2025-04-01 00:00:00 - Joint Committee on Financial Services
2025-04-01 00:00:00 - Joint Committee on Financial Services
REP MURPHY - Good morning, everybody. It's like the first day of school today. We have about nine hours of testimony here today, but April fool's day. Right? So welcome to everybody for our first hearing on Committee of Financial Fervices. I'm here with my co chair, Senator Paul Feeney, who I'll introduce in a second. So this custom started years ago where there'd be an informational hearing at the beginning of each session, started many years ago. So today, it's just for us to hear from you as to who you are. We don't need to hear about any bills because it's time later on that we'll hear testimony. But today is just a quick one minute, 30 seconds. Hi. I'm so and so. I represent so and so. You might hear me on these bills, but that's it. Right? So there's be plenty of time during this session to testify on bills. Right now, there are no bills before the committee for this hearing. So just say hi, and, we'll say hi back, and then we'll see you again at a later point. So I get my404 point across? Alright. Okay. We have some esteemed members of the committee, but at first, I wanna turn up to my coach here who I'm412 very excited to share this committee with. He's the smartest, best looking, most talented senator in the Senate. So I got him back this year, which is great. And, it's an honor to work with him. He's a friend prior to him being a senator, and he's a colleague and a great counterpart to this committee. So with that, I wanted to introduce my good friend, Senator Paul Feeney.
SEN FEENEY - Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It's great to see everybody. Thrilled to be back on this committee again, with my, my good friend, Jim Murphy. You know, not only friends long before, taking this committee together, but even, you know, as we've been going through this last couple of sessions, I learned a lot, certainly, from representative Murphy. In his frame of reference has been very, very helpful to me as we kinda navigate through all these different issues. So I458 appreciate the fact that I get to chair this committee with him again and to be here with462 all of you who I know many of frequent flyers464 are gonna be here, week after week, month after month, testifying on your important bills and priorities. They're important to us too, and we definitely wanna, you know, we look forward to hearing all about them in the months ahead. But with that, again, I just wanna say how blessed I am, to be chairing this committee with Jim Murphy and all the members. We have some new members, some returning members, and I will tell you that this committee especially, really takes pride in digging deep into all these bills. The reps, the senators that are on this committee, have really vetted a lot legislation over these last couple of years. We don't legislate for the sake of legislating. We actually look where we can help people in the commonwealth, and I'm just so grateful for all the members of this committee. So with that, I'll turn it back to Chair Murphy and the rest of the members of the committee to introduce themselves.
MURPHY - Thank you, Senator Feeney. So every two years, members of the house and senate request committee assignments. We have a vetting process by which we select the hardest working, smartest members in the building. And so I'm a let them speak for themselves. So on my left over here, forget it. My colleagues introduced themselves. Actually, we introduced by vice chair first. Sorry. We have a new vice chair this year, David Biele from South Boston. Great legislator, good friend, and it's his first time in this committee, so we're gonna go pretty easy on him this term. I'd like to turn it over to my vice chair, David Biele.
REP BIELE - Thank you, Chair Murphy. Good, hello everyone. It's an honor to be with you here today. Look forward to the work ahead, on the committee. You know, chair Murphy has, done a fantastic job, you know, shepherding bills through and, doing a deep dive. So look forward to being a part of the conversations to come on matters facing, the Commonwealth and legislation before us. So it's an honor to be here and look forward to getting to know you,565 and the issues a little bit better, as a new member to the committee. Thank you.
MURPHY - Thank you, Vice Chairman Biele. So with that, from the left, Kate, do you wanna say hello?
REP LIPPER-GARABEDIAN - Good morning, everyone. Kate Lipper-Garabedian, 30 second Middlesex, and this is my577 third session on the committee. So glad to be back. I see a lot of familiar faces.
MURPHY - Welcome back, Kate. And, over here to my right, all the way down the end.
REP CHAISSON - Michael Chaisson, freshman rep here. I represent the Norton. And, looking forward to hearing from all you guys today and learn a little bit more about the committee and the work that we're gonna be doing here.
MURPHY - Thank you. Welcome. Welcome to the committee.
REP KERANS - Good morning. Great to be here. My name is Sally Kerans. I represent the 13th Essex District. My third term on this committee, except for some time back in the nineties when I did some time on the insurance committee. So delighted to be here. Thank you, Mr Chairman, Mr vice chairman.
MURPHY - Welcome back.
REP CATALDO - Thank you, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, Simon Cataldo. I represent the 14th Middlesex District, which includes residents in Acton, Carlisle, Chelmsford, and Concord. It's my second session on the committee. Learned so much from so many of you in this room last session and looking forward to doing so again this session.
MURPHY - Welcome back, Simon.
REP MCGREGOR - Bill McGregor, the 10th Suffolk State Representative. I am in my second term, but this will be my first session, on financial services, and I'm looking forward to it. 10th Suffolk represents, West Roxbury, half of Rosendale, a little bit of Jamaica Plain, and South of Vermont.
MURPHY - Welcome, Bill.
REP WORRELL - Christopher Worrell,5th Suffolk District. That's God's country, which is Dorchester and Roxbury. Second term, first time on this committee. So be very nice and patient with me. Thank you.
MURPHY - Thank you, Chris. Okay. So with that, there's a sign up sheet we have here, order people order in the order which they signed up. We also have a sign up sheet outside. So if you haven't signed up and you wanna testify, just sign up outside the door there. So with that, we're gonna get going with testimony. So Mary Gallagher, commissioner banks. Is Mary here? SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER9 - Virtually. She's online?
SPEAKER10 - Can you hear me?
Yeah. Do you
SPEAKER1 - have it?
SPEAKER10 - Chair Murphy, can you hear me?
SPEAKER1 - Commissioner Gallagher, are you there?
SPEAKER9 - Yes. Can you hear me?
SPEAKER1 - Okay. We can see you. Mary, can you hear us?
SPEAKER9 - You can't hear me.
SPEAKER10 - Can you
SPEAKER1 - hear us okay?
SPEAKER9 - I can hear you. Can you not hear me?
SPEAKER1 - I do now. Yeah. Gotcha. Okay. Great. That's good. Welcome.
MARY GALLAGHER - MASS DIVISION OF BANKS POLICY GROUP - Thank you. Good morning. Good morning, Chairman Murphy, Chairman Feeney, members of the committee, new members of the committee. My name is Mary Gallagher. I serve as the commissioner at the Massachusetts Division of Banks. I'm joining you, virtually this morning. I'm sorry not there in person. I'm actually down in Washington DC meeting with other state banking departments and our federal regulators, the theme of the week is we are living in interesting times. So, I'm sorry to not be there in person, but I'm joining you for two purposes. First and foremost, to thank you, for your leadership and, really in championing being champions for the769 multi year effort in modernizing the commonwealth's money transmission law, in the775 last session, which culminated with the successful enactment of chapter779 312 of the acts of 2024, which the governor signed on January first of this year.
Your leadership and support in moving that legislation, really helped Massachusetts, come into line with the rest of the country and I am grateful for your many years of collaboration and796 support and I felt strongly enough that I wanted to thank you on the800 record, as you start off the new session. This brings me in my second purpose for joining you this morning which806 is to really underscore, how much we at the division appreciate your leadership, your partner. You're at the ready to be a resource technical resource for you and the committee, when and as needed, as you start to delve into the many bills,826 in this session. And we just wanna be there for you, always available. Don't hesitate to reach out. So thank you for your continued support and leadership in the last session, and I wish you the best, in this new, season. So thanks very much. I don't know if you have any questions for me, but I really just wanted to say thank you and good luck.
MURPHY - Thanks, commissioner. That bill would not have happened without your advocacy the last couple of terms. So, that money transmission was all about you. So congrats on that.
GALLAGHER - It's funny. I feel like that's last session, money transmission's done. And, we're working very hard to promulgate the regulations and get it implemented, but it would never have happened without your leadership, honestly, from this committee. And, so I really I just appreciate and value so much your, collaboration. So have a great, hearing and, we'll see you soon.
MURPHY - We'll see you soon. Thank you. Okay. Glenn Sorry. Senator Feeney.
FEENEY - Thank you. Chairman, I just wanna, thank the commissioner. It was her advocacy that got this done, that transmission bill last year, and we are, very, proud to have done that through this committee. Also, I wanna thank the commissioner and her team for answering all of our questions as crazy as they can be from time to time, understanding, the sector and what's going on in the Commonwealth. So I just wanna thank the commissioner. Also, Schumer, I wanna recognize, Senator Oliveira has joined us online as well, member of the committee, and ranking member Representative Howard, who I know is nursing an injury, but also joining online as well. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you. Joining by our colleagues in, Representative of Tram Nguyen, welcome. So with that, we'll move on to the next person's name enlisted here, Glenn cap Glenn Kaplan. Hey, Glenn. Welcome back, Glenn.
SPEAKER11 - Yes. Thank you.
GLENN KAPLAN - OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, MASS - So, good morning, Chairman, Murphy, chairman Feeney. I'm Glenn Kaplan. I'm chief of the insurance and financial services division in the office of attorney general Andrea Campbell. I, we have written965 testimony, which will go into a lot more detail available to which will be available to all of you as as you suggested, Mr. Chairman. Just quick overview of, of what we do. In my division, we largely spend our time on two or three979 different things. One is we bring cases and investigate unfair trade practices. The overlap, between what we do and what you do relates to, insurers and lenders and, securities firms to some extent. A lot of time spent in this last year working on, cryptocurrency-related matters. It's turning into a big area and student debt still a big area. In addition to the cases that, we investigate,1004 there's another division in our office,1006 the consumer protection division, which does have some overlap, with what you all do.1010
They're spending a lot of time right now within that overlap area on, mortgage brokers, related debt collection, and on1017 equity stripping schemes. Aside from the cases, big area that we do is we do mediation work, helping individual consumers in their disputes with financial services companies. We do thousands of these a year, and when it comes to, insurers and securities firms, we do a lot of it. We also spend a lot of time lending, especially we have a dedicated, student loan assistance unit that helps people with their student loan issues with their loan services. Other big area that we work on is, insurance rate cases. We litigate the insurance rate cases administratively in the division of insurance in front of the commissioner. Usually it's with auto or workers comp, or the fare plan. And, right now we're in the middle of a workers comp case. Did one last1066 year. We're able to secure a rate rollback, about $90,000,000 for,1070 for the rate payers.
And we're preparing right now for what we expect in the spring will probably be not this spring, but next spring will be a fair plan, rate case as well. Again, not for sure, but we expect that'll happen, so we're preparing for it. The last thing that we, do, is we also engage in policy work, gathering and analyzing data, trying to make suggestions, trying to make the rules work better. We've been spending a lot of time, working on concerns we have about the impact of the current insurance rating system for auto, in, urban communities, and also spending a fair amount of time in our office relating to predatory mortgage lending issues. We're happy to help, both with your individual constituents, if you want to send them our way if they're having problems, and on these larger issues if we can be of any1119 assistance.
