Massachusetts

Massachusetts Nurses Association Endorses Maura Healey for Governor

Published

3 years ago

May 26, 2022

Massachusetts Nurses Association Endorses Maura Healey for Governor

“Maura Healey is a real champion for employees and employees’ households,” mentioned Katie Murphy, ICU RN, and president of the MNA. “The MNA is proud to endorse Maura Healey for Governor as a result of she has all the time had an open door for frontline healthcare employees. She actively listens to our issues, empathizes with the challenges we face, and works exhausting to assist nurses and healthcare professionals present high quality take care of our sufferers.”

“I’m the proud daughter and granddaughter of nurses and their empathy and resilience stick with me to at the present time,” mentioned Healey. “Nurses present us the that means of exhausting work and compassion day by day. It’s a particular honor to have MNA’s endorsement. And I can be a Governor dedicated to respecting and honoring the large worth, capability and dignity of the work they do.”

Healey, the daughter of a union nurse, has lengthy been a supporter of MNA nurses and healthcare professionals. She was the keynote speaker on the MNA Labor Chief Summit in 2016, was an early and stalwart ally of St. Vincent Hospital nurses throughout their historic 2021 strike, and as Lawyer Basic has labored carefully with the MNA and its members by means of the Coverage & Authorities Relations Division, the Well being Care and Honest Competitors Bureau, and the Honest Labor Division on quite a lot of points.

Healey additionally strongly helps employees’ collective bargaining rights. When the U.S. Supreme Courtroom opened the door to “proper to work” standing for public workers, Healey ensured employees had been totally protected beneath Massachusetts regulation, declaring in July 2018, “My workplace will all the time act to guard working households, guarantee secure working circumstances, and defend the proper of employees to prepare.” Healey has additionally fought for better transparency in conditions the place employers rent third-party anti-union contractors.

As famous in her assertion to the MNA about her candidacy for Governor, Healey has a robust report of opposition to hospital consolidation when it could improve prices or compromise high quality. She just lately launched a report on how the proposed Mass Basic Brigham growth would drive up prices – an growth that the MNA additionally opposed as a part of a coalition to guard neighborhood care. As well as, Healey opposed the proposed merger between then Companions Healthcare and South Shore Hospital in 2015.

“As Lawyer Basic, Maura Healey has not been afraid to tackle robust points and hard opponents, very similar to MNA nurses and healthcare professionals,” Murphy mentioned. “Healey stands up for what is true and can convey that very same tenacity on behalf of working individuals to the Workplace of Governor.”

When the COVID-19 pandemic struck Massachusetts, Healey was fast to behave, serving to coordinate sources for frontline healthcare employees and first responders together with private protecting tools steerage, precedence testing, different housing choices, free and discounted meals, self-care and emergency childcare.

Healey has additionally been a strong advocate for equality, earlier than and through her time as Lawyer Basic. She introduced the primary profitable problem to the anti-LGBTQ+ Protection of Marriage Act, and has labored to struggle bullying in faculties, shield girls’s rights to accessible, reproductive healthcare, and fight discrimination in lending and housing. Healey has advocated for laws to guard transgender individuals from discrimination in public locations, a marketing campaign that MNA nurses and healthcare professionals joined as nicely.

Since its founding in 1903, the MNA has been essentially the most highly effective and efficient voice on nursing and healthcare within the Commonwealth. The MNA created the Nurse Follow Act, the RN license designation, developed a uniform curriculum for the schooling of nurses, wrote the primary code of ethics for nurses and handed, or helped to cross, almost each state regulation governing nursing apply together with the regulation permitting nurses to unionize in Massachusetts.

Right now, the MNA represents greater than 24,000 nurses and healthcare professionals working in 85 well being care services, together with 51 acute care hospitals, in addition to a rising variety of nurses and well being professionals working in faculties, visiting nurse associations, public well being departments and state businesses.

MassNurses.org │ Fb.com/MassNurses │ Twitter.com/MassNurses │ Instagram.com/MassNurses

Based in 1903, the Massachusetts Nurses Affiliation is the most important union of registered nurses within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Its 23,000 members advance the nursing career by fostering excessive requirements of nursing apply, selling the financial and basic welfare of nurses within the office, projecting a optimistic and real looking view of nursing, and by lobbying the Legislature and regulatory businesses on well being care points affecting nurses and the general public.

