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Richard Moore, a State Senator for “all seasons,” and many issues
 Senator Richard T. Moore, represents
thirteen Central Massachusetts towns in the Massachusetts Senate. His priorities in the current legislative term are putting people back to work and making state government work again for the people of this state. He is among the leaders in the Senate fighting for programs to help small businesses to succeed and grow, and to make state government more efficient and accountable to the voters.
Senator Moore, as Senate Chairman of the Massachusetts Legislature’s Committee on Health Care Financing, has been in the forefront of issues affecting the health of the people of Massachusetts since his appointment in 1999 to lead the health committee by then-Senate President Thomas Birmingham. His imprint can be found on nearly every piece of health care legislation enacted in Massachusetts during the past decade.
Perhaps, Senator Moore’s greatest health policy achievement to date is his pivotal role, working with then-Senate President Robert E. Travaglini, in creating legislation designed to extend access to health care to every resident of Massachusetts – now called “Health Reform I.” He was the primary sponsor of two of the major bills, and numerous other pieces of legislation, on which the landmark Massachusetts Health Reform Law (C. 58 of the Acts of 2006) is based. Moore also served as the Senate’s point person as Senate Chair of the legislative conference committee that produced the final product that has become a catalyst and, to some degree, a national model for health reform efforts across the Nation.
Many health experts have said that the primary benefit of the Massachusetts law was to demonstrate that virtually universal health coverage is possible at least at a state level. While some states have adopted specific features of the Massachusetts law and others are watching to see if it can be sustained, the unique circumstances which enabled passage are not found elsewhere. However, a remarkable feature of the reform effort was the broad-based coalition that Moore helped to forge along the road to passage. The plan is considered to be bi-partisan, and one in which all of the many – often competing – interests in health care both gained and compromised. The process that produced the Massachusetts are being studied as much as, or more than, the details of the policies.
By 2008, Massachusetts achieved nearly universal health coverage with an estimated 97% of her citizens with health insurance. These reforms have received much attention and praise both here at home and across the nation. Significantly, the Massachusetts example and reform principles are among the building blocks for national health reform being discussed at the federal level. However, the changes enacted in Health Reform I were just the first steps toward creating a world-class health care system for everyone in our Commonwealth.
During the 2007-2008 Session, the Legislature took another major step toward that world-class system. Recognizing that to sustain, and move beyond the dramatic gains being realized with the passage of Health Reform - I, key quality, safety, and cost control measures were needed. The signature bill of the 185th legislative session is Chapter 305 of the Acts of 2008 - An Act to promote cost containment, transparency and efficiency in the delivery of quality health care.
Once again, Senator Moore, in partnership with Senate President Therese Murray, guided the enactment of this comprehensive measure. The new law established the statutory foundation for greater transparency in health quality and cost for consumers and providers, set realistic goals of moving health care into the 21st century with dramatic expansion of health information technology, provided mechanisms for real cost containment, established programs for expanding the availability of primary care providers, and established goals and benchmarks for measuring progress toward improved quality and cost containment. The new law included guidance for regulations developed by the Massachusetts Department of Public Health that are considered the strictest in the nation for regulating the marketing relationships between pharmaceutical and medical device manufacturers and the health professionals licensed to prescribe drugs and medical devices.
The legislation also set in motion the opportunity for dramatic reform of health care through a review of health care payment and a pilot “medical home” demonstration project, both of which could trigger fundamental change in how health care is delivered in Massachusetts. While some providers may simply hope for more money, the goal of payment reform needs to address more effective use of existing resources and funds as well as compensation for a different delivery model along the lines of “medical home” care delivery especially for managing those with chronic disease.
Another of Senator Moore’s achievements gave Governor Deval Patrick something to show for his first year in office since the concept was promoted in his Municipal Relief Package. Legislation, sponsored by Moore, then-Representative Rachel Kaprelian (D-Watertown) and more than a hundred of their colleagues, has begun to ease the pressure of rising public employee health insurance premiums in the nearly twenty communities that have availed themselves of the law’s benefits. The new law promises to save taxpayers millions of dollars by allowing cities and towns to join the state’s Group Insurance Commission. The GIC currently manages health insurance for state employees and has successfully managed to keep health insurance costs under control while municipal health insurance has increased three or four times the rate experienced by state workers.
