THE PIONEER BLOG

MuckRock

When Transparency Redeems: The Unexpected Case of Bill Galvin

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Dear Secretary of State William F. Galvin: On several occasions Pioneer Institute has criticized your perceived inaction in responding to complaints about various agencies’ non-compliance with public records law. On those occasions we opined that inaction by your office had the effect of promoting a culture that did not take the state’s duty to provide transparent information seriously enough. More recently, we wrote about emails between you and the Attorney General‘s office — emails which you claimed would validate your long-held position that you were a dedicated public servant stymied by outside forces. Having now read those emails, we agree with you and stand corrected. The records your office provided to us clearly show that previous attorneys general, the final […]

Jim Stergios

The Convention Center Expansion was a House of Cards

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In a piece by Jack Encarnacao in the Boston Herald, Richard Rogers, executive secretary-treasurer of the Greater Boston Labor Council claimed that opponents of the South Boston Convention Center expansion were “ideological.”  He called out Pioneer for putting ideology “ahead of the best interests of our regional and state economy.” As I noted in the piece, Mr. Rogers is doing his job, seeking to advance the interests of his members.  But his are partial interests–and advancing the interests of the GBLC in this case harms the interest of hundreds of thousands of fellow Massachusetts residents. The fact is that the South Boston Convention Center expansion has always been a vanity project with no economic and financial data to back it up.  In the […]

Greg Sullivan

Status Report on the Job Creation Impact of the Life Sciences Act of 2008

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This is the second in a continuing series of status reports published by Pioneer Institute on the Massachusetts Life Sciences Act of 2008 (LSA). This report presents an analysis of job growth in the life sciences industry in Massachusetts and other states utilizing data from the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (QCEW) published by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). The data presented in this report are for the 69-month period (23 quarters) beginning with the first quarter of fiscal 2009, the effective date of the Massachusetts Life Sciences Act of 2008 (LSA), through the third quarter of fiscal 2014, the most recent quarter for which BLS data are available. The LSA (Chapter 130 of the Acts of […]

Scott Haller

Is Keolis Up to the Task?

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The snow has melted from our streets, our fields are filled with oblivious geese, and the lights at Fenway shine on the Sox once again; all signs that Spring has finally arrived. But there is one thing that hasn’t changed, and another that we must not allow to fade. The MBTA is still struggling to snap out of a snow-induced coma, and our wait for a meaningful solution must hold firm as the failings of February retreat into the past. New on-time performance figures released yesterday show that last week’s return to normality may have been the peak of a dangerously sinusoidal pattern, hinting at continuing management problems at Keolis. The average on-time performance during the morning commute two weeks […]

MuckRock

Galvin Wants $70 to Show He Fought For Transparency

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On several occasions, both MuckRock and the Pioneer Institute have made their dissatisfaction with Secretary of State William Galvin’s role as Supervisor of Public Records perfectly clear. Few officials have worked harder to protect the government from the public’s right to transparency, ruling time and time against disclosure. Spurred by his abysmal handling of a request for officers’ drunken driving records – ruling that police are entitled to withhold whatever criminal records they choose to withhold without oversight, on the eve of Sunshine Week, no less – dissatisfaction with Galvin appears to be catching, with media outlets all over Massachusetts crying foul. In response to this increased scrutiny, Galvin’s gone on the defensive, arguing that, whatever appearances, his actions were […]

Greg Sullivan

What if “The Ride” operated like the best big paratransit systems in the US?

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OK, let’s cut straight to the answer.  If The Ride had operated as cost-efficiently as the ten most cost-efficient large-scale paratransit systems in FY2013, it would have saved between $48.2 million and $60.3 million in FY2013. If the MBTA can bring its costs per passenger trip going forward to the level of the average of the ten most cost efficient large scale paratransit systems in other U.S. cities, it will generate savings of $373 million between FY2016 and FY2021, the end of its current paratransit provider contract. Here’s the analysis to back up those claims. Pioneer Institute published a report yesterday concerning The Ride, the MBTA’s demand response paratransit service, comparing its cost per trip to that of other Massachusetts […]

Greg Sullivan

Guess Who Runs the Best Paratransit System in the MBTA’s District? Hint: It’s Not the T

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Pioneer Institute’s ongoing analysis of the MBTA’s operations, finances, and performance aims to inform the public debate about the true problems plaguing the T and the most effective ways to improve the commuter experience for Massachusetts’ 1.2 million public transit system riders. In recent weeks and months, Pioneer has published reports using Federal Transit Data to compare the MBTA to other, similar systems across the US. Recent reports found that: Contrary to accepted wisdom, the MBTA has not been cash starved relative to its national peers, whether in terms of its capital or operating budget. The MBTA has added more commuter rail miles than any other commuter rail system operating in the nation since 1991 The often-cited notions that the MBTA commuter […]

