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Late-Moving Legislative Action Injects ‘Ambiguity’ Into Ballot Questions
Legislative leaders have not been shy about their disdain for the surge in initiative petitions that’s put a nearly unprecedented volume of major policy choices in the hands of voters in the form of ballot questions. Now, they might turn that irritation into controversial action.
Lawmakers — as well as many policy experts — routinely warn against lawmaking by ballot question, arguing that the yes-or-no votes on complex issues are a blunt instrument and a poor substitute for the give-and-take of the deliberative process of hashing out legislation. Even some campaign leaders acknowledge privately that they prefer the traditional route through the House and Senate to the ballot whenever possible.
Recognizing that fact, the ballot question process has a built-in, if informal, schedule for the Legislature to engage with advocates about possible compromise legislation that would satisfy proponents enough to get them to drop their campaigns.
In recent years, the Legislature even established a formal system for examining all potential ballot questions with a single committee of House and Senate members. But that review process came and went this spring, and lawmakers made no overtures suggesting interest in discussing such compromise.
Now, however, with a record-tying nine questions locked in for the November ballot, top Democrats are seriously considering a tactic nearly unprecedented in recent decades: taking last-minute action of their own that could significantly reshape or even upend two of the decisions their constituents will make.
Depending on the course of House-Senate negotiations, Beacon Hill might take the bite out of a tax rebate law at the same time that voters are deciding whether to expand it. Both branches are also eyeing a legal lever that, if pulled, could force their preferred, more limited version of public records reforms to supersede whatever voters decide on a ballot question that would extend the reach of the state public records law to lawmakers and the governor. And in each case, lawmakers could wait until the lame-duck stretch after the November 3 elections to play their cards.
Those moves are not sitting well with advocates who spent months — and, in many cases, millions of dollars — gathering tens of thousands of voter signatures and clearing every hurdle required to place a question on the ballot.
Scotia Hille, executive director of the Act on Mass group supporting a measure to expand the public records law to the governor, House, and Senate, accused legislative leaders of displaying “contempt for the initiative petition process that is reserved for the public in our constitution.”
The changes lawmakers are weighing to public records and the tax cap law, if finalized, would also inject confusion into the ballot campaigns. If both pending legislative proposals pass, it “will add ambiguity to the policy impact of those two ballot questions,” according to Andrew London, a partner at law firm Foley Hoag who has worked on cases challenging ballot questions.
Lawmakers have resisted complying with public records requirements for years, and they bristled at the ballot question in recent months. House and Senate Democrats argue they should not be required to abide by the same records requirements as other government entities because that would give the secretary of state, who enforces the current records statute, undue power over the legislative branch in violation of the constitutional separation of powers.
“The simple reality is that the public records ballot question and the existing public records framework use a method of enforcement that we believe to be clearly unconstitutional when applied to the legislative branch,” House Speaker Ron Mariano said in a speech in June, when the House approved legislation creating a different public records approach for the Legislature.
The Senate is set to follow suit with its own records bill this week, which like the House’s would make many documents available, but not lawmakers’ correspondence.
Both versions also include a sentence that could prove key, declaring that the legislation “shall constitute the sole and exclusive remedy” for acquiring House and Senate records, and that any other segment of the public records law does not apply to the Legislature. That line seems designed to make the Legislature’s version supersede the language of the ballot question, essentially rendering changes voters might embrace meaningless.
London, who is not involved in either the records campaign or the tax cap campaign, said it’s a “complicated legal question” to figure out what would happen if both the public records ballot question and the changes the House and Senate are weighing ultimately pass. He added it would likely prompt litigation to sort matters out.
The outlook is especially complicated for the ballot question changing the tax cap and rebate system, which four years ago forced Beacon Hill to return $3 billion to taxpayers. The question, backed by some business groups and the free-market-oriented Pioneer Institute, would change the formula for the tax cap, making it more likely the state owes money back to taxpayers in a given year.
Senate Democrats initially eyed a straight repeal of the underlying law, a move that would have rendered the measure on the ballot moot. However, they balked at nuking the law entirely and instead settled on adding a new condition: the state would not owe any refunds under Chapter 62F unless net state tax revenues for the year were at least 7.5 percent of total statewide personal income.
Sen. Jason Lewis, who authored both the original amendment and the redrafted version, described it as an additional “test” to determine if Beacon Hill must return money to taxpayers that does not imperil the ballot question.
“They would sit alongside each other,” he said of his proposal and the ballot measure. “Essentially, both would need to be triggered in order to result in a refund to taxpayers.”
