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.
☀️Sunny and chilly, with highs in the 60s. Sunset is at 5:58 p.m. It’s day 17 of the federal government shutdown.
It’s been about 48 hours since U.S. Rep Seth Moulton announced he’ll challenge Sen. Ed Markey in next year’s Democratic primary, rather than seek reelection to the House. Potential candidates have already joined the race to replace him as the congressperson representing much of the North Shore.
Dan Koh, who lives in Andover, was a senior aide in the Biden administration and chief of staff for then-Boston mayor Marty Walsh. He ran for a House seat in the district next door in 2018, coming in second. Jamie Belsito lives in Topsfield and is a former state representative and founder of the Maternal Mental Health Leadership Alliance. And Beth Andres-Beck, a software engineer from Middleton, had already entered the race before Moulton announced his Senate run. GBH’s Adam Reilly noted one common theme in all these campaigns: discontent with how Democrats are responding to the Trump administration nationally.
Four Things to Know
1. In a mayoral debate ahead of next month’s election, Worcester Mayor Joseph Petty said he was skeptical of starting a board of city residents to review the work of the police department. His challengers, City Council Vice Chair Khrystian King and local business owner Owura Sarkodieh, both said they’d support a civilian review board. You can watch the full debate here.
A bit of context: last year the U.S. Department of Justice released a report saying that Worcester police officers’ misconduct violated people’s constitutional rights. Federal investigators had said there was evidence that some officers had threatened women with arrest and sexually assaulted them, and that officers were allowed to have sexual contact with sex workers during undercover investigations.
2. An organizer of this Saturday’s No Kings day of action in Boston, part of a national day of protests and rallies against authoritarianism, said the Boston Common event will be focused on education.
“We want people to learn how to make this action sustainable,” said Rebecca Winter, executive director of the Massachusetts branch of 5051. “We’re going to have 30 different tables set up with organizers to teach you how to do activism non-violently, and we’re going to have a main stage with not a lot of talking heads, but a lot of performers.”
3. Visiting nurses at Cape Cod Hospital and Falmouth Hospital are saying they may go on strike for three days next week, from Wednesday to Friday, because negotiations with Cape Cod Healthcare have stalled. The visiting nurses have been offered a raise of 10%; staff nurses at the same hospitals are getting a raise of 19% over the next three years.
“We are not expecting the hospital wages. They’ve always been very different,” said Pamela Anderson, a visiting nurse case manager. “We just want to have the same pay increase. … We all have the same cost of living.”
4. The Citgo sign is getting a new location in Kenmore Square — about 30 feet higher and 120 feet east of its current location atop 660 Beacon St. The building is undergoing renovation, and as part of the project, construction workers will move the sign to another part of the building’s roof.
“We wanted to make sure that with that new growth in that area, and with the new buildings, that the view and the appropriate sightlines for this really iconic symbol of Boston would be protected,” Mayor Michelle Wu said. GBH covered efforts to save the sign when the building under it was sold almost a decade ago.
MBTA’s Phil Eng tapped as interim state transportation secretary
MBTA General Manager Phil Eng got a new job yesterday: overseeing the state’s public transit efforts and highways as the interim Massachusetts secretary of transportation. He said he will keep his current top job at the T. Meanwhile, Monica Tibbits-Nutt, the state’s former transportation secretary, announced she will step down, but did not say why.
“I intend to stay just as engaged as I have been with the MBTA,” Eng said. “That doesn’t sound feasible, but it is.”
Eng added that he is “not worried about the interim tag:” “I’m open to holding it as long as it’s needed,” he said.
So why this change? Jim Aloisi, Massachusetts Secretary of Transportation under Governor Deval Patrick, told GBH’s Jeremy Siegel that he was not surprised to see Tibbits-Nutt’s departure.
“I can’t speculate on the factors and the timing,” Aloisi said in an email. “But I do not think this comes as a shock to people who follow these things closely.”
As we mentioned yesterday (if you missed it, you can read the whole story here) the Massachusetts Department of Transportation is restarting the process of finding a company to run 18 service plazas along highways in the state. The first company selected — an Irish firm called Applegreen- — backed out of negotiations after a local competitor, Global Partners, challenged the fairness of the contract award and tried to block the deal.
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