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Page 16 THE MALDEN ADVOCATE–Friday, December 17, 2021 Beacon Hill Roll Call By Bob Katzen GET A FREE SUBSCRIPTION TO MASSTERLIST - Join more than 22,000 people, from movers and shakers to political junkies and interested citizens, who start their weekday morning with MASSterList—the popular newsletter that chronicles news and informed analysis about what’s going on up on Beacon Hill, in Massachusetts politics, policy, media and infl uence. The stories are drawn from major news organizations as well as specialized publications selected by widely acclaimed and highly experienced writers Chris Van Buskirk and Keith Regan who introduce each article in their own clever and never-boring, inimitable way. MASSterlist will be e-mailed to you FREE every Monday through Friday morning and will give you a leg up on what’s happening in the blood sport of Bay State politics. For more information and to get your free subscription go to: www.massterlist. com/subscribe THE HOUSE AND SENATE: PRINCIPAL RESIDENCE PROBATE, MASSHEALTH AND CAPITAL GAINS TAX CONSIDERATIONS I f you transfer your home to an irrevocable trust in order to protect the home from the possibility of going into a nursing home, there are several benefi ts of doing so. First and foremost, once your home is transferred to an irrevocable trust, the fi ve-year look back period commences in order to protect the home in the event of one or both of the Donor’s of the trust enters a nursing home and needs to apply for MassHealth benefi ts. Another benefi t of an irrevocable trust is the avoidance of probate upon the death of the Donor(s) of the trust. Certainly, if a husband and wife own the home as tenants by the entirety, probate would be avoided upon the fi rst spouse to die. If the surviving spouse does not take action to place the home either into a revocable trust or irrevocable trust, upon the death of the surviving spouse, the children would have to initiate probate proceedings in order to obtain title to the home. A simultaneous death, although very unlikely, would also result in the children having to probate the estates of both spouses. Having a funded irrevocable trust would obviously avoid the negative ramifi cations of that unlikely event. When you place your home into an irrevocable trust, you also obtain the benefi t of being able to sell your home and take advantage of the Internal Revenue Code Section 121 capital gains tax exclusion on the sale of your principal residence. The trust will be drafted as a grantor-type trust for not only income tax purposes but for capital gains tax purposes. For a husband and wife, this means the fi rst $500,000 of capital gain is exempt from taxation. For a single person, the fi rst $250,000 of capital gain is exempt from taxation. The home must be your principal residence for at least two of the fi ve-year period immediately preceding the date of sale. What is becoming more of a concern with deeding the home outright to the children reserving a life