Gov. Maura Healey’s first several weeks in office have been a time of foundation-building: putting together her team, reintroducing herself to top lawmakers, and publicly setting the goals that will define her tenure as she leads Massachusetts.
She has sketched out a first-term agenda that keys on pressing issues facing the state, like the hefty price tags for housing and child care and the threats of climate change. As a candidate and now in office, “affordability” has been a common refrain for Healey. With her blueprints drawn up, the questions now become how she’ll deliver, and how her priorities match up with those of her constituents.
Healey wants to tackle housing costs that make it too expensive for renters and homeowners alike to live in Massachusetts. She plans to name a housing secretary, turn unused state land into new housing, expand deductions for renters and help first-time homebuyers.
She also aims to make sure education is accessible, and see that young people have the mental health care, food security and other resources they need to thrive. Her education agenda aligns with her goal of easing pervasive, economy-wide workforce shortages. To help workers learn the skills employers are looking for, she wants to make community college free for adults over 25 without degrees.
Healey also promised the plan to fund the free community college program in the state budget she'll file next month, which will also include money for 1,000 extra workers focused on MBTA operations. The safety of the T — and its basic ability to function like it's supposed to — is another area the governor's zeroed in on, along with securing federal funding to help fix dilapidated roads and bridges across the state.
As governor, Healey established climate as a focal point early on, adding a climate chief to her Cabinet on her first full day office. She wants to bet big on climate technology, research, innovating and manufacturing, and create jobs in the process.
However, the overall cost of living is the key issue for Healey and other elected leaders, according to MassINC Polling Group President Steve Koczela. He said more people think Massachusetts is headed in the right direction than not, but he sees some consistent concerns show up in his organization’s surveys.
“Cost of living is right up there,” Koczela said. “It’s expressed in different ways. It's the cost of health care, it's inflation, it's the cost of living in general. All of those kind of tie back to the same thing."
This aligns with voter sentiment in a UMass Amherst poll in Massachusetts at the tail end of the 2022 campaign, in which people said they wanted the next governor to address inflation as well as the supply and affordability of housing.
Tatishe Nteta, a UMass Amherst political science professor and director of the UMass poll, said this is a time when new governors typically seek to harness their public support to make progress on their major goals.
“This is where leaders step up and articulate their vision for the future of the state, and the question is, is she going to do that or is it just going to be reactive to the problems that we have been dealing with, whether that’s the MBTA or issues of housing, the overarching issues or transportation and economic issues,” Nteta said. “Is she going to be proactive and visionary? Or is she just going to be reactive and managerial?”
The actions Healey and her team take next will reverberate statewide, but they’ll feel different depending on where you are. Transportation needs differ in North Adams and Boston; the housing markets aren’t the same in Provincetown and Springfield. Follow our stories for the next several weeks and learn more as we work with reporters across the state to take a closer look at what the people of Massachusetts have to say about Gov. Maura Healey’s first agenda.
GBH News is teaming up with New England Public Media in Western, MA and CAI on the Cape, coast and islands, to take a closer look at Governor Healey's political agenda. We'd like to hear what you think. Do her priorities line up with the issues that are top of mind for you? What should she be focusing on, in your view? Go to our form and have your say.
