Boston, MA

Thirteen states have adopted a simple criminal justice reform. It’s time for Mass. to join them. – The Boston Globe

Published

5 months ago

February 26, 2026

Thirteen states have adopted a simple criminal justice reform. It’s time for Mass. to join them. – The Boston Globe

That law is not just right. It’s also smart. But we have been lousy about putting it into practice.

Only 10 percent of those eligible to have their records sealed here have actually done it, according to The Clean Slate Initiative, an advocacy group. That’s because we’ve made it impossibly complicated.

Having a criminal record is an enormous obstacle for people who have done their time and are trying to rebuild their lives. A conviction, even a minor one, even from long ago, can mean being rejected by employers and denied by landlords. Cases that were dismissed, or which prosecutors dropped, and even many that ended in not guilty findings also show up on criminal background checks. That can keep someone from getting life insurance, credit, a real estate license, and other professional certifications. It also means they can’t volunteer at their kids’ schools or coach Little League.

“I have grown men in my office crying because they can’t get housing,” said Leslie Credle, who heads Justice 4 Housing, which helps move formerly incarcerated people into permanent homes. “Individuals who were once breadwinners come home and now they’re a burden to their family. It’s a lifetime sentence … even if you have done your time.”

Maybe you’ve gotten this far and are thinking this doesn’t affect you. It does.

Nearly half of US children have at least one parent with a criminal record. People with solid jobs and stable housing are more likely to support their families and communities. They are more likely to fill vacancies at all kinds of businesses that need more workers to thrive. They are also way less likely to reoffend, or to rely on public benefits.

So why have we made the process so much harder than it needs to be?

Right now, a person who has served her time and stayed out of trouble for the waiting period must petition the commissioner of probation in writing, or go before a judge. It’s needlessly complex, requiring time and familiarity with a backlogged and sometimes hostile system. And that’s if they know they can get their records sealed in the first place.

“It’s like double jeopardy,” said Shay, 36, who finally got hers sealed a few years ago. “You can’t try somebody twice for the same crime, but you can double punish them. In my case, I was punished triple.”

Shay, who asked that her last name be withheld, was 22 when she was convicted of carrying a dangerous weapon — a misdemeanor. She did six months in jail, paid thousands in fines and other costs, and had a successful probation. Since then, her record has held her back in ways big and small.

“I had to keep explaining it to people when I wanted to get a job and apply for housing,” she said. “I could not go on any field trips with my daughter, so now she had to suffer.” They had to stay on other people’s couches for months because a landlord ran a background check and gave an apartment to someone else.

Shay knew she could seal her record, thanks to Greater Boston Legal Services. But doing it, even with an attorney’s help, was a whole other thing. Her first application got lost somewhere between the post office and the probation department, which cost her a year. It took two years to process her second application, she said.

“Now here we are, years later, and it’s no longer a burden I have to worry about,” said Shay, who now works to help those with records get into the cannabis industry.

She’s doing well now, but why should it ever be this hard?

In 13 other states — including Oklahoma, Michigan, and Utah — they automatically seal criminal records after someone has met the conditions. It’s embarrassing that Massachusetts hasn’t joined them yet. Legislators have introduced measures to automatically seal eligible criminal records a bunch of times since 2019, but they’ve gone nowhere.

Clean Slate Massachusetts is working to make this time different, with the help of a huge coalition of community partners, including business leaders who understand we all thrive when more people can find work and stability. Yet again, legislators have proposed two bills that would require the state to automatically seal records in cases that are already eligible under the law.

So much about this country is messed up right now. Here is something we can actually fix.

What the heck are we waiting for?

—–

This story has been updated to correct the charge of which Shay was convicted.

Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham can be reached at yvonne.abraham@globe.com.

Source link

Boston, MA

SEE THE GOOD: Roxbury center reminds young adults ‘You got this’ – Boston News, Weather, Sports | WHDH 7News

Published

5 hours ago

July 15, 2026

Press Room

SEE THE GOOD: Roxbury center reminds young adults ‘You got this’ – Boston News, Weather, Sports | WHDH 7News

BOSTON (WHDH) – The You Got This center, run by Children’s Services of Roxbury, helps young adults coping with homelessness, mental health needs, and addiction.

The drop-in center also provides a space to create community.

One of the programs they center offers, freestyle Fridays, held on the first Friday of every month, gives members a chance to test out their rap skills.

Members said programs like these have taught them to be more confident.

“It’s a comforting area,” Deryq Samson-Brown said. “I’ve never felt like an outcast; I don’t think anybody has really felt like an outcast. It’s like a real accepting place.”

Samson-Brown said the center has inpsired him to pursue a career giving back to youth.

Source link

Boston, MA

Chickadee, the popular Mediterranean restaurant in Seaport, is shutting down – The Boston Globe

Published

17 hours ago

July 14, 2026

Press Room

Chickadee, the popular Mediterranean restaurant in Seaport, is shutting down – The Boston Globe

The half fried chicken served with black bean hummus and cauliflower cashew pilaf at Chickadee Restaurant in the Seaport.Matthew J. Lee/Globe staff

An Instagram post that announced their closure on Tuesday evening did not point to any reason for the closure, and requests for comment were not immediately returned.

“Eight years ago, we opened our doors at the Innovation and Design Building with a simple hope: to bring you honest, delicious food and a warm place to share it,” read the post. “What we found instead was a community – regulars who became friends, first dates that turned into anniversaries, celebrations, quiet lunches, and everything in between. You made this restaurant so much more than a place to eat.”

Globe Food Critic Devra First awarded Chickadee 3.5 stars in October 2018, where she wrote how some meals “are magic, everything cooked perfectly, making you swoon.”

