It’s the first major decision day for ballot questions in Massachusetts.
Attorney General Andrea Campbell will make clear Wednesday the initial fate of more than 40 proposed laws and constitutional amendments dealing with everything from rent control to auditing the Legislature.
Ballot question backers filed 42 different initiative petitions in early August which Campbell has spent the past month reviewing to see if they meet constitutional muster. Supporters hope to see their ideas on the ballot during the 2024 elections.
The questions touch on some of the most debated topics on Beacon Hill — removing the MCAS as a condition for high school graduation, election reform, the classification of app-based workers, and allowing for the unionization of transportation network company drivers.
In the weeks since those proposals were submitted, advocates have let loose 55 legal briefs — 32 in favor and 23 in opposition — in an attempt to convince Campbell to either certify or toss aside various questions.
One question would ask voters to repeal the state’s 1994 ban on rent control, an idea that has drawn financial support from an out-of-state advocacy group but opposition from think tanks, real estate associations, a developers group, and landlords, among others.
But state Rep. Mike Connolly, the Cambridge Democrat behind the proposal, said he and other proponents are “feeling very hopeful” ahead of Campbell’s decision.
“We’re here because we’re in an unprecedented housing emergency,” he said Tuesday. “… That’s really the source of our resolve in this matter, is to take every opportunity to address this ongoing, unprecedented emergency that has resulted in unseen homelessness as well as affordable housing being more out of reach to more people than it has ever been in our lifetime.
In a letter opposing the idea, the Fiscal Alliance Foundation argued it violated parts of the state constitution prohibiting ballot questions that create takings of property without just compensation and those that address multiple unrelated policies in the same question.
Connolly and other supporters of the question planned an 11 a.m. press conference Wednesday outside the State House to “react to the attorney general’s certification decisions on potential 2024 ballot questions.”
For the ballot questions that receive the greenlight Wednesday, supporters will likely start a mad dash to collect more than 75,000 signatures that need to be filed with local election officials by Nov. 22 and Secretary of State William Galvin’s office by Dec. 22. After that, the questions head to the Legislature for review.
The finances of the various ballot question committees will not become fully clear until next year, when they are required to disclose their 2023 activity to the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance.
One of the state’s largest teacher’s unions is hoping to nix the MCAS graduation requirement and replace it with “locally developed alternatives for certifying academic mastery.” The Massachusetts Teachers Association, which represents more than 115,000 members across the state, is backing the idea.
MTA President Max Page said union members are “very optimistic” about their “strong, clear, completely legitimate ballot question.”
“We are hoping and expecting that the attorney general will certify it [Wednesday] and then we’ll be off to the races,” he told the Herald Tuesday. “We’ve got a big meeting planned this weekend to get this out to all of our locals, and we’ll start gathering signatures.”
Another question awaiting a decision by Campbell and backed by State Auditor Diana DiZoglio would authorize the state auditor’s office to audit the state Legislature, something the former senator has been pursuing since taking office this year.
The proposal would allow the state auditor to take a look at accounts, programs, activities, and functions directly related to the Legislature. DiZoglio asked Campbell earlier this year to approve legal action against the House and Senate in an attempt to force them to open up their books.
Top Democrats have so far refused, arguing the state auditor does not have the legal authority nor the precedent to audit the Legislature. House Speaker Ronald Mariano and Senate President Karen Spilka both authored letters to DiZoglio outlining those points.
Campbell has called the request to pursue legal action “rare” but has so far not tipped her hand on whether she will approve the request. The state’s top prosecutor has also declined to comment on the ballot question until her office has finished reviewing it.
Other questions before Campbell touch on the classification of app-based rideshare and delivery drivers and requiring the full minimum wage for tipped workers with tips on top.
The app-based workers proposal was thrown off the ballot last year by the state’s highest court because justices believed it dealt with too many matters for voters to consider in one question.
A lawsuit against Uber and Lyft filed in 2020 by then-Attorney General Maura Healey is scheduled to go to trial in Suffolk County Superior Court starting in May 2024, according to court records. The lawsuit asks the courts to classify drivers as employees rather than independent contractors.
“We heard loud and clear that the SJC had concerns about relatedness, and we know that trial lawyers and labor will once again try to use legal loopholes to deny voters the chance to weigh in on this important issue,” Conor Yunits, a spokesperson for this year’s ballot question campaign, said in an early-August statement. “We have provided the attorney general’s office with a number of options for certification that should address these concerns and ensure that voters have an opportunity to make their voices heard.”