Medfield Town Online

Before he decided to take his nascent video game company to Rhode Island, Curt Schilling sought to stoke a “bidding war” with Massachusetts, one that Bay State officials wanted no part of, the Patrick administration’s top economic development official told the News Service Tuesday.

House and Senate leaders continued their high-stakes staring contest on dueling proposals to overhaul employer access to criminal records, and on Wednesday neither side blinked.

Fueled by persistently high unemployment rates, completed foreclosures surged 56.7 percent over the first half of the year, placing foreclosures on pace to surpass their recent high in 2008, according to figures released Tuesday morning.

Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo emerged from a closed-door meeting with Gov. Deval Patrick Monday afternoon with no agreement on an expanded gambling bill, talking up their efforts at collaboration but noticeably empty-handed as time winds down on chances for compromise.

After news that the Patrick administration supports moving to national education standards sparked outrage among the governor’s political opponents, a growing list of supporters of the move began to take shape Monday.

The Patrick administration picked a quiet Friday afternoon to announce that Massachusetts officials will pursue national education standards that could lead to the replacement of the MCAS, drawing howls from critics who say the state could jeopardize its nation-leading student achievement.

Expect to hear a lot in the coming months about Questions 1, 2 and 3.  Massachusetts voters in November will decide the fate of questions slashing the sales tax rate to 3 percent from 6.25 percent, overturning last summer's new tax on retail alcohol sales and repealing the state's comprehensive permit law known as Chapter 40B. 

The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority board asked staff Wednesday to re-evaluate the way the agency estimates projects and writes contracts after identifying a trend of over-budget projects.

Transgender rights advocates pressured lawmakers Wednesday to vote on a bill that would protect transgender people in state non-discrimination and hate crime laws.

The House voted 101-52 on Wednesday to approve legislation, long advocated by Gov. Deval Patrick, aimed at easing the siting of wind energy facilities, over objections from all 15 House Republicans and 37 Democrats.

Savings Bank Life Insurance Co., Massachusetts’s largest life insurer, won’t rule out a move out of state, the second time in three years the company has raised the prospect of leaving Massachusetts if certain laws aren’t changed to accommodate it.

Massachusetts cracked the top five on CNBC’s list of top states for businesses released Tuesday, the report prompting a victory lap from Gov. Deval Patrick and Republican Charles Baker to point to the state’s poor performance elsewhere in the survey, including its cost of doing business.

Gov. Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray and Speaker Robert DeLeo met for dinner at a Boston restaurant last Thursday to discuss a contentious gambling bill and the sequencing of other measures over the final three weeks of the legislative session – a sitdown that has borne no evident fruit, as Beacon Hill’s competing power centers continue staking out at-odds positions.

The Bay State is short a few great places.

The Bay State is short a few great places.

Urging agreement on a casino-authorization bill among legislative negotiators who have showed little progress in closing significant gaps, Gov. Deval Patrick on Tuesday reminded lawmakers of his opposition to racetrack slot machines, said he could support efforts to underpin the horse racing industry and outlined ideas for helping displaced track workers.

A House-Senate conference committee appeared to reach agreement Tuesday on a so-called municipal relief bill that would allow cities and towns to trim payrolls by offering early retirement programs, take longer to pay down unfunded pension system liabilities and deploy other initiatives to curb costs in the face of local aid cuts.

Seeking out last minute savings, Rep. Elizabeth Poirier (R-North Attleboro) and House Republicans filed a bill Tuesday to end the practice of paying inmates for doing menial jobs within prisons.

More than 30 recently ratified collective bargaining agreements would be funded with $9.5 million, $10.9 million would be set aside to settle underground storage tank claims and $3.7 million would be appropriated for summer youth jobs, under a $28.5 million spending bill Gov. Deval Patrick has filed.

Senators preparing to debate shock therapy -- a practice that one senator has decried as “torture” and that a House chairman has said saved his nephew’s life – may have to wait, after a procedural move by Republicans prevented a pair of related bills from being placed on Tuesday’s calendar.