Boston Public Radio

Even with housing assistance, many families need more help to move into high-opportunity areas, Chetty said.

Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone and Aeronaut's Jason McCool joined us for our weekly news quiz.

The governor has faced criticism for imposing a four month ban on vaping devices, but the Boston Globe business columnist said she thinks Baker made the right call.

Richard Tretheway and Jeff Sweenor joined Boston Public Radio to take calls from listeners and discuss the show's upcoming season.

Steve Hoffman said that while he's not critical of a four-month ban on vaping products, he is concerned it will have negative consequences.

Santiago is an emergency room physician, South End resident, and state representative.

Today on Boston Public Radio: We opened the lines to hear from listeners about how mass shootings are affecting our mental health. NBC Sports reporter Trenni Kusnierek discussed a recent Major League Soccer player's goal celebration decision to grab a field microphone and call on Congress to end gun violence, and the league's decision not to punish him. Chris Dempsey and Jim Aloisi discussed Governor Charlie Baker's transportation bond bill, highlighting aspects where the governor is a leader and where he's falling behind. Dempsey is director of Transportation For Massachusetts. Aloisi is a former Massachusetts Secretary of Transportation and is on the board of TransitMatters. ACLU Executive Director Carol Rose discussed anti-immigration rhetoric coming out of the White House in the aftermath of the El Paso shooting, and what the civil liberties union is doing to protect immigrants rights. Lizzie Post discussed her new book* Higher Etiquette: A Guide to the World of Cannabis, From Dispensaries to Dinner Parties.* We took listener calls again, this time to hear horror stories and odes to the long distance bus ride. Poet Richard Blanco joined us for another edition of Village Voice, and shared a collection of poems to help us “surrender to oblivion” and recenter in the wake of trauma with recent mass shootings. Blanco is the fifth presidential inaugural poet in U.S. history, his new book How To Love A Country deals with various socio-political issues that shadow America.

Today on Boston Public Radio: Sue O'Connell and Joanna Weiss discussed the weekend mass shootings in Ohio and Texas and other national headlines in a political round-table. O'Connell is co-publisher of Bay Windows and South End News, and in-depth politics reporter for NECN. Weiss is editor of Experience, a magazine published by Northeastern University. WGBH News analyst Charlie Sennott looked at how America compares to other nations when it comes to gun deaths, and why mass shooters who espouse white nationalism aren't charged with domestic terrorism in the country. We opened the phone lines to hear from our listeners about where they stand on gun control. Reverends Irene Monroe and Emmett Price discussed what rural Christians heard during the Democrat presidential debates. Monroe is a syndicated religion columnist and the Boston voice for Detour’s African American Heritage Trail and a Visiting Researcher in the Religion and Conflict Transformation Program at Boston University School of Theology. Emmett is Professor of Worship, Church & Culture and Founding Executive Director of the Institute for the Study of the Black Christian Experience at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Together they host the All Rev’d Up podcast. TV guru Bob Thompson previewed the American Experiences documentary on Woodstock, and reviewed other media headlines. Thompson is founding director of the Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture and a Trustee Professor of Television and Popular Culture at the Newhouse School of Public communications at Syracuse. We got an acoustic set from musician Will Dailey, who will perform a series of concerts at Fenway Park this summer.

Today on Boston Public Radio: Congresswoman Katherine Clark discussed what moved her to join other Democrats calling for impeachment against President Donald Trump. We opened the lines to ask our listeners how they feel about the near end of summer. WGBH's Callie Crossley joined us at the WGBH studio at the Boston Public Library to discuss how race was handled in the 2020 Democratic debates. Boston Globe travel writer Christopher Muther explained why some hotels are phasing out min-toiletries. Tech writer Andy Ihnatko spoke about how safe our next election will be from tampering. Boston Globe business columnist Shirley Leung spoke about the racially insensitive cover of yesterday's Boston Herald. Rhett Price and Josh Knowles, aka the Subway Violinists, took part in our weekly news quiz and played us some tunes.

Today on Boston Public Radio: NBC's Chuck Todd joined us on the line to recap the 2020 Democratic debates the past two nights. Did you watch the debate last night or did you decide to tune it out? We opened the lines to ask our listeners about their debate opinions. Criminal justice analyst Andrea Cabral discussed the 2020 Democratic candidates' criminal justice reform plans. Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley joined us to discuss President Donald Trump's racist rhetoric and her take on the debates. We opened the lines again to continue the conversation with our listeners about the debates the past two nights. Medical ethicist Art Caplan explained the 2020 Democratic candidates' health care plans. Media maven Sue O'Connell spoke about Justin Trudeau making history by visiting a gay bar for Canada Pride. Boston Globe columnist Alex Beam discussed Herman Melville's writing habits.

The Trump administration is proposing a change to the rules that govern who is eligible for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly known as food stamps. Under the proposed rule changes, the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates 3 million people would lose benefits, which includes an estimated 90,000 people in Massachusetts, according to the state's Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA). The proposed changes would prohibit the states from expanding who is eligible for the program beyond the federal baseline, which is $33,475 for a family of four — or 130 percent of the federal poverty level. Right now, 39 states, including Massachusetts, offer federally-funded SNAP benefits to people who make more than that — up to 200 percent of the federal poverty level — but still qualify for benefits because they have other expenses that make it hard for them to pay for food. In a statement, U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue said the rule changes will “close a loophole” and will save the federal government an estimated $2.5 billion a year. The administration and some Republicans in Congress have highlighted a case that involves a wealthy Minnesota man who had extremely low income, but huge assets, and said he applied for and collected SNAP benefits. Corby Kummer, executive director of the food and society policy program at the Aspen Institute, told Boston Public Radio on Wednesday that the proposed change would also impact half a million children who currently get discounted school lunch. Kummer said that the administration's narrative harkens back to the derogatory trope of the welfare queen: that people rely on public services paid for by the rest of upstanding citizens, so they don't have to work themselves. "The whole premise of this welfare queen free-loader, people are gouging the government and taxpayers because they want free school lunches, is so absurd. It's so hateful that it's hard to believe the cynicism, Kummer said. "This whole idea that people would be deliberately trying to freeload off of the government for food stamps, as opposed to, for example, the multimillionaire large big-ag farmers who get huge subsidies for growing things like soybean ... that gets unstated because that's Trump's base." Corby Kummer is also a senior editor at The Atlantic and a senior lecturer at the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy.