This year, GBH News reporters have found stories of community and of division, of hope against despair and of the things that shape us. As 2022 draws to a close, GBH’s Morning Edition is calling up the journalists, musicians and community activists to get updates on some of the most impactful stories we’ve covered this year.
Trans people continued the fight for equal rights, safety and joy
We met Chastity Bowick, executive director of the Transgender Emergency Fund of Massachusetts, during our Walk Down the Block series during Pride Month in June, as part of a conversation about making pride more inclusive for all.
It’s been a difficult year for many members of the LGBTQ+ community, and for trans people in particular. Lawmakers across the country have filed legislation targeting trans youth, and white supremacist hate groups have protested events like drag queen story hours and outside Boston hospitals offering gender-affirming care.
“I’m trying to stay positive and uplift my community to provide awareness of how to protect ourselves,” Bowick said. “But at the same time, we can’t do this alone. We can’t fight this fight alone. It takes our allies, people who claim they love us, and these organizations that claim they serve us. Beyond just trying to submit a quota for numbers or funding, you need to really protect us.”
The end of 2022 also marks a professional change for Bowick. Friday is her last day as executive director of the Transgender Emergency Fund of Massachusetts. She will soon start a new role as the community engagement director at the Massachusetts General Hospital Community Access, Recruitment and Engagement Research Center, where she will lead community events and work on connecting organizations that serve trans women of color with resources they need to get involved in research.
“I’ll still be working for my community,” she said. “Just in a different capacity.”
She also found some joy in Beyoncé’s album “Renaissance,” an ode to queer dance scenes released this summer. Listen to her favorite track, “I’M THAT GIRL.”
Read more:
A walk down the block: Pride for all with Trans Resistance MA
'This is the future’ grassroots LGBTQ+ organizers reimagine Boston Pride
A walk down the block: Stepping into the Boston Pride past and present in the South End
Iconic Boston Pride parade will not return this summer
Maura Healey’s election broke barriers. What will her governing look like?
Maura Healey was elected governor of Massachusetts in November, and next week will become the first elected woman to lead Massachusetts and one of two openly lesbian governors in the U.S. What Healey will tackle in her first months as governor remains to be seen. But her record of lawsuits may offer some hints, GBH News State House reporter Katie Lannan said.
“She led the state’s challenge against the Defense of Marriage Act, and had been involved in the fight to preserve marriage equality,” Lannan said. “As A.G., she was probably best known for her willingness to sue former President Donald Trump. And she also took on opioid manufacturers, Purdue Pharma and the Sackler family that controls it. She sued Exxon Mobil related to climate change. She had some gun actions that really drew a lot of attention.”
For much of the campaign, Healey positioned herself as a successor to outgoing Republican Gov. Charlie Baker, Lannan said.
“It’ll be interesting to see starting a week from now, when she is sworn in, just how different she does plan to govern from Charlie Baker or if she keeps up what she kept positioning herself as on the campaign trail,” Lannan said. “It was kind of his stylistic successor, that middle-of-the-road, collaborative, solutions-oriented governance.”
Read more:
Healey names three top aides
Gov.-elect Healey is mostly mum on priorities. Experts point to major challenges and low-hanging fruit.
Wu and Healey promise partnership — but no specifics — on issues ranging from rent control to Mass. and Cass
LGBTQ leaders reflect on Maura Healey’s historic win
What to expect when you’re expecting Maura Healey
Healey’s barrier-breaking win the next chapter in a career built on law and basketball
White supremacist groups are growing across New England. Some communities are pushing back.
In early 2022, GBH News reporter Phillip Martin got a tip from a local doctor: White supremacist hate groups were targeting Brigham and Women’s Hospital with demonstrations.
“It received absolutely no media attention until GBH decided to take a closer look,” Martin told GBH’s Morning Edition. “These white nationalists were holding a banner ... accusing the hospital of killing whites.”
The demonstrations appeared to be a response to the hospital’s equity efforts to address proven, long-standing biases people of color face when they seek medical treatment.
“Data has shown that people of color have received inferior treatment in all kinds of medical settings for heart conditions, for neurosurgery and so forth, with symptoms that are often ignored, often overlooked in the medical community,” Martin said. “They started to respond to this with efforts targeting minority communities for increased outreach and more conscious care. Now, this led white nationalist groups to accuse these doctors of being anti-white.”
Martin has spent much of the year covering neo-Nazi hate groups, how their members have been emboldened by politicians and people in power, and how those groups, while still small, are growing across New England.
“These folks have found that they are not alone in the echo of their hate,” he said.
He has also covered the ways in which people fight back against them.
“What was key this year were counter-demonstrations by folks all over the region,” he said.
