Rep. Robert Koczera

Youth court programs in New Bedford and Fall River are getting a boost from Beacon Hill. Local lawmakers have secured $100,000 for youth courts in both cities. Youth courts are juvenile diversion programs that offer first time youthful offenders the chance to go before a jury of their peers, rather than appear in the traditional juvenile justice system...

A summit meeting held in New Bedford Thursday is seeking to devise strategies to help prevent the abuse of opioids in our region. Rep. Robert Koczera attended the summit and applauded the formation of a regional coaliition. He says with four people dying each day across the state from overdoses, something must be done...

A Mass. state lawmaker has some issues with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Rep. Robert Koczera says with New Bedford being a major fishing port, NOAA should be reaching out to fishermen and institutions like the UMass Dartmouth School of Marine Science to get updated information on fishery stocks in the North Atlantic...

Rep. Robert Koczera of New Bedford has filed legislation to reinstate the Clean Environment Fund as part of state government. The fund was done away with in 2003 because of budget constraints. Koczera says the fund would use a portion of unclaimed bottle deposits for grants to cities and towns needing help with solid waste management or recycling measures...

Partisan politics did not surface in the Mass. House on Wednesday, when lawmakers, mostly all Democrats, gave near-unanimous support to a budget shortfall plan offered by Republican Governor Charlie Baker. Baker's financial team says this year's state budget is about $768-million in the red...

Rep. Robert Koczera of New Bedford says he'll be voting against the casino compact agreed to by Gov. Patrick and the Mashpee Wampanoag tribe, and he hopes his colleagues will do the same.  The tribe is hoping to build a resort casino in Taunton, but has yet to convince the federal government to put land in trust for the project...

The wheels are already turning on Beacon Hill, after the State Auditor's office confirms fraud in the Department of Transitional Assistance.  The audit show more than 1,100 people who were confirmed dead were still receiving welfare checks, and those checks were being cashed...

Hundreds of young people from across Massachusetts converged on the Statehouse to push for summer jobs funding.  Organizers say they want lawmakers to support $16 million in funding for two youth job initiatives and approve new state tax revenue to ensure there's enough money to pay for the programs...