Senator Moore can also point with pride to his successful multi-year effort which led to the establishment of the Betsy Lehman Center for Patient Safety and Medical Error Reduction. It was Senator Moore’s idea to name the center in memory of the Boston Globe health reporter who died from a medical error - a chemotherapy overdose. The center’s aim is to help improve safety in health care and recently championed the development of standards from weight loss surgery. The center is rapidly becoming a focal point of efforts to make health care more safe for patients and less costly for payers.
A new statewide infection control program developed by the Department of Public Health was sponsored and initially funded at $1million in the Health Reform Law, and funded with another million dollars in 2008, through the senator’s leadership on the patient safety front. Another Moore-initiated health care reform is the dramatic reorganization of the state’s Public Health Council to focus the group’s expertise and energies more on improving public health than following the political philosophical leanings of any particular state administration.
A new program initiated by Senator Moore as part of the Health Reform Law is already becoming indispensable to Massachusetts families with seriously ill children. Moore established the first in the nation Pediatric Palliative Care, or children’s hospice program, and obtained an initial appropriation of $800,000 in the landmark reform legislation. He successfully sought another $800,000 budget for FY ’08 and $900,000 in FY ‘09 to continue the program.
Hospice had traditionally been limited by its mission to help dying patients. Its clients had to be nearing the end of their life and must have stopped any curative treatments. Such a restrictive definition left out children because few, if any, families are willing to forego any treatment, no matter how experimental or how long the odds of success.
The unique feature of Senator Moore’s program is a change in that conventional definition which now brings the caring talents of hospice to the problem of seriously ill children without the need to give up hope for life-saving treatment. To qualify, children are referred by their pediatrician. They must be suffering a life-altering and potentially fatal illness such as cancer, cystic fibrosis, HIV/AIDS, or organ failure. Since January 2007, 10 agencies in Massachusetts were awarded 55,000 each to run a pediatric program for six months.
Still another priority for Senator Moore is the expanded use of health information technology. He has been at the forefront of efforts in the state, and nationally, to promote electronic health records, electronic prescribing, and computerized physician order entry systems. Another $5 million appropriation included in health reform, at Moore’s insistence, was allocated to the Westborough-based Massachusetts Technology Collaborative to support the state’s e-Health Initiative. Health Reform II included an initial $20 million health information technology fund and a Massachusetts eHealth Institute to provide grants to advance the use of health information technology.
On the national level, Senator Moore serves as
President-Elect of the National Conference of State Legislatures (NCSL), and is poised to lead this important association of the nation’s 7328 state legislators and legislative staff
this year. NCSL was founded in 1975 with the conviction that legislative service is one of democracy’s worthiest pursuits. The late Senate President Kevin B. Harrington served as the founding president of the organization. NCSL is a bi-partisan organization that serves legislators and staffs of the nation’s fifty states, its commonwealths and territories. NCSL provides research, training, technical assistance, and opportunities for policy makers to exchange ideas on the most pressing state issues. NCSL is considered the most effective and respected advocate for the interests of state government before the Congress and federal agencies.
Senator Moore holds other leadership positions within NCSL. He co-chairs Health Information Champions (HITCh), a health information technology project sponsored by the National Conference of State Legislatures. He also serves as one of only four state legislators on the steering committee of the State Alliance for eHealth, a project of the National Governor’s Association’s Centers of Excellence.
Long before the federal government adopted a prescription drug benefit as part of Medicare, and even before Massachusetts launched its highly successful Prescription Advantage drug insurance program (which Senator Moore co-sponsored), Senator Moore developed a program to link needy seniors with free drug programs offered by pharmaceutical manufacturers. The MassMedLine program funded by the state and operated by the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences has helped to provide more than $24 million worth of urgently needed drugs to Massachusetts senior citizens since its inception five years ago. Moore’s efforts for this program were recognized in
2004 when the college awarded him an honorary doctorate.
Senator Moore has found himself on opposite sides of the state’s politically powerful nurses union in a debate over legislation to mandate that hospitals hire a specific nurse-to-patient ratio. Arguing that while more nurses can improve patient care, there is no peer-reviewed, evidence-based research to indicate what the exact ratio should be since both patient care needs and nurse capabilities vary so much even on the same shift. Instead, Moore wants to address the growing shortage of nurses by creating incentives for people to become nurses, by creating more nursing faculty and clinical sites to train qualified applicants for the nursing profession, and through establishing a mechanism to monitor nurse staffing levels and their relationship to patient outcomes. Editorials published in nearly every newspaper in Massachusetts, including the
Boston Globe and Boston Herald, supported the senator’s position on the matter.
