Mass Roundup: Budget off $3 Billion
December 18, 2009 by Jim Coen
Filed under Uncategorized
Some tax collection figures and lottery revenues will come in higher than projected in the current fiscal year that ends in June. But the state’s heavy reliance on one-time money such as federal stimulus funding could slow any chances of a balanced budget for years to come, according to state officials and outside experts who spoke at a legislative hearing on Wednesday.
The 2011 deficit is still projected at $3 billion and unemployment levels are expected to peak next year, but aren’t expected to reflect pre-recession levels any time soon.
In the short-term, the glimmer of hope from any revenue rebound won’t prevent further budget cuts, said Jay Gonzales, the state’s secretary of administration and finance.
The good news came in separate testimony from Department of Revenue Commissioner Navjeet Bal and Treasurer Tim Cahill.
Crediting this past summer’s 25 percent increase in the sales tax, Bal said sales tax receipts have gone up 9.2 percent over the first five months of the fiscal year. In 2011, overall tax revenues should be 3.9 percent higher than this year.
Cahill – a Quincy resident who’s also running for governor as an independent – told the panel that as of Nov. 30, the state’s pension fund has seen a positive return for the first time since before the recession. It’s climbing back up from its worst year yet in 2008, Cahill said.
“We’re not going to go broke from pension liability problems,” he said.
Lottery sales – which fund the state’s local aid payments to cities and towns – will come in about $35 million higher than initially projected, Cahill said.
“It’s still not more than past years, but it’s better,” he said.
Still, experts warned, revenue won’t solve the state’s problems on its own.
Read More at: Patriot Ledger
Hundreds Turn Out to Build Home for Disabled Vet
December 13, 2009 by Jim Coen
Filed under Uncategorized
Mike Downing posed with his wife, Dawnalee, volunteers from Cape Cod Lumber, and Homes for Our Troops founder John Gonsalves (kneeling) today in Middleborough. Valerie Larsen Photography Boston Globe
Jeannie Nuss reports in the Boston Globe that hundreds of contractors, students, and other volunteers are turning out in Middleborough this weekend to build an accessible home for a veteran who lost both legs in a roadside bomb explosion in Afghanistan.
Homes for Our Troops, a Taunton-based non-profit group, organized a three-day building brigade to raise a house for Staff Sergeant Mike Downing.
The house will have wider hallways and accessible doors to allow 43-year-old Downing to get around in his wheelchair. The kitchen will feature lower cabinets and the bathrooms will have roll-in showers.
“Even when it comes down to things as simple as doing the laundry, everything is set up so that I have access to it,” Downing said in a telephone interview.
Downing, a father of four, lost both legs after an improvised explosive device (IED) detonated in Afghanistan in September 2008.
The Downings are slated to move into their new home in March. The new home is about 2 ½ miles away from their current multi-story house where Downing faces challenges in everyday tasks.
“I go up the stairs on my rear end. I have to go up one stair at a time,” he said. “And then when I’m up there, someone has to carry my wheelchair for me.”
Volunteers came out in such numbers this weekend that they had to set up a shuttle from a parking lot at a nearby high school.
“There isn’t enough room for everybody to park here — there’s been so much help,” Downing said.
Homes for Our Troops has built 48 accessible homes like Downing’s since John Gonsalves founded the organization in 2004. Another 33 homes, which each take about six months and $275,000 to build, are in the works.
Donations from organizations like the Dunkin’ Donuts & Baskin-Robbins Community Foundation cover the cost of the houses, which go to the veterans for free, according to Vicki Thomas, a spokeswoman for Homes for Our Troops.
“It just enables him to be a part of his family, to participate in things, to go out to his backyard,” Thomas said.
Oakbrook: Meet and Greet
May 4, 2009 by Jim Coen
Filed under Uncategorized
