GBH News brought you stories from every corner of the region this year. We’ve seen an impactful national election, continued struggles with housing and health costs, and plenty of worries, but also moments of joy and impactful investigations. As we wrap up 2024, we bring you conversations with reporters, producers and editors reflecting on the year — and looking ahead to what’s next.
In Worcester, higher rents and confirmation of police misconduct
Some residents are frustrated about slow pace of changes
Henry Santoro: This is GBH’s Morning Edition. As 2024 comes to an end, we’re reflecting on some of the biggest news stories of the year. There was no shortage of news happening in Worcester this year. For instance, there continues to be a shortage of affordable housing that’s pricing families out, and people are still coming to grips with the damning findings from a federal investigation into Worcester police conduct. Joining us to talk about those stories and more is our Worcester bureau reporter Sam Turken. Hey, Sam.
Sam Turken: Hey, Henry. Thanks for having me.
Santoro: This situation with the Worcester Police Department has been going on now for two years. Can you tell us more about what the investigation found and what was the fallout?
Turken: Yeah, so this was a huge federal investigation. Earlier this month, U.S. Justice Department officials, they released their findings — this 41 page report — and it was scathing. It confirmed police have routinely used excessive force. We’re talking about things like unnecessarily tasering people, hitting them in the head, having police dogs bite them. The other main finding was the police department allows undercover officers to have sex with women suspected of being prostitutes — behavior that investigators called outrageous.
Santoro: It is outrageous.
Turken: It is outrageous. And you know, Henry, the police department has been battled for years because there have been a lot of accusations for this type of misconduct. And as you can imagine, now that the federal report is out, it’s been a major blow to the city. The police department’s outside lawyer slammed it as inaccurate and biased, and so have police unions. But City Manager Eric Batista — he oversees the department — he says he’s committed to restoring trust in it and he’s creating a city hotline to report police misconduct, among other steps. But it’s still early. Folks are just waiting to see what actually happens.
Santoro: As a reporter, have you been able to get any officers to speak?
Turken: No. No. You have to go through the top officials at the police department.
Santoro: On to the housing issue in Worcester. What are you seeing on the ground?
Turken: Unfortunately, it’s more of the same. There just aren’t enough affordable apartments and homes for people, as is the case across the state. More folks in Worcester County are becoming homeless as a result. We reported on that quite a bit this year. And for people who do have apartments, another thing we’ve reported on is how many have to settle for really shoddy living conditions because they just have nowhere else to go. Worcester’s tried to use federal COVID relief money to help fund the construction of more affordable housing, and state leaders are doing the same. But it’s a slow process and the gap is just, it’s huge. Some experts estimate that just in the state’s 26 Gateway Cities, which include Worcester, we’re going to need 80,000 new homes over the next decade. And if we don’t meet that need, people will continue to leave the state, which obviously hurts the economy.
Santoro: And that’s going to cost billions of dollars.
Turken: Exactly.
Santoro: You mentioned COVID relief money from the federal government. There’s criticism that Worcester officials are awarding it unfairly. Can you tell us about that angle?
Turken: So we’re talking about the American Rescue Plan Act, which was passed by the federal government, and we’re talking about ARPA money, which is the abbreviation for American Rescue Plan Act. And it had to be committed for the end of this year. It came from the federal government and went down to states and cities. And the feds wanted the money to go to underserved communities, plain and simple. And in line with that, Worcester officials had said they would prioritize these small, grassroots organizations led by people of color that help those communities. But it turns out that a lot more money has gone to larger, established nonprofits with deeper pockets that don’t necessarily specialize in helping Black and brown communities. And this has led to complaints that the funding process is inequitable. Worcester officials have said strict federal eligibility requirements make it hard for the city to give money to groups with less of a track record managing these large grants. But I’ve reported that the requirements, they’re actually more lenient for this type of funding. Now, just real quickly, there’s no money left to give these organizations, but the latest I’ve heard is that the city is now trying to set aside the interest on the funds. So it’s kind of like the leftovers, about $2 million, for those groups that haven’t received as much.
