Massachusetts Budget Vetoes Have Impact on Service Sectors | News

Reintegration services, job training programs and nursing homes could soon feel the effects of Gov. Maura Healey’s budget veto, which were left untouched after the chaotic conclusion of formal legislation.

The House overrode some of Healey’s fiscal year 2025 budget vetoes during formal sessions last week, but the Senate did not seek any overrides of her line-item reductions. Healey vetoed $317 million in 60 line items in a nearly $58 billion budget.

Lew Finfer, director of Massachusetts Action for Justice, said Monday he was concerned about multiple vetoes, including Healey’s cut of $2.5 million from the Community Empowerment and Reinvestment grant program, which he said supports dozens of reintegration programs for formerly incarcerated people. That leaves $7.5 million in a budget line item that received $15 million last fiscal year.

“People face a lot of barriers,” Finfer said, speaking of the need to connect people to housing, mental health and addiction services after they leave prison. “When their lives get derailed, that could mean they get a new charge and go back to prison, to the detriment of themselves and their families. That’s why reintegration programs are really important.”

Leslie Credle, executive director of the Boston-based nonprofit Justice 4 Housing, which provides services such as case management and family reunification for former Bay State inmates, said Healey’s veto is “not good.”

“A lot of organizations rely on that money for reintegration work, and that means we can’t serve as many participants as we would like,” Credle said.

Healey, in budget documents, said she had reduced the grant funding to “the amount anticipated to be necessary given the availability of alternative trust funding that could be maximized to support similar programs.” She also said that “the Executive Office of Economic Development will work to leverage the Workforce Investment Trust Fund to offset the funding that was vetoed.” However, Finfer and the Healey administration have said the stalled economic development bill must be passed to use that fund.

“Look, our economy is strong, our bond rating is excellent, we have money in our rainy day fund. But it’s also our responsibility to make sure that we’re fiscally responsible at a time when there’s still some uncertainty about the economic environment. And we’d rather be in a position where we can budget properly now than face the specter of having to make cuts later. It’s better to plan than to make cuts later,” Healey said of her overall veto strategy last week. “We think these vetoes were vetoes that were well-managed. $317 million, that’s more than last year. But again, we think we did it in a responsible way that also didn’t hurt service delivery.”

Healey also made $10 million cuts to two budget items related to the state’s “supplement” to the Supplemental Allowance program for the “aged and disabled” and an emergency cash assistance program for the elderly, disabled and children.

Ronald Pawelski, president of the Massachusetts Association of Residential Care Homes, said the money was intended to increase reimbursement rates for the state’s 75 nursing homes, which offer a level of care that falls between assisted living facilities and nursing homes. Most nursing home residents receive some form of public assistance, and “several” of them were formerly homeless, he said.

Pawelski said the Legislature has supported requests for additional funding in recent years, citing positive working relationships with House and Senate budget managers. When a Department of Transitional Assistance official notified him of the veto last Monday, Pawelski said it “came as a complete surprise to us because we had been assured, based on multiple meetings, that the amount would be included.”

“We are concerned. We are concerned that this veto could lead to another round of closures, and we will work closely with our members to monitor the impact on the industry as a whole,” said Pawelski, who noted that more than 100 nursing homes have closed in Massachusetts since 1998.

Healey cut SSI funding by $6.3 million and EAEDC funding by $3.7 million to “the amount anticipated to be necessary,” she wrote. The veto documents explain for both budget items: “Based on historical spending and expected demand, this level will support the continuation of current services.”

Finfer of Massachusetts Action for Justice also sounded the alarm about the governor’s budget cuts, which include $750,000 in funding for technical education institutes at vocational schools, $1 million for MassHire Career Centers and $500,000 for a summer job program for at-risk youth.

A voc-tech veto could mean that colleges that offer evening training in fields such as welding, plumbing and carpentry may have to reduce the number of skills they teach, Finfer said. Finfer said the MassHire cuts could limit job training and services for unemployed residents, while he said a veto on summer jobs would hurt a program that has already faced “serious cuts” this season.