There’s a war raging on every screen and platform for your brief attention. And between Super Bowl excitement, snowmageddon hysteria, and reverberations of the maelstrom out in Minneapolis, those of us whose job it is to hold state and local officials accountable are getting clobbered.
This is not a lecture. I may not care too much for football or small talk about weather, but I understand the inevitable compulsive coverage of both, as well as the appetite for cheap and digestible news blips. As for Minnesota, the ongoing atrocities inflicted there by the hand of a feral government are the most horrific displays of American force that I’ve ever seen, including the markedly inhumane actions I witnessed during the bloodiest moments of the Occupy movement.
Still, with all of the above considered, the team at BINJ remains committed to our state and local beats. Those shift slightly every now and then but for a decade have revolved around Mass government accountability and social (and economic, environmental, etc.) justice—issues that aren’t always front and center, but that we follow way beyond headlines and hashtags. In addition to prison, parole, and the opioid crisis, which we faithfully report on year after year, topics like these …
Police in general
As I write this, the Boston Police Department is enjoying a parade thrown in its name by local media—for the accomplishment of not assisting in the savage detainment and abuse of immigrants and onlookers with rogue bands of beef slabs swinging for ICE. The department looks especially noble in outlets that are trying to smear it. Like the Boston Herald (“Police ignored all 57 immigration detainer requests from ICE last year”), and Fox News (“[BPD] ignored 100% of ICE detainer requests in 2025, citing sanctuary law”).
But what cop apologists and rage-baiting haters of liberal Boston alike have lazily skirted for ages is how the BPD’s Boston Regional Intelligence Center (BRIC) is largely funded by and intrinsically linked to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Every hollow social post and gesture by these corny Dems and other centrist geeks who love hugging local police to hedge against potential future ICE aggression while scoring cheap dopamine boosts is a knife in the chest of the privacy advocates who have fought to keep BRIC and others in check on this front for two decades.
State surveillance
When I say “state surveillance,” I am typically referring to the vague but menacing and all-engrossing apparatus reaching down from outer space and capturing our every move and misstep. For the purpose of this exercise, though, let’s say I deliberately mean the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the countless constitutionally tenuous data collection methods employed by its various lavishly funded law enforcement agencies. It’s the kind of stuff that scares the heck out of people when it’s being used someplace else on the national news, but which they barely protest when it is purchased in their backyard with their tax dollars.
Consider cell-site simulators, the sophisticated surveillance units used by state police and others to gather mobile phone data and locate users. Or the connected Flock Safety cameras used to track people between cities and towns, or even out of state. A recent ACLU analysis found that “police in Massachusetts have been sharing data about the movements of state residents with Flock’s network, allowing 7,000 agencies and organizations across the United States to access that data.” Flock, by the way, recently opened an office in Boston, where it pledged to bring 150 jobs. Which brings me to the next topic worth birddogging …
Corporate welfare
While it’s fun to point and laugh at red states that emphatically value the major businesses in their borders more than individuals, it’s still the case that Massachusetts serves its corporate class in ways that working plebs wouldn’t believe. Look no further than Gov. Maura Healey’s lowering of the state’s capital gains tax (at a cost of more than $100 million a year) to seemingly pacify crybabies whining about the new millionaire’s tax.
I’m not arguing that all incentives are imprudent. As a longtime journalist in this state, though, I testify that neither pols nor the press frequently follow up with corporate promises. Look no further than the prescient series on Boston’s skunked GE deal by my colleague Jason Pramas for a prime example. It’s easy to applaud the Healey administration for freeing up more than $17 million in tax incentives through the Massachusetts Life Sciences Center, like it did last year. That’s especially true while barbarian luddites run Washington. But what takes a continued effort, and what we need to remember during and hopefully following troubling national times such as these, is to follow up on the 800 jobs the incentive is supposed to create.