Santoro: That is Sam Turken discussing news out of Worcester over the past year. Sam, thank you so much. Merry Christmas. Happy holidays.
Turken: Thank you, Henry. Same to you.
Santoro: I'm Henry Santoro. You're listening to GBH.
Worcester ended the year with major news about its police department: A U.S. Department of Justice report found that officers in the city used excessive force and “rapidly escalate minor incidents.”
“We’re talking about things like unnecessarily Tasering people, hitting them in the head, having police dogs bite them,” said Sam Turken, GBH’s Worcester reporter. “The other main finding was the police department allows undercover officers to have sex with women suspected of being prostitutes, behavior that investigators called outrageous.”
The police department’s lawyer and police unions have called the report inaccurate and biased. But in response to the findings, City Manager Eric Batista has opened a hotline for people to report police misconduct.
Worcester, like much of the region, has also struggled with rising housing prices and with how to fairly distribute pandemic relief money.
“I think that’s where some folks are most frustrated, that some of the problems aren’t necessarily being addressed the way they want them to be,” Turken said.
For disability communities, a big legal win and moments of joy
Plus: Bringing GBH’s reporting beyond broadcast airwaves.
This year brought a big legal win for disability communities in Massachusetts. In April, the state settled a lawsuit that argued thousands of people with disabilities were essentially warehoused in nursing homes because the state was not offering them the support they needed to live independently.
“This new settlement will create new programs, help people move out,” said Meghan Smith, senior digital producer on GBH’s Equity and Justice team, who covers local disability communities. “A lot of the advocates I talked to said that this is really transformational. They said it could be a pretty dramatic change to how the state supports people with disabilities, and they hope it can change the culture around nursing facilities.”
After the Democratic National Convention, Smith spoke with Boston-area families who said they saw themselves and their children in Gus Walz, the neurodivergent son of Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz.
Smith has also brought her reporting beyond the FM broadcast airwaves: To make her reporting easier to find for more people, she’s produced short videos about a disability fashion show, what it’s like to vote when you’re legally blind, and a blessing of mobility devices like wheelchairs, walkers and canes.
Full speed ahead at the MBTA
But 2025 will bring funding challenges
Mark Herz: This is GBH’s Morning Edition. We’re continuing our coverage looking back at the biggest news stories this year. We turn now to transportation, where this year the MBTA tackled slow zones, faced some budget shortfalls and redesigned its bus routes. Jeremy Siegel covers the issue here in the Commonwealth and around the globe for GBH and The World, and joins me now to go over the year in transportation. Jeremy, thanks for joining us.
Jeremy Siegel: Good morning, Mark. It’s great to be here.
Herz: Fantastic. So as of this week the T’s entire train system — speaking of fantastic — from subways to trolleys, are now free of slow zones. That’s a far cry from where we were this time last year. And it’s kind of a long time first for us, right?
Siegel: Yes, it is. I think 2024, this year, will go down in history as the year that the T actually proved it could work. You might remember that one day just over a year ago when the MBTA, under the new leadership of general manager Phil Eng, announced that it was putting in place a series of shutdowns on every one of its trains: the Blue Line, the Green Line, Orange, Red, in order to do some sorely needed maintenance work. And I think a lot of us, from riders to reporters in journalism, we were skeptical.
Herz: But they did it, huh?
Siegel: They did. Piece by piece. The MBTA was shut down and it wasn’t what I’d call a totally smooth process. We did over and over what I like to call the shuttle bus shuffle with buses replacing service when trains were closed. That caused a lot of traffic, a lot of confusion. Buses were not always accessible for people with disabilities, too. But after all of the pain of those shutdowns, the maintenance is now complete. And for the first time in more than a decade, trains are, for the most part, operating at full speed. And then on top of all that, Mark, as you mentioned, the T also launched the first phase of its bus network redesign. This is a huge project to overhaul bus lines around Boston to be more frequent and to better serve riders. Here is Undersecretary of Transportation Hayes Morrison at a recent ride along in Chelsea of the new Route 104 bus.