What Lewis calls an added test to be folded into the law, however, backers of the initiative petition see as a backdoor move to undercut the law — and by extension their ballot question.
The latest Senate maneuver is “a cunningly worded amendment designed to gut the original law without formally repealing it,” the Pioneer Institute said in a statement.
Though Lewis’s updated idea does not outright sink the ballot question, it would effectively limit the impact of the language that will go before voters. If the ballot question passes and the Senate measure becomes law, it would be harder for Beacon Hill to hit the tax refund trigger than it would be if the ballot question alone passed.
“Reading these two changes together will likely reduce the frequency of rebates under Chapter 62F – which undermines the objectives of the ballot question’s proponents,” said London.
It’s not clear if the House will go along with the last-minute Senate change. Mariano said he personally likes the idea of repealing Chapter 62F altogether, but is wary of the outrage it could generate among voters.
Officially, legislators have limited options during the time allotted to them to review ballot questions: approve a measure as drafted by proponents, or take no action. But in the past, they’ve used their position to negotiate with campaigns about a compromise — say, if the House and Senate approve a somewhat scaled-back bill targeting the same issue, organizers will drop their question before it reaches voters.
Eight years ago, as initiative petitions dealing with minimum wage, taxation, and paid family and medical leave wound their way toward the ballot, lawmakers and then-Gov. Charlie Baker convened an extensive series of negotiations with supporters and opponents of the proposals. Those talks led to the “grand bargain,” a bill passed by the Legislature and signed by Baker that addressed those myriad policies satisfactorily enough for each campaign to halt its efforts before their questions were locked in for the general election.
That did not happen this year. There appear to have been no substantive talks about legislative compromises to either the public records ballot question or the Chapter 62F overhaul. (The one would-be ballot question on which there were initial discussions of a possible legislative compromise was a rent control measure, which was ultimately doomed by courts.)
Now, lawmakers are considering changes to both the tax cap law and the public records law in their end-of-July burst of activity, after the final deadline for any campaigns to keep their questions off the ballot.
So whatever decisions the House and Senate make, voters will still have questions to answer in November — even if it’s not clear how much decision-making power they’ll actually have, adding more confusion to a year where Bay Staters might already be overwhelmed by the sheer number of ballot measures.
Further muddying the picture, newly adopted legislative rules this term mean that legislative leaders can wait as long as they want to take up a final bill as long as each branch approves a preliminary version before July 31.
Hille, the Act on Mass leader, said she’s concerned House and Senate negotiators will wait until after the November 3 election to surface a deal on the records legislation, which could give lawmakers a lame-duck opportunity to change or even spike the outcome of the ballot question. Such a move, The Globe‘s editorial board wrote Wednesday, “would be downright shameful.”
“That is a part of this that is really alarming to us as good-government advocates,” Hille said.
The closest corollary in recent history is 2012, when proponents and opponents of an automotive “right-to-repair” proposal agreed to a deal after the question had already locked in a spot on the ballot. The Legislature enacted the compromise legislation in the final hours of its formal sessions for the term in July, and the campaigns initially agreed to urge voters to simply skip the question.
One side changed its mind in the fall, however, and resumed campaigning. Voters then approved the question, putting two competing laws on the books — one enacted by the Legislature, and one that came from the ballot box. The following year, lawmakers moved to untangle the mess by reconciling the two statutes.
In that case, however, the Legislature was acting with input from at least some of the entities behind the right-to-repair campaign. The new public records and tax cap proposals in play before lawmakers have not involved any discussion with the ballot question proponents.
“The fact that the Legislature can try everything to fight a ballot question, and then, in the last few days of the legislative session, pass legislation that would essentially nullify the impact of the ballot question — I think it absolutely sets an alarming precedent about our right as citizens to make laws by initiative petition,” Hille said.
This article first appeared on CommonWealth Beacon and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Worcester Seeks Information on Fiber Network Development
WORCESTER – The City of Worcester announced on Thursday, July 29m that it seeks input and ideas from qualified vendors on the development of a Fiber-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network.
The announcement says that the city “aims to gather information that will maximize access to high-speed, reliable, and affordable internet service.”
“The City of Worcester is actively working to bridge the digital divide,” said City Manager Eric D. Batista. “We want every household, business, school, and non-profit to have access to next-generation connectivity. This RFI is the next step toward that goal and is part of our broader strategy to strengthen digital equity, expand economic opportunity, and enhance public services.”
The request for information (RFI) document on the city website describes the scope of the request as:
“Provide industry information to the City for the design, installation, implementation, and successful operation of fiber network connections across the entire area of the City of Worcester per the attached specifications.”
