Section summary
The size of the ask matters more than the need behind it. Over ten years the Senate adopted 71% of requests under $50,000 and 6% of requests of $5 million or more. Between $1 million and $5 million, senators without a leadership post or top-tier chair won 3 of 50 need-based requests in FY2024–FY2026, against 15 of 50 for assistant leaders, whips and $30,000-tier chairs. Among need-based requests naming a town, requests for poorer resident populations were adopted less often, and requests naming the least needy towns passed 54 times in 56.
The clearest pattern in the amendment data is the size of the ask.
Over ten years 6,553 Senate budget amendments asked for money. The Senate adopted 71% of the requests under $50,000 and 61% of those between $50,000 and $250,000. Between $1 million and $5 million the rate fell to 26%. Of 272 requests for $5 million or more, it adopted 6%. Holding the year and the kind of request constant, each tenfold increase in the amount went with odds of adoption about a third as high. Sponsors withdrew about 775 of these requests before a decision; they count here as not adopted. Most of the rest were decided in bundles without a recorded vote. Leaving the withdrawn requests out raises every rate but keeps the order; under $50,000 the rate becomes 77%.
The Legislature has a fair defense. Large requests deserve more scrutiny, revenue is finite, and approving many small one-time items while deferring structural changes to the base budget is a defensible way to manage a $60 billion budget. The consequence is still a consequence: needs that come in large units, such as a statewide benefit increase, rarely survive the floor.
Where the post matters
The Senate’s need-based amendments of FY2024–FY2026 can be tested in more detail. There are 1,092 of them, covering food, housing, health, poverty and similar purposes, each scored for the need of the towns it names and matched to the sponsor’s post in the General Court that enacted the budget.
Below $250,000 the sponsor’s post makes less difference. Senators without a leadership post or a top-tier chair won 85% of requests under $50,000 and 73% of those between $50,000 and $250,000.
Between $1 million and $5 million it is different. Senators without a leadership post or top-tier chair won 3 of 50 such requests, 6%. Assistant leaders, whips and $30,000-tier chairs won 15 of 50, 30%. The top group’s seven requests came from two senators: Majority Leader Cynthia Stone Creem, who won 4 of her 6, and Minority Leader Bruce Tarr, who lost his one. Nineteen of the 22 winning requests in that band came from senators in the top two groups. The top group is small: seven requests would seem to indicate an advantage at the top, not establish one. Posts for FY2024 and FY2025 are taken from the General Court that enacted those budgets, and a senator counts as a $30,000-tier chair only when one chair pays at that tier; an earlier version that used the FY2026 roster for some of them gave 5%, 27% and 56%.
Need does not predict adoption
The need score of the towns a request names has no measurable effect on whether it passes (odds ratio 0.96 per point on a ten-point scale, p = 0.32). Split need into its two parts and the picture sharpens. Holding the size of the request constant, a town whose residents have lower incomes and more poverty is less likely to have its request adopted (odds ratio 0.72 per point, p < 0.001). A town with a weaker tax base is more likely (1.19 per point, p < 0.001). The two parts pull in opposite directions, which is why the combined need score shows nothing.
Requests naming towns in the lowest need bracket, a group that includes Newton, Brookline, Wellesley, Nantucket, Weston and Cohasset, passed 54 times in 56. Requests naming a town at all passed 78% of the time (315 of 404); requests for statewide or regional purposes, 35% (239 of 688).
The town-named losses are concentrated in Boston. Of the nine senators whose town-named requests failed most often, five represent districts that include Boston neighborhoods. Sen. Lydia Edwards of the Third Suffolk district, whose requests failed most often, won 11 of 27. Sen. Pavel Payano of the First Essex district, which includes Lawrence, won 16 of 16. Boston senators file many requests for the same city, and those requests compete with one another for a limited allowance.
A caution applies. The need-based amendments were also scored for merit, but 56% of those scores rest on a 300-character excerpt rather than the full text. The merit result is provisional and is not used here. The need and size results do not depend on it.