MURPHY - Thank you, Glenn. Thank you for your help over the course of the past few terms. You've been very helpful with us working on legislation answering our1127 questions. So thank you very much, to1129 the attorney general also. Thank you. Lauren Peters. Welcome.
LAUREN PETERS - MASS CHIA - Good morning, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, and other distinguished members of the committee. My name is Lauren Peters, and I'm the executive director of the Center for Health Information and Analysis, otherwise known as CHIA. It's a privilege to be here today to testify on behalf of CHIA, and to highlight some of the agency's pertinent work to this committee. I'll be brief today, but would direct you to our written testimony that has more details. So as an independent agency of the Commonwealth, CHIA serves as the state's primary hub for health care data and analytics to inform and advance data driven policy making. We fulfill this mission through our robust datasets, analytic resources, which enables the agency to carry out our core functions such as measuring health care spending to measure the state's performance against the cost growth benchmark, examining trends in insurance premiums and cost sharing to inform and advance policies related to health equity and affordability, and collecting and monitoring provider financials to support market stability.
Additionally, with the1215 passage of two major health care bills that strengthen oversight and transparency of the Massachusetts health care system. CHIA's role is further expanded to include collecting and analyzing new information from private equity investors, real estate investment entities, and pharmacy benefit managers to name a few. Another example this committee may be familiar with is CHIA's work reviewing mandated benefit bills on behalf of the legislature. The reviews evaluate the medical efficacy and cost impact of those proposals that would require insurance coverage for specific treatments and services. CHIA works closely with the legislative sponsors of each bill to confirm the review accurately reflects the intended purpose and scope of the legislation.
In addition to perspective review of new mandate benefits, every four years, CHIA conducts a comprehensive retrospective review of all health care-related mandated benefits currently in effect to calculate the cost impact comprehensive review later this year. The agency prides itself on being a trusted resource for the legislature and one that is select examples of Chia's work, we our data and analytic capacity expands well beyond this list. And finally, I would note that we're always happy to take ad hoc data or analytic requests, whether it's in support of constituent needs, a hospital in your district, or policy development. Our team seeks to be1312 objective thought partners and a resource to address the health care issues of1316 the day no matter how big or1318 small. So I wanna close by thanking you again for the opportunity to present today. I'm happy to take any1324 questions. Otherwise, I look forward to our continued work together.
MURPHY - Thank you, Lauren. Thanks for1328 all the work that CHIA does. You know, we're in contact with you, contact with you a lot over the course of past few years about studies. We appreciate all the work you've done for all the requests we made to you. So that's what we're here for. So thank you.
PETERS - Thank you. Deborah Souza and Darryl SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Caffee.
Yeah.
SPEAKER14 - Good morning.
SPEAKER1 - Welcome back.
DEBBIE SOUSA - MMBA - Oh, thank you. Thank you so much. Chairman Feeney, Chairman Murphy, members of the committee, thank you for this opportunity. My name is Debbie Sousa, and I am the executive director of the Mass Mortgage Bankers Association. And I'm joined by
DARRYL CAFFEE - MMBA - Darryl Caffee, director of retail lending and collections at Webster 5. I'm also the legislative chair of the MMBA.
SOUSA - So we wanted to just take a few minutes to tell you what's going on in the industry as well as what the MMBA does. So we are an association which represents our members, our banks and credit unions, and mortgage lenders doing business in the Commonwealth. And, our lenders work every day with individuals and families to help them realize the dream of homeownership. We provide our members with, on average, about 20 educational programs every year, ranging on compliance and consumer protection in industry best practices we advocate on behalf of the state and federal issues. As a matter of fact, Daryl and I are in the state and federal issues. As a matter of fact, Daryl and I are in DC next week. We have a foundation.
And through that foundation, we have funded we have awarded 67 nonprofit organizations in Massachusetts entirely funded by our members, that all have to do with affordable housing and, credit education. So we wanted to provide you with a quick overview of what's happening in the industry and as far as on this committee. So we have right now, there's been 267 bills that have been filed that impact the mortgage industry. This committee, however, only has 48 of those. I have emailed you a list of this, and we're not gonna there's everything. The topics range from, arms, regulatory changes, credit triggers, foreclosure legislation, escrows, flood insurance, shared depreciation mortgages. You have it all. So, I'm gonna turn this microphone over to Daryl to give you some additional information.
CAFFEE - And thank you again everyone for the opportunity here to speak. It's truly an honor. I just wanted to start by giving a little data point on foreclosure delinquencies. One of the things that we monitor very closely, both at the national level and more importantly at the state level here. Massachusetts currently has a 1.68%. They're actually slightly below that, delinquency rate on mortgages. I think that's really relevant, especially when we put in context of the nation. The Northeast in general has performed really, really well when it comes to foreclosures or delinquencies rather. But Massachusetts has really stood out as an ally. And that's something that we're both, proud of, but we view with great caution. Right? We wanna make sure those trends continue to go, in the right direction, which is DAF. I'd also like to add,1536 that housing affordability still remains a major concern. Prices probably in all of your respective cities, have probably grown over the last 4, 5, 6 years, which is truly a challenge that we're all concerned with. I also wanna take a moment and just state the obvious, which is that so much federal regulatory changes taking place.
The Supreme Court overturning the Chevron doctrine, has a significant impact on mortgage lenders, in particular, taking away the power that the agencies once had to interpret legislation, shipping that to the federal courts, which is a major concern, especially when considering, how, discrimination that is viewed. But, to get out of the weeds for a second here. One of the main focuses of the MMBA is provide education, and compliance, seminars, programs for our members. And one of the biggest challenges we're facing now is actually the inaccessibility of some of the federal regulatory agencies. For the first time in, my time with NMBA, we've been denied requests from Fannie Mae, from Freddie Mac, from FHFA, from CFPB, to provide resources to the MMBA, for these type of educational seminars that directly impact our members, which is a great concern to us. And one last thing I'd like to mention, insurance. I know it's on everyone's mind. It affects homeowners both at the time of purchase and then even, the years that follow. I believe this, committee has five flood insurance, bills that you're gonna be reviewing, over 10 insurance bills in general. I think you can put your attention on those matters, it's something very, very close to us.
SOUSA - So I guess to wrap up, we just wanted to thank you for this opportunity. Our members remain ready to collaborate with the legislation to ensure that our homeowners and ensure that our homeowners and communities across the Commonwealth continue to have access to safe, sustainable, and affordable mortgage options. And we would love to be a resource on any bill, not just in the committee, but on anything relating to the mortgage industry. So thank you again for your leadership and your hard work and dedication, and we look forward to working with you.
MURPHY - Thank you very much. Appreciate you coming in today. Look forward to working with you. Dan Ditullio. Dan, are you online?1675 SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER16 - Yes. I'm here remotely, Mr Chairman.
SPEAKER1 - Hi, Dan. Go ahead. Welcome back.
DAN DITULLIO - MASS DENTAL SOCIETY - Thank you very much. Chairman Murphy, Chairman Feeney, Vice-Chair Biele, members of the committee, as a former staffer, I think I'd also be remissed if I didn't thank the staff of the committee for everything they do to, support your offices. I apologize I can't be there in person. Sounds like everybody's in DC1698 this week and I'm down here myself right now1700 for a few events. So I appreciate you, allowing me to Mass Dental I'm the executive I'm the director of government affairs and dental practice for the Massachusetts Dental Society, overseeing our legislative and regulatory, matters before the state. I believe we have three bills that will be heard by the committee later on this year. And I just wanna thank the committee for their past work, past support of MDS. I look forward to, coming before the committee in the coming weeks and months to testify on behalf of some of our bills. There's also a multitude of other oral health bills that we're gonna continue to monitor. And I think just lastly, I just wanna be able to offer the support of the MDS in any type of matters that the committee may see, that they need any type of input, subject matter experts or anything like that. That's like we like to always say that oral health is overall health and, we just wanna continue to recognize the importance of that And, again, we look forward to it, the year ahead. Thank you very much, to all of you.
MURPHY - Thank you, Dan. Appreciate it. Look forward to working with you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER16 - Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
SPEAKER1 - Chris Stark. Chris?
CHRISTOPHER STARK - MASS INSURANCE FEDRATION - Thank you, Chairman Murphy, Chairman Feeney. It's great to be back with so many, new faces and faces that we've worked with in the past. First of all, to the members of the committee, really wanna, thank you for last session, for the Federal Home Bank, Home Loan Bank, modernization, the guarantee fund modernization, and of course, our, repetitive group marketing, legislation, all of which, were1807 signed by governor Healy at the end1809 of the last term. So really appreciate that. I am Christopher Stark, the executive director of the Mass Insurance Federation. The federation, is the property casualty, advocates in the state. We represent 64% of the workers' compensation market, 60% of the homeowners' market, 77% of the medical malpractice market, and 80% auto market. Sometimes it's easier to say what we're not. We're typically not life or health issues. But all of those other issues that are before your committee, we will be here, to talk with you about just very quickly, a short, market update for the committee on the issues of most importance. Auto labor rate, I am pleased to announce since the last time that we were before this committee.
Most of the federation's membership is now over $50 an hour of the labor rate, and most of them significantly into the $50 range. I do wanna say that the tariffs are an unknown for the insurance market, and most likely something that is going to have upward pressure on premiums as, especially for Massachusetts, so much of our lumber for home reconstruction will come from Canada. And when it comes to cars, so many of the parts will come from other countries as well. So, tomorrow will be a big day as our eyes1890 are also, tuned in to see what's going to happen, with tariffs. And when it comes to homeowners, I just wanna say we are in a precarious position right now with the amount of1900 factors facing the homeowners insurance market from climate change to inflation. Hopefully, not supply chain issues again. But we wanna work with this committee on developing a culture of resiliency in this state and doing all that we can, to help place those downward pressures back on the homeowners market. So look forward to working with all of you, over the months and years to come. Thank you, mister chairman.
MURPHY - Thank you, Chris. Thanks for,1922 coming back today and working with us. We appreciate it. Thank you. Ben Loraco. I believe Ben's online. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Ben Loraco?
SPEAKER18 - Yes. I'm here. I'm, trying to get my camera to work. Can you see me?
SPEAKER1 - Yes. Yep. Welcome. Can you hear me? Alright. Yep. All set.
BEN LAROCCO - EWA - Wonderful. Chair Feeney, Chair Murphy, members of the committee, thank you so much for allowing me to present today. My name is Ben LaRocco, senior director of government relations for Earnin. We're a leading earned wage access or EWA company. Last year, nearly 25,000 Massachusetts residents used our product to access their wages, and more than 458,000 Massachusetts customers have used our service all time. Nationally, more than 2,000,000 people have used earn in to access their wages on their schedules last year. Earned wage access, high level, is allowing workers to access the money they have earned and is legally theirs on their schedules. Payroll is by far the most common form of cash flow and income for American families, and therefore, the timing of payroll has an outsized role in all other financial decisions. But payroll has been largely unchanged in over a century. Currently, payroll is in batch. You work, you earn money, that money is legally yours, but your employer gets to keep it up and pay you in two to four-week batches because running payroll is complicated. A generation ago, most things were in batch. TV, letter writing, research, but now all of those things are streaming, thanks to Netflix, Outlook, and Google. Our entire existence is going from batch to continuous, thanks to technological advances.
