Things are down to the wire for the political groups Act on Mass and the Coalition to Reform Our Legislature to get a nonbinding ballot question about stipend reform onto the ballot in Cambridge.
The groups have a “final push” signature collection drive at 6:30 p.m. Monday at Cambridge City Hall, when members break into groups to collect names there, outside the nearby 1369 Coffee House, at the Cambridge Main Library and at the Porter Square T stop. The groups are targeting the 25th Middlesex District where Act on Mass has endorsed second-time challenger Evan McKay against incumbent Marjorie Decker.
Both candidates urge stipend reform.
Two hundred signatures are needed in 14 state House of Representatives districts before Wednesday and 1,200 in the state Senate Suffolk & Middlesex district, the groups said on Monday.
Around half the districts have the needed signatures. The 25th Middlesex is “one of the ones that is lagging,” said Scotia Hille, executive director of Act on Mass. The group has a mission of advocating for transparency at the Massachusetts State House.
The question would ask voters to say they want their representatives in each district to vote in favor of legislation or rules “to reduce the House speaker’s and Senate president’s control over state legislators’ stipends (extra pay) and to provide stipends only to legislators who do significant extra work that is transparent and accountable to the public.”
The base pay for a Massachusetts legislator is $82,000 per year. Committee chairs and other leadership positions, such as House speaker, are additionally compensated with money and staff – 149 out of 200 state senators and representatives, the groups say. The stipends can reach upward of $119,000 atop legislators’ base salary.
In a May forum held by the Cambridge Committee for Transparency and Accountability in Government, MacKay and Decker discussed stipend committee payouts, with MacKay on the attack over the dozen committee chairs whose committees have never met. Decker, chair of the Public Health Committee and compensated monetarily and with three additional staffers, agreed but noted that she is the lowest paid of all chairs while overseeing one of the most important and busiest committees in the House.
“Passing this would show our legislature that voters want a Legislature that works for them, not one where our representatives must bend to leadership’s will or risk loss of pay,” the groups said in an email.
Cambridge City Hall is at 795 Massachusetts Ave., Central Square.
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