Beacon Hill passes flurry of late-night bills

Beacon Hill lawmakers sent a flurry of eleventhhour bills to Gov. Charlie Baker’s desk in a marathon late-night session that tested the limits of tradition and where they finally took action on a series of bills that sat gridlocked in secret negotiations for months.

With the session officially over, Baker will have the final word on each piece of legislation placed on his desk. Any mechanisms to veto his decisions have expired.

In the final push to pass major legislation, both the House and Senate extended their final day of sessions into the wee hours of Wednesday morning, pressing past the typical midnight deadline.

Their actions paid off. Lawmakers closed deals on an economic development and jobs bill, a $17 billion transportation infrastructure financing bill, a craft brewers and beer distributors bill, legislation targeting sexual violence on college campuses and a bill that could spur a change to the state seal and motto.

The highly anticipated $626.5 economic development and jobs bill nearly fell apart, but a conference committee inked a lastminute deal. It includes Baker’s Housing Choices legislation intended to spur more high-density zoning as well as millions in pandemic relief.

It includes $30 million for a loan program similar to the federal Paycheck Protection Program for businesses hurt by COVID-19, and funding for job training, tourism, technology and advance manufacturing and $50 million in funding for transitoriented housing, to name a few.

It also caps the amount third-party delivery services such as Door Dash or Uber Eats can charge local restaurants. The down-to-the-wire action closed out a chaotic end to a session like no other. Lawmakers in July extended the legislative session in an effort to shore up business deferred or affected by the coronavirus pandemic.