Between the state's recent vaccine website crash and the delay on call centers, getting an appointment for a vaccine has been a difficult process for many people in Massachusetts. Governor Charlie Baker is set to appear before the Joint Committee on COVID-19 and Emergency Preparedness on Thursday to defend the state's vaccine rollout and share with lawmakers how plans have shifted. GBH Morning Edition host Joe Mathieu spoke with GBH News State House reporter Mike Deehan about what we can expect from the hearing. The transcript below has been edited for clarity.
Joe Mathieu: What's this going to be for the governor? What's Baker expected to tell [lawmakers at the hearing]?
Mike Deehan: Well, I expect him to be a bit of the way he has been in all of these press conferences that he has every day or every week. He's defending his plans, really, to shift from that more targeted vaccination plan at the local level that was through hospitals [and] boards of health, shifting a lot of that very limited vaccine supply into those big mass vaccination sites like Gillette Stadium. There's a lot of smaller decisions that have been involved in this whole rollout — we'll get into the website stuff and the appointment booking and all that — but I think what lawmakers definitely want to know is what has been your plan [and] how has it shifted? Baker has admitted to it's been shifting a little bit. He'll have the opportunity to defend that.
Mathieu: I suspect the line of questioning has evolved since this was first scheduled, Mike, certainly over the last week with the website launching.
Deehan: Yeah, exactly. The website was probably what expediated this. The committee existed when the Senate and the House put together their new committee list and chairman. But this was scheduled right around the time that the vaccine website failed when the 65 and older age group was activated. So lawmakers are definitely taking the initiative. They realize that this can't go at the same pace that normal lawmaking does. You can't have the hearing eventually and then file the bills eventually and then pass something because we're only going to be at this for the next couple of months, if all things go well.
Mathieu: So obviously, that's one of many things that will come up, Mike. I don't know if we should call it a grilling because that's what I'm hearing and a lot of local stories. Is this going to be contentious or is this going to be a conversation?
Deehan: I think when Baker is there personally talking with the chairman — William Driscoll in the House and Joanne Comerford from the Senate — it's not going to be a lovefest, but I don't think they're going to rake him over the coals. I've talked to these two and they really want to know how we got here — what were those plans [and] what has shifted? And is it going to shift again? That's one thing that they're looking at, forward looking. Can we expect consistency from here on out? And they want to know who's been involved in the process. Are there outside vendors and third parties like we see on the web side? Are they involved in the decision making beyond that? Even lawmakers aren't really told that much about Baker's team.
Mathieu: You spoke with Rep. Driscoll, right? You just mentioned the House co-chair. This is more about what's going to go into the hearing, yes?
Deehan: Yeah, this is something that Driscoll wants to know, how they got there and what the crisis is. I talked to Driscoll and he actually reflected on that day that the website went down and really didn't impress a lot of people. Here's what Driscoll said:
"That's a particular day where you have a crisis on top of a crisis compounding. And when you have that much uncertainty, it really leads to a crisis of confidence with the public."Rep. William Driscoll
Deehan: So you can see there it's critical. It definitely is looking at and reflecting on that failure, so Democrats are going to come at him pretty hard with the governor there in person. But they're still state House Democrats, so they'll probably be at least very civil with the governor.
Mathieu: I'm sure their phones have been ringing from confused if not angry constituents. Are they going to just be investigating what's happened so far, Mike, or are we looking forward to what may be next?
Deehan: Yeah, they definitely want to look at preventing future problems — knowing what's consistent and what Baker still kind of considered flexible as this moves out. And this is really where the committee has its most influence. Lawmakers have already been successfully pushing Baker in different directions when it comes to that call in for appointments. There's talk of a central registry getting the website upgraded, if not fixed to begin with. And that's something that Senate co-chair Comerford told me last week. She says, and I'll just kind of paraphrase what she said here, we have opportunities to pass legislation and that the Senate president and the speaker of the House have given us tools, numerous tools, and it's our job to use them. So she expects to really use this new committee for some substantial movement here.
Watch: Have the Senate president and speaker of the House been this aggressive before?