Read more:
Neo-Nazis target anti-racist doctors at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, calling them 'anti-white’
Medical community rallies behind Boston doctors targeted by neo-Nazis
Antisemitic harassment tied to COVID policies in Salem continues even as pandemic rules ease
It is happening here: Massachusetts has a growing neo-Nazi movement
'An intelligence failure of significant proportions’ preceded white supremacists’ march in Boston, city leaders say
How small New England cities are standing up to white supremacists
Migrants landed on Martha’s Vineyard and settled in Massachusetts
Almost 50 migrants, most of them from Venezuela, were lured onto a plane to Martha’s Vineyard with false promises of work and education, a scheme paid for by Florida taxpayers under Gov. Ron DeSantis. The people who arrived in Martha’s Vineyard were resettled on Cape Cod, and most have found more permenant housing in Massachusetts. But challenges remain: The United States government is slow to produce work authorizations, housing is expensive, and legal cases are still in progress.
“I think it’s really important to remember here: These aren’t people who are expecting handouts,” said GBH News reporter Sarah Betancourt, who has written extensively about the issue. “I’ve heard of some migrants going door-to-door to businesses asking if they can work, and of course, the employers are like, let’s see the work authorization. So people are struggling. In Chelsea, people are renting floor place in kitchens of apartments of other people, strangers, just to catch a few hours of sleep.”
Read more:
Advocates ask Boston City Council for help housing migrants
One migrant says he felt 'deceived’ by events that led to his arrival on Martha’s Vineyard
Texas sheriff certifies the Martha’s Vineyard migrants are crime victims, opening the door for special visas
Feds probe how DeSantis paid for migrant flights to Martha’s Vineyard
Migrants from Martha’s Vineyard flights file suit against Florida Gov. DeSantis
Roe fell. What’s next for abortion?
GBH producers Hannah Reale and Meghan Smith had already been covering reproductive rights and access to abortion before Roe fell. But in the summer of 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Roe v. Wade with Dobbs v. Jackson, undoing 50 years of precedent and making way for state legislatures to outlaw or severely limit abortion.
“I caught up with someone in the field this past week and they said, ‘I wish there was better news,’” Reale said. “Demand is really up here, particularly in the last weeks and months, as more and more bans go into effect in these other states. ... There’s this bigger and bigger burden on every other state that does allow abortion.”
Smith has kept up with what college student activists are pushing for in Boston. At Northeastern, students fought for a vending machine dispensing emergency contraception.
“Now students can get a generic version of Plan B for about $7,” Smith said. “The machine completely sold out the first week on campus, and they had to restock it multiple times.”
Read more:
Why three people in Massachusetts sought out abortions: love, self and timing
Student activists are pushing their colleges to offer more reproductive health care
What impact will the national abortion fight have here in Massachusetts?
A Greater Boston musician still raising funds for Ukraine, though attention has waned
Ukrainian American viola player Alexander Vavilov has spent the last 10 months raising almost $100,000 for musicians in Ukraine, many of whom were displaced during the Russian invasion.
He’s still raising money — and talking to musicians in Ukraine experiencing violence unthinkable to many Americans.
“You know, the things she described, it’s one thing when you see this in the news of the things that you read in an article. But when you hear it from a person who’s experienced that, it’s just — it’s a very profound experience.”
Read his story here.
Read our first interview with him in May.
We held listening sessions to learn about what matters to you
This year, GBH News has been trying something uncommon in the news business: Going into communities we serve, not to chase a story but just to listen.
Annie Shreffler, GBH’s audience impact producer, led 14 listening sessions with 140 people, on Zoom and in libraries and other civic spaces. These sessions allow our reporters and editors to hear what people are looking for from their news sources; what we do well; and how we can better reflect our neighbors’ lived experiences.
“I call it turning our newsroom inside out,” Shreffler said. “As reporters and as journalists, we have learned to judge what’s important, what people need to know, what those news stories are. We have to do those jobs. But then we also have to hear from the people that are impacted by these stories, and what it is that they need us to understand from their own perspective, so that we help foster a better understanding of each other from community to community.”
For our next scheduled listening session, we’d like to hear from people living with disabilities about how they navigate systems of medical care. The session will be held online Mar. 1 at noon. Preregister for free here.
Interested in joining us for a listening session in 2023? Email us at gbhnewsconnect@wgbh.org.
Read more:
In the wake of violence in Roxbury and Dorchester, young people need someone to listen
A walk down the block: Boston Uncornered works to end gang violence by getting young people to college
Read more stories from GBH News listening sessions
Tell us: What should we cover next year?
What will GBH News reporters cover next year? Assignment editor Matt Baskin has some big stories he’ll be keeping an eye on: how incoming Gov. Maura Healey will manage the MBTA; what hate groups are doing around New England; and how Massachusetts will treat people migrating into the state.
When dark or painful things happen in our communities, Baskin said, journalists have a responsibility to bare witness to those stories and share them with our listeners, readers and viewers.
But we’re also looking for positive stories to tell — and not just the latest Celtics or Bruins win, though we’ll also cover those teams’ successes in 2023. Through the new All Things Considered Joy Beat, we’ll share how your neighbors, friends and family are doing great things in our community.
“Once a week we’re going to be doing interviews with folks who are doing really impactful work that’s making people’s lives better in the Greater Boston community ... shining a light on people who are doing good work and who are helping lift others up,” Baskin said.
Know someone you’d like to see spotlighted? Get in touch at gbhnewsconnect@wgbh.org.
