News: MassLawReform

The Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI) has launched a new website, MassHealthProject.org, for its MassHealth Monitoring Project. The purpose of the project is to monitor MassHealth redeterminations and provide MassHealth beneficiaries and their advocates with the tools and resources to maintain their MassHealth coverage or successfully transition to other affordable coverage.

For Immediate Release

Media Contact
NASW-MA: Rebekah Gewirtz | rgewirtz.naswma@socialworkers.org | 617.645.4773

BOSTON, MA (July 31, 2023) – The Massachusetts FY 24 budget includes a 10 percent increase in cash assistance benefits starting April 2024, marking another historic step forward for families in Deep Poverty. This is the fourth increase in four years after decades of frozen benefit levels. These successive increases demonstrate our legislative leaders’ moral commitment to our most vulnerable children, older adults, and people with disabilities.

For Immediate Release 

Media Contact:
Allie Girouard
agirouard@mlri.org | (617) 357-0700 x 305 

BOSTON, July 27, 2023 – Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI) will be honoring Dr. Michael Curry, Esq. with the 2023 Catalyst for Change award at a reception on October 10, 2023 at the UMass Club in Boston. 

The Massachusetts Legislature is considering whether to include tuition equity in the FY24 budget. This measure would extend in-state tuition and access to state financial aid to students in the Commonwealth, regardless of immigration status.

The Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI) is deeply disappointed in yesterday’s U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College. Although the ruling was not unexpected, the upending of decades of precedent is once again shocking. This decision is a setback in the progress that has been made to increase educational and economic opportunity for communities of color who have been historically and presently excluded from so many opportunities, most notably opportunities of educational and economic advancement.

For Immediate Release:
Media Contacts
MLRI: Pat Baker | pbaker@mlri.org | 617.357.0700 ext. 328
NASW-MA: Rebekah Gewirtz | rgewirtz.naswma@socialworkers.org | 617.645.4773

New Funding from Administration will Realize Promise of Common Application Law and Improve Access to Critical Safety-net Benefits for all Low-Income Massachusetts Residents

Boston, MA (June 22, 2023) — Today, the Healey Administration announced $40 million in federal and state funding to implement the law promoted and passed in 2022 that would streamline access to core safety net programs. Legislation passed in August of 2022, Chapter 174 of the Acts of 2022, directed the Administration to create a Common Application for SNAP, MassHealth, cash assistance, childcare and housing subsidies, fuel assistance, and other needs-tested benefits and today this funding infusion will ensure the state can reach this goal.

BOSTON, June 15, 2023 – Brown Rudnick and the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI) obtained a favorable ruling for children and families in a lawsuit filed against the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF).

In this case, a Superior Court justice found that DCF had violated the due process rights of a mother when it denied her the right to an agency hearing to challenge DCF’s finding of a “substantiated concern” that she had neglected her child.

Imposing SNAP work requirements on older adults and doubling down on TANF work rules will increase hunger and deepen poverty

BOSTON, MA (May 30, 2023) — The debt-ceiling agreement expands failed work requirements for SNAP and TANF, jeopardizing access to food and basic income for tens of thousands of low income people in Massachusetts.