$100 Million in Chapter 90 Money Aimed at Rural Communities
JULY 21, 2025…..A $1.185 billion borrowing bill to fund local infrastructure maintenance cleared another legislative hurdle Monday and might be on track to emerge for a House vote as soon as Wednesday.
Hours after hosting a public hearing to review the measure, the Joint Committee on Bonding, Capital Expenditures and State Assets advanced the bill (H 4257) combining the latest annual authorization for the Chapter 90 program with hundreds of millions of dollars in additional grant funding.
Rep. Michael Finn, who co-chairs the panel, praised the measure as a way to balance the long-expressed local desire for more road and bridge maintenance funding with fiscal caution in the face of federal funding cuts.
“There’s not a day that goes by without a headline talking about how there’s reductions to federal funding,” Finn said at the hearing. “It’s just across the spectrum, the potential hits to our economy. So when I looked at this bill … I thought it was a positive and it recognizes the need of the municipality to have increased funding, but it also has some balance to it for the unknown.”
The committee opened a poll on the bill shortly after the hearing wrapped up, and by 5 p.m., its members had voted in favor of moving it forward to the House Ways and Means Committee.
The bill would allot $300 million to the Chapter 90 program, an increase over the traditional $200 million per year that Beacon Hill has favored for most of the last decade-plus. The additional $100 million would be carved up based on road mileage, which backers say would better support rural communities less favored by the traditional formula.
It also includes $885 million in borrowing to fund programs beyond Chapter 90, including $500 million for the Department of Transportation’s lifecycle asset management program, $200 million for culvert replacement and $185 million to tackle “congestion hotspots.”
Gov. Maura Healey’s original version of the bill (H 53), filed in January, would have authorized $1.5 billion in Chapter 90 funding over five years — the same $300 million per year level and distribution formula, but over a longer period of time — in addition to the $885 million in other grants.
The Transportation Committee rewrote the bill to pare back the Chapter 90 approach to a single year.
Lawmakers from both parties on Monday focused much of their attention on the extra $100 million in Chapter 90 money aimed at rural communities, praising it as a way to support cities and towns that historically have not benefited much from the program.
“That $100 million means a lot to communities who really have no other options for paying for road upkeep,” said Rep. Aaron Saunders, a Belchertown Democrat.
Republican Rep. Joseph McKenna of Sutton added, “The road mileage piece that was added is phenomenal. I think it’s a great piece to bring some equity in road funding to rural communities that have been lagging for years.”
They also tossed around the question of whether leaning on revenue from the surtax on high earners to expand state borrowing capacity — which Healey has proposed doing for both transportation and for higher education infrastructure — meshes with the intent of the voter-approved law.
Kaitlyn Connors, assistant secretary for capital in the Executive Office for Administration and Finance, likened borrowing against surtax funds to “expanding the pie for how much capital resources we have to address these needs” as the state approaches its statutory debt limit.
Finn said he had been debating whether the approach matched the “spirit” of the new levy, which is designed to fund additional investments in education and transportation.
“I think the answer is yes, right? Because at the end of the day being able to leverage some of this money, this dedicated revenue stream, at a very good bond rate would probably be more beneficial to all of the residents,” Finn said.
The House has a formal session planned for Wednesday. Top Democrats have not yet signaled what legislation they plan to bring forward, and the bond bill — a version of which the Legislature typically approves every spring or summer — might emerge for action.