The deadline for proposals is Sept. 2.
The largest internet provider in Worcester, Spectrum, a division of Charter Communications, provides service throughout its cable network.Verizon Fios, a fiber-based service, currently has coverage across roughly a third of the city.
Unlike cable, fiber provides higher upload speeds for users, lower latency, and does not face slower speeds during neighborhood congestion.
Governor Signs New Laws on Sexual Assault
BOSTON – Governor Maura Healey held two ceremonial signings on Friday, July 24, for two laws included in the FY 2027 state budget related to sexual assault.
The first law eliminates the statute of limitations for cases of rape when new DNA evidence identifies a suspect. The second prevents mandated reporters from claiming consent as a defense for sexual activity with 16- and 17-year-old minors.
Healey proposed the first law in January. It allows prosecutors to bring charges of rape when DNA evidence identifies a suspect after the 15-year statute of limitations expires.
The second law closes what the governor’s office calls a loophole that allowed adults in positions of authority to claim that a 16- or 17-year-old consented to sexual conduct. Those adults include those in professions such as teachers, coaches, police officers, social works, and other mandated reporters. The law states that those teens cannot legally consent to any type of sexual conduct with someone who has exercised authority over them.
“As a former prosecutor and Attorney General, I spent years working alongside survivors of sexual violence. I saw firsthand the trauma they carry, and the extraordinary courage it takes to come forward. I also saw the devastation caused when our laws don’t do enough to protect survivors and hold offenders accountable,” said Governor Maura Healey. “These new laws close dangerous loopholes, strengthen protections for children, and make sure survivors have a better opportunity to seek justice. While no law can change what survivors have endured, we can take action to make our laws fairer, our communities safer and help survivors get the justice they deserve.”
Proposed graduation requirements revive debate over standardized testing
Nearly two years after voters eliminated the MCAS graduation requirement, state officials are proposing a new set of statewide exams that could once again make standardized testing part of earning a high school diploma.
A proposal released by the K-12 Statewide Graduation Council recommends that students complete state-designed and administered end-of-course assessments in English, math, and science as part of a broader graduation framework.
Exactly how much the tests would count towards graduation remains unclear. Under the plan put forward by the council, results “will meaningfully count toward students’ academic record and path to graduation,” but it did not specify whether students must pass these assessments in order to earn a diploma.
The proposal also recommends that students be required to complete a statewide sequence of courses known as MassCore, a capstone project or portfolio, and gain a background in financial and digital literacy to graduate.
The set of recommendations represents the state’s new proposed graduation standard after voters approved the 2024 ballot measure ending the use of MCAS as a graduation requirement. While the proposal would require legislative approval before taking effect, it has already revived debate over whether the state is reintroducing the kind of standardized testing voters rejected.
Students would take these statewide assessments after completing their related core high school classes. A history and social science assessment could be added later on.
Supporters argue that statewide assessments would restore consistency to a diploma that has become increasingly dependent on local standards.
“Parents and families don’t want a different test in every different classroom, and they don’t want a different grading policy so they can’t really know for sure how well their student’s doing,” said Ed Lambert, executive director of the Massachusetts Business Alliance for Education, who opposed the 2024 ballot measure doing away with the MCAS graduation requirement. “That’s the importance of these end-of-course assessments.”
Critics counter that the proposal simply brings high-pressure testing back under a new name.
“We had this debate about high-stakes testing and the voters overwhelmingly said no. But now they are trying to repackage it,” said Max Page, who just ended a four-year tenure as president of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, a union representing over 117,000 Massachusetts educators.
He argued that standardized testing forces teachers to teach to the test and prevents them from offering comprehensive instruction. “Standardized tests are a blunt and ineffective way of measuring student learning.”
Research on Massachusetts’s testing system paints a more nuanced picture.
A 2024 paper produced through a research partnership between the Annenberg Institute at Brown University and the Massachusetts Departments of Elementary and Secondary Education and Higher Education found that strong MCAS performance was a good predictor of students’ long-term college and career outcomes.
The report also found that low-income students who narrowly passed the MCAS math exam on their first try were more than three percentage points more likely to graduate from high school than comparable students who fell just short, suggesting the requirement itself may have motivated students.
At the same time, the researchers cautioned that relying too heavily on standardized testing could encourage schools to prioritize improving test scores rather than broader learning outcomes.
The state graduation council determined that nearly three-fourths of districts already use one or more end-of-course assessments as a way for students to work towards their competency determination, a state requirement that asks students to meet certain academic standards in order to earn a high school diploma.
