Massachusetts Law Reform Institute and National Association of Social Workers-MA Applaud the Massachusetts Legislature and the Baker Administration for Streamlining Access to Safety Net Programs
For Immediate Release – August 04, 2022
Media Contacts
MLRI: Christine Dunn
christine@sevenletter.com | 617.646.1044
NASW-MA: Rebekah Gewirtz
rgewirtz.naswma@socialworkers.org | 617.645.4773
Newly implemented systems will increase program efficiency and improve access to critical safety-net benefits for all low-income Massachusetts residents
On July 27th, the Baker Administration implemented a portion of FY21 and FY22 budget language and began allowing low-income households applying for or renewing MassHealth online to apply for SNAP food benefits at the same time.
Statement from the Lift Our Kids Coalition on Cash Assistance Increases in the FY 23 Budget
The FY 2023 budget’s 10 percent increase in cash assistance starting in October marks another historic step forward for families in Deep Poverty. This is the third increase in three 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.
Lift Our Kids Coalition Secures 10% Increase to Cash Assistance Grants in FY23 Budget
In late 2018, the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, together with Greater Boston Legal Services and many other legal services programs and community organizations, began a campaign to increase state cash assistance grants, which had been frozen for two decades. With the leadership of Sen. Sal DiDomenico (D-Everett) and Rep. Marjorie Decker (D-Cambridge), the Lift Our Kids Coalition secured a 10% increase – the first in a generation – in the FY21 budget, and then a further 9.1% increase in the FY22 budget.
MLRI Files Successful Joint Amicus Brief on Behalf of Advocacy Organizations
Last month, Mass Law Reform, Greater Boston Legal Services, South Coastal Counties Legal Services and the Legal Services Center of Harvard Law School submitted an amicus brief for the case of Slavin v. Lewis in Norfolk Superior Court, representing six advocacy groups who serve survivors of domestic abuse. Amicus briefs, also known as friend of the court briefs, can be a key component of efforts to support low income survivors of domestic abuse. Amicus briefs are an opportunity to inform appellate courts on how their decisions may affect people beyond the parties in an individual case.
Statement of Georgia D. Katsoulomitis, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute, in Response to the Dobbs v. Jackson Decision
The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization is a stunning reversal of legal precedent and the loss of a constitutional right that has been protected for almost half a century. The reversal of Roe v. Wade is not only a devastating loss of reproductive rights for women in the United States but it is also an affront to the fundamental right to bodily autonomy and to our privacy rights. Furthermore, it opens the door to legal challenges that threaten to weaken or eliminate other important fundamental rights and liberties.
Dobbs does not outlaw abortion in the United States; it simply leaves the legality of abortion access to each individual state. The consequence is that the choice of whether a woman has access to reproductive health services will depend on where in the United States she happens to live. Women of economic means who reside in states that restrict or outlaw access to abortion may have the financial ability to travel to states where abortion remains legal and accessible. However, low income women in states with restrictive abortion access now have no choice or options – at least not safe ones.
The Moral Imperative of Anti-Racism
On June 19, 1865, Major General Gordon Granger led a contingent of Union soldiers into Galveston, Texas to inform its citizens that slavery had been abolished. Two and half years after the Emancipation Proclamation and less than six months before emancipation officially became national policy, the last Confederate bastion ended the inhuman practice of slavery – and more than 250,000 Black people in Texas were granted their freedom.
Language Access Bill Reported Favorably Out of Committee
An Act Relative to Language Access and Inclusion (now H.4872 and S.2929) has officially been reported favorably out of Committee.
MLRI Applauds Supreme Judicial Court Decision on Ride-Share Ballot Initiative
Yesterday, in a unanimous decision, the Supreme Judicial Court ruled that a ballot initiative being funded by ride-share companies Uber and Lyft could not appear on the 2022 statewide ballot. The Court ruled that the initiative, which would have classified ride-share drivers as independent contractors and therefore not entitled to the strong protections generally afforded to employees under Massachusetts law, would have improperly presented voters with more than one policy decision to make, in violation of the state constitutional requirement that ballot questions may pertain only to a single issue.
MLRI was honored to join in one of the amicus briefs filed on behalf of worker groups opposing this effort by tech and business interests to exclude ride-share drivers from the protections of state law. We are gratified by the Court’s decision to protect workers across Massachusetts.