protect and progress our shared values here in Massachuses. Yours in Service,
Jerey Sánchez
State Representave
Thank you for reading my April 2018 Newsleer. I have been busy the past few months working on my rst budget as Chair of the House Ways and Means Commiee. I have met with over 130 representaves, ocials from every level of government, advocates from across the state, and hundreds of constuents in the process of craing budget recommendaons. Meanwhile, we’ve made historic progress on criminal jusce reform and women’s rights legislaon, while holding dozens of events throughout the district. It is an honor to represent the 15
th
Suolk/Norfolk District in the State House. I look forward to working with constuents and members of the House over the next few months to pass the budget and legislaon that
Pregnant Workers Fairness Act
As I’ve highlighted in previous newsleers, this has been an ex-cing session.
On April 1, the Preg-nant Workers Fairness Act ocial-ly became law
. With this law now in place, discriminaon against pregnant women in the hiring pro-cess and workplace is explicitly illegal, and workplaces must pro-vide a private space for breaseed-ing. I proudly supported this bill in the House last June.
Housing
We’ve addressed aordable hous-ing through a $1.7B housing bond bill passed earlier this year. Build-ing on these eorts, we passed comprehensive legislaon regu-lang and taxing short
-
term rent-als. The House’s bill recognizes local control, so Boston can create a regulatory structure that address-es the impact short
-
term rentals have on our housing market. I advocated for a provision that was ulmately included that would ensure a por-on of local taxes collect-ed from rentals go toward the preservaon and de-velopment of aordable housing in the city.
(Contnued on page 3)
Friends and Neighbors:
INSIDE THIS ISSUE:
Short-Term Rentals
1
Criminal Jus-tice Reform
1
Public Health Week
2
PATCH Act Becomes Law
2
Bromley-Heath Jamboree
3
Family Plan-ning Funding
3
Immigrants’
Day
4
Ride the Link Bus
4
Legislative Updates
Jeffrey Sánchez
APRIL | 2018
State Representative
Budget Update
I am in the midst of my first budget process as Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee. Between now and my next newsletter we will have released and debated the budget. To receive updates in the meantime, visit my website: www.jeffreysanchez.org.
There are a couple truly historic votes I’ve taken in my me at the State House: passing universal healthcare reform in 2006, pro-tecng legalized gay marriage in 2008, and approving the strictest gun control laws in the country in 2014 stand out among them. On April 4, y years aer the as-sassinaon of Dr. Marn Luther
(Contnued on page 4)
Criminal Justice Reform
PAGE 2
Constituent Meetings
The 15th Suffolk/Norfolk district’s vast number of active neighborhood
groups and associations is one of its strongest assets. In February and March, I met with groups, including the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council and Long-fellow Area Neighborhood Association in Roslindale. The meetings provided a terrific opportunity to hear from our leaders in the community, inform my legislative work, and share budget updates from the House Ways and Means office.
Big Sister Fashion Show
I made my runway debut in March at the Big Sister of Greater Boston Gala. They do so much work throughout the city empowering young women, and I am proud to support their mission.
Roslindale Easter Egg Hunt
Have you ever seen 10,000 Easter eggs? I have, but not for long before the kids of Roslindale found them all! Thanks to phenomenal work by the Roslindale Village Main Streets and contributing partners, kids and fami-lies were able to enjoy face painting, arts & crafts, and a record-setting game of Egg Toss.
Public Health Week
Every year, the American Public Health Association recognizes the first week of April as National Public Health Week. In celebration, we held events that highlighted emerging pub-lic health issues
–
an overdose pre-vention training and a panel on the impact of gas leaks. Special thanks to all of our partners: Brenda Cantero of AIDS Action Committee, the JP Fo-rum, Mothers Out Front JP, and all who attended!
Celebrating Margaret Noce
Congratulations to Margaret Noce on
her retirement. Margaret’s 40 years of
service to JP, as an advocate of health and social services embody the true essence of JP. Fitting for a woman of her impact, a boisterous celebration was held at the First Baptist Church.
District Events
PATCH Act Signed into Law!
On April 2, the Protecting Access To Confidential Healthcare Act was signed into law! It will ensure
patients’ privacy when they receive sensitive ser-
vices, like
STI tesng, HIV treatment, domesc vio-lence counseling, mental health support, or sub-stance use treatment.
PAGE 3
Bromley-Heath Sports Jamboree
On March 24th, I hosted a sports jam-boree at Bromley
-
Heath with Mayor Marty Walsh, the Bromley Tenant Or-ganizaon, and many other communi-ty partners.
Aended by approximately 200 youth and family members who reside at Mildred C. Hailey Apartments, the fesvies included games, music, sneaker giveaways, and basketball drills led by the City of Boston’s BCYF and Bryan Doo, former Boston Celcs Athlec Trainer. In addion to being a day of engagement, the event served as an opportunity to reect on recent gun violence tragedies at Bromley, and the community’s dedicaon to ensure that safety remains the top priority. On a day that young people across the naon marched to galvanize a broader public safety movement through March for Our Lives, the jamboree symbolized a similar local movement among Bromley residents to show soli-darity in the face of gun violence. The catalyst of this event was the mur-der of Gerrod Brown in October. Aer that, we coalesced with the Mayor and the Tenant Organizaon to establish priories for what we wanted to ac-complish to help a community aected by violence. We held a series of events during the holidays and the winter months. The sports jamboree was the culminaon in this series to keep youth engaged and to kick o the beginning of spring. We look forward to connu-ing to hold events in the summer months to provide youth opportunies to get involved and to bring the com-munity together.
Thank you to everyone who made the event possible.
Funding for Family Planning, Veterans, and Special Educaon in Supplemental Budget
From me to me, the Legisla-ture needs to pass a supple-mental budget to address unex-pected costs during the scal year. In a recent supplemental budget, the House provided $1.6M for
Family Planning
, intended to ll the gap in the event the Trump Administraon cuts federal fund-ing for reproducve health ser-
(Contnued from page 1)
Legislative Updates (cont’d)
vices for low
-
income/uninsured individuals. We also provided $5.3M for
Vet-erans’ Benets
in the form of payments to Gold Star families.
Among other programs funded were
Emergency Assistance Fam-ily Shelters
, the
Healthy Incen-ve Program
, which connects people with SNAP benets to local farmers throughout the state to increase access to fresh, locally
-
grown produce, and the
Special Educaon Circuit Break-er
, to enable school districts to connue special educaon clas-ses and programming.