Under the old system, in which students had to pass 10th grade MCAS tests in English, math, and science, the decision of whether to impose other graduation requirements was left to local districts.
The new blueprint recommends that students complete the state’s MassCore curriculum to graduate, which includes four years of English, four years of math, three of lab-based science, three of history and social science, two of world language, one of art, and five additional year-long courses.
Forty-six percent of Massachusetts high schools already require the full completion of MassCore as a graduation requirement.
For districts that do not meet these requirements, the Healey administration has announced $500,000 in grants to help them align their curriculum with MassCore.
Page argued the amount falls well short of what implementation would require. “If you have to hire a number of educators to be able to offer two years of world language or to offer the full sequence of math for every student in the Commonwealth, it’s going to cost a lot more than that,” he said.
He also questioned whether districts facing budget pressures and staff layoffs could realistically implement the new framework on the proposed timeline.
“We have a huge fiscal crisis, and we have been laying off hundreds of members all across the Commonwealth, but the proposals here will require greater investment to have more MassCore courses, to have counselors, to do capstone experiences, and so on,” he said.
The graduation council proposal also calls for students to meet a set of milestones designed to prepare them for college and career, including in work-based learning, civic readiness, and artificial intelligence.
Graduates must also complete a capstone project or portfolio demonstrating student learning. While the state would create a common rubric, local districts would have the authority to evaluate student work for portfolios or capstone projects.
Implementing these new requirements would happen over multiple years. Under the recommendations, students entering ninth grade in the fall of 2027 would only be required to meet MassCore graduation requirements, while students beginning high school in 2028 would be the first class required to meet the complete set of graduation requirements.
The timeline for the Legislature to take up the recommendations is unclear, but with the July 31 deadline approaching for considering new major business this year, the debate over what should replace MCAS is likely to spill into the new legislative session that begins in January.
This article first appeared on CommonWealth Beacon and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Sewer Overflow Leads to Lake Quinsigamond Restrictions
WORCESTER – A sewer overflow on Route 20, near 23 Southwest Cutoff, enabled up to 15,000 gallons of untreated wastewater to discharge into the street from an underground pipe.
The overflow began at around 5:20 AM on Friday, July 24. City of Worcester workers stopped the leak about two hours later.
According to the City of Worcester, some of the flow made its way into the storm sewer system. That system drains into Lake Quinsigamond from O’Hara Brook.
The city advises residents to prepare for the possibility of elevated E. Coli levels around the area of discharge
The city says testing will occur daily until levels return to an acceptable range.
Fishing and swimming in that section of the lake is restricted until testing indicates safe levels. The city advises all residents should use the lake with caution until testing indicates the water is safe.
39-Year-Old Lunenburg Man Sentenced for Child Pornography
WORCESTER – A local man received a federal prison sentence on Thursday, July 23, for possessing pornographic material of children, also called child sexual abuse material (CSAM) .
Michael Myers, 39, of Lunenburg, received a sentence of 12 years in federal prison followed by five years of supervised release by U.S. District Court Judge Margaret Guzman.
In March 2026, Myers pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography. Authorities arrested him in December 2024
Myers, a level one sex offender, received a state conviction in 2015 for possession of child pornography. He received a sentence of two years of probation.
According to federal prosecutors, law enforcement identified a Kik Messenger account owned by Myers transmitting CSAM files in March 2023. One image discovered depicted a boy as young as eight years old being sexually assaulted by a man.
In April 2024, authorities identified a Reddit account belonging to Myers transmitting CSAM.
A search warrant for access to both accounts enabled investigators to find chats showing his interest in this material.
When authorities searched Myers’ home in December 2024, an anonymous messenger app found on his phone showed additional material being sent and received.
Marijuana Question Survives as all Nine Ballot Questions Get their Numbers
MASSACHUSETTS, meet your ballot — and get ready to hear a flood of arguments about marijuana pinned to “Question 8.”
A state panel ruled Tuesday that the campaign seeking to eliminate legalization for recreational cannabis use can proceed. Less than an hour later, elections officials announced the order in which all nine statewide ballot questions, tying the record field size last set in 1994, will appear to voters this fall.
The decision from the State Ballot Law Commission turned aside a last-ditch effort to block the anti-marijuana proposal, whose backers have long been beset by allegations of shady tactics to gather the voter signatures required to qualify.
Kevin Gilnack, a leader of cannabis advocacy group Equitable Opportunities Now, filed a complaint on July 9 claiming the campaign obtained signatures through “fraudulent means” or that some signatures should not have counted because of formatting problems.