At the time, it was also considered one of the earliest restaurants to have opened in the still-industrial far reaches of the Seaport, which was home to ship-repair facilities and cutting-edge design firms, seafood wholesalers, and biotech companies. In terms of location, some said it was ahead of its time.

DaSilva, a three-time James Beard Best Chef: Northeast semifinalist, has led some of the top restaurants across the Greater Boston area. Aside from Barbara Lynch’s flagship No. 9 Park, he opened Spoke Wine Bar in Somerville in 2013. During his time at Spoke, he received a number of accolades and was named one of Zagat’s “30 Under 30” for Boston and earned the title “Rising Star Chef” from StarChefs.

Kilpatrick, who also left Lynch’s group in 2014, worked for the team behind O Ya to help open restaurants in New York. According to his LinkedIn, he started a new job as a regional operations manager for Lark, a boutique hotel management company, in April.

Alexa Gagosz can be reached at alexa.gagosz@globe.com. Follow her @alexagagosz and on Instagram @AlexaGagosz.

Source link

Boston, MA

GBH Daily: Come sail away

Published

1 day ago

July 14, 2026

Press Room

This is a web edition of GBH Daily, a weekday newsletter bringing you local stories you can trust so you can stay informed without feeling overwhelmed.

🥵Very hot, with highs around 97 degrees. Sunset is at 8:19 p.m.

GBH’s Dan Murphy captured Abby Evangelista and her corgi, Rocko, at Sail250 this weekend. “Rocko gets dressed up for lots of occasions … sometimes just to go to the store, and he does so great with meeting people,” Evangelista said. Keep reading for more photos from the tall ships.

A year ago today firefighters were extinguishing flames at the Gabriel House, an assisted living facility in Fall River. Ten people died in the fire, a tragedy for their loved ones and a scary moment for about 18,000 people who live in assisted living facilities across the state.

Now state officials have created new regulations for fire safety in assisted living facilities, going into effect later this month. Fire departments will inspect these facilities once a year, and facilities will need to submit emergency plans and train their workers on what to do in case of a fire.

GBH’s Craig LeMoult found that neither the new regulations nor state or federal fire codes address checking sprinkler systems. Some of the sprinklers at the Gabriel House weren’t working the night of the fire, including the ones in the room where it started.

“Had the sprinklers functioned properly, we’re not having this conversation right now. It is maybe a single fatality fire, but certainly not more than that,” Fall River fire chief Jeffrey Bacon told LeMoult. “The good news is that some of the sprinklers did function. And had they not, we would be here talking about 20, 30, 40 victims.” You can read the full story here.

Four Things to Know

1. Colleagues and friends are remembering Louisa Gag, a Boston transportation planner killed last week when a truck driver hit her as she rode her bike near the Roxbury Crossing MBTA stop. Gag grew up in Roslindale and worked for the city on expanding the BlueBikes bike-share program. Before that, she worked for the LivableStreets Alliance, co-authoring a plan to help cities stop traffic deaths. You can see her talk about her work in this 2019 video.

“In moments like these, there is a tendency to reduce the person to the way they died and to their activism,” said Stacy Thompson, a former executive director of LivableStreets. “While we may know Louisa as a deep champion of the city and a close advocate, she’s also a Boston Latin [School] kid. She’s also, like, the most infectious, hilarious person you’ve ever met. She’s also a daughter. It’s so important to us right now for her life to not be reduced to how she stopped living.”

2. More than 4,000 nurses are back at work at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. They went on a one-day strike last week, and hospital administrators kept them from returning to their jobs for another five days. The Massachusetts Nurses Association and Brigham management have been negotiating a contract for seven months, going back and forth over wages, health insurance premiums and staffing levels.

“It’s exciting, but also frightening,” said Christine Forgeron, a cardiac nurse at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. “I don’t know what to expect when we go back to our patients. What happens next, because we still don’t have a contract,is the most unsettling part.”

3. Michael Walsh, a Republican candidate for state attorney general, will be on the primary ballot in September despite what Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Karp called “substantial evidence in the record of voter fraud.” The case began when Adam Roof, executive director of the Massachusetts Democratic Party, submitted a complaint accusing a signature gatherer Walsh’s campaign hired of either falsifying or not meeting state requirements for 1,021 of the 10,677 signatures they submitted. Candidates for statewide office need 10,000 signatures to get onto the ballot.

Karp said that there was indeed evidence that the signatures came not from voters themselves but from a list of registered voters the state’s Republican party gave the signature gatherer. But the case fell on a technicality: state law required Roof, the Democratic party official, to submit his complaint by certified mail, and he did not do so. The state’s highest court still has to decide what will happen to Anne Manning Martin, a Republican candidate for lieutenant governor who used the same signature gatherer.

4. Residents of towns around the Quabbin Reservoir flooded into the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority meeting last week to ask for a better deal. The Quabbin supplies clean drinking water for dozens of cities and towns in the eastern part of the state. Right now, the state requires towns like Shrewsbury, Belchertown, Orange and Pelham to keep their development in check to keep the Quabbin clean. Though those towns get some money in return, local officials said it’s not enough to cover their costs.

“We are protecting this watershed by foregoing any type of economic development, which is a cornerstone of providing the basics of education [and] public safety,” said state Rep. Aaron Saunders, of Belchertown. “It’s time for a change, and not an incremental one.”

Tall ships sail into Boston

The Colombian vessel ARC Gloria passes spectators watching from Castle Island on Saturday, July 11 in Boston.

Dan Murphy / GBH News

Tomorrow is the last full day of Sail Boston, the city’s tall ships celebration. The ships will leave our harbor Thursday morning. GBH photographer Dan Murphy was there over the weekend to capture the Parade of Sail.