Batch payroll is bad for a worker living paycheck to paycheck because they may only have a few dollars in their bank account, but hundreds or even thousands of dollars that are legally theirs, but they don't have access to. Workers are delaying purchases, paying bills, potentially racking up fees and interest because they don't have access to their own money. Why are we paid in two week2038 batches? For most of history, workers were paid at the end of the day. You got your piece of silver, bought your daily bread. However, during the Industrial Revolution, things changed. Industrialists said, now you have to work for two weeks, and then on Friday, you can come to the pay window and get your pay. Essentially, they had market power. So rather than paying on demand or even in advance, they were able to make their employees wait weeks for the money they were legally owed. We are trying to build a more worker-friendly payroll system, which we believe is every worker getting paid in real time. Question is policymakers, how do you come up with the regulatory framework for this product as it is exists today, when thousands of people rely on it, allow our information so it can evolve into something even better, and ensure there are no loopholes for bad actors. That's not an easy question, but, Reps Cusack and Domenico have introduced bills, which we may hear about later this session. Thanks so much for your time.
MURPHY - Thank you, Ben. Looking forward to hearing from you in this session. Thank you very much for being with us today. Jonathan Shriver. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Jonathan here?
Jonathan Shriver, American Property Casualty. I can get back to you, Jonathan. You saw the line you see my line anyway? No? Okay.
Jessica, Avery, and Adrian Velasquez.
Welcome back.
JESSICA AVERY - CCUA - Good morning, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, and members of this esteemed committee. First, I want to congratulate you all on your appointment to this committee and the opportunity to serve the commonwealth with the work of this great committee. My name is Jessica Avery and I am the director of advocacy here with my colleague, Adrian Velazquez, for the Cooperative Credit Union Association representing over 140 Massachusetts credit unions and more than 10,000 employees and 3,500,000 members across the Commonwealth. Today, I wanna highlight briefly the role that credit unions play here in the Commonwealth, particularly in providing affordable financial services to those over 3,500,000 financial services to those over 3,500,000 residents. I'm also here to illustrate why the bills that you will deliberate on are crucial in continuing financial security and community empowerment.
First, I wanna share the numbers. Credit unions are the backbone of Main Street, not Wall Street, with over $5,000,000,000 in small business loans made. Another example, take housing, the leading issue in our commonwealth. Credit unions hold $24,000,000,000 in outstanding real estate loans and credit you pardon me. Credit unions approved 60% of mortgage applications accounting for low and in low and moderate income borrowers. Second, those numbers are just the beginning of our story. It's about people. Our mission of people helping people can be seen in this story. A woman with a young child was forced to leave an abusive relationship. She only had her job in a clunking vehicle. While living in a shelter, she was connected to a credit union that provided her with a loan to ensure that she had transportation to drive her child to school and for her to go to work. She worked with her credit union in rebuilding her credit to explore acquiring a dwelling. Thanks to those efforts, she was able to move out of the shelter into stable housing.
Another example, in times when a virtual world means more practical and economical, A credit union in Greater Boston offers in-person financial literacy for adults, teaching them real-life budgeting and the necessary skills for financial success. Because of the nonprofit initiative, credit unions are about providing services that our communities need. Finally, we want to continue doing that kind of work in our communities. CCUA has refiled legislation to give municipalities the choice to deposit into credit unions. We also refiled legislation to update the oldest national credit union charter. These acts promote economic growth, foster community engagement, and strengthen financial well-being. I thank you for your time and attention and look forward to working with you to serve your constituents and our members. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you very much. Look forward to working with you again. Thank you. Kathy Murphy, Brad Pilato,
and Larry Luzzo.
Kathleen? Yeah. I'm sorry. She's That's fine. We'll catch up there.
So welcome.
BRAD PAPALARDO - MASTERS OF BANKERS ASSOCIATION - I think it's still morning. Good morning, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, distinguished members of the committee. Thank you for inviting us and having this informational, hearing. I think it's such a great start to the session, hopefully, but will be a great session, for all of us. So, I am Brad Papalardo. I'm chief of government affairs and general counsel for the Masters of Bankers Association. With me is Larry Liuzzo, our, vice president of government affairs. You probably all know Tom Joyce, our outside lobbyist who's been representing the senate for I won't say how long, Tom, but for a long time, let's say. On behalf of our member of solutions, again, thank you for hosting this. MBA has a pro a long and proud history of working with this committee, and, with this committee for legislative and, of course, with state, for regulatory, issues that may pop up that affect our members. Massachusetts Bank is was established 120 years ago back in 1905, to represent the interest of Massachusetts banks, to provide educational training, educational excuse me, career development resources, and otherwise serve our members, which accuse our our advocacy here on Beacon Hill and down in DC.
Today, Mass Bankers represents from the smallest to the largest banks, all forms of charters and ownership. Most of our members are state chartered community banks. They're typically the cornerstone of many downtowns of your communities that you represent, some for over 200 years. Mostly with assets less than 10,000,000,000, and we're proud to say we we have the most mutuals of any state, in this country with 92, about 70% of our membership. Mass bankers is currently monitoring 400 bills, so we'll we'll be, be in touch with you all, one way or another. We wanna be a resource on all of them if we can be. But mostly, we just wanna thank you for the work you do and, allowing us to weigh in when appropriate as well. To have us at the table is invaluable for us and our members, and we really do thank you, for that collaborative approach, especially how it's championed here in this committee. So thank you all.
MURPHY - Thanks, Brad. Thank you very much. Look forward to working with you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Nick Frintulakis.
There he is.
Welcome back, Nick.
NICK FYNTRILAKIS - MAIA - Good morning. I think it still is. Chairman Feeney, Chairman Murphy, members of the committee, pleasure to be with you today. Appreciate that the timer's back on. It's the closest thing to a buzzer beater that I'm gonna, run into in my athletic career, so I'll take it. It. But, my name is Nick Fyntrilakis. I'm here representing the Mass Association of Insurance Agents. We represent about 900, insurance agencies throughout the Commonwealth. Our members are located in just about every city in town in the Commonwealth and certainly, at least represent those cities and towns. Our members are very engaged in their communities, focused on consumers, providing them, the right products and services to protect their families, their homes, their businesses. Our, members, have about a billion dollars of economic impact in Massachusetts, have about a billion dollars of economic impact in Massachusetts, per a study that we have conducted, recently. Many of those businesses are, family businesses, been in business for, in some cases over 100 years, and so we're very proud of the work that our members do in their communities. The real focus that we have is to ensure that our members have a level playing field.
The insurance, landscape is very diverse with very large entities, small entities, and that goes for our members as well as, for the carriers that they work with. And what we really focus on is making sure that consumers are protected, that they have the right information, and that there's a level playing field, between agents, carriers, etcetera. So a couple of the highlights, I won't get into specific legislation. I know you don't wanna hear that, but I'll just talk about some of the focus areas that we have. One is our continued opposition to, allowing rebates and insurance. We believe that insurance should be sold for the merits of insurance and the protection that it provides as opposed to what, somebody can offer them to entice and induce a sale. The other area of focus that we have this year is around, and it's not before your committee, but it's tangential in the sense that insurance is involved in the auto registration process. But there is a push around e titling and esignature, in auto in the auto space, which, obviously, is on the RMV shoulders.
What we want to ensure is that, the rights of the consumer and insurance, is protected and that we may not have the registry always gets a bad rap but we have a pretty good system in Massachusetts and compared to other states to ensure that, consumers are protected, that insurance is in place, and that we avoid fraud. So we wanna ensure that that remains the case with these potential changes that are are, being proposed for e-titling and e-signature. And then lastly, and I think our colleagues on the, insurance carrier side would agree that we're concerned about, ensuring transparency in third-party litigation. There's a lot of, litigation and outside funding, particularly from outside sources internationally and elsewhere, that is providing funding to, create some of these nuclear verdicts as they're referred to that you see in the, insurance space. And we wanna just make sure that there's transparency around that. Apologize for going over time, and I think we're very much Look forward to work with you. Thank you very much for coming in. Thank you. Rob McLaughlin and Liz Murphy. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Get back to Rob and Liz2695 in a little while. David Marietta? Yeah. I already saw David.
DAVID MATTEODO - MABHS - Hi. Thank you, Mr Chairman, Senator Feeney, what members of the committee. I appreciate this opportunity, and I did, leave something written with the staff. So just so mostly for the new members. But my name is David Matteodo. I'm executive director of the Mass Association Behavioral Health Systems. And I'll just give a summary of what our group does. We have three bills before you guys. I think you heard them all last session. So I'm not gonna get into that now. But I represent 50 behavioral health facilities throughout Massachusetts.2743 We have three kinds of hospitals. We have freestanding hospitals like McLean, Bornwood and Arbor. There's about 102751 of those. We have 30, facilities, units in general hospitals. We go right across the state from Berkshire Medical Center down to Cape Cod and many in between Springfield and Worcester and so forth. And then we have substance use facilities. So we we are are I'm the, executive director and we advocate for our patients. And some of the big issues we're2777 seeing now are it tend to2779 be with boarding, emergency department boarding, people waiting for services. We're trying to facilitate admissions.
We see discharge issues. We have patients sometimes that are stuck for many months in our hospitals with nowhere to go. So I do a lot of work with the state agencies to move those forward. In our system, there's 3,100 beds, private beds throughout Massachusetts. We run an occupancy of about set 2,700. So we have some flow there mostly because of staffing. We lost a lot of staff. A lot of people retired and got out of the field because of COVID and other reasons. So we're trying to get our census up to where it should be. There's also 700 DMH beds in the state, and those are mostly taken up with forensic patients. We have great difficulty getting a patient into a DMH, which is long-term. They tend to take people from the court. So as I said, our some of our big issues are patient flow, staffing, acuity. Our patients are very ill. It's very difficult, jobs to work on our units. We do the best we can. We're very worried about MassHealth. If the federal government hat comes down with a hatchet on MassHealth, that would really impact our we're 40% Medicaid and another 20% Medicare. So, we're very dependent on the, private, public sector. So in summary, I wanna be a resource for the committee. If issues come up that aren't part of our legislative docket, feel free to, contact me. As I say, we're the only group, in Massachusetts that represents, entirely inpatient behavioral health. So I appreciate this and hope to I'll be back when the bills start coming up. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, David. It's been great work with you, and, welcome back.
SPEAKER23 - Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Jonathan Schreiber. Go back to Jonathan. I think Jonathan's on now. Oh, he's here.