A particularly large concern Gilnack raised was that 231 signatures — above the 123 needed to be tossed to sink the question — appeared on petition sheets that contained “stray marks.” Case law holds that signatures on forms with “additions or deletions” of any kind should not count.
But after holding hearings last week, the commission concluded that the sheets in question contained “errant pen marks that have no material effect on the remainder of the content of the petition.”
Gilnack, the commission wrote, failed to meet the “burden of proof to disqualify enough signatures.”
voters in 2016 approved a ballot question legalizing recreational marijuana use among Bay State adults. In the ensuing decade, cannabis has become a multibillion-dollar industry that’s generated significant tax revenues for the state and municipalities, overseen by a large, and sometimes chaotic, regulatory operation.
SAM Action Inc., a national organization opposing recreational drug use, is pushing the new ballot question to undo that decade-old vote. The group — which as a 501(c)(4) is not required to disclose its donors — provided the entirety of the $1.55 million the campaign raised last year.
“With surging emergency room visits, youth addiction, and more dangerous roads, it is time for Massachusetts to end this disastrous experiment,” Kevin Sabet, the president and CEO of Sam Action Inc., said in a statement celebrating the decision.
The State Ballot Law Commission in January turned aside another challenge to the marijuana question that hinged on whether campaigners misled voters by describing the proposal as dealing with other topics, such as affordable housing.
With the ballot order set Tuesday, the 2026 election officially tied a record for the most statewide questions in a single year, last reached when Bill Clinton was president.
The first question voters will consider is whether to require the Legislature and governor’s office to follow the public records law that already applies to most other government entities in Massachusetts. Subsequent questions deal with collective bargaining rights for employees of the Committee for Public Counsel Services (Question 2), replacing partisan primary elections with a single all-party primary (Question 3), allowing voters to register on Election Day (Question 4), overhauling the cap-and-rebate system for state tax collections (Question 5), earmarking a share of sales tax revenue from sporting goods for conservation (Question 6), allowing smaller lot sizes for single-family home zoning (Question 7), repealing recreational marijuana legalization (Question 8), and repealing a 2024 gun control law (Question 9).
Secretary of State William Galvin typically decides the order of questions himself with a goal of achieving a clean layout, but this year, he delegated that task to a top deputy because Galvin is leading the campaign for Election Day registration.
With so many questions in the mix, Galvin expects all ballots across the state will require at least two pages.
This article first appeared on CommonWealth Beacon and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Worcester Police Investigate Double Shooting on Shrewsbury St.
WORCESTER – The Worcester Police Department is investigating a double shooting on Shrewsbury Street that took place overnight on Wednesday, July 22.
According to the Worcester Police Department (WPD), a man and woman at the Victory Cigar Bar, at 56 Shrewsbury St., sustained gunshot injuries. Both were conscious and alert when police arrived and provided medical aid. EMS transported them to a local hospital.
Both the man and the woman underwent surgery and are in stable condition.
The WPD says the investigation is ongoing and no suspects are in custody. The department also says there is no reason to believe there is a threat to the public.
Anyone with information about this incident is asked to contact the police through one of the following methods:
- Send an anonymous text to 274637 TIPWPD + your message
- Send an anonymous web-based message at worcesterma.gov/police
- Call the Worcester Police Detective Bureau at (508) 799-8651
City Manager’s Report Rejects Far More than Civilian Review
This is the sixth and final part in a series that will look at actions taken by some city councilors over recent years that, when viewed collectively, display a disturbing downward spiral towards a council that serves the interests of its members, not of city residents.
The introductory piece of the series, The City Council Circles the Drain, looks at a City Council resolution supporting Worcester Police Department actions in several recent cases. In isolation, the resolution is harmless. When viewed in the context of the behavior of the majority faction within the council, the resolution tells a different story.
The second piece of this series, Worcester Council Holds Fewest Meetings in 20 Years in 2025, looks at the near-total elimination of the ability of residents to put issues before their local elected legislature and the events from October 2024 through January 2025, which some councilors cited as the reason for eliminating that ability.
The third piece of this series, Worcester City Council Criticizes Manager, Snitches on Itself, reviews a discussion within the city council related to the specialized stretch code during its meeting on April 28. It’s not the stretch code itself that is important here, but how the discussion shows the sources of information councilors base their decisions on.
The fourth piece of this series, One Year After Eureka St., What Officers at the Scene Knew, reviews the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operation on Eureka Street on May 8, 2025, the orders under which Worcester Police officers operated that day, and how those orders contradict the later public statement of city officials, including city councilors.
