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New from CommonWealth Beacon BALLOT QUESTION: Secretary of State Bill Galvin is pursuing a ballot question to allow same-day voter registration after the policy has stalled multiple times in the Legislature over the years. Michael Jonas reports.  OPINION: A production technician at Holbrook Community Access and Media, Caleb Tobin, argues in favor of legislation that would require streaming platforms to pay to support public access television as more households transition away from cable.

Massachusetts signals new gas customers may soon have to pay full hookup costs August 14, 2025 By BHAAMATI BORKHETARIA

GAS = METHANE The Department of Public Utilities has indicated that gas utilities may no longer be able to charge existing gas customers for the cost of adding new ones – one step among many that the agency is taking to wean the state off of natural gas to meet climate goals.

The agency is currently reviewing the climate compliance plans submitted by gas companies in April, to ensure their operations and future projects align with the state’s legally mandated climate goals. As part of this process, the DPU issued an order last week that new gas customers will be responsible for the entire upfront cost of connecting to the existing system unless the new customer has no alternative to natural gas.

The order addresses the “line extension allowance”– a much-debated policy that lets gas companies subsidize new customer connections by spreading infrastructure costs to existing ratepayers. Utility companies say this policy ensures equitable access, treats customers fairly, and lowers rates by sharing costs more widely. Environmentalists counter that it incentivizes natural gas infrastructure expansion, raises costs for current customers, and undermines climate goals.

“The DPU’s order establishes an intention to move away from line extension allowances for new gas hookups … to promote more affordable options for ratepayers,” a DPU spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “Line extension policies, along with other elements of the plans submitted by the gas companies, will be reviewed by the DPU over the next several months.”

The new policy, if enacted, would start after the DPU issues final decisions on the gas companies’ climate compliance plans, the timeline of which is not clear as the agency doesn’t have a statutory deadline. DPU proposed an earlier version of this change in February that included more circumstances in which a utility could claim an “exception” to continue offering line extension allowances. The updated proposal narrows those circumstances, permitting allowances only when no “technically feasible” alternative exists.

Across the US, states are reassessing gas utility line extension policies amid climate and energy affordability concerns. California and Colorado have started to eliminate the practice. New York passed a bill this summer aiming to phase out line extension allowances. Overall, 12 states plus Washington, DC, have either removed these policies or are actively reviewing them for reform, according to the Building Decarbonization Coalition, a national group that works on promoting fossil-fuel free buildings.

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The DPU made this decision after stakeholders like the Department of Energy Resources, the attorney general, the Sierra Club Environmental Law Program, and Conservation Law Foundation shared public comment letters and testimony to the agency that eliminating line extension allowances would change the equation for developers when considering whether to add gas or electrification and decarbonized energy in new buildings.

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More Context In enforcing new climate law, a dispute over the ‘obligation to serve’ natural gas customers (July 2025)  Healey’s energy affordability bill gets support, tough questions on Beacon Hill (June 2025)  The $500 million cut to Mass Save budget is ‘short-sighted,’ climate activists say (March 2025)

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Can Mass. turn the health care crisis around? This week on the monthly Health or Consequences episode of The Codcast, Eric Dickson, president and CEO of UMass Memorial Health, lays out a grim picture of health care in Massachusetts if the state and federal trajectory does not change. He discusses the primary care crisis and the troubling federal landscape with John McDonough of the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health and Paul Hattis of the Lown Institute. LISTEN NOW

What We're Reading IMMIGRATION: There are thousands of immigrant health and nursing home workers in Massachusetts who have lost or are at risk of losing their employment as a result of the Trump administration terminating their legal status. (WGBH)  RESIGNATION: Suffolk County Sheriff Steve Tompkins – who was arrested in Florida on charges that he extorted a Boston-based cannabis company – resigned from the Roxbury Community College board of trustees where he served as chair. (Boston Herald Propoganda rag  – paywall)  CULINARY PROGRAM: A culinary program run by Snapchef Foundation teaches incarcerated men at Norfolk County Correctional Center cooking skills that will help them get a job after being released. (WBUR)  AGING MARMOSETS: A University of Massachusetts laboratory euthanized 13 marmosets that were used to study aging and menopause two months before the facility closed at the end of July. People for Ethical Treatment of Animals has led a campaign against the lab and has claimed credit for expediting the shuttering of the lab. UMass officials and the lab researcher have cited federal funding cuts and shifting research priorities. (Daily Hampshire Gazette – paywall)  RARE BACTERIA: A rare, life-threatening bacteria – Vibrio vulnificus – was found on a beach in Buzzards Bay after a person was infected. The bacteria normally lives in warm salt water and heat waves can make more favorable conditions for Vibrio to flourish. More than 70 confirmed and probable cases of Vibrio have been reported so far in Massachusetts this year. (MassLive – paywall)

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