Over the years, Senator Moore has been recognized by a long list of organizations for his leadership in the legislative arena. In 2008, he was honored with three major awards for his health care advocacy. In February, the Department of Public Health honored Moore for his bold and effective leadership in reducing hospital acquired infections. The month of October was especially memorable for the Senator, as he was honored by the Massachusetts Medical Law Report under its newly created “Rx for Excellence Awards,” which recognizes individuals who have the best practices in medicine (Sen. Moore was the only legislator and elected official bestowed with the award). Additionally in October, he was recognized by the New England Health Institute for his work in the innovation, drafting, passage and implementation of the landmark Massachusetts Health Reform Law of 2006.
Senator Moore’s legislative interests, however, range well beyond the high profile area of health care. A prolific legislative draftsman, Moore routinely tops the list of most filed bills in a legislative session. Many of his bills are ultimately enacted into law or become part of other legislation, although, he admits, it sometimes takes several years of effort, compromise and refinement.
Taking on powerful interests such as major insurance companies, the state’s nurses union, the federal government, or unsafe health care systems is nothing new to Senator Moore. Early in his Senate career, with several of the state’s scandal-ridden county governments facing bankruptcy, Moore led efforts to abolish several counties, including his own Worcester County. . As Senate Chairman of the Committee on Counties, he partnered with Senate Ways and Means Chair Stan Rosenberg (D-Amherst) to lead efforts to abolish most forms of county government and save the taxpayers of those counties from continued property tax increases to pay for patronage and wasteful services. The result was to put an end to an archaic, unnecessary, and costly layer of government and reduce the tax burden of local property taxpayers.
Senator Moore has also been a leader in promoting civic education in America’s schools. He was a member of the Massachusetts delegation to the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Congressional Conferences on Civic Education, and is a member of the Steering Committee of the Campaign to Restore the Civic Mission of Our Schools. He is also Co-Chairman of the National Conference of State Legislatures’ (NCSL) Trust for Representative Democracy Advisory Board which promotes “America’s Legislators Back to School” program and other civic initiatives. In Massachusetts, Senator Moore has been the primary sponsor of legislation to establish a Commission on Civic Learning that has been approved by the Legislature, but vetoed by then-Governor Mitt Romney. The bill was finally enacted in the FY ’09 state budget and the Commission is in the process of being appointed.
 Senator Moore has considerable experience with terrorism and natural disasters as a former Associate Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency in the Clinton Administration. During his tenure at FEMA, Mr. Moore guided the agency’s efforts to develop a National Mitigation Strategy to reduce the vulnerability of Americans to natural disasters. His work won for him the Agency’s highest award – FEMA’s Distinguished Service Award. In addition, he is Co-Chairman of the National Conference of State Legislatures’ Task Force on Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness, leading that unit since the devastating attack on the World Trade Center and Pentagon in 2001.
Senator Moore is the principal sponsor to state legislation to reform how the state government deals with a major public health emergency such as an Avian Flu Pandemic. His Pandemic Emergency Bill
has three times received a favorable recommendation from the Committee on Health Care Financing and
most recently passed the Senate in 2009 (the
legislation is currently in Conference Committee). In addition to providing resources for the state to respond to a major public health threat, the bill would begin the effort to rebuild the local and regional public health infrastructure of Massachusetts that was substantially weakened during the recession earlier in the decade.
Another major initiative outside of the health care realm is Senator Moore’s persistent effort to include Massachusetts among the states seeking to streamline state sales tax collections in order to curb the growing loss of sales tax revenue resulting from out of state on-line purchases. With important state programs such as the School Building Authority and mass transit agencies dependent on sales tax receipts, Moore argues that the state cannot afford to lose tax revenues that are legitimately owed, but normally difficult to collect from vendors beyond the state’s borders.
Moore’s interest in the arcane issue of taxation of internet sales is, undoubtedly, a holdover from his leadership of the House Committee on Taxation in the early eighties. In fact, Moore is credited with being one of the leading advocates for reform of the state’s school building assistance program which had been poorly managed and was rapidly becoming financially unsustainable. It was Senator Moore’s proposal to dedicate one percent of the state’s five percent sales tax to funding school construction that helped put the program on a stable financial footing.
