Healey lays out agenda for housing, education
In her most detailed speech since declaring her candidacy last year, Gov. Maura Healey last Thursday outlined policies and legislative goals her administration plans to pursue, speaking to lawmakers during her swearing-in ceremony in the House chamber.

BHA redeveloping its public housing
When the first rehabbed units in the Mission Main public housing development came online in 1999, it was the culmination of a seven-year, nearly $100 million process during which the 1940 brick-and-concrete development was razed and rebuilt as a community of three-story woodframe buildings.

Councilors call for police officers in schools
A letter signed by four Boston City Council members calling for more police officers and “non-invasive” measures like metal detectors in Boston Public Schools is drawing criticism from advocates who are striving to reduce police and law enforcement presence in schools.

Doo-wop singer, dancer, author, Ilanga dies at 82
As a young man, Ilanga helped form a popular doo-wop and rhythm and blues group, the G-Clefs, comprising himself, his brother Chris and various cousins, who performed in and around Boston at venues including the Strand Theater and the Wonderland Ballroom.

Payouts slow to come in drug lab settlement
“The feedback I’ve gotten is that people haven’t gotten their check yet, and they’re understandably anxious to receive compensation,” said Luke Ryan, an attorney with Sasson Turnbull Ryan & Hoose who has been actively involved in the effort to find justice for families caught up in the state drug lab scandal from a decade ago.

Remembering King’s Boston legacy
Martin Luther King Jr.’s achievements were so significant for the welfare of humanity that most people lose sight of how short his life was. He was assassinated at the age of 39. Although he was a son of Georgia, Dr. King spent many of his adult years in Boston.

A Republican agenda that violates the peoples’ interests
With the world in the throes of a severe international inflation, the United States, the world’s largest economic power, may have lost much of its capacity to ameliorate the problems.

Dr. King’s quest for economic justice continues
On January 16, the nation will mark its 37th national holiday honoring the life of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Across the country observances will chronicle how one man’s efforts pricked the moral conscience of the nation in a lifespan of only 39 years.

IN THE NEWS
Amplify Latinx, Massachusetts-based nonprofit non-partisan, collaborative convener advancing Latinx leadership representation, economic prosperity, and civic engagement, recently announced Eneida Román as its new president and CEO.

Inaugural address
Governor Maura Healey approaches the House chamber for her swearing-in and inaugural address..

A call for answers in Cambridge cop shooting
Members of the local Bangladeshi community and their supporters continue to seek answers in the death of 20-year-old Sayed Faisal, who Cambridge police shot and killed last Wednesday after he allegedly approached officers with a knife. And while people may want questions resolved as soon as possible, any solid clarity may be a long time coming.

Voter fraud claims led to voter suppression laws
Two years after false claims of voter fraud fueled the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, those same lies are shaping restrictive voter laws in a slew of states nationwide, explains Sean Morales-Doyle, director of the Voting Rights Program at the Brennan Center for Justice.

Doctors raise concerns about COVID response
The new subvariant accounts for 75% of new infections on the East Coast and 40% of new cases in the country overall. Moreover, the XBB 1.5 subvariant contains five new mutations not found on Omicron, on which the current vaccine boosters are based. “It can evade antibodies better and infect human lung tissue easier than earlier strains,” said Dr.

Long road to recognition in a city King once called home
Yet, unlike these other cities that King once called home — and many other major U.S. cities — Boston has until now had no major monument to the slain civil rights leader.

Boston loomed large in King’s formative years
His first apartment here was at 170 St. Botolph St. in the South End. At the time, the neighborhood was the center of Boston’s Black community, with many railroad porters renting rooms in the area adjacent to the former railyard that is now the site of the Prudential Center.

King made connections with local community
The first one, made on the advice of his father, Daddy King, was to the Howland Street residence of the late Rev. William H. Hester and his wife, Beulah, a prominent social worker. Hester was an old friend of Daddy King’s and longtime pastor of the Twelfth Baptist Church, one of the city’s most prominent churches.

Tracy Heather Strain directs Zora Neale Hurston doc
“Zora Neale Hurston: Claiming A Space,” premieres on PBS Tuesday, Jan. 17 at 9 p.m. as part of the network’s “American Experience” series. A major writer and anthropologist, Hurston was a leader of the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s and 1930s.

Celebrate MLK
The King family and local leaders will gather on the Boston Common for the unveiling of the “Embrace” memorial. Designed by artist Hank Willis Thomas, the memorial commemorates the legacies of Martin Luther King Jr. and Coretta Scott King and their time in Boston.

Stories on the Roxbury stage
On Saturday, Jan. 14 at 6:30 p.m., Hibernian Hall in Nubian Square will come alive with the age-old sound of storytelling. “Roxbury Roots II: You Don’t Know My Story,” is the second of these live storytelling events, designed to bring the community together and foster connectivity.