The fifth piece of this series, When Worcester Chose the Trump Bailout Over the Constitution, looks at the campaign to undermine the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) investigation of the Worcester Police Department and the manipulations, changing narratives, and declaration of mission accomplished.
This sixth and final piece of this series looks at the Municipal Civilian Review Board Report released by City Manager Eric Batista to the Worcester City Council, the conflicts of interest surrounding the report, the declining transparency it indicates, and the focus on managing public awareness rather than protecting the constitutional rights of Worcester residents.
City Manager Declares Police Reform Dead
This report by the Batista administration is an exercise in self congratulations. The report says, in short, that we are doing a great job, so we’ll do nothing differently.
This report is not a repudiation of a civilian review board for Worcester. It is a repudiation of independent oversight in any form. In this report, the Batista administration states clearly that it will maintain total authority over all aspects of upholding the U.S. and Massachusetts constitutions within government in Worcester, and the individual rights enshrined in them.
Calling this a report is disingenuous in its own right. This, like many of the reports fed to the Worcester City Council by the administration, is a position paper. The dynamic is quite simple: the administration feeds the majority faction within the council, led by Mayor Joe Petty, what they want to hear. The majority tells him what a great job he’s doing. Then, once a year, the majority produces a stage show they call an evaluation and reinforces what a great job he’s doing, providing the underlying arguments for what they already want to do.
This aligns with Mayor Joe Petty’s statement on the radio show Talk of the Commonwealth with Hank Stolz just a few weeks ago. Petty said that his personal philosophy is that decision making happens behind closed doors.
Executive Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (EODEI)
An obvious red flag about this report is that Batista assigned writing this report to Chief Equity Officer Kevin Lovaincy. As the head of the Executive Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (EODEI), Lovaincy’s area of responsibility includes the Investigations Division and the Human Rights & Accessibility Division.
In other words, the report is written by the head of a division which would lose part of its current portfolio and have its influence challenged by the creation of a civilian review board. Nobody in government ever wants to give up power or portfolio.
Page 3 of the report says:
“Through the Investigations Division and the Human Rights & Accessibility Division within the Executive Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (EODEI), the municipality already possesses many of the foundational elements of oversight models examined by the WRRB.”
The elephant in the room: This is all under the direct control of the city manager. According to the charter of the City of Worcester, the city manager is the chief conservator of the peace. He is at the top of the chain of command of law enforcement in the city.
The goal here is not to enhance the city government’s ability to defend and uphold the constitution. The goal is information control and public relations management.
It is a keen insight into what is important to this administration. What matters is not what happens, but what goes public.
NEPBA Local 911 President Thomas Duffy II described it another way to Masslive:
“This effort is the new defund the police call that takes valuable resources away from public and officer safety simply to create controversy.”
It’s about the controversy. Not the constitution. Not individual rights. Not the law. Not transparency. Not accountability.
Right. Exactly the problem.
(Editor’s note: Duffy has filed a defamation lawsuit again Tom Marino, the author of this piece and principal of This Week in Worcester. I fully stand by our reporting and have total confidence in victory.)
Apparently, now any expenditure by city government that isn’t directly funneled to law enforcement is “defund the police.”
The economics are simple. Estimates for funding a civilian review board are around $750,000 per year. Two lawsuit settlements last year, both relating to liberty stolen from civilians by Worcester Police officers, totaled just over $2.25 million.
I think we should start calling each lawsuit settlement and judgement resulting from police behavior part of the “defund Worcester” campaign.
Human Rights Commission
This report continues to assert that the Human Rights Commission plays a role in accountability. The city manager, contrary to what appears to be the plain language of the city ordinance and relevant case law, has castrated the human rights commission, preventing data on anything discipline-related from being sent to the commission.
Lovaincy, the author of the report, has been the Batista’s primary weapon in limiting the scope of the Human Rights Commission.
Jacqueline Yang was first appointed to the Human Rights Commission in 2018. She received reappointment in 2023. On July 20, she resigned from the commission.
According to the Worcester Telegram and Gazette:
“Yang confirmed she resigned July 20, and used an expletive to describe any suggestion that the Human Rights Commission plays a serious role in police oversight.”
The same Telegram article:
“[Yang] said the Human Rights Commission should not be considered part of a layer of overview of police, arguing it has no actual power and has been impeded in its efforts for years. “
A second member of the Human Rights Commission, Drew Schnoebelen resigned on July 21. Ina statement, Schnoebelen said:
“City leadership has consistently and purposefully manufactured roadblocks and barriers that constrict the Commission in a way that simply cannot be overcome without major systemic change.”
