State House News Service

The Sumner Tunnel will be undergoing some much-needed repairs starting Saturday morning. Driver’s will have to find new routes — including many traveling from Boston’s Logan International Airport — and business owners and residents in downtown and East Boston will have to deal with major inconvenience

Traveling between downtown Boston and East Boston, including Logan International Airport, is about to become even more of a headache. A major, year-plus rehabilitation project in the Sumner Tunnel, which is in a state of “disrepair” 87 years after it opened as the first traffic tunnel in Massachusetts, is set to kick off Friday night. The work will shutter the…

The Sumner Tunnel is set to close Friday night as MassDOT crews work to modernize the century-old tunnel — but not without anticipating some traffic headaches.

Massachusetts Democrats on Saturday afternoon endorsed Maura Healey’s quest to move from the attorney general’s office to the governor’s suite but also put Sonia Chang-Díaz on the September primary ballot, ensuring that Healey will have some intraparty competition before she could turn her full attention to any Republican opponents. Healey, serving her eighth year as attorney general and who...

Traveling between downtown Boston and East Boston, including Logan International Airport, is about to become even more of a headache. State transportation officials are preparing next month to kick off a major, year-plus rehabilitation project in the Sumner Tunnel, which is in a state of “disrepair” 87 years after it opened as the first traffic tunnel in Massachusetts. The work…

Massachusetts cities and towns, school districts, libraries, public hospitals and other entities will be able to purchase rapid COVID-19 test kits for $5 to $26 per test under a new state contract, the Baker administration announced Wednesday. The administration signed contracts with Ellume Limited, iHealth and Intrivo to make at-home antigen tests available to municipalities and a range of other…

After hosting an oversight hearing that top state health officials skipped, high-ranking lawmakers are calling on Gov. Charlie Baker to consider a menu of pandemic management options, including quarantine and isolation shelters and a pause on school mask mandate exemptions. Baker on Tuesday introduced a masking advisory, outlined plans to have the National Guard assist the health care sector, and…

The Massachusetts State Senate on Wednesday went on record supporting the permanent adoption of COVID-era voting allowances like expanded early voting and voting-by-mail, and also adopted policies like same-day registration that go beyond the changes made to accommodate elections during a pandemic. The bill passed 36-3 along party lines after Democrats rejected an alternative the Republican senators offered to address many...

Potentially coming soon to a sliver of Allston land near you: four rail tracks, eight lanes of the Massachusetts Turnpike, four lanes of Soldiers Field Road, and a pedestrian boardwalk over the Charles River, all laid out side-by-side. Ten years after discussions on the project started, the Baker administration on Wednesday embraced a design for a once-in-a-generation, $1.7 billion infrastructure…

Hospital leaders sounded an alarm Wednesday about the workforce challenges plaguing them as they continue to grapple with the COVID-19 pandemic’s effects. “I get that people fully want to go back to some semblance of normal, but our health care organizations don’t have that option,” Steve Walsh, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Health & Hospital Association, said during...