Hayes Morrison: I know that there has been an awful lot of press time given to the release of all of the slow zones on the MBTA system, and that is amazing. But there are at least 40% of the riders on the MBTA system who are using buses at any time. And the improvements on services like these are as if not more important to those residents.
Siegel: So, Mark, it is not just getting rid of the slow zones, but it’s totally redoing the buses around Boston.
Herz: Well, let’s take the overview now. How would you rate this entire year for the T?
Siegel: In some respects, it was a great year for the T, but there is a big but here: that is funding for the agency. The T is operating under a huge, and I mean huge deficit, $800 million for next year. Experts are calling this a fiscal cliff. I recently spoke with Reggie Ramos with the nonprofit Transportation for Massachusetts, and I asked her how the team can continue operating given that funding problem. Her answer here was blunt.
Reggie Ramos: Frankly, to your question, I don’t know. I don’t know how we’re going to solve the $800 million.
Siegel: And then on top of that, Mark, Ramos says she has some big concerns, first, that service cuts could actually be coming. And second, she says even though everybody is really excited about these slow zones being gone, trains operating at full speed doesn’t mean we actually have a good system that makes the state competitive. We now just have a system that isn’t bad. So overall, I would say this was a huge year for transportation in Massachusetts, especially for the T, but the real test comes in 2025 because the state legislature needs to do something to fund transit, according to advocates I’ve spoken to. They are hopeful that there’s an appetite and there are ideas out there like more corporate taxes or congestion pricing. But it remains to be seen what could actually make it past state lawmakers.
Herz: Well, speaking of looking into the future and wondering what’s going on, I’ll ask you to take out your crystal ball, such as it is. What do you foresee next year in transportation?
Siegel: You know, I’m going to be looking at whether the T continues to operate smoothly, whether there is money for it and for the other regional transit authorities in Massachusetts. And then also what Boston can learn from other places around the world. I recently went on a reporting trip to Japan, which has some of the best public transportation in the world. So stay tuned for some reporting on that and some of the big ideas that Massachusetts could be looking into for how to better serve its residents and cut down on emissions.
Herz: GBH transportation correspondent Jeremy Siegel, thanks for joining us.
Siegel: Thank you, Mark.
Herz: This is GBH News.
This year will “go down in history as the year that the T actually proved it could work,” said Jeremy Siegel, who covers transportation for GBH News and The World.
After shutdowns and shuttle buses allowed the MBTA to do much-needed track repairs, riders saw something they hadn’t experienced in some time: faster, more frequent train service.
But now, for the first time in over a decade, the whole system is more or less operating at full speed. The MBTA also launched the first phase of a bus redesign, trying to make bus service more frequent, speedy, and reliable.
Next year will likely bring challenges around funding, Siegel said.
“The T is operating under a huge — and I mean huge — deficit: $800 million for next year,” he said. “The state Legislature needs to do something to fund transit, according to advocates I’ve spoken to. They are hopeful that there’s an appetite and there are ideas out there like more corporate taxes or congestion pricing. But it remains to be seen what could actually make it past state lawmakers.”
Read more:
The MBTA bus network is changing. Here’s what you need to know.
Low-income MBTA riders can now apply for reduced fares
A Walk Down the Block: Reporting from your neighborhoods
What can you learn from your neighbors?
GBH’s Paris Alston, host of the upcoming Basic Black, brought her Walk Down the Block series to more neighborhoods this year. Exploring a neighborhood on foot and talking to its long-time residents can unveil all kinds of stories and make us better neighbors, she said.
“I especially remember taking a walk down the block in Mattapan Square, right along Blue Hill Avenue to look at transit changes. That evolved into a strong connection to the liquor license bill that was passed this year by the legislature,” Alston said.
In 2025, Alston plans to expand the series to more Boston neighborhoods — and beyond city limits.
“We still want to definitely check out our communities right here in our backyard, but [also] communities across the state and across the region and maybe even revisit some places that we’ve been already,” Alston said. “And this is the really important part: We want to hear from people who want us to visit their blocks.”