Schnoebelen added:
“These purposeful roadblocks and barriers have rendered the Commission a toothless body that primarily exists to be a symbol of advocacy and change which can be pointed to as evidence of the city’s efforts, all so that real, meaningful change does not have to be enforced.”
Overwhelming Numbers of Worcester Residents are Liars
Page 11 of the administration’s report shows the number of complaints related to the use of force by officers within the Worcester Police Department. The administration intended to show a diminishing number of complaints from 2018 to 2025.
It is true, the number of complaints has declined. Looking closely at the statistics provides insight into what those within city government find reasonable.
The department categorizes civilian complaints under 1503.1, Unnecessary Force. Cases brought internally are categorized under Pol. 400 Use of Force. That the report doesn’t explain that is all you need to know about the integrity of it.
The numbers provided tell us that civilians filed 102 complaints related to unnecessary force from 2018 to 2025. The department’s internal investigations sustained one of those complaints. One out of 102 is just under 1 percent.
Anyone who looks at those numbers and doesn’t find reason for alarm, or at least further inquiry, has to believe it is possible that 99 percent of Worcester residents are liars.
Much of the report directs the reader to focus on the decline of the last three years, since the appointment of Chief of Police Paul Saucier. From 2023 through 2025, there were 15 civilian complaints, with one complaint sustained. While the sample size is smaller, the plain math of it is that represents a percentage that rounds up to seven percent.
That means from 2018 to 2022, liars filed every one of the 87 complaints of unreasonable force.
Kate Toomey, chair of the City Council Public Safety Committee, who consistently asks for crime statistics every quarter, has never asked for these statistics to be taken up in her committee. This council term is the sixth time Mayor Joe Petty appointed Toomey to a two-year term to lead that committee.
Minimizing Constitutional Violations
On page 14, the administration presents how often the police department responds to incidents and faces no allegations of policy or constitutional violations.
This statistical framework goes well beyond dishonest. Like everything in this report, it is the government telling residents there is no problem.
The report says that in 2025 the Worcester Police Department responded to 144,858 incidents and received only four excessive force complaints. They get to put a lot of zeros in front of it, as if it’s relevant. The percentage: 0.0028 percent.
Oh wow. That’s so low; nothing to see here, folks. It’s just “anti-police sentiment.”
When two stabbings occurred on the Worcester Common a few weeks ago, we heard city councilors and others talking about people “feeling safe.” Nobody estimated the number of actions taken on the common over the year and buried the statistical relevance of those stabbings.
In a criminal trial, is a defendant allowed to calculate the total percentage of actions that weren’t criminal in their life and present how often they weren’t committing crimes? That sort of stuff comes in the penalty phase.
This statistic buries the problem, collectivizing responsibility and diluting the positive behavior of those doing the job the right way in the interest of protecting bad actors. Its dishonesty is unsurprising.
Application of Policy
As I wrote in the last piece in this series, the administration and police department credit themselves for the development of new policies at the department. The statistics provided in the report, combined with many cases of use of force where video evidence shows the department’s internal investigations were inadequate to the point of malicious intent, show enforcement was nonexistent.
But not being impressed that they wrote more policies down is anti-police sentiment.
The reality comes in the application of policy. Let’s look at just one controversial case: the Beer Garden.
On page 31 of the internal investigation report:
“PO – reported that Mr. Ayala-Melendez pushed past officers and was yelling towards the arrestees. The video does not depict Mr. Ayala-Melendez pushing past officers.”
[Editor’s Note: The name of the officer involved is no longer a city employee, thus his name was not included.]
The department’s internal investigator on the case didn’t even bother to include an allegation for the violation of policy for the false statement this officer made, which is a crime in Massachusetts. Months later, after the controversy over the incident became public, then-Chief Sargent ordered the case reopened to sustain a violation of the department’s submitting reports policy.
The officer also used force to arrest Ayala-Melendez for crimes he did not commit.
That is just one of many examples of how policy has been enforced for years at the Worcester Police Department.
The report frames the reduction in civilian complaints as a product of the appointment of Chief Saucier. That may be true.
However, come Sept. 1 of this year, Saucier will have three years serving at the salary of chief. That will effectively maximize his pension. I have no insight into the chief’s plans, but nobody in city government would be surprised if he announced his retirement by the end of the year or early next year.
So if the reduction of civilian complaints is a product of Chief Saucier alone, what happens when he’s gone?
