Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker has been getting a lot of pushback for the way he has rolled out the COVID vaccine. GBH Morning Edition host Joe Mathieu spoke with GBH News State House reporter Mike Deehan about how lawmakers are trying to influence the governor's plans and whether it's likely to have an impact. The transcript below has been edited for clarity.
Joe Mathieu: We've been talking about vaccines all morning: mass vaccines, the governor's comments on the pools of eligibility. There've been complaints along the way here. Lawmakers have more specific requests, though, Mike Deehan. I wonder how they're seeking to alter the way vaccines are being handed out?
Mike Deehan: Yeah, actually, several lawmakers have actually filed legislation to try to force Baker to make changes they want to see done. And so they have their own ideas about what needs to happen and they're, of course, hearing from a lot of their constituents, people who are over 75 [or] over 65, equitability challenges [and] things like that that we're hearing a lot about. For instance, for lawmakers, Senators Chang-Díaz and Rausch, and Representatives Domb and Miranda — which is kind of across the whole state geographically — they want to do more as far as equity in expanding the vaccination so that it gets to different communities they say that already are underserved. They use some DPH statistics to say that just 2.6 percent of those who have received the vaccine so far are Black, 3.3 [percent] are Latino as of the end of January. So they're asking for Baker to appoint a Director of COVID Vaccine Equity to really address the disparities. They want a mobile vehicle for vaccinations and things like that. And so there are other bills in the mix that would push the governor in one direction or another. All these features of these bills are about the existing vaccination plan and how to tweak it.
Mathieu: Mike, the big issue of the website is still being resolved. People were confused. They found it inaccessible [and] couldn't book appointments. I know that there is a hotline; the governor says it's working very well. But as far as the site goes, we're hearing that more changes could be coming. Are lawmakers trying to change that system?
Deehan: Yeah, this is another factor that lawmakers are trying to influence as this rolls out. And there is limited time. We have to remember, if everything goes to plan, Phase Three will start in March or April and vaccines will go through the summer, so there's a limited window here.
Watch: Does the state need a vaccine registration website?
Mathieu: I have to admit, it seems to make sense if we're trying to avoid the bottleneck here when all of a sudden everyone's eligible at once. But it all begs the question, Mike: does this strategy work with Governor Baker? Does he alter his plans because of these ideas or is that just political posturing?
Deehan: He's open to them. There is one good example. Senator Eric Lesser had a bill that tons of lawmakers signed on to very rapidly to institute a call center for the vaccine hotline. We know that that has gone into effect. Baker had been planning, it just wasn't done yet. Whether or not that bill and that legislative pressure got Baker to finally go and do that is kind of unclear. But I think the important thing here is that the legislature just doesn't work nearly fast enough to pass these bills on a usual basis. However, that might be changing because new Speaker Ron Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka actually established a COVID oversight committee that they think is going to be a long term thing. But Mariano sent a letter just yesterday to members saying that he wants to address vaccine rollout through legislation. So we might see the legislature picking up the pace a little bit to get this done in that slim window that they have.
