The Massachusetts House and Senate Conference Committee on Joint Rules has advanced new legislative rules for the 2025-2026 session. These rules outline how lawmakers will consider and vote on legislation, as well as how the public can provide feedback on bills.
Geoff Foster, Executive Director of Common Cause Massachusetts, stated, “Strong legislative rules are critical to ensuring everyone gets a voice in the policies that impact their lives. From the very beginning of this process, Common Cause Massachusetts urged lawmakers to adopt more transparent, accessible rules for this session. The new rules announced today accomplish just that by increasing transparency for the public and accountability for lawmakers.” He added that they are pleased with the inclusion of more advanced public notice of hearings, publicly posted committee votes, and public access to written testimonies. Foster expressed gratitude towards House Majority Leader Moran and Senate Majority Leader Creem for their transparency during negotiations.
The proposed new rules include several measures aimed at enhancing transparency:
– Publicly posting committee members’ votes.
– Making most submitted written testimonies public.
– Increasing required public notice of hearings from 72 hours to up to 10 days.
– Requiring hybrid meeting participation so the public can watch or testify at hearings either in-person or remotely.
– Ensuring that the first conference committee meeting is open to both the public and press.
– Maintaining a formal session deadline of July 31, 2026, while allowing continued handling of conference committee reports and veto overrides after this date.
Common Cause Massachusetts had initially called for these changes since no comprehensive update had been completed since 2019.
The full list of agreed joint rules is available online.