The Next Chief of Police
This Week in Worcester spoke with two current captains and 2 officers close to the NEPBA Local 911 union’s thoughts on the appointment of the next chief. One captain said, “The city is afraid to appoint Carl Suprenor because he is known for being brutally honest.”
Sources tell This Week in Worcester that city leaders see Deputy Chief Edward McGinn as too open, including with media outlets.
Both McGinn and Suprenor filed a complaint with the Civil Service Commission objecting to Saucier’s appointment as chief. The state legislature approved the city’s request to opt-out of the civil service system for chief and deputy chiefs during the process.
Another Deputy Chief, Kenneth Davenport, filed a lawsuit along with three other officers in 2013 that alleged racial discrimination in promotions at the department. The settlement included Davenport’s promotion to lieutenant. He later became the first Black person to achieve the rank of captain. He is also the first Black person promoted to deputy chief.
According to the same sources at the police department, city and union leadership views Davenport as controllable.
Why look outside the department, like Governor Maura Healey did, to find the current commander of the Massachusetts State Police?
Why look when city leadership already has someone with the primary trait they want? Its the same reason Mayor Petty’s majority refused to consider anyone other than Eric Batista for city manager. Why search based on ability when their primary concern is an asset they can control?
The worst-kept secret in city government is that City Manager Batista and Mayor Petty have already decided that the next chief of police will be- the author of the internal investigation report into the Beer Garden incident, the former Commander of the department’s Bureau of Professional Standards, and current Deputy Chief Kenneth Davenport.
God help us all.
Second Human Rights Commission Member Resigns
WORCESTER – A second member of the Worcester Human Rights Commission has resigned in the wake of City Manager Eric Batista’s release of the Municipal Civilian Review Board Report, which will be taken up by the Worcester City Council at its meeting on Tuesday, July 21, at 5:30 PM.
The report not only rejects the establishment of a civilian review board but also rejects any change in oversight of mechanisms related to the police department, including any independent oversight mechanisms.
Drew Schnoebelen, appointed to the Human Rights Commission in November 2024, resigned from the commission on July 21.
In his letter of resignation to Batista, he said:
“City leadership has consistently and purposefully manufactured roadblocks and barriers that constrict the Commission in a way that simply cannot be overcome without major systemic change.”
Schnoebelen added:
“These purposeful roadblocks and barriers have rendered the Commission a toothless body that primarily exists to be a symbol of advocacy and change which can be pointed to as evidence of the city’s efforts, all so that real, meaningful change does not have to be enforced.”
The full text of Schnoebelen’s letter of resignation is at the bottom of this page.
The first commission member to resign after the release of the report is Jacqueline Yang. She was first appointed to the Human Rights Commission in 2018. She received reappointment in 2023. On July 20, she resigned from the commission.
According to the Worcester Telegram and Gazette:
“Yang confirmed she resigned July 20, and used an expletive to describe any suggestion that the Human Rights Commission plays a serious role in police oversight.”
The same Telegram article:
“[Yang] said the Human Rights Commission should not be considered part of a layer of overview of police, arguing it has no actual power and has been impeded in its efforts for years. “
The full text of Schnoebelen’s letter of resignation:
To the City Manager,
After much consideration, I am resigning from the Worcester Human Rights Commission, effective immediately. I joined the HRC in Fall 2024 as a new resident of Worcester with enthusiasm and hope. I felt that becoming a part of this volunteer organization was one way to contribute to the Worcester community, and I was strong in my conviction that doing the work on a local level could make a lasting, tangible impact.
Unfortunately, I have not observed a healthy, functioning, and effective commission, especially over the last 12 months. I personally feel that over the course of my tenure, city leadership has consistently and purposefully manufactured roadblocks and barriers that constrict the Commission in a way that simply cannot be overcome without major systemic change.
It is my personal belief that these purposeful roadblocks and barriers have rendered the Commission a toothless body that primarily exists to be a symbol of advocacy and change which can be pointed to as evidence of the city’s efforts, all so that real, meaningful change does not have to be enforced. Simple commission activities like electing new leadership, filling vacant positions, and making basic statements to the public have been met with contention, controversy, and inaction, while more significant projects and repeated policy recommendations have been ignored. Whether or not my observations are shared among all Commission members, the relationship between the HRC and city leadership leads me to believe that I cannot in good conscience continue to participate.
My hope is that my resignation will continue to draw attention to what I feel is the city’s misuse and exploitation of the Human Rights Commission and spotlight one of many challenges the community faces in achieving equity and inclusivity.