officials talking about some business is a public meeting here. You know, lawmakers can caucus for hours without the public knowing what they're talking about. So very different.
Jennifer Smith [00:20:38] And practically thinking about that, you know, it's it's very easy for journalists to kind of get a little bit navel gazing about, you know, we wanted this thing and then we didn't get it. But then if you're trying to figure out, you know, the reason that we've got public records laws in the first place is ostensibly so that people can find out what the people they're electing are doing in office. So when there's something, for instance, that you request from a gubernatorial administration, maybe not in their first month, where it's them getting settled, but maybe in the middle of an administration, what could you see as this being like a real imposition to from kind of a public access perspective?
Samantha Gross [00:21:14] Yeah, I mean, public records laws are important, like you said, because people who elect their leaders want to know who they're meeting with, you know, who they're doing business with. You know, the travel logs and call logs aren't just about being nosey into someone's life. It's about, you know, knowing how they're conducting their business on behalf of the state. And at the end of the day, you know, people who are elected work for the people of Massachusetts. So I don't know. I think, you know, that we'll see what is to come in the months ahead. But I do think that people will be interested to know, you know, the types of people she's meeting with and what their lawmakers are doing and how much face time they're getting with the governor. Like, that stuff is all really important and it goes far beyond, you know, where she's traveling to on the weekends.
Jennifer Smith [00:22:01] When you look at the difference between the public campaign statements and then kind of how it looks in practice, what does this imply or what are you kind of trying to read from this about other public statements that she's made, you know, trying to distinguish between what is candidate Healey and what is Governor Healey, especially since so much of the campaign did involve people looking at the statements and policies and going, well, some of these are actually pretty vague. We don't know how this is going to look in practice.
Samantha Gross [00:22:28] Yeah, that's a good point. And I think, you know, she talked about things like this, this public records thing, for instance, before her inauguration. But even since her swearing in, she's gone on the radio and talked about a lot of big issues that we still don't really know what they're going to look like in practice. My takeaway is that that office is very much still figuring out how they want to conduct themselves and they're still crafting kind of, you know, things that we're going to see more tangible policy on. Like her first budget, supplemental budgets that might come with it, pieces of legislation. So I think like my you know, the indication I'm getting between like her campaign approach her, you know, kind of pre-inauguration approach and then obviously now as governor is that they're still very much figuring it out. And I think as reporters, you know, we just have to keep on pushing for answers to like the vague statements that she had made on the campaign trail. And, you know, and after that point and it's something that I think we're going to see materialize in the months to come.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:23:29] And we're also going to see it next week with both her budget and her, I guess, her tax package that's going to come with it. And while we have you, just remind us a little bit of kind of the things that she has said that she is open to about taxes and what we think might actually materialize in this long awaited package.
Samantha Gross [00:23:49] Yeah, she has said that she plans to file this tax package alongside her budget. Thanks for the reminder, Lisa, that that's coming up quickly. I was like next month, but I guess this March 1st is very soon. So, yeah, she is open to, you know, relief in this kind of style that was proposed last session, you know, relief for kind of middle income people in Massachusetts, relief for low income folks, renters, seniors. We don't really know what the details are going to look like yet. So much to come. But I know that's something that's being closely watched and is obviously something that people were really kind of hoping for the end of last session basically got, you know, it never materialized kind of in the end of session craziness and procrastination on the part of the legislature.
Steve Koczela [00:24:39] Procrastination on the part of the legislature is, I think, going to be the new title of this podcast. But for now, Samantha Gross, political reporter for The Boston Globe. Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your insights with us on all of us.
Samantha Gross [00:24:52] Thank you for having me.
Steve Koczela [00:24:59] And that brings us to our final segment, which this week is a special update from The Horse Race style department. Generally said there are some awesome new sneakers, epic, even new sneakers available from not a shoe store, but instead from the white institution, the Kowloon. Have you seen these yet? And more importantly, do you have a pair?
Jennifer Smith [00:25:19] Wait. Okay, So. So the Saugus place with the giant 30 foot tiki statue is now in the shoe wear business is what I'm gathering. And when I say I'm gathering and I can only describe it by the Tiki statue, it's because I've only seen it from inside a car as we drove past. So I'm going to need a bit more context.
Steve Koczela [00:25:40] Actually, I've never been to the Kowloon either. Lisa Save us. Lisa.
Lisa Kashinsky [00:25:45] All I will say is that my Massachusetts credibility has already been deeply called into question earlier in this podcast.
Steve Koczela [00:25:53] So yeah, none of us have been to Kowloon, that's amazing. Well, according to the Boston Globe's hard hitting deep special investigation Spotlight series, Kowloon is now selling sneakers for $500 a pair. So let's go out and get ourselves a pair. It also made us think that we at the Horse Race should have our own custom sneakers. So this week and this week only for an extra, we'll make it, 20,000 horse race trivia points. Tweet us your design for horse race custom sneakers, which we will then attempt to sell on the internet.
Jennifer Smith [00:26:25] Maybe not. I don't know. I feel like that would get us into some real scam territory. Elizabeth Warren shows up on our doorstep at horse race global media empires. I don't know. I don't know. This feels like a risky proposition.
Steve Koczela [00:26:38] Start issuing crypto that would definitely draw her office's attention.
Jennifer Smith [00:26:42] Oh. Oh, okay. I'm taking us out before we do anything super illegal. That's all the time we have for today. I am signing off with Lisa Kashinsky and Steve Koczela. Our producer is Adam Boyajy. Don't forget to give the horse race a review wherever you're hearing us now, subscribe to the Massachusetts Politico playbook and reach out to the MassInc Polling Group if you need polls done. Thank you all for listening. We'll see you next week.