Senator Brownsberger submitted the following letter to the Chair of the Senate Committee on Ways and Means outlining his budget priorities for Fiscal Year 2019:
March 26, 2019
Michael J. Rodrigues
Chair, Senate Committee on Ways and Means
State House – Room 212
Boston, MA 02133
Dear Chairman Rodrigues,
I greatly appreciate the opportunity to meet with you to discuss my thoughts on the FY20 budget. I would like to discuss three policy priorities and a handful of district priorities.
- In the wake of criminal justice reform, we need to turn to the issue of funding rehabilitative programming – for people in prison, for people on probation, and for people returning from prison. There are several worthy initiatives that could be combined into a Senate package to follow through on progress that we have made.
- After 12 years in the legislature it is clear to me that we are not going to provide enough funding to the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) to do all that we ask of them. It is time to study the current responsibilities and structure of the DCR to determine whether assets or operations of the department should be transferred to other entities. A special commission should be formed to study the DCR to analyze at a component level the relationship of cost to value, and make recommendations as to how to improve transparency and accountability, and maximize return on the commonwealth’s investment in DCR. I have filed a bill, S.434, which would create and fund such a commission but I believe it is more appropriate as a budget item.
- Rates for CPCS private bar counsel should be increased in this budget. The new rates should be set in accordance with the recommendations of a recent CPCS subcommittee. This increase would help to address the private bar counsel shortage in the Commonwealth that has resulted in inadequate access to attorneys for indigent clients and a constitutional crisis.
My top district priorities are education aid and the Department of Conservation and Recreation. Also, to the extent transportation funding (MBTA) becomes an issue, that is a top priority for me.
Key education line items for me include:
- Fund Charter School Reimbursements fully; and
- Implement the recommendations of the Foundation Budget Review Commission
- Fund the Special Education Circuit Breaker account fully, with an allowance for inflation;
The line-items below are additional items which are of importance to me and my constituents:
0321-2000 Mental Health Legal Advisors Committee
0321-2100 Prisoners’ Legal Services
0640-0300 Massachusetts Cultural Council
1410-0250 Assistance to Homeless Veterans
1595-0115 Civics Project Trust Fund
1599-6901 Human Service Salary Reserve and Related Programs
1599-6903 Chapter 257 Reserve
2200-0100 Department of Environmental Protection Administration
2210-0105 Toxics Use Retained Revenue and Related Programs
2300-0100 Department of Fish and Game Administration
2511-0100 Department of Agricultural Resources Administration
2810-0100 State Parks and Recreation
2810-2042 Department of Conservation and Recreation Retained Revenue
3000-2050 Children’s Trust Fund and Related Programs
3000-4040 Birth through Pre-School and Related Programs
3000-4050 TANF-Related Child Care and Related Programs
3000-4060 Supportive and TANF Childcare
3000-5000 Grants to Head Start Programs and Related Programs
3000-7000 Healthy Families Home Visiting Program and Related Programs
3000-7050 Services for Infants and Parents
3000-7070 Reach Out and Read Program
4000-0005 Safe and Successful Youth Initiative and Related Programs
4000-0007 EOHHS Youth Homeless Program
4000-0051 Family Access Centers
4000-0300 Exec. Office Health and Human Services
4000-0500 MassHealth Managed Care
4000-0600 MassHealth Senior Care
4000-0700 MassHealth Fee for Service Payments
4003-0122 Low-Income Citizenship Program
4110-1000 Community Services for the Blind
4110-3010 Vocational Rehabilitation for the Blind
4120-0200 Independent Living Centers
4120-2000 Vocational Rehabilitation for the Disabled
4120-3000 Employment Assistance
4120-4000 Independent Living Assistance for the Multi Disabled and Related Programs
4120-4001 Accessible Housing Registry for Disabled Persons
4120-6000 Head Injury Treatment Services and Related Programs
4125-0100 Massachusetts Commission for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing
4400-1001 Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) Administration – HIP program
4401-1000 Employment Services Program and Related Program
4403-2119 Teen Structured Settings Program
4408-10000 EAEDC Elderly, Disabled, Children
4510-0100 Public Health Critical Operations and Essential Services
4510-0600 Environmental Health Assessment and Compliance
4510-0710 Health Care Quality and Improvement
4510-0810 Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner & Pediatric SANE and Related Programs
4512-0103 HIV/AIDS Prevention Treatment and Services and Related Programs
4512-0201 Substance Abuse Step-Down Recovery Services
4513-1020 Early Intervention and Related Programs
4513-1130 Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault Prevention
