MassBudget PolicyTALKS: Progressive Revenue

Join MassBudget as we present a new toolkit of over 20 progressive revenue options to address looming state fiscal challenges.

With the federal administration slashing funding for state-administered safety net programs, Massachusetts is expected to lose billions of dollars over the coming few years for programs like SNAP and MassHealth, harming hundreds of thousands of people across the Commonwealth. Hear from local, state, and national experts as MassBudget leads a discussion about the challenges Massachusetts faces, what can be learned from other states, and options for home-grown revenue solutions. 

Event Details

📅 Date: Tuesday, September 22, 2026

⏰ Time: 9:30 AM – 11:00 AM

📍 Location: Zoom (link sent with registration confirmation)

Why Attend?

• Join this space where we bring together experts on progressive policies to discuss proposed solutions and how to improve, implement, and/or propose new ones. 

• Understand how the Commonwealth can weather financial storms by adopting additional progressive revenue options.

MassBudget is a trusted voice for rigorous research and deep and critical public policy analysis. MassBudget specifically focuses on understanding the state budget through an equity lens.

Through our PolicyTALKS, we will provide a platform for informed dialogue and practical policy recommendations that lead to a racially and economically just Commonwealth.

Meet the panelists!

Moderator 

Kurt Wise is a Senior Policy Analyst at the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center, focusing on tax policy. Before joining MassBudget, Kurt worked as a policy analyst at the Maine Center for Economic Policy and the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation. 

In his twenties and early thirties, Kurt owned and operated a small, book wholesaling business. During that period, he also worked in cabinetry and construction, eventually designing and building his own, super-insulated home in the woods of Pelham, Massachusetts.

Aidan Davis is the State Policy Director at the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP). She coordinates ITEP’s state tax policy research and advocacy agenda and works closely with state and national organizations, policymakers, and legislative staff to advance policy solutions that aim to achieve equitable and sustainable state and local tax systems.

She is the lead or co-author of numerous publications with topics ranging from tax policy trends across the country, progressive revenue raising options, refundable tax credits, inequality and poverty, and ITEP’s flagship report, Who Pays? A Distributional Analysis of the Tax Systems in All Fifty States.

Peter Enrich is an emeritus professor of law at Northeastern University School of Law in Boston, where he specialized in state and local government law, state and local tax and fiscal policy, and intergovernmental relations. Following law school, Professor Enrich clerked for Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer during his tenure on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit. He subsequently served as general counsel to the Massachusetts Executive Office for Administration and Finance under Governors Dukakis and Weld, before joining the law school's faculty in 1991.

Professor Enrich frequently serves as an advisor to state and local governments and to advocacy groups interested in state and local fiscal and regulatory policy, and he argued a prominent state taxation case before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2006. He has served on MassBudget’s Board of Directors since its inception.

Chris Marino serves as the Assistant Secretary for Budget at the Executive Office for Administration and Finance, a position that he has held since September 2023. In this role, he oversees the development of the governor’s annual budget recommendation, as well as the management of the Commonwealth’s finances over the course of the fiscal year.

Prior to his time with the Healey-Driscoll Administration, Chris spent nine years with the Massachusetts Senate Committee on Ways and Means, including six years as the Committee’s Budget Director. He is a proud graduate of Boston College from which he earned a degree in Political Science in 2014. Chris resides in Dedham with his wife, daughter, and golden retriever.

Anabel Santiago Gibson is the Co-Executive Director of the Coalition for Social Justice Education Fund (CSJ). She brings nearly a decade of experience in community, faith-based, and labor organizing, coalition building, and campaign work.

Anabel began with CSJ as a college student volunteer in 2016 and later served as the Grassroots Coordinator, leading regional organizing for Raise Up Massachusetts. She has also held organizing roles with Jobs with Justice/MA COVID Response Alliance, Brockton Interfaith Community, and AFT Massachusetts, where she led contract negotiations and campaigns for educator unions across the state.

Rooted in participatory leadership and community power, Anabel has helped advance major victories across Massachusetts, including the $15 minimum wage, Paid Family and Medical Leave, transgender nondiscrimination protections, and strong union contracts for educators and librarians.