Fixing MBTA and housing in Massachusetts are Gov. Maura Healey's goals for 2025
BOSTON - In the second part of Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey's interview with WBZ-TV political analyst Jon Keller, she spelled out what her top priorities are for the state heading into the new year - housing and transportation.
"There are two things that are top priorities for me - building more housing in the state and improving our transportation infrastructure," said Healey. "When I talk to CEOs and employers, those are their priorities as well."
For Healey, addressing those two long-festering problems is key to sustaining the state's economic outlook, facing stress from potential federal spending cuts, international events and who knows what else. And she was eager to take a victory lap of sorts on both fronts.
"A lot more work to do" on the T
"On transportation infrastructure, when I started it was kind of a disaster in terms of the state of play at the T, I'll be honest with you. So I went out, and I recruited [MBTA General Manager] Phil Eng to come here," Healey said. "And I said to him, 'You hire who you need to hire,' and that includes workers at the T - we were down 1,500 workers when I started - and also bringing in some new management. He's done that, and I'll tell you, in just under two years, he has eliminated slow zones. He's given riders back two million minutes every weekday. Now people are riding the T and levels are above what they were pre-pandemic."
But Healey concedes "we have a lot more work to do," especially when it comes to finding the money to reverse the T's massive deficits, which could force service cuts and layoffs in that newly-reconstituted workforce as soon as next spring.
A crucial upcoming milestone: the release of her Transportation Funding Task Force's recommendations.
Confident on MBTA zoning ruling
On the housing front, another key moment looms: the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court's ruling on Milton's challenge to the MBTA Communities Act, the state law that requires cities and towns with access to the T to remove zoning impediments to new affordable housing construction or lose out on state grants.
Healey expressed confidence that the law will hold.
"I see more and more communities coming on board, because it's an economic imperative for our state if we want companies to stay here, to grow here, if we want economic growth and development, if we want to see our kids and our grandkids live in Massachusetts, or be able to live in Massachusetts, then we're going to need more housing," Healey said. "It's going to take a few years for us to catch up, but I'm at ribbon cuttings all the time on new housing development projects that we've made happen. That's good. And I think also you see communities doing this well, and that, you know, inspires other communities to do it."
Also discussed in the interview – Healey's vision for high school graduation requirements in the wake of the ballot question dropping passage of the MCAS as a standard, her support for the return to phonics-based literacy instruction, and what she hopes voters will hold her accountable for at the end of 2025.
Watch the interview on-demand here, and join WBZ-TV every Sunday at 8:30 a.m. for newsmaker interviews and analysis on the Sunday edition of "Keller At Large."