Hi, Jonathan. How you doing? Good. Welcome.
JONATHAN SCHREIBER - APCIA - Thank you. Good afternoon, chairs Murphy and Feeney, members of the committee. My name is Jonathan Schreiber. I'm here on behalf of the American Property Casualty Insurance Association. APCIA represents 67% of The US property casualty insurance market. A dozen of our members are located in Massachusetts and many more do business here. ABCIA members write 75% of the property and casualty insurance sold in this state. Property and casualty insurers protect over 4,500,000 cars and 2,100,000 homes in Massachusetts. They provide more than $8,000,000,000 in annual assistance via claims payments to help customers recover and rebuild after disasters and other losses in the state. Insurers also contribute nearly $1,000,000,000 in annual tax revenues to the state budget. PNC Insurance is the state's fourth largest2967 industry. 43 property and casualty insurers are domiciled in2971 Massachusetts, and 43 have offices here.
The industry employs over 15,000 people in Massachusetts with wages totaling over $2,200,000,000. Focused climate resiliency projects, emergency preparedness, and response assistance. Notably, in 2020, one company donated over $2,000,000 in aid to supply PPE and other basic needs to help with COVID response, investments in economic development, creating jobs, housing, and communal spaces, tens of millions in local charitable contributions supporting education, food security, arts, culture, and entertainment, youth programming and violence prevention, health and wellness, and many more, leadership in local nonprofit organizations and charitable board charitable boards, and tens of thousands of volunteer hours. I'm proud3029 to have the opportunity to speak before you on their behalf and look forward to a productive dialogue throughout the session. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you very much. Look forward to working with you again this year. Thank you.
SPEAKER24 - Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Michael Best.
You by yourself, Michael? By myself. All along.
MICHAEL BEST - NCLC - Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, members of the committee,3053 it's great to be here. Great to see everybody. I really appreciate you all doing this. My name is Michael Best. I'm a senior attorney at the National Consumer Law Center. We're a3061 national advocacy group for low income people on consumer issues, particularly financial services issues. We're headquartered down the street in Winthrop Square. We have a DC office where we do federal work. One of my roles is to help coordinate with advocates across the country at the state level to connect them to our experts. We work on everything from mortgages to credit reports to debt collection, to high-cost lending. So anything that comes across, your desk, we'd likely have lawyers who work on it with a lens towards helping the most vulnerable, people. So please see us as a resource. Come to us, anytime with questions. If it's not something I work on, we have about 50 lawyers.
One of them is an expert in one of these areas that you all work in. I also want to take a second to thank you all. You know, I've worked for many years now, as you know, on the Debt Collection Fairness Act, which is up again. Really appreciate the leadership of Chair Feeney and Chair Murphy brokering a deal with industry. That deal is held. I'm happy to say, and I believe you've heard from us and from industry saying we still support, the bill that you reported out last session. And I'm just really grateful for all the hard work done by you all on the committee, by our great sponsors, including rep Wynne, who's now on the committee. Just, you know, I've been lucky enough to do this for almost 20 years, and this is, I think, the best example of coalition-building and deal brokering I can point to.
And, I really appreciate the great work of the committee on this, and hope this is the year we can get over the line. So like I said, let us be a resource. You'll hear from us, of course, in support of the DCFA. There's one, in front of you you just heard about you'll hear in us in opposition on, which is an act relative financial technology services. I won't get in the weeds in that here. Just a heads up that is something we have deep concerns about that I know it can sound good on paper, but we worry3160 it'll result in essentially payday loans at a high interest3164 rate being legal that would not otherwise be legal and currently under Massachusetts law. So I3168 just wanted to flag that. I think there's there's some distance3170 between consumer advocates and industry on that one. But other than that, please, just see us, as a resource. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you, Michael. Thanks for your hard work on the debt collection bill, and many people in the room. Thank you for your hard work. We'll get back at it this term, I guess. It's like Groundhog Day again, Michelle.
SPEAKER25 - Great. Appreciate it.
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, Michael. Amy3190 Gross?
AMY GROSS - MOPSS - Good morning, Chair Feeney, Chair Feeney, members of the, committee. My name is Amy Gross. Thank you for your dedication to3212 constituents in Massachusetts, first off. It's definitely strong. Sitting next to me is Thomas Healy. He's the founder of the group I'm representing, the Massachusetts Oncology Patient3222 Survivors and Supporters. Tom's of Dedham, and he probably grew up in Mission Hill with his nine brothers and sisters. Tom is a nasopharyngeal cancer survivor of over 25 years. And as a result of his own personal struggles, he established MOPS to serve as a voice for head and neck cancer survivors. I myself am a nasal cavity cancer survivor of three years. You may recognize me. I testified last year, and I went to the citizens' legislative workshop that, the senate puts on, which is a very great, opportunity.
Our group was grown from Mr Healy to a 501c3 nonprofit organization that includes survivors, physician groups, professional organizations, dental professionals. In Massachusetts, approximately 3,000 individuals are, living with head and neck cancer, and, also importantly, firefighters and other professions are more susceptible to this, disease. There's approximately eight to nine survivors in every town. Many of these individuals face long-term health challenges as a result of their treatment, including oral health care and medically necessary dental care. We're here today to offer our group as a resource, a nonpartisan resource to the members of3303 the committee. We go by the acronym MOPSS, as you may know, so it's memorable. MOPSS can connect you with survivors, constituent survivors, individuals who can share firsthand experiences navigating the complexity of medical and dental care coverage. We can facilitate expert access. That was difficult to say.3328
Our network includes specialists in otolaryngology, radiation oncology, dental care, and other professionals that a non survivor may not consider or think about when, considering, legislation. These experts can provide critical insight of the medical necessity of dental procedures, as well as the frequency that rehabilitation is needed to either go forth with cancer surgery treatment or post surgery. We can support collaborative efforts with national organizations. We work with, the Head and Neck Cancer Alliance. We work for support for people of oral, head, and neck cancer known as Spunk. We work with American Cancer Society and other, national groups. Last but not least, we can help clarify complex terminology that we have all had to learn as survivors. Insurance and medical terminology is overwhelming and can be very, unwelcoming to the even dictionary.
3382 It's3382 difficult to find in a regular dictionary some of the words. We can help explain the nuances survivors face when seeking coverage. Head and neck cancer3390 survivors are typically so exhausted from their treatments, they don't have the energy left to self advocate, or they literally do not have a voice after surgery due to the larynx or complications from other treatments to make it extremely difficult to communicate with others. We, as MOPSS, are the voice of head and neck cancer survivors, and, we're supporting your nonpartisan efforts to create policies that help3415 people in the commonwealth and assist with oral health issues of the head and neck cancer3419 of head and neck cancer. We know there's a lot of oral health bills coming around and it's not just head and neck cancer we can help with. So I truly thank you for your time and consideration. Thank you. And if you have any questions, please feel free.
MURPHY - Thank you, Amy. Thank you, Amy. You didn't say you're from Mission Hill last time you were here.
THOMAS HEALY - MOPSS - I just thought3438 I'd be remiss if I didn't mention, Senator Michael Rush3442 from West Roxbury and, my good friend, the state rep, Paul McMurtry, who have been, working with us probably before, 4 other bills previous to this. So we look forward to, working with you. And what we'd like to do, today, is provide you with some, educational, documents so, you can learn from what, we've gone through. And we look forward to seeing you in the upcoming months. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER2 - Thanks for coming back, Tom.
SPEAKER1 - So I'm Senator Feeney and I's families are from the Hill. So Yeah. Do you know any Hannafin's back in the day? Absolutely. Yeah.
SPEAKER10 - The Dodge comes to
SPEAKER1 - me. Yeah.
You've built you've built a great chance of passing now too.
So, Dennis Lyons. Dennis, you here? Hey, Dennis. Welcome, Dennis. Welcome back.
DENNIS LYONS - MASS INDEPENDENT PHARMACIST ASSOCIATION - Thank you, Mr Chairman, Chairman, Murphy and Feeney, members of the committee. My name is, Dennis Lyons. I'm a registered pharmacist here in Massachusetts, and I'm here today representing the Massachusetts Independent Pharmacist Association. Our organization represents, the interest of some 125, independently owned pharmacies. Generally, the difference between an independent and a chain would be the independent has 5 stores or less, although most 90% of our members have one pharmacy. In Massachusetts, there is approximately 1,100 pharmacies in totally around the state. And of that, approximately 900 of the 1,100 are chain pharmacies. So we're a small, player in a big pond, but, many of our members have been pharmacists for many, many years and, critical part of the community. Independent pharmacies provide personal enhanced services to many residents of the Commonwealth.
These services range from individual counseling and advice, transitional pharmaceutical care after hospitalization, special compliance packaging, and free delivery to patients, and their residents. Our members currently serve many thousands in group homes, residential schools, sober homes, and, service elderly living either assisted living or on their own. These services keep patients well and avoid the need for hospital stays and or long term care, thus saving the Commonwealth taxpayers millions of dollars. Pharmacist independent pharmacies were also very active in the pandemic, providing vaccination services, especially for those people who couldn't get out of their home, who couldn't, access a chain pharmacy, our independent pharmacists were very active. However, the survival of independent pharmacists is currently under siege from unfair insurance reimbursement for prescription drugs. Insurance companies utilize pharmacy benefit managers, PBMs, to oversee medication services to just about 100 percent of insured patients in the Commonwealth as around all around the country. PBMs are very powerful for-profit companies with unlimited legal and lobby resources, and the largest CVS Caremark, Express Scripts, and Optum account for 80% of the prescription, drug market in The United States.
These companies are also a subsidiary to the three largest for-profit insurance companies that nash nationally are valued at over $900,000,000,000. The top 3 PBMs are listed in the Forbes top 50 companies in America. Last year, the legislature, and with the help of this committee, which we are very grateful, took an important first step by putting in place a requirement for these companies to be registered by the division of insurance. And while we thank the members who helped make this possible, much more is needed to control these companies. As we saw in the Stewart Health debacle,3704 for-profit health companies can wreak havoc if left to their own devices. So who cares if independent pharmacist make it in this environment? We should. In a recent study done by the University of California, a startling one third of all pharmacies opened in 02/2010 in The United States. One-third have closed from 02/2010 to3735 02/2023, and a major reason is linked to inadequate reimbursement by insurance. In Massachusetts, we have seen the closings of both independent and chain pharmacies, unfortunately, in those neighborhoods where pharmacy deserts already exist. The committee will be evaluating many PBM-related bills in the 2025, 26 sessions. We hope that reforms of this industry will continue with necessary legislative action to assure patients have access to medication. I thank you for the time. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Dennis, welcome back, and thank you for all your work. We appreciate it. Thank you very much. Ashley Blackburn?
Welcome, Ashley.
