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News

By Paris Alston and Callum Borchers | Feb 18, 2021
Senator Chang-Díaz and the Vaccine Equity Now! Coalition discuss Massachusetts' vaccine rollout
News
By Nik DeCosta-Klipa | Feb 09, 2021
From pre-registration to a mobile vaccine program.
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WGBH
By Tori Bedford | Jan 01, 2021
State Sen. Sonia Chang-Díaz, who was one of the bills sponsors, said the law is a “mile-marker,” but not an end to an ongoing fight against racism in policing.
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By Sarah Betancourt | Jan 01, 2021
Gov. Charlie Baker signed sweeping police reform legislation on Thursday that will create a mandatory certification process for law enforcement and launch the nation’s first civilian-led police oversight board with subpoena power and decertification authority.
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By Matt Stout | Dec 22, 2020
Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz, a Jamaica Plain Democrat, lamented that many things “over-policed communities pleaded for” are not in the bill, including binding definitions of use of force. But she said there was much for advocates to celebrate.
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By Greater Boston | Dec 02, 2020
State Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz, who served on the police reform conference committee, and state Representative Russell Holmes, who has long pushed for many of the changes included in the bill, join Jim Braude to discuss the long-awaited police reform bill.
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By Chris Lisinski and Sam Doran | Dec 02, 2020
"I'm really satisfied with the total product of this bill," Sen. Chang-Diaz said. "...It is a final package that strikes a lot of wins for accountability, for community voice at the table of power, for changing our vision for what public safety is and means from one of force and punishment to one of de-escalation and helping and prevention."
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By Deborah Becker | Nov 20, 2020
The lawmakers say the Department of Correction will expand testing and take steps to release prisoners to home confinement.
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By Chris Burrell | Nov 17, 2020
With immigrant communities disproportionately impacted by COVID-19, the debate about whether to allow unauthorized immigrants in the state to get driver’s licenses is heating up.
Press Release
Jul 14, 2020
Bill enacts reforms to raise police accountability standards, shift resources to communities and build equity, justice and fairness
Video/Media
Jul 10, 2020
Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz speaks after the second day of delaying debate on the Senate's Reform, Shift + Build Act
News

State House News Service
By Katie Lannan | Jul 06, 2020
The Massachusetts Senate plans to vote Thursday on a wide-ranging bill that would create a process for certifying and de-certifying officers and impose new limits on use of force, including a ban on chokeholds and restrictions on the use of tear gas.
Press Release
Jul 06, 2020
Bill enacts reforms to ban aggressive police tactics, significantly raise standards for accountability in law enforcement and reprioritize public safety resources
Press Release
Jun 18, 2020
On behalf of their constituents and in solidarity with the Movement for Black Lives, the legislators filed An Act to make Juneteenth a State Holiday.
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The Boston Globe
By Matt Stout and Dasia Moore | Jun 02, 2020
Mobilized by the social unrest gripping the country, the state’s top political leaders of color gathered Tuesday to urge action across all levels of government, their words underwritten by a docket of resolutions, policies, and legislation they say are designed to transmute anger into change, increasing police accountability and chipping away at structural racism.
Press Release
Jun 02, 2020
Coalition unveils 10-point plan for policing reform and accountability.
Press Release
May 14, 2020
Legislation will study disparities in treatment among communities of color.
News

Jamaica Plain News
By David Ertischek | Apr 23, 2020
“Ensuring people have safe, reliable housing throughout this crisis is one of the most important things we can do to flatten the curve and save lives right now,” said state Sen. Sonia Chang-Díaz (D-2nd Suffolk).
Press Release
Apr 21, 2020
The moratorium provides some of the strongest protections in the nation for renters, homeowners, and small business owners harmed by COVID-19.
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WGBH
By Esteban Bustillos | Mar 20, 2020
State Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz’s Twitter feed has been filled with information about local resources in both English and Spanish.
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MassLive
By Melissa Hanson | Mar 05, 2020
“This is both a critical and efficient step in delivering on the requirement that money from marijuana tax revenues be spent on restorative economic development for communities harmed by the War on Drugs,” said state Sen. Sonia Chang-Díaz, the chair of the joint committee.
News

State House News Service
By Chris Lisinski | Nov 27, 2019
Massachusetts will invest an additional $1.5 billion in K-12 public education over the next seven years after Gov. Charlie Baker signed a funding reform bill, touted by supporters as a generational change, into law Tuesday.
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Lowell Sun
By Editorial | Nov 22, 2019
The bill, dubbed the Student Opportunity Act, represents the most significant update to the funding formula since it was established as part of the 1993 Education Reform Act.
Press Release
Nov 20, 2019
The bill would set a new national standard for equitable K-12 funding.
News
WWLP
By Jodi Reed | Nov 16, 2019
Senator Chang-Diaz said the current policies in place make it hard for inmates to return to civilian life once they are released.
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MassLive
By Shira Schoenberg | Oct 03, 2019
Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, D-Boston, a former Education Committee chair and a leader on education funding reform, said, “This bill stands as our commitment that, in Massachusetts, zip code must not be destiny.”
Video/Media
Oct 03, 2019
"Our session today continues nearly a half-century of work for educational equity. And this bill would not exist without the generations of Bay Staters who tirelessly and passionately kept the cause alive. Who saw the work ahead and never gave up, even when political insiders believed the issue was dead."
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Boston Globe
By Sonia Chang-Díaz | Sep 30, 2019
Fulfilling the promise of public education as the great equalizer is our next big goal. Bay Staters believe in it. It’s a goal our constitution anchors us to. Now, that collective effort in advocating, crafting policy, and working together has given us a chance to deliver on it.
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MassLive
By Shira Schoenberg | Aug 28, 2019
Chang-Diaz noted that mass shootings, especially those involving middle-class white children, make headlines. But she asked fellow lawmakers to have that same “sense of horror, unacceptance, urgency when shootings happen in Dorchester or Roxbury or Springfield or Holyoke or other urban communities, when the child’s riddled body is black or brown and their family is low-income, doing their best to make ends meet.”
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Dorchester Reporter
By Katie Trojano | Aug 14, 2019
“There’s no reason it had to be this way, the situation we find ourself in now is due to years of deferred maintenance. Deferring maintenance is a habit that State leaders need to break,” Chang-Diaz said.
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MassLive
By Shira Schoenberg | Jul 31, 2019
“At what point does ‘we’re working on it’ become justice delayed and denied?” Chang-Diaz said the Senate has passed the recommendations of the Foundation Budget Review Commission multiple times. “The Legislature has had nearly four years to consider the recommendations — that’s half a kid’s elementary school years,” she said. “There’s no good reason that students will go back to school with no foundation funding plan in place.”
Video/Media
Jul 01, 2019
On July 1st, Sen. Chang-Díaz joined more than 300 volunteers across the MBTA system to canvass to stop the new #UnfairHikes.
News