As House Chairman, first of the Committee on State Administration and, later, the Taxation Committee, then-Representative Moore played a key role in limiting the state government’s penchant for passing unfunded mandates that added new burdens and costs to cities and towns. Using his experience as a three-term Hopedale Selectman and President of the Massachusetts Selectmen’s Association, Moore successfully quarter-backed efforts in 1980 for passage of Article 115 of the Amendments to the Massachusetts Constitution limiting state mandated programs and sponsored legislation that created a Division of Local Mandates (DLM) in the Office of the State Auditor. For more than two decades now, the DLM has been a critical source of help in preventing executive and legislative initiatives that shifted costs to local governments.
Also using his experience as one of the first members of the Governor’s Local Government Advisory Committee created by then-Governor Michael S. Dukakis, Representative Moore sponsored legislation that made the body a permanent voice for municipal government as the Advisory Commission on Local Government. The group has been a liaison for municipal leaders to a succession of Massachusetts governors for over 25 years actively advocating local interests at the highest councils of state government.
Senator Moore has also developed an impressive track record for helping the people in his district pushing state agencies to address local issues. As a State Representative in the nineteen eighties he led efforts to establish the Blackstone River and Canal Heritage State Park and the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor. He continues to aggressively advocate for construction of a long-planned Blackstone River Bikeway linking Worcester, Massachusetts with Providence, Rhode Island and for restoration of sections of the historic Blackstone Canal (1826-1847). With his move to the Senate, Moore expanded his environmental projects by promoting funding for a greenway along the French River in Oxford, Dudley and Webster and the acquisition of an unused spur of the Providence and Worcester
Railroad in Southbridge, Dudley, and Webster to be
developed as the Quinebaug Rail Trail.
He also convinced state government to reconstruct Route 146 as a four-lane, limited access highway to improve road safety and become a catalyst for the region’s economic development. The rebuilt highway has proven to be a much safer route ever since. Moore also led efforts to link Route 146 with the Massachusetts Turnpike and I-290 in Worcester further enhancing the economic development potential of the region. In recent years, he has turned his attention to further improvements for the transportation corridor by pushing for construction of a fly-over at Boston Road in Sutton to eliminate traffic congestion and removal of curb cuts in the Sutton-Millbury section.
Partly as a consequence of connecting the region to the state’s economy, unemployment rates in South Central Massachusetts have moved from double the state average when Moore began his career to several points below the state rate today. More recently, he has taken on the plan to restore commuter rail service along the Providence and Worcester rail lines to Rhode Island and Connecticut to allow workers in the region to commute more easily to high wage jobs. He has referred to the economic potential of road and rail improvements linking Worcester and Providence as the “third side of the Golden Triangle” linking these two major New England cities with the region’s largest city – Boston.
Senator Moore’s efforts have not only focused on promoting development of his region of the state. When major development proposals threatened to alter the quality of life of towns in his district, Moore again went into action. An ill-conceived plan by the Weld Administration to build a second major international airport by paving over large tracts of Douglas and South Uxbridge was thwarted by Moore’s use of federal law governing the heritage corridor to block the airport scheme. Another plan by a private developer to construct a mega-landfill on the Webster-Douglas town line that threatened the Douglas State Forest and Webster Lake was blocked when Moore and State Representative Paul Kujawski (D-Webster) convinced their legislative colleagues to take the land by eminent domain and add it to Douglas State Forest.
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After graduation from Hopedale High School, Mr. Moore earned a bachelor’s degree in history from Clark University in Worcester and a Master’s Degree in Student Personnel Administration from Colgate University in Hamilton, New York. Demonstrating early leadership potential in his undergraduate years, Moore served as President of the Clark Student Body, President of the Scarlet Key service society, and member of Gryphon, the senior men’s honorary organization. He also represented Clark at the National Student Association Congress held in 1965 at the University of Minnesota.
Mr. Moore began his professional career as Associate Dean of Students at Assumption College in Worcester (1967-1969). While an administrator at Assumption, Moore was appointed as one of the original members of the Massachusetts Health and Educational Facilities Authority and served as the authority’s first secretary. The agency has helped many Massachusetts colleges and hospitals to finance the construction and renovation of badly needed facilities to better meet the needs of those they serve.
Moore later moved to Bentley College in Waltham as Assistant to the President under President Thomas L. Morrison and then, under President Gregory H. Adamian, as Assistant to the President and Secretary of the College Corporation (1969-1976). During his time at Bentley, Moore filled in for a semester as Director of Institutional Advancement while the Trustees searched for a new staffer to head the college’s crucial fundraising development efforts. He also shepherded the efforts by the College to expand its degree granting authority to liberal arts degrees and other business degrees beyond the school’s traditional accounting degree. Upon completion of that effort, he was then tasked with further expanding degree granting authority to include graduate degrees in business and finance. Today, Bentley College, now Bentley University, is one of the region’s top business-focused higher education institutions.