ASHLEY BLACKBURN - HEALTH CARE FOR ALL - Good afternoon. Chair Feeney and Chair Murphy, thank you for the opportunity to testify today and members of the committee. My name is Ashley Blackburn, and I'm a senior director of policy and government relations at Health Health Care for All. For those of you who are not as familiar with HealthCare for All, we are a statewide nonprofit consumer advocacy organization that advocates for health justice in Massachusetts by promoting health equity and ensuring coverage and access for all. And we advance our mission in three primary lines of work. We have a direct service helpline, our community engagement work, and then our policy advocacy. So we directly serve residents in Massachusetts through our free helpline that takes over 25,000 calls per year in five different languages. And our certified application counselors spend time on the phones every day making sure that people in the Commonwealth have help applying for health insurance coverage and then using that health insurance coverage as well.
I'm sure many of you, maybe even this week, have received, calls or emails from your constituents who are having issues either enrolling in coverage or navigating the health care systems. We wanna make sure that you know that we are a resource for you. Send your constituents to us. Make sure your staff have our email addresses. When you reach out to us, we will direct to we connect you or your constituent with the help line counselor, and then we always circle back to your offices so you know how the constituent's case, ended up. So please please use us as a resource. Additionally, we partner with community and faith-based organizations to run effective outreach and education campaigns on a number of public health issues. And then we use what we learn from our help line and from our community engagement team, and we come here to advocate for policies, to make health care coverage more affordable, equitable, and accessible in Massachusetts.
So we really appreciate the work from this committee last session to advance a number of health challenges both affording and accessing the care they need. And we know that these barriers, to coverage and care the care they need. And we know that these barriers, to coverage and care are even deeper for marginalized populations in the state. So to that end, there are a number of bills that we are, prioritizing this session, and I will follow-up in written testimonies so you have that full list, but I do wanna highlight three topics that will be in front of the committee this session. Tackling high cost prescription drugs, simplifying the health insurance prior authorization process, and increasing access to behavioral health services for kids. So a short list, but very important topics, for health care consumers here in Massachusetts. Thanks again for the opportunity to reintroduce Health Care For All to you today, and we look forward to working with you this session.
MURPHY - Thanks, Ashley. Look forward to working with you. Thank you.
FEENEY - Mr chairman. I just, Ashley, before we go, I just wanna thank you again. I know I do it every time you're here, but on behalf of all of the legislators, and our staff who you have helped navigate, help our constituents navigate through many difficulties and challenges. Just thank you for the work that you do. It's invaluable. So not only in a policy advocacy, you know, front, but for doing what you do to kinda help our constituents get what they need. We really appreciate that. So thank you.
BLACKBURN - Thank you. Appreciate it, chair. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, Ashley.
SPEAKER8 - Can I can I just second that too? Yeah. I'll just second that.
SPEAKER29 - Thank you.
SPEAKER2 - And to the new members on the committee, make sure you get to know Ashley because they will Yes. They will be very helpful.
SPEAKER28 - Number is plastered on all of our materials, but email any of us and we'll get you connected. Right.
SPEAKER10 - Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Ashley. We're joined by rep Ryan Hamilton. Ryan, welcome. Welcome back this year. Thank you, sir. Tim Havel. Tim, are you here? Tim's remote, I think. Tim Havel, Mass Public Banking steering committee.
I'm here, but I am not on the panel for, testimony today. Okay. Other members of the steering committee are. So I apologize. I'm not at all ready for that.
SPEAKER2 - That's like that's okay.
SPEAKER1 - Expecting it back. Who's, who's who's with you that will testify? Who wants to testify? SWAC, and and Yeah. You Go ahead. Now. Yeah. We got them here, Tim. Thanks. The sun. Okay. No problem. Sorry about that. Thank you. No.
Just, just tell me your name so I can mark it off on our list here. Yeah. Just your your names, please.
SPEAKER9 - Yes.
SPEAKER1 - Thank you.4063
CHRISTINE DIZON - MASS PUBLIC BANKING GROUP - My name is Christine Dizon. I wanna thank, Chair Feeney and Chair4067 Murphy for allowing me to testify. I'm a professor of law at Harvard4071 Law School where I work on the monetary system and on constitutional law, and I'm here to tell you about the work of the Mass Public Banking Group, which is a coalition of about 20 civic organizations. Public banks are a powerful strategy for economic development. That they are particularly suited for times like this when economic stress is intense and when state-centered initiative is essential. Both of these conditions are likely to persist. So, as for economic stress, the likely of recession is rising. As you know, the federal government is in disarray. Federal funding is thus falling just as it is more necessary than ever. In these circumstances, the states will bear a heavier load to support our communities in creative ways, and a state public bank could address both those issues.
It would bring tremendous capacity in financing and would assert state authority and innovation at a time that it's desperately needed. In fact, public finance was scarce. Private commercial banks were inadequate. So wholly or partly, public banks existed in each of the original 13 states, including Massachusetts, which owned a stake in a number of state chartered banks. The power of banking was considered a public resource, not just a privateone. So just a moment on why banking. Banking brings amazing capacity, unique capacity to a lender. Banks can lend low lower than other lenders because they provide the money supply in modern societies. They advance private credit in a network of banks doing the same, and banks then set off their mutual obligations that allows them to extend new credit as money on a smaller reserve. And that money creative power means banks can take a sum of capital and lend 8 to 10 times as much. The Commonwealth could deploy the same power. That is potent.
As for reach, a public bank could lend to those unable to borrow adequately from commercial banks today. In fact, the Massachusetts model directs lending to borrowers identified by commercial banks and CDFIs as the ones they would like to reach but cannot. So a public bank would work in partnership with those organizations to get to those borrowers. The MAS model establishes a public bank that is complimentary, in other words, not competitive with private banks. And just to clarify, a mass public bank would not be a retail bank for depositors, but one that would hold public deposits and lend against them to those borrowers I just mentioned using public revenues that are now sitting in commercial banks as the deposit base for the public bank. So the public bank could, extend $1,400,000,000 of credit against a $200,000,000 capital appropriation, just as an example. I'll stop there, and just with the point that that's a significant impact, and we'd love your help making that happen. Thank you.
MICHAEL SWACK - CARSEY SCHOOL OF PUBLIC POLICY - Hi. Thanks for having us, Chairman Feeney and Chairman Murphy. You're probably thinking right now you're probably thinking when's the lunch break? But I'm not sure if you're thinking Harvard law, constitutional law, you're gonna be busy the next few years. This is ridiculous. So my name is Michael Swack. I work at the Center for Impact Finance at the University of New Hampshire, although I'm a Massachusetts resident. Anyhow, you're pricing why does Massachusetts need a public bank? Chris touched on some of that, but a public bank, even though there are a number of banks in Massachusetts and credit unions, there's still a big unmet need. This is particularly true for capital that serves the needs of low and moderate-income communities. And in fact, Massachusetts has 31 certified community development financial institutions. These institutions are really the capillaries, the ones that get money to communities that the banks are not able to serve. And so they're the ones that make the loans to, for affordable housing, small businesses, farms in Massachusetts that that, that the commercial banks aren't able to serve.
Certification of CDFIs is by the US Treasury, and, they require activities to be purposefully directed towards improving economic conditions of underserved people. CDFIs in Massachusetts, the 31 of them hold $2,200,000,000 right now that they safely deploy with, delinquency and default rates equivalent to the commercial banks. So they're not big risk takers, but they fill this gap, that needs to be filled. So why a public bank? A public bank would be serving primarily these capillaries. A survey we did earlier showed that4375 they're 86% deployed right now. What that means is they're getting4379 the money out on the street. It's not4381 just sitting there. Just for comparison purposes, commercial banks generally have deployment rates of around 70. So these 31 capillaries are getting money out to places that aren't served. A public bank would primarily serve by being a lender to these institutions, not a direct lender.
It's not gonna be big enough to serve the small businesses themselves, but they can capitalize using the resources from the Commonwealth, this existing system that needs more money. So public bank could also operate sustainably. We've run a couple of different models on what the capitalization would be. This would not require an ongoing subsidy from the Commonwealth. This is a bank that could support itself sustainably from its operations. Finally, a public bank can effectively manage risk, and CDFIs have shown that over the years. By directly lending to them, they're lending to institutions that have reserves, strong balance sheets, in fact, generally more capital, than banks to, adjust for that risk. So in short, a public bank in Massachusetts makes a lot of sense. On the surface, you think, why do we need another bank? It actually makes a lot of sense. It plugs a large capital gap, particularly in low and moderate-income communities. It can maintain a sustainable business model and manage risk effectively. Thank you. I hope you'll think about it. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Oh, thank you. We're forward to working with you on it. Is Niam Nia part of your panel? Nia Evans? Yes.
SPEAKER10 - Oh, he's
SPEAKER32 - doing it. I'm here in Florida.
SPEAKER1 - Hi, Nia. You wanna testify?
SPEAKER32 - Yes. I do. I'm trying to figure out okay. I love it now.
NIA EVANS - BOSITON UJIMA PROJECT INC. - Good afternoon. Thank you so much. Apologies. I did intend to be in person, but I am feeling a bit under the weather. My name is Mia Evans, and I'm the executive director of Boston Ujima Project Incorporated. And, we have created an investment vehicle, that when we launched it in 2018, made history as the nation's first democratically governed investment fund. So my colleagues have already talked about why a bank and have already talked about partnership with, CDFIs and other other banks. I just wanna emphasize a couple of things right now first, and I should say we're members of mass public banking. I just wanna talk about our, coalition real quickly. We are members along with other, investment funds, along with CDFIs, along with community organizations that deal with, everything from environmental justice, to community, land trust, to youth advocacy. We match4542 the metropolitan area planning council is also, members of our coalition and the metropolitan mayors, coalition is also4550 a member of our group. So just wanna show, how widespread our, support is.
And, for every member of the committee, as you think about your communities, and the needs that you're hearing about from your constituents, the other thing I'd I'd like to focus on is, who we are centering essentially or focusing on with a public bank. So we are,4577 looking to partner with entities in your communities to provide affordable financing to small and medium4583 sized businesses, businesses and municipalities that are recovering from, economic, recessions, natural disasters, effects of of climate, change, the affordable financing needs of cities and towns, worker owned co ops, affordable housing. We heard about, the challenges that are that continue to persist in that area, family-owned farms, rural businesses, nonprofits, other community based, organizations. And, so, just again, wanna focus on those groups again as you think about your communities and your constituents, and if you can identify, anybody in those, in that4629 list that I have mentioned who could benefit from partnership with entities in your area for more affordable financing,4635 for businesses, houses, and community infrastructure. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you, Nia. Was Nancy Ryan part of your panel too? Is Nancy online or is she she's not here. Right? So is Nancy Ryan online?
SPEAKER10 - She's not
SPEAKER32 - She's in person.
SPEAKER1 - She's in person. Nancy. You don't have to come up. Yeah. Alright. Well, thank you, Nancy. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for your your testimony. I think that's it. Yep. Thank you very much. I look forward to working with you.
SPEAKER32 - Thank you. Oh, can I just say 1 more thing? I'm sorry.