Mary Connaughton

Public Left in Dark on Carmen’s Union Contract

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Background Over the past two months, Pioneer Institute has focused substantial resources on analyzing the MBTA’s operations, finances, pension system and governance (leadership and accountability).  A key piece of our work has included comparisons of the Authority to other American transit systems.  We have provided comparisons to all systems, but have focused on like or peer systems.  We have also progressed from system-wide (all-mode) analyses to in-depth, mode-specific research. Prior Findings Using transit agency peers as defined by Integrated National Transit Database Analysis System (INTDAS), Pioneer debunked the myth that the MBTA is underfunded.  We’ve shown that the T expanded faster than any other system since 1991, the earliest year for which information is available in the National Transit Database, […]

Jim Stergios

A highly temporary solution on higher education

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With my older daughter heading off to college next year, the question of how much debt is too much debt for her take on is something I’m mulling over quite a bit these days. How much can you pay, how much will she need to borrow and work, and how much support, if any, can the institution provide? US Senator Elizabeth Warren has been asking this question, and she is right to raise the issue, given the burden on, as she puts it, their later “economic lives”—buying a house, leasing a car, building some savings, investing, etc. So what of Senator Warren’s proposal to cut federal borrowing rates from 10 to 4 percent?  Her call to wipe out the federal […]

Mary Connaughton

And What About the T’s Retirement Costs?

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Pension and other post-employment benefit (OPEB) costs significantly impact the MBTA’s financial position.  There’s been much talk about the T’s retirement costs but relatively little about how those costs and their funding rank among other large transit systems.  The MBTA has not set assets aside to fund OPEB obligations and is underfunding its pension costs. Neither is unusual, but what sets the T is apart is that it is significantly underfunding both. We reviewed each of the following systems’ 2013 audited financial statements to obtain data (not all systems have yet made 2014 statements available) Here’s how the T compares with pension information: *may include multiple pension plans The MBTA is the lowest of the largest transit systems in funding […]

Jim Stergios

Why the free fall in support for the Olympics

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Notwithstanding articles that pass the blame off on John Fish, then Doug Rubin’s Northwind Strategies, then everybody else on the local committee, the striking fall in support for the Olympics has little to do with any one person. It has to do with trust. While not for or against the Olympics at this point, I will admit that, as is the case with any big bold project, we believe it is important to remain skeptical early and to ask lots of questions.  That was true of the debate over the South Boston convention center in the 1990s, when we came out in opposition to the project, or more recently casinos, where we limited our work to questions surrounding the public trust […]

Editorial Staff

2015 Hewitt Health Care Lecture : Under the Microscope: Advancing Health Care Value Through Greater Transparency

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Dr. Robert S. Kaplan is the world’s leading authority on strategic performance measurement. Professor Kaplan discussed measuring medical-condition outcomes as well as the costs of treating medical conditions, and how these can lead to more transparent pricing.   Tickets: $50. To register click the Register Now! Button. For faster check-in please print and bring your ticket to the event. Ticket price for students: $25. No cost for Pioneer Members. Become a member today! Sponsorship opportunities are available, on the registration page. About the Featured Speaker: Dr. Robert S. Kaplan is the world’s leading authority on strategic performance measurement. He is a co-founder of both Palladium and its predecessor firm, Balanced Scorecard Collaborative, and currently advises practitioners on emerging best practices and […]

Editorial Staff

The MBTA Commuter Rail’s Cost Structure Is Off the Rails

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Read coverage of this report in The Boston Globe and the Boston Herald. Pioneer Institute’s ongoing analysis of the MBTA’s operations, finances, and performance aims to inform the public debate about the true problems plaguing the T and the most effective ways to improve the commuter experience for Massachusetts’ 1.2 million public transit system riders. Calls for more state funding ignore the system’s serious governance issues, including its misguided focus on expansion projects at the expense of its maintenance backlog. In recent weeks and months, we published reports using Federal Transit Data to compare the MBTA to other, similar systems across the US. Our last report on the T’s level of capital funding showed that the MBTA has not been cash […]

Mary Connaughton

Projections Matter and the MCCA Got it All Wrong

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The Boston Business Journal was dead-on when Craig Douglas wrote, “the BCEC’s expansion plan is a case in point for why Massachusetts is in such a financial quagmire today. It’s had virtually no relevant financial vetting. Its cost projections are Big Dig-esque.” His case in point was the recent room-night figures reported in the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority’s annual report.  “In the fiscal year that ended June 30, the BCEC’s slate of events directly generated 264,669 hotel room nights — its second lowest 12-month total since 2007. The Hynes generated another 208,000, or half of what it managed to book in 2001.” Charlie Chieppo, the master of all things Convention Center, put the grim hard numbers into further context in a […]

Scott Haller

Sunshine Must Return to MBTA This Spring

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What began as a benign winter, accumulating only 2.9 inches before the New Year, quickly escalated into a 99.1 inch, two-month-long blizzard throughout January and February. As the snow thaws and sunshine finally returns to Boston’s streets we must take care to learn what we can about dealing with disastrous winter conditions. What have we learned? Chronically deferred maintenance projects result in a rail system ill-prepared for consistently inclement weather; constant expansion has left the MBTA’s resources spread thin; don’t count on reliable delay information from the MBTA to help plan your commute; and when the going gets tough, the MBTA gets going a few months later. Recent on-time performance reports for the commuter rail for the week ending in […]