This is a moment of both urgency and opportunity for Massachusetts. In June, Governor Maura Healey introduced the Massachusetts Environmental Bond Bill — officially the Mass Ready Act — a sweeping $2.9 billion proposal to shore up our infrastructure, protect natural resources, and safeguard communities against the mounting impacts of climate change over the next five years. Its core goals are clear:

Invest in flood control, dam safety, and nature‑based solutions to mitigate extreme weather.

Upgrade roads, bridges, culverts, and coastal defenses.

Fund clean‑water initiatives, PFAS remediation, and biodiversity conservation.

Support farms, food infrastructure, and land‑use planning.

Streamline environmental reviews to accelerate housing and restoration projects.

Even more commendable is its focus on historically underserved communities, those bearing the disproportionate burden of pollution, aging infrastructure, and climate driven hazards,

Yet, as one who represents the Grove Hall community in Dorchester, I know that “prioritizing underserved communities” on paper does not always translate into the targeted, concentrated investment these neighborhoods desperately need. That is why I coauthored the Commonwealth Green Zone Act.

Imagine a white shirt with a stubborn stain. If you wash the entire shirt equally, the fabric may brighten, but the stain remains. Only by applying extra detergent and focused scrubbing to the spot can you remove it altogether.

Grove Hall and similar districts have decades of under-investment, leaving them with more hazards — brownfields, heat islands, poor air and soil quality, and higher energy burdens than other neighborhoods. A “whole shirt” approach disperses funding too thinly; a Green Zone concentrates resources where they will have the greatest impact.

Greg King, Managing Director of TSK Energy Solutions LLC, and three Northeastern University graduate students — Hiovanni Gonzalez, Claren Copp‑LaRocque, and Nicholas Pietrinferno — developed the Environmental Justice Community Index Story Map system, to demonstrate how publicly available data can be used to rank the severity of environmental damage a community has experienced over time. The current statutory definition of an environmental justice community in Massachusetts does not consider any environmental damage.

The Massachusetts Environmental Justice Community Index Story Map https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/ca19c7c9c4ad46a28f2825aa2a3a5ed2 provides policymakers and program designers with a tool that helps prioritize which communities should receive funding and communities with a methodology to better understand the level of environmental damage that exists in their community. The model could be applied to individual climate mitigation or adaptation projects to enable communities to decide which project investments will have the biggest impact.

Despite the intuitive appeal of Green Zones, the political reality is that spreading funds across every district is often easier than targeted allocations. Even at the municipal level, coordinating planning and execution to produce tangible change in a single neighborhood is challenging. Our experience under the previous administration — when federal dollars were available — taught us that:

Historically underserved communities lack the resources and technical expertise to conduct feasibility studies or develop competitive grant applications for large‑scale environmental projects.

Wealthy communities (with higher tax bases or staff capacity) more readily access funding than those most in need.

Dr. Joan Fitzgerald, a professor of Urban and Public Policy at Northeastern University said, “Without a dedicated funding mechanism, Green Zone concepts remain more ‘aspirational’ than actionable.”

Greg King created the Green Zone Investment fund to move from aspiration to reality.

Recommendations include:

Designating the most environmentally damaged EJ communities  as “Green Zones,” to prioritize EJ areas based on measurable environmental harm — not just income, race, or language isolation — using public‑health data and cumulative‑impact scores.

Adopting the Environmental Justice Community Index system to rank projects and grant neighborhoods standing to compete for dedicated Green Zone funds. Public health data and cumulative impact scores should guide prioritization.

Aligning the Bond Bill and Green Zones

Seeding the Fund with a percentage of revenues from existing and new sources:

AGO Polluter settlements

Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) auction proceeds

Local building performance penalties

Reclaimed tax credits and renewable‑energy credit revenues

Based on my estimates, combining these streams could generate $710 million to $1.49 billion annually — enough to sustain focused interventions in 10–15 high‑need Green Zones across the Commonwealth.

Governor Healey’s Mass Ready Act already prioritizes underserved communities for grants and low‑interest loans, streamlines permitting for restoration projects in EJ areas and introduces flood risk disclosure to empower homeowners in vulnerable neighborhoods.

By adding Green Zone designation and channeling a stable revenue share into a Green Zone Investment Fund, we can ensure that the Mass Ready Act’s ambitions translate into deep, measurable impact — not just incremental improvements — where they are needed most.

The Mass Ready Act arrives at an opportune moment for Massachusetts. But to truly deliver environmental justice, we must go beyond broad prioritization. We need a methodology that focuses funding like a magnifying glass on the Commonwealth’s most overburdened communities. Green Zones — and a dedicated Investment Fund —provide that approach. Gov. Healey must take the next step in transitioning her environmental goals into reality. The Legislature, and all stakeholders should adopt these amendments, so that we may finally remove the stain of inequity from neighborhoods like Grove Hall — and, in doing so, make Massachusetts a national model for targeted, equitable climate resilience.

Ed Gaskin is Executive Director of Greater Grove Hall Main Streets and founder of Sunday Celebrations