SOURCE Massachusetts Nurses Affiliation

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Massachusetts

2 of the largest fairs in North America are in Massachusetts

Published

2 hours ago

January 9, 2025

Press Room

2 of the largest fairs in North America are in Massachusetts

Travel

One saw record-breaking attendance in 2024.

Children on a ride at The Big E.

If you attended The Big E or the Topsfield Fair this past fall, you were in good company.

These New England hotels, restaurants, and more are ‘must visit spots’ in 2025, according to USA Today readers

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Both Massachusetts fairs ranked among the top 50 fairs in the U.S. and Canada in 2024, according to Carnival Warehouse. The list was ranked by attendance.

“2024 contained very positive indicators that North Americans have rekindled their romance for midways, outdoor shows, agricultural programming and food-on-a-stick,” wrote Carnival Warehouse on its website. “Most fairs saw increases over last year’s attendance, only 12 top-50 fairs saw decreases, most of which were nominal and all of which were due to weather.”

The Big E (the Eastern States Exposition) in Springfield ranked No. 4 with an all-time total attendance record of more than 1.6 million visitors. Seven other daily attendance records were also set this year at The Big E, including an all-time single day attendance record of 178,608 visitors on Sept. 21. The Topsfield Fair, at No. 40, saw 418,170 visitors.

Running since 1916, The Big E is New England’s biggest fair. The fair brought live musical acts, carnival rides, agricultural competitions, and food vendors this past September. All six New England states are famously represented on its grounds.

The Topsfield Fair, America’s oldest agricultural fair (running for more than 200 years), featured carnival rides, food, live music, rodeos, art shows, exhibits, and nearly 300 vendors this past October.

For those looking to help boost attendance in 2025, this year’s fair dates are Sept. 12-28 for The Big E and Oct. 3-13 for the Topsfield Fair.

North America’s No. 1 fair in 2024 is the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, which saw 2.5 million visitors.

Check out the top 50 fairs in the U.S. and Canada in 2024.

Kristi Palma

Culture writer

Kristi Palma is a culture writer for Boston.com, focusing on New England travel. She covers airlines, hotels, and things to do across Boston and New England. She is the author of Scenic Six, a weekly travel newsletter.

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Massachusetts

‘Lives are on the line': Mass. native living in Calif. describes wildfires

Published

10 hours ago

January 9, 2025

Press Room

‘Lives are on the line': Mass. native living in Calif. describes wildfires

As wildfires continue to spread through Los Angeles County, some from Massachusetts now living in California are faced with the likelihood of evacuations.

“Our bags are packed and we’re ready to go somewhere else if we have to,” said Justin Bitensky.

The native of Hopkinton, Massachusetts, now lives in Calabasas, a city impacted by the wildfires.

“As a dad and a husband, it definitely hits a little different,” he said.

According to Bitensky, 70mph winds whipped through his neighborhood Tuesday night.

Since then, his family has been without power.

“At this point, everyone kind of knows someone who has been evacuated, or their home has burned down, or both,” he explained. “There’s almost no one who hasn’t been affected.”

The mortgage broker added that his family is waiting to see which roads remain open if evacuations do come to fruition.

“Lives are on the line, homes are on the line, people’s businesses are on the line,” Bitensky said. “I don’t think it can be understated how serious it is.”

At Boston’s Logan Airport Wednesday, passengers who flew in from LA described the inferno from the sky.

“You could look out the window and see the flames burning,” explained Amy Aldrich of western Massachusetts. “You could see the black smoke. We could smell it. My daughter and I smelled it and said, ‘That smells like wildfire smoke.’”

“A lot of people got on planes to start heading kind of west and all,” said Cam Mahseni of Boston. “A buddy of mine, Chris, is in Pasadena, and he had to kind of evacuate, and a power line went down, too, outside his house.”

“From the highway, we saw the fire and the big smoke,” another passenger added. “It’s like a movie.”

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