If you’d like Alston to bring her Walk Down the Block series to your neighborhood, email thewakeup@wgbh.org.
Read more:
Boston’s Spooky Streets Halloween parties
Tracing the history of busing through Boston’s streets
Is a bus lane redesign the development that Mattapan Square needs?
Investigations: Debt mills, poisoned ports, and white supremacists
Plus, what GBH’s investigative reporters will dig into next year
GBH News’ Center for Investigative Reporting has dug into a series of stories this year that affect people across the commonwealth. Among them are ongoing investigations into the state’s massive consumer debt industry.
“We decided to look at small claims courts in Massachusetts, which were initially created to help people resolve legal issues without a lot of legal complications,” said Jenifer McKim, interim investigations editor at the GBH News Center for Investigative Reporting. “But what we found was that they are swamped by big companies suing people for, oftentimes, old credit card debt.”
About 85% of cases in small claims court — 70,000 cases last year — were big companies suing people for debts as little as $2,000, McKim said, “many times for people who didn’t even know they owned the debt at all.”
GBH’s investigative unit also looked into how pollution around ports affects the health of people living nearby, from Boston Harbor to Providence to out-of-region trips to New Jersey and California.
And there’s much more to do in 2025, McKim said, from investigations into issues related to white supremacy to stories about how local politicians, advocates and communities are trying to protect their most vulnerable members.
Read more:
Full series: Debt Mills
Full series: Poisoned Ports
A website that provides a platform for neo-Nazis got its seed funding from Boston elites
TikTok on the edge, video dominance mark the year in social media
A TikTok ban? Not Demure, not mindful.
In April, President Joe Biden signed a bill that would ban TikTok from Apple’s and Google’s app stores unless its parent company, China-based Bytedance, sells its U.S. operations to an American company.
That law is scheduled to go into effect on Jan. 19, said Zack Waldman, GBH’s senior social media strategist.
TikTok has 170 million users in the U.S., and 40% of all young adults here regularly get their news from the app.
“I think it speaks to the emerging trend of greater government oversight around how these platforms function and operate,” Waldman said. “It is a very dangerous precedent for Congress to shut down entire social media platforms because of simply the threat of national security without any real evidence to prove that threat.”
And short-form video is here to stay, he said: Video content accounts for 60% of time spent on all social media apps.
“The quicker that all media makers are able to meet audiences where they are on social, thinking about and resourcing for creative ways to make the video content format, … the better positioned they’ll be to survive and even thrive in 2025 and beyond,” he said.
Read more:
Social Media Portal: Nothin’ But Bluesky
Possible TikTok ban could be 'an extinction-level event’ for the creator economy
The year in arts: AI, a changing of the guard in Boston, and a country renaissance
What does the future hold for arts?
Arts and entertainment industry leaders started exploring what growing capabilities in generative artificial intelligence might mean, said Jared Bowen, GBH’s executive arts editor and host of The Culture Show.
“A lot of this we saw come in with the actors and writers strikes because artificial intelligence is going to have a huge impact on jobs in the entertainment industry,” Bowen said. “How do we live with A.I.? Because it’s not going away and there has to be a collaboration, ultimately.”
Locally, Boston’s arts institutions saw major changes in leadership. Having weathered the COVID-19 pandemic, racial reconciliation and more, leaders of places like the Harvard Art Museums, the Museum of Fine Arts, the Speakeasy Stage Company and the Boch Center announced that they’ll step down.
Bowen said he hopes the leaders who take their place will emphasize making art more accessible to more people, especially those who don’t have as much money to spend on expensive tickets.
He also noted a surge in Black and queer people at the top of country music charts, with singers like Beyoncé, Shaboozey and Orville Peck.
“Maybe the faces, the identities, the personalities of people who are sharing that with us is changing. But people ultimately love the vocal quality,” Bowen said. “They love the folksiness. They love the roots of this all. And I think it’s going to be really exciting to watch where this all goes.”
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