Dorchester Reporter
By Jennifer Smith | Jun 27, 2019
In an extended interview during and after The Horse Race podcast last week, Chang-Díaz told the Reporter that the dramatic funding boost is necessary to fully meet the state’s obligation to provide a quality education to its students while grappling with the greater cost of educating disadvantaged children. It expands on the bipartisan though last-minute efforts of the last cycle.
News

MassLive
Public school advocates have $950 million incentive to lobby for education funding bill, study finds
By Shira Schoenberg | Jun 17, 2019
Chang-Diaz said the difference in funding between the PROMISE Act and Baker’s plan is “stark” and represents the difference between a school district hiring a fraction of a school counselor or starting a quality preschool program.
Press Release
Jun 08, 2019
Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz has announced neighborhood office hours for June 2019.
News

The Boston Globe
May 17, 2019
The nascent legal pot industry is dominated by white players and out-of-state corporations. Enter state Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz.
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Energy News Network
By Sarah Shemkus | Apr 25, 2019
“I want to fix it because it is just plain unfair,” said state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, the bill’s sponsor in the Senate.
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Boston Herald
By Mary Markos | Mar 22, 2019
“Massachusetts still has one of the worst achievement gaps in the nation between rich and poor students,” state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz said in her testimony. “Everybody knows that money alone won’t do it, but we also know that you can’t do it without money.”
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Boston Patch
By Jenna Fisher | Mar 22, 2019
During eight hours of testimony, hundreds took to the mic to indicate their support for the PROMISE Act.
Video/Media
Mar 22, 2019
It is past time to implement a sensible, effective plan to fix our broken education funding system.
Press Release
Feb 04, 2019
Senator Sonia Chang-Díaz has announced neighborhood office hours for February 2019. Office Hours, held by Sen. Chang-Díaz and her staff, will take place within each of the neighborhoods of the Second Suffolk District.
News
Jamaica Plain Gazette
By Seth Daniel | Jan 27, 2019
JP Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz took the podium at the 49th annual Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast in the South Boston Convention Center and used the shining light of Dr. King’s example to call for another local fight for justice – that being the justice of equal education funding.
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Boston.com
By Nik DeCosta-Klipa | Jan 11, 2019
Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, the lead sponsor of the PROMISE Act, says it “isn’t about providing ‘new’ or ‘extra’ funds. It's about making good on what we've already promised.”
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The Boston Globe
By Victoria McGrane | Jan 10, 2019
Seeking to accelerate Beacon Hill’s often glacial pace, Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz on Wednesday rolled out a revamped version of the Senate’s funding bill from last session alongside four dozen legislators, mayors, and other advocates gathered behind the podium.
Press Release
Jan 09, 2019
Educators, local leaders, and state legislators united at the State House today to call for passage of the Education PROMISE Act in 2019. The bill is backed by a broad coalition of students, teachers, parents, superintendents, school committees, legislators, and experts from the heart of Boston to the outskirts of Western Massachusetts.
News

State House News Service
By Katie Lannan | Jan 09, 2019
Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, a Boston Democrat who was the main architect of the Senate's $1 billion school funding bill last year, Wednesday morning filed a similar bill -- dubbed the Education Promise Act -- that includes language addressing some concerns raised with the previous version.
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WBUR
By Max Larkin | Jan 09, 2019
State Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz has again put forward an ambitious bill to increase funding for Massachusetts public schools. Again, a large and vocal coalition has assembled behind it.
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Politico
By Stephanie Murray | Jan 07, 2019
"Every year that we wait as a legislature to act on a highly-vetted, highly-researched, highly-debated road map that this bipartisan group of experts has given us, is a year that students can't get back," Chang-Díaz told me in a recent interview.
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U.S. News & World Report
By Lauren Camera | Nov 23, 2018
"I'm proud to see this important civics education bill signed into law," Massachusetts state Sen. Sonia Chang-Diaz, a Democrat who heads the Joint Committee on Education, said during the signing. "In light of recent reports of voter suppression and the perilous state of our country's civic and political life today, this legislation is especially critical."
Press Release
Oct 30, 2018
Office Hours, held by Sen. Chang-Díaz and her staff, will take place within each of the neighborhoods of the Second Suffolk District.
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