SPEAKER1 - Sure.
EVANS - I just wanna point out a couple of other colleagues in the room. Ray Field Fielder and Ahlul, if you can kinda raise your hands if you're in the room, just also ask committee members to, try to follow-up with our colleagues. We would love to set aside time with to, and to talk about public banks more. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Welcome. Thank you. Thank you very much. Go back to let's see. Liz Murphy. Saw Liz just walk in. Rob. Rob McLaughlin.
SPEAKER2 - Mister chairman, I just wanna recognize senator Bill Driscoll has joined us as well.
SPEAKER1 - Welcome, Senator.
Welcome back.
SPEAKER33 - How are you? I'm sorry that we were a little bit late there.
SPEAKER25 - No worries. And
ROBERT MCLAUGHLIN - MASS ASSOCIATION OF HEALTH PLANS - Chair Feeney, thank you very much for just the opportunity, for listening. I just take a few moments to reintroduce, the map to everybody here in the Financial Services Committee. Obviously, we've worked really well with your staffs, and we're really appreciative that you guys were reappointed, to the chairmanship of this committee. Really have a long history of working greatly with your staff, and I really just wanted to say, for everybody here, most of you have my cell phone number. If you don't, I'm happy to give it4738 to you. But happy to be a point of contact for all of our plans. We know that you get calls from constituents all the time, and there are things that, you know, we can be a point of contact and help resolve issues. Before they become anything more than that. Happy to be that person. It doesn't matter. Morning, noon, or night, happy to be that person, that is a point of contact for your staff. And I know especially for your staff and the, chairs that the other members of the committee other members of the committee, other members just in general don't have an expertise in this area, and they will reach out to you folks. So happy to be that point of contact. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you. And it really
SPEAKER29 - Absolutely. Thanks, Rob. Good morning. Good afternoon.
ELIZABETH MURPHY - MASS ASSOCIATION OF HEALTH PLANS - I don't know what time it is right now. Chairman Murphy and Chairman Feeney and members of the committee, I wanna introduce myself. I'm Liz Murphy. I'm the vice president of legislative and regulatory affairs at the Mass Association of Health Plans. We represent 13 health plans and one behavioral health organization, that provide coverage to over 3,000,000 residents here in Massachusetts. And our plans participate in public programs, including MassHealth and Medicare, and also in the commercial markets and the self-insured space. My message to you today is that Massachusetts health care spending continues to grow at unsustainable levels. The total annual price tag has reached almost $80,000,000,000, and the increases, are almost to the level of 10% each year. We ask that you give consideration to the financial impact of the bills that you have before you this session. Each bill that mandates to add, mandate additional services or increase reimbursements for provider groups, or prohibit cost sharing, all have a price tag attached to it, and that price trickles down to the insured members of Massachusetts.
Fully insured plans in Massachusetts are already required to cover more than 50 specific services here in Massachusetts, and this is in addition to the 10 broad categories of comprehensive coverage that are mandated by the ACA. These state mandates account for almost 20% of premium spending in Massachusetts. That's two and a half billion dollars, at most recent look. This means, that our members share the experience of this. However, the majority of the Massachusetts residents that are insured are enrolled in public plans like Medicare or Medicaid or self insured, which means that state mandates can't impact that coverage. So, really, the mandates that are passed by the legislature impact only about 10% of the state's insured residents. And the cost of these mandates does not disappear, but gets spread amongst that 10% of the membership here in Massachusetts. So we just want to express our commitment to affordability and any proposals before you that look to lower health care costs or contain spending or really address the true cost drivers, that have been identified by the state. As Rob said, we look forward to being a resource to you and happy to meet or speak with any of you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER14 - Thanks for your time.
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, Liz. Thanks, Rob. Rob. Thanks for being that resource over the years. We appreciate it. Look forward to work with you again this term. So thank you very much.
SPEAKER12 - Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Sarah Frederickson, Jay Newsome, and Melissa Crowett.
SPEAKER25 - Welcome.
SARAH FREDERICKSON - SALTMARSH CPA - Hi. Thank you for letting us, talk. The, issues that, we are monitoring include, perceived staffing anesthesia and issues with private payer insurance reimbursements, which can lead to, which decreases can lead to decreased access to care provided by CRMAs. So overall anesthesia care in hospitals, clinics, and outpatient surgery centers. And just a little bit about, CRMAs, we're advanced practice nurses similar to nurse nurse practitioners. We've been around practicing it as a profession for over a hundred 50 years. We work in all areas of anesthesia care, in as I said, in both in operating rooms, GI centers, in outpatient surgery centers, some in pain management as well. We work, with the surgical team as independent practitioners with or without physician anesthesiologists. And as, as I said, that we are our primary, thing today is with the insurance, reimbursement. And Jay can go over that bill that we're concerned about.
JAY NEWSOME - SALTMARSH CPA - Thank you. Chairman Feeny, chairman of the emergency committee. My name is Jay Newsome. I was a long time staff rep here before the committee, which will provide the parity and reimbursements and bring, reimbursements to commercial insurers in commonwealth in line with the Federal Medicare reimbursement schedule. Just as they are in the Medicare system. So, anyway, I look forward to working with you on these bills in the future. Thank you.
MURPHY - Thank you, Jay.
FREDERICKSON - If I could just clarify since it'd take a couple minutes of Jay's time. If I could just clarify. So CMS, the HHS, you know, controls CMS, you know, controls CMS and centers, for Medicaid and Medicare services. And they, reimburse, CRNAs 100% for the anesthesia care, and anesthesia cases. And they have since, the late 80s. I believe this is when we first got a direct reimbursement from them. And as all of you know, commercial and private insurers tend to, you know, follow the Medicare rules as well, the CMS rules as well. And so they do reimburse 100%. But we're just concerned with, some, carriers not, cutting down. And they are, currently, sometimes in other states. And so we're just trying to, as Jay said, keep, Massachusetts in line with federal laws and see with CMS reimbursement rules.
MURPHY - Thank you. Jay and I show all the work in the building. We appreciate it. When you wanna come back, let us know. Yeah. I can hear you. Yeah. And, thank you to the nurses. My wife's a nurse at Beth Israel, the GI department. So, but, yeah, thank you for nurses. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER14 - She's what did you say?
SPEAKER1 - She's in the GI department. Gastro Internet. GIA. Oh. Using GI.
SPEAKER28 - Some pharma. Oh, great. Yeah.
SPEAKER1 - Yep. Yep. I've been there. Yep. I've been there myself.
SPEAKER10 - Yeah. Love you.
SPEAKER1 - Yeah. Lucky you. Part of life, I guess. Right?
SPEAKER14 - Better living through pharmaceuticals, sir.
SPEAKER1 - Yeah. But thanks for doing what you do. We appreciate it. Good luck in a new position.
SPEAKER29 - Well, this is my third daughter.
SPEAKER1 - Oh. Yeah. President-elect. So you're5299 you're a team again this year? Yeah. Yeah. Alright. Yeah. Stay in touch5303 with us. Look forward to working with you. So thank you very much for today. Thanks. Thanks, Jerry. Good to see you.
SPEAKER14 - Alright. Thank you very much for the time.
SPEAKER1 - Alright. Thanks. Ryan Fielder.
Is he part of the panel of the public banking? He's all set? Okay.
It was, Alula Hansen.5326 Alula Hansen? I might mess up your name up here. With you also? Okay. Yeah. Let's see. Matthew Barard. Matthew.
Welcome. Welcome, Matthew.
Right. Thanks for coming today.
SPEAKER35 - Thanks.
MATTHEW BERARD - NAIFA - Good morning. Good afternoon. Chair Feeney, Chair Murphy, members of the financial service committee, thank you for having me. My name is Matthew Berard. I'm a member of the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors here in Massachusetts. I'm a volunteer. I'm actually a financial advisor here in the Commonwealth. I've lived here in Massachusetts since February and in Roxbury and Dorchester since5377 2004. I've had a successful career providing insurance solutions for individuals, families, and businesses to ensure their income in the event5385 of accident, sickness, or death. I've helped hundreds of businesses and have insured5389 over 15,000 individuals over the last 27 years that I've been in the business. So I've insured a few folks over the years. The National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors began here in Boston, Massachusetts on 06/18/1890, at the Parker House as the National Association of Life Underwriters. National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors is the preeminent association for financial services professionals in The United States of America. NAIFA members exist in every congressional district and in every state house.
They subscribe to a strong code of ethics and represent a full spectrum of practice specialties to promote financial security for all Americans. Complemented by its professional development and consumer communities, the Society of Financial Service Professionals, and Life Happens, the association delivers value through advocacy, service, and education. NAIFA Massachusetts has over 430 members statewide5454 for licensed insurance agents and financial advisors who focus their practice in one or more of the following. Long term care insurance, disability insurance, life insurance, annuities, health insurance, employee benefits, multiline agencies, financial advising, and investments. What is NAIFA Massachusetts doing for constituents in Massachusetts? NAIFA Massachusetts a NAIFA Massachusetts member has been named by representative Thomas Stanley in House 792 to a commission to study statewide long term services and support benefit programs for the Commonwealth. NAIFA Massachusetts has three filed bills. All NAIFA's bills are to benefit consumers, your constituents, and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. And I do have, some written testimony here that I'll provide you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - It'd be great. Thanks.
SPEAKER35 - That concludes it. So thank you for your time.
SPEAKER1 - Thanks for your work, Matthew. Appreciate it. We look forward to getting that and, getting into the committee members. Thank you very much.
SPEAKER10 - Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Michael Curry. Michael.
MICHAEL CURRY - MASS LEAGUE OF COMMUNITY HEALTH CENTERS - Good afternoon. My name is Michael Curry, and I'm the president and CEO of the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers. We are proud to represent 50 community health centers across Massachusetts that care for more than 1,000,000 patients. That's one in seven people in the Commonwealth. And if you're in a city like Boston, one Out Of Every two people get their care at a community health center. So I'd like to thank Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, all the members of the committee for this opportunity to testify. I'm gonna go off script and share a little, interesting and humorous point. I was sitting there a minute ago and felt some nervousness come over me because I remembered it. It was 25 years ago that I testified before this committee for the first time. And then Chairman Ron Mariano was the chairman of the committee.
MURPHY - I might have been there that day. I was there I was there 25 years ago.
CURRY - And I was terrified he would ask me a question after I testified. So don't ask me no question. Don't ask me.
MURPHY - I'm much easier than he is. Trust me.
CURRY - Oh. For more than 50 years, community health centers have recognized that to improve health outcomes and to advance health equity, we must provide high quality care in addition to addressing the social determinants, like access to food, housing, education that influence our health and wellness. By mission and by mandate, community health centers are the are for are for patients regardless of their ability to pay. While we are used to doing more with less, we have a history of innovation every dollar, strategically, to provide services that are responsive to the needs of our patients5627 and communities. Significant and concerning changes at the federal level have caused considerable uncertainty for health centers, including recent cuts to health key health agencies that health centers rely on. Now we are faced with looming agencies that health centers rely on. Now we are faced with looming cuts to Medicaid, which is generally the best payer for health centers. Medicaid reimbursement accounts for nearly one-third of health centers' total revenues. Any cuts to Medicaid will be devastating for our health care system.