4516-1000 State Laboratory and Communicable Disease Control Services
4530-9000 Teenage Pregnancy Prevention Program
4590-0250 Smoking Prevention and Cessation Program Expansion and Related Programs
4590-0925 Prostate Cancer Research Program
4590-1506 Youth Violence Prevention Grants and Related Programs
4590-1507 Youth at Risk Matching Grants
4800-0016 Transitional Employment Program (Roca)
4800-0038 Services for Children and Families (Foster Care/Adoption) and Related Programs
4800-0040 Family Support and Stabilization and Related Programs
4800-1400 Support Services for People at Risk of Domestic Violence and Related Programs
5011-0100 Department of Mental Health Administration and Operations
5042-5000 Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services and Related Programs
5046-0000 Adult Mental Health and Support Services
5047-0001 Emergency Services and Mental Health Care and Related Programs
5095-0015 Inpatient Facilities and Community-Based Mental Health
5911-1003 Dept. of Developmental Disabilities Administration and Related Programs
5911-2000 Transportation Services
5920-2000 Community Residential Supports and Related Programs
5920-2010 State-Operated Residential Supports and Related Programs
5920-2025 Community Day and Work Programs
5920-3000 Respite Family Supports for the Developmentally Disabled
5920-3010 Autism Division
5920-5000 Turning 22 – Dept. of Developmental Services
5930-1000 State Facilities for the Developmentally Disabled
7000-9101 Board of Library Commissioners
7000-9401 State Aid to Regional Libraries
7000-9406 Talking Book & Machine Learning
7000-9406 Talking Book Program Watertown
7000-9501 State Aid to Public Libraries
7000-9506 Library Technology & Resource Sharing
7000-9508 Mass. Center for the Book
7002-0012 YouthWorks and Related Programs
7003-1206 Massachusetts Service Alliance and Related Programs
7004-0100 Caseworkers for Homeless Families and Individuals
7004-0101 Emergency Assistance – Family Shelters & Services and Related Programs
7004-0102 Homeless Individuals Assistance and Related Programs
7004-0104 Home and Healthy for Good Program and Related Programs
7004-0108 HomeBASE
7004-1000 Supplemental Funding for Low Income Residents’ Utilities
7004-2033 Fuel assistance
7004-3036 Housing Services and Counseling
7004-3045 Tenancy Preservation Program
7004-4314 Service Coordinators Program
7004-9005 Subsidies to Public Housing Authorities
7004-9024 Mass. Rental Voucher Program – MRVP
7004-9030 Alternative Housing Voucher Program
7004-9316 Residential Assistance for Families in Transition
7004-9322 Secure Jobs Pilot
7006-0011 Loan Originator Administration and Consumer Counseling Program
7009-9600 Inclusive Concurrent Enrollment and Related Programs
7010-0012 METCO
7027-0019 School-to-Career Connecting Activities and Related Programs
7030-1002 Kindergarten Development Grants
7030-1005 Reading Recovery and Related Programs
7035-0002 Adult Basic Education
7061-0009 Chapter 70 Aid
7061-0012 Special Education Circuit Breaker and related programs
7061-9010 Charter School Reimbursement and related programs
7061-9412 Extended Learning Time Grants
7061-9611 After-School and Out-of-School Grants
7061-9626 Youth-Build Grants
7061-9634 Mentoring Matching Grants
7066-0009 New England Board of Higher Education
7066-0015 Workforce Development Grants to Community Colleges and Related Programs
7066-0021 Foster Care and Adopted Fee Waiver
7066-1300 Completion Incentive Grants
7070-0065 Massachusetts State Scholarship Program
7100-0700 Office of Dispute Resolution
8100-0111 Shannon Grants
8200-0222 Municipal Recruit Training Program Fee Revenue
9110-1604 Supportive Senior Housing Program
9110-1630 Elder Home Care Purchased Services
9110-1633 Elder Home Care Case Management and Administration
9110-1636 Elder Protective Services
9110-1700 Elder Homeless Placement
9110-1900 Elder Nutrition Program
9110-9002 Grants to Councils on Aging
Thank you very much for your consideration of these items.
Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions. I can be reached by phone at 617-771-8274 or by email: william.brownsberger@masenate.gov
Respectfully,
William N. Brownsberger
STATE SENATOR
Andrew Bettinelli
Chief of Staff
Office of Senator William N. Brownsberger
Senator Brownsberger,
I noticed that your #2 priority listed under Education is to implement the recommendations of the Foundation Budget Review Commission. When I looked at bill S. 238, also known as The Promise Act, your name was not listed as a petitioner. Could you please explain why your name is not listed in support of a bill that seeks to implement the recommendations of the Foundation Budget Review Commission?
As a local teacher and Belmont resident, this is very concerning to me.
Hi Kristen,
Thanks for reaching out.
As a member of the Senate Leadership Team, I’m very hopeful that we will put together a strong education package this year. I sense a strong commitment to do so among my colleagues. It is certainly a top priority of mine to get done. In my role, I’m not signing on to particular flavors of this — my job is to push for it overall.
Give me a call on my cell, 617-771-8274, if you’d like to talk about the process.