Mr. Moore’s interests in higher education have also included teaching of history and government at Quinsigamond Community College, Bentley College, and Bridgewater State College. The latter role was in Bridgewater’s Graduate Program in Public Administration where he has focused on topics such as emergency management administration and health reform. Senator Moore also served five years on the Quinsigamond Community College Board of Trustees (1970-76), including a term as board chairman; and for nearly twelve years as a member of the Board of Trustees of Nichols College, Dudley, Massachusetts 1997- present.
Senator Moore has long been an active member of the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) including two years (2001-2003) as President of the Massachusetts Chapter of ASPA and a three year stint on ASPA’s National Council (2002-2005) representing Region I (New England and New York). During his terms as President of the Massachusetts Chapter, Mr. Moore edited a publication entitled “Memos to the Governor” with policy advice for those who sought the Massachusetts governorship in 2002 and he organized two Massachusetts Summits on Civic Education to focus on the need to strengthen civic learning in schools and colleges. Senator Moore is a firm believer in the need to encourage America’s youth to take an interest and get actively involved in government at all levels in order to leave their community, state, nation and world better than when they entered the scene.
Although Senator Moore is a lifelong Democrat, he has always respected and worked closely with political leaders of both major parties. Several of his appointments – the Health and Educational Facilities Authority, the Quinsigamond College Trustees, the National Heritage Corridor Commission – have been made by Republican governors. The National Conference of State Legislatures – in which Senator Moore has been an active leader – is based on strong bi-partisan cooperation.
Moore’s interest in a variety of issues and causes has helped him to avoid being strictly defined as a “liberal” or “conservative.” His interest in seeking real results that help people rather than maintaining ideological purity at all costs, led him in the early nineteen nineties to join a national centrist movement known as the Democratic Leadership Council. When the Council decided to establish state chapters, he organized and become the founding chairman of the Massachusetts Chapter of the Democratic Leadership Council from 1990 – 1994.
This DLC vantage point put him in contact with policy experts and the new class of “movers and shakers” of the Democratic Party and led him to become the first elected official in Massachusetts to openly support the candidacy of Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton for President. He took the position when a fellow Bay State Democrat – Paul Tsongas – was also a candidate for the Presidency. During the campaign, he aided Hillary Clinton in her effort to help her husband’s cause as well as the candidate himself. As a state co-chair of the Clinton for President Campaign then-Representative Moore was chosen as a member of the Massachusetts Electoral College when the Clinton-Gore ticket carried the state and the country. Later, as the Clinton Administration was being organized, Representative Moore was nominated and confirmed by the United States Senate as Associate Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency [when it functioned successfully as an independent agency in the pre-Katrina days] and served for two years in that post before returning to Massachusetts to seek his current post in the Massachusetts State Senate.
 Married for the past 30 years to the former Joanne Bednarz, Senator Moore lives in Uxbridge, Massachusetts. Joanne is a graduate of Worcester State College and was employed as a Custom Service Supervisor by the Massachusetts Electric Company (now National Grid) for twenty years. She met Senator Moore when he was a Hopedale Selectman and she took a temporary job in the Hopedale Town Hall. They were married May 26, 1979. She is currently Co-President of the Uxbridge Woman’s Club and is active in the General Federation of Women’s Clubs of Massachusetts. She is also active in Blackstone Valley Heritage Homecoming, Inc., a non-profit group initially organized by Senator Moore that promotes the Blackstone Valley and the Blackstone River and Canal Heritage State Park.
Senator Moore filed the legislation and obtained the funding for the state
park.
Senator Moore holds a Bachelor’s Degree in History from Clark University (1966), Master’s Degree in Student Personnel Administration from Colgate University (1967). He is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including an honorary Doctor of Science degree from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences
(2006), and an Honorary Doctorate from the New
England College of Optometry (2009). Senator Moore served as 2008 President of the Clover Club of Boston – a prominent cultural and social organization of Irish – Americans in the Greater Boston area since 1883. The Vatican State has also honored Senator Moore with a knighthood-Knight Commander of the Equestrian Order of the Knights of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, the oldest order of chivalry of the Vatican State, founded in 1099.
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