Governor Maura Healey signed a trio of bills Friday pertaining to child welfare, home care licensure, and seizing Norwood Hospital property, as she goes about cleaning off the plethora of bills lawmakers sent her way last week.
The child welfare law includes a so-called Foster Child Bill of Rights and creates a dedicated education infrastructure inside the Department of Children and Families, requiring DCF to appoint an education director to oversee its education policy. The law also “streamlines and modernizes” DCF oversight and reporting requirements, the Healey administration said.
“Every child deserves the opportunity to grow up safe, supported, and set up to succeed, and every family deserves somewhere to turn before a challenge becomes a crisis,” Healey said in a statement Friday afternoon. “We’re building one of the strongest child and family support systems in the country by strengthening protections for children, expanding community-based support for families, and making our child welfare system more transparent and accountable.”
The House passed its child welfare bill on a 159-1 vote in October, and the Senate in June unanimously passed its version. The compromise law transfers the state’s child fatality review team from the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner to the Office of the Child Advocate and implements a new, stronger description of the OCA so it can maintain independence. The section calls the office “an independent state agency that shall not be subject to the supervision or control of any other executive office, executive agency, commission, board, bureau, or political subdivision of the commonwealth.”
Child Advocate Marisol García said this week that she “is overjoyed” about the legislation, adding that it “helps safeguard the wellbeing and rights of children in state care, provides our office with additional tools to review child fatalities and critical incidents, and reforms the Child Requiring Assistance system — shifting children and families toward resources rather than court involvement.”
The law Healey signed related to Norwood Hospital enables the state to take the property occupied by the under-construction facility by eminent domain.
The law exerts pressure on Medical Properties Trust, an Alabama-based real estate investment trust that owns the property, to make a deal before the state steps in and takes the land. Lawmakers enacted the bill on the last day of scheduled formal sessions last Friday and shipped it to Healey’s desk. The governor on Friday blamed Steward and former CEO Ralph de la Torre for delays that impacted the town and residents.
“Now, we need MPT to do the right thing and come to a reasonable agreement with a qualified operator who can rebuild the hospital. Our administration will be closely following their progress and will be prepared to act if MPT does not follow through,” she said.
Healey’s signature brings the Steward Health Care bankruptcy saga nearly to a close in Massachusetts. Norwood Hospital shuttered in 2020 due to catastrophic flooding, and construction to rebuild the site came to a halt when Steward went bankrupt. MPT, Steward’s landlord, continues to own the property and says it has invested more than $350 million into rebuilding the hospital.
On the House floor late last Friday, Representative John Rogers of Norwood told MPT, “Get out of Massachusetts.”
The law directs the Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance to conduct a competitive bidding process for a nonprofit health care operator. DCAMM is instructed to delay that process or any land taking if a sale, lease, or agreement between MPT and a health care operator “appears likely to result in near-term execution.” The law takes effect Nov. 1.
Healey also signed into law legislation imposing a licensure framework on the home care workers who help the state’s aging population with non-medical care like dressing, meal preparation, bathing, and more. Lawmakers came to an agreement on the legislation last week. The law attempts to implement ways to ensure safety for both home care workers and clients of home care agencies, an industry lawmakers say is underregulated.
“This law strengthens the safety, quality, and accountability of home care across Massachusetts, giving families confidence in the care their loved ones receive and supporting the dedicated workers who make independent living possible,” Healey said Friday.