Health centers will be forced to curtail services or lay off staff. Care will become harder to access. People will get sicker and end up in emergency rooms. And at the cost of care, all will go up for everyone. The mass lead is working on legislative approaches to secure health center revenue streams at no cost to the state, one which is addressing increasing problematic actions against the 340 b drug pricing program. That is one you'll you'll hear about throughout the session, and we hope you will work with us on as well. Another ongoing issue for health centers is, under reimbursement from commercial payers. Health centers receive only 65% of what commercial plans pay other office-based practices for a physician visit. Commercial payers also reimburse health centers less than Medicaid for the same services. Despite all the challenges I could share with you today, the work of our members to provide responsive and accessible vulnerable patients and communities will go on. Thank you again for inviting me to speak. If you have any questions about these policy issues or the health centers generally, the mass league here is to serve as a resource for you. We look forward to working with you to address these issues with our legislation currently before, this, legislature. And just a quick shout-out to my good friend, Representative Worrell. Good to see you as well.
MURPHY - Thank you. Thanks, Michael. And I appreciate all the hard work you do. We really do. We know you're up against it. And thank you for coming in today. We appreciate it.
CURRY - Thank you. Appreciate it.
WORRELL - And I was also add thank you for the work you do for the three health centers in my district and making the black and brown community feel felt and also served. Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
Absolutely. Yes. Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Thank you. Timothy Ball. Tim? I think Tim's remote.
You see Tim on on the screen again? Hi. Hi, Tim. How you doing? Turn your microphone on so I can hear you. Maybe I can see you, but I just can't hear
you. Not yet. No.
It's thrown on Irene, is it?
I want to get back to you. Yeah. Get get back to you in a few minutes.
Zijor Azaglo. Okay.
Kim Olsen. Kim, are you here? Or am I?
SPEAKER36 - I'm online.
SPEAKER1 - Hi, Kim. Welcome.
KIM OLSON - THE PEW CHARITABLE TRUST - Thank you. Good morning. Thank you, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, and members of the committee for the opportunity to testify on retirement security issues and policy options. My name is Kim Olson, and I am the senior officer on the retirement savings project at the Pew Charitable Trust. Pew is a nonpartisan nonprofit, public policy organization. And this testimony is a summary of my written comments. Across the country, an estimated 57,000,000 private sector workers lack access to retirement savings at work. In Massachusetts, that number is 1,150,000 or about 42% of the private sector workforce. And while any person can set up a retirement account on their own through a financial institution, only 13% of Americans actually5886 save for retirement outside of work. Massachusetts faces a variety of challenges because workers are not saving enough. Insufficient retirement savings will increase pressure on public assistance programs, reduce tax revenue, and decrease spending by retirees.
Results of a study that Pew commissioned on the cost of insufficient savings in Massachusetts indicate, first, that the number of Massachusetts households with residents aged 65 and older is expected to increase from 762,000 to just over 1,120,000 by 02/1940. Second, as these demographics shift, a shrinking population of working age taxpayers will need to cover the costs for the financially vulnerable. And third, over the 20 year period ending in 02/1940, insufficient retirement savings will result in an additional state social assistance spending, via programs like Medicaid of nearly $14,000,000,000 But there's good news. If Massachusetts households saved an additional $215 per month, they could erase that additional tax payer burden and ensure that retiring households could maintain living standards they enjoyed during their working years. Now the question is always, how can households save more and avoid those outcomes? And the answer from the Pew's perspective is just expanding access to workplace savings. We know that employers care about their employees' financial well-being and many want to offer a retirement plan but they simply cannot do so.
So, states are taking action and many are turning to automated savings programs to close the access gap by providing a retirement savings option. A a simple payroll deduction individual retirement account to those workers whose employers cannot provide something. Now, 17 states have adopted these automated savings programs and 11 of those programs are already active. So we're seeing momentum building nationwide. And, you know, as a side note, in April of 20 23, I testified before this committee on this very topic. And since that time, five states have passed this program legislation. And together, these active programs are serving over eight years. So Pew is continuing to work with legislators in the Massachusetts House and Senate6024 on some legislation that would create a state automated savings program in Massachusetts. And we believe that doing so is essential to ensuring all Massachusetts workers can have a financially secure retirement. So thank you for this opportunity to provide our views, and I'm happy to take any questions. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you, Kim. Look forward to working with you. Appreciate you being here today. Thank you.
SPEAKER37 - Great. Thanks.
SPEAKER1 - Bill Rennie, Mass Retailers. Bill, are you online? Oh, just thinking you're
online. Welcome, Bill. Thank you.
BILL RENNIE - RAM - Chair Feeney, Chair Murphy, members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. My name is Bill Rennie. I am the senior vice president of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts. We are a statewide trade association of, formed in 1918, just down the street in downtown crossing by a group of, a6083 group of merchants over a hundred years ago. We represent retailers, large and small, a very broad range of the retail industry from general retail, gifts, gift stores, retail, gift gift stores, convenience stores, restaurants, auto service, chain and independent pharmacy, and, now cannabis. So a very broad range of the retail industry, again, large and small. Majority of our membership, retail industry, again, large and small. Majority of our membership would be, Massachusetts only, one or two locations, owner-operated stores. We primarily exist as the voice of retailing in Massachusetts, working on public policy issues here at the state house. We also offer our members discounted services and group buying opportunities to save our members money.
Two of those programs do involve, some issues here before RAM continues to operate, one of two remaining, certified small group, purchasing cooperatives. Co-ops were created in chapter 2, 8 February of the acts of, 2010, the small business, health care cost containment law. We offer health insurance to our members in the merged market with our with our partner, in that program, Blue Cross Blue6162 Shield in Massachusetts. The other program I wanted to mention was that we sponsor a division of6170 insurance-regulated, small business workers comp group. The Massachusetts retail merchants workers comp group. That was established in 1991, and that program covers, over 4,000 small businesses across the Commonwealth. In terms of issues before the committee, workers' comp issues, health insurance, particularly small business health6192 insurance, cost and affordability issues, also payment and sales transaction issues. Ram, was fortunate to be named to a seat on the special legislative commission, dev bill, passed last session, to study the future of payments. So we look forward to the discussions on the commission, and we look forward to working, with you all here on the committee on, the issues that come before you. Thank you.
MURPHY - Thank you, Bill. Thanks for the great work the retailers do, and, we appreciate your hard work. Look forward to work6224 with you on the commission this year and some other issues. So thank you very much.
RENNIE - Thank you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Leader Anderson, National Medical Society. How are you? Welcome back.
LEDA ANDERSON - MASS MEDICAL SOCIETY - Thank you. Good afternoon, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, members of the committee. Thanks for the opportunity to say hi today. My name is Leda Anderson. I'm the director of Massachusetts Medical Society. We're a professional association of over 24,000 physicians, residents, medical students, across all clinical disciplines, organizations, practice settings6273 in the commonwealth. Our mission is to advocate on behalf of settings in the commonwealth. Our6276 mission is to advocate on behalf of physicians,6278 but also very importantly on behalf of the patients they serve, to protect and improve access, equitable access to quality affordable healthcare in the commonwealth. As well as to promote physician well-being and advance health equity. Our goal is to offer the collective expertise of our physician leadership, our members, and our staff to serve as a trusted resource for you all, on all health care matters, state or federal, what have you, and especially on issues impacting your constituents.
So, please do reach out to us, wherever we can provide insight or clinical expertise. And, yeah, again, on, especially on impacting, issues impacting your constituents. You know, there have been a few references today to what's going on in Washington. And I think in light of the policy recent actions and proposals that we've seen out of the Federal Government, we certainly wanna reiterate our commitment, to protecting and improving access to and affordability of health insurance coverage, in the Commonwealth. In addition to working with the committee to be responsive, responsive to the, evolving, shall we say, federal landscape, there are a few issues before the committee that I do just wanna highlight.
I'm not gonna go into any detail, but, you know, we know the legislature made great progress last session, with some pretty significant, health care legislation, market oversight reform, prescription drug reform, substance use, legislation, that really made great strides, but we know that there's more to do and there are several issues before this committee that we think are gonna be really critical, to improving timely access to care for patients and also reducing unnecessary administrative waste, in the healthcare system. So think prior auth reform, there's a bill before the committee that will reconcile duplicative state and federal, disclosure requirements, and building upon our telehealth infrastructure in the Commonwealth. So, we really appreciate the committee's consideration and great work on these issues, and advancing them last session. And we really, look forward to working with you again in the session. So thanks. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thank you, Lita. No. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Emily Doolong?
Emily, are you online?
SPEAKER37 - I'm online. Can you see me and hear me okay?
SPEAKER1 - Yes. Yep.
EMILY DLONG - MHAR - Alright. I saw Mary's head nods, so I'll take that as a sign. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Chair Feeney, members of the committee, staff, nice to see you all. Emily DeLong, VP of government advocacy and public policy with the Massachusetts Health and Hospital for those who don't know, we are the leading voice for the Massachusetts hospital and health systems across the Commonwealth. Appreciate the invitation to reintroduce, myself and MHA to all of you today. But more than anything, appreciate the invitation to throw out the script. And so just wanted to say, again, we appreciate all the work we've done with the committee, both in your capacity as members, but also as legislators and patients in years prior, and look forward to working with you in this legislative session. Most of our legislative package is before the financial services committee this session, so we anticipate to be engaged in a lot of conversations moving forward. And please let us know how, myself, Steve, our CEO, or MHAR members can be helpful moving forward this session. But happy to stop there, and we'll take any questions. But if not, I'm sure we'll be speaking soon. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, Emily. Appreciate your work. Say hello to Steve for us. So we look forward to working with you again this year. Thank you. Let
me see6504 that. Just for a sec.
Kirsten Piper. Kirsten?
You can see Kirsten online in there.
Emily and Esther. Emily?
Welcome.
EMILY ANESTA - BAY STATE BIRTH COALITION - Hi. Thank you. Chair Feeny, Chair Murphy, really appreciate the opportunity to speak to you and the members of the committee this afternoon. I wanna introduce myself. I'm Emily Anesta. I'm a cofounder and I lead the Baystate Birth Coalition. We are a consumer-led grassroots nonprofit seeking to improve maternal and infant health in Massachusetts, through access to community-based care, which includes midwives and birth centers. We partner with dozens of organizations in the state, from community-based providers and clinics to advocates for civil rights, reproductive freedom, and health equity. As6586 I'm sure you're aware for the past four years or so, this legislature has been working to address the maternal health care crisis, which is a national issue also impacting families and individuals here in the commonwealth. The mass department of public health laid this out pretty starkly in their 2023 report where they showed that the rate of life threatening pregnancy complications had doubled in Massachusetts over a period of 10 years with enormous, inequities, disproportionately impacting black and brown individuals as well as people on public insurance and people with disabilities, due to things like, access barriers, racism, and bias.
In addition, closures of maternity wards and birth centers, across the state have reduced access to care, exacerbating this crisis. And, you know, the reason we're we focus on midwives and birth centers as a solution, is because they really meet this, triple aim of improving health care outcomes, of improving the patient experience, and also, lowering healthcare costs. Let's see, I wanna be quick. So all this led to, as you all know, the wonderful landmark omnibus6674 maternal health bill, an act promoting access to midwifery care and out-of-hospital birth options that passed last year. That mostly went through the public health committee, though there were components on nurse midwife reimbursement that went through this committee, and have already been really impactful. As this rolls out, as we'll see certified professional midwives getting licensed this year, more birth centers opening, there's a lot of issues, you know, that we're looking to build upon the success of last year, and some of that will be before your committee around reimbursement, workforce development, and so forth. So, really looking forward to working with you to continue to improve, maternal and reproductive health care in Massachusetts, so families can not just6719 survive, but thrive here, and let Massachusetts really lead6723 the nation in6725 solving this crisis.
MURPHY - Thank you for your work on the maternal health6729 field and a lot of other things. So we appreciate6731 that. So we look forward to working with you. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER41 - Thank you. You too.
SPEAKER1 - Catherine Rushfirth.
SPEAKER28 - Perfect. Sorry
SPEAKER1 - to make you wait all this time.
SPEAKER41 - No. No worries.
KATHARINE RESCHFORTH - ACNM - Thank you, Chair Murphy, Chair Feeney, the members of the committee. My name is Katharine Reschforth. I am a certified nurse midwife. I'm here representing the Massachusetts affiliate of the American College of Nurse Midwives. I'm also the policy director for Neighborhood Birth Center, which is working to open Boston's First freestanding birth center. So ACNM, we represent over 400 certified nurse midwives working throughout the Commonwealth in over 30 clinical sites, which include hospitals, community health centers, and birth centers. Midwives obviously are most associated with prenatal care and6779 pregnancy and birth, but we are full-spectrum reproductive and sexual health providers. So we can provide comprehensive family planning, menopause care, perinatal mental health, and other sexual health services. As my dear colleague and friend Emily just mentioned, midwives there's decades of data that midwives improve every single perinatal health measure, lower health care costs, and give people better experiences, but have historically been undervalued and underutilized in the health system. We are, like, beyond thrilled, that last year there's the maternal health mom on the bus that this committee took leadership on in terms of, nurse midwifery reimbursement. There are some major champions here in this room.
And I actually have some a nice update. So part of that is the MassHealth actually is now reimbursing those midwives at full parity with physicians that went into effect on January 1. And I can tell you already, Bay State out in Springfield has been able to hire 6 more midwives who are gonna serve an additional 400 families. So the things that we've been arguing all this time, which is if you get the reimbursement there, you could increase access. It is so nice to be here and say, oh, it was true. And we have an example already. So, you'll hear from us this session. We're gonna continue to talk to you all about midwifery care, the remaining reimbursement inequities for midwifery care through commercial payers, for birth center care, as well as workforce development, midwifery workforce development and data tracking for our birth outcomes. We're really lucky in Massachusetts. We6867 work wonderfully collaboratively with a number6869 of organizations all looking at reproductive justice and midwifery. This includes, so AC and M really works closely with Bay State Birth Coalition, with the National Association of Certified Professional Midwives with Repo Equity Now. So when you see one of us talking about birth birth centers or midwives, they're representing all of us. Anyway, thank you.
MURPHY - Thanks for your work. Thanks for sticking around. We appreciate it.
WORRELL - Mr. Chair, I just wanna thank all the great work that, Bay State has been doing, and thank Katharine for all the work she's been doing. She we're, Lincoln Sudbury alumnis. So I went to high school.
RESCHFORTH - Yeah. So you're looking at the Lincoln Sudbury glitter out out of here.
WORRELL - Yes. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
A good company, both of you. So thank you. Anybody else wanna testify that has not testified? I've reached out to the list here and the sign up list is also exhausted. So anybody here wanna testify? Sure.
Go ahead. Just state your name for me.
SPEAKER42 - Bob Wieckowski, Massachusetts State Auto Dealers Association.
SPEAKER1 - How do we miss you, Bob? Did you sign up? Did you sign up?
SPEAKER42 - I did.
SPEAKER1 - Alright. I missed you. I did. So welcome.
SPEAKER42 - But I'm,
SPEAKER1 - welcome back.
SPEAKER42 - I'm on the satellite campus today.
SPEAKER1 - Awesome. So shoot shoot. The floor is yours.
ROBERT OKONIEWSKI - MASS STATE AUTO DEALERS ASSOCIATION - But well, good morning. I appreciate your time today, Mr. Chairman, Chairman Feeney, through you to the committee members.
MURPHY - Bob, how are those car prices with the tariffs6956 coming now? 25% as of when? Tomorrow? Today?
OKONIEWSKI - Will they kick in, tomorrow?
MURPHY - Tomorrow. Yeah. Good luck with that. Bob represents the auto dealers. So go ahead, Bob.
OKONIEWSKI - So as I've been, telling reporters, you know, if someone's out there who's looking for a car, they they would definitely, in their better interest to, try to nail it down beforehand. So appreciate the time. We represent the, Massachusetts State Auto Dealers Association, Robert Okoniewski, executive vice president general counsel. We, represent the 427 franchise new car and truck dealers across the Commonwealth. We're, 20% of the retail economy in Massachusetts, and, we have over 25,000 employees collectively at all the dealerships. So that comes out to a little over 50 employees on average per dealership. We always have a number of issues, before this committee, especially in the vehicle transactional financial realm. We also have issues, regarding, auto insurance, auto body labor rates, service contracts, and just about anything else that pops up on the financial side of this industry. We always like to hold ourselves out as a resource to tap into on any issue that, you may have interest in. We always like to be helpful on that end and, appreciate the time today. Thank you. Look forward to, the rest of the, hearing season. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER1 - Thanks, Bob. Thanks for your work. Look forward to working with you again. Anxious to see what
SPEAKER42 - happens with your industry, so we're
SPEAKER1 - gonna be watching that too. So thank you very
SPEAKER42 - much. It will be interesting. Thank you.
SPEAKER1 - Tim Ball. I wanna get back to Tim. I called you earlier, but oh, he was I saw Tim.
SPEAKER43 - Yes. Can you hear me now?
SPEAKER1 - That's right. Tim. Yeah. Can you hear me okay now, or we can hear you now?
SPEAKER43 - Yeah. Can you hear me?
SPEAKER1 - Yeah. That's good. Go ahead.
SPEAKER43 - Okay. Great. Yeah. Sorry about that little glitch.
SPEAKER1 - Yeah.
TIMOTHY BALL - MASS ASSOCIATION OF PUBLIC INSURANCE ADJUSTERS - Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman Feeney, Chairman Murphy, and committee members. My name is Tim Ball. I'm the president of the Mass Association of Public Insurance Adjusters. Public Adjusters are licensed, regulated, and overseen by the Division of Insurance. We represent the insured in the negotiation of property insurance claims. That profession has been around over a hundred years, and I've been a public adjuster for 36 years. Some insurance companies,7097 from out of state,7099 I'll explain in a minute, have added some language to their policies prohibiting the insured from using our services. And they drew up an endorsement that changes the policy. It's called the anti-PA endorsement. It's very clear. It says that the insured shall not hire, engage, retain, contract with, or otherwise utilize the services of a public adjuster. We have two bills before you to eliminate the use of such language filed by Chairman Cahill and Chairwoman Lovely.
The two general types of property insurers in Massachusetts are admitted carriers who are licensed by the state of Massachusetts to conduct business here. They're basic everyday companies you all probably have heard of. They need approval from the division of insurance for policy language, changes to their policies, rates, etcetera. They are not using the endorsement against public adjusters at this time as it would have to be approved, by the DOI. And, we're confident they wouldn't do that. We have some excellent insurers here in Mass that we work with all the time. Then there are non-admitted surplus lines or also called excess and surplus lines carriers. They are not licensed in the state. Their rates and policies, endorsements, language, none of it is reviewed by anybody. They could write policies. Typically, they write for unique, complex, or high risk properties that don't meet or conform to admitted carriers guidance.
Again, they do not require7188 approval from the DOI for policy language. Now one of them has gone too far by inserting this language to their policies in this state. Our profession is licensed regulated by the division of insurance whose primary interest is to protect consumers, and they essentially endorse this profession. Yet, we've been cast aside and banned from use by this language, yet we're also the only ones involved in the adjustment of a claim with a fiduciary responsibility to the property owner. We are protecting their interest. We are pro-consumer all the way, and I'm sure we'll elaborate on this more in the future. I wanna thank you for the opportunity to introduce myself and look forward to working with you this session.
MURPHY - Tim, thank you for your testimony. Thank you for being here today. We appreciate what you, do. We appreciate working with you. So we'll be talking to you.
BALL - Thank you very much.
MURPHY - So I think that's it for the list that we have. Anybody wanna testify that we haven't gotten to or didn't sign up would like to testify? Looks like none. So I wanna thank members of the committee for being here today, returning members and new members. As you can see, this is a wide-ranging committee with septic matters, so thank you all for being here. And I'll turn over to my friend, Senator Feeney, for closing remarks here.
FEENEY - Thank you, Chair Murphy. I just wanna thank everybody that came and introduced themselves today or reintroduce themselves. And also, again, the members of this committee, I think, Mr. Chairman, we heard a theme among many of the testifiers today. And just to real quickly, professional educational programs, consumer protection, uncertainty from Washington DC, uncertainty about tariffs from Washington DC, for the Mass Insurance Federation, MassHealth and Medicaid, cuts we heard from the Association of Behavioral Health Systems, Mass League of Community Health Centers, worry about Medicaid cuts, evolving federal landscape from Mass Medical Society, and also, tariffs from the automobile industry. Mister chairman, this committee, and especially all the legislators here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts have an obligation and a responsibility this year with uncertainty happening in DC, to stand on the vanguard and protect the people of Massachusetts. And I am absolutely thrilled, to see the makeup of this committee and the members involved here. This is like, when you look around, this is the A team. This is like the Justice League or the Avengers of the, legislature. So whatever happens down in DC, I'm confident that financial services under your leadership and the members of this committee will lead, here in Massachusetts and make sure to protect them people. SHOW NON-ESSENTIAL DIALOGUE
SPEAKER10 - So thank
SPEAKER2 - you, mister chairman. Our leadership. Our leadership.
SPEAKER1 - Yep. So no. Thank you
SPEAKER10 - all for your time.
SPEAKER2 - The Avengers.
SPEAKER1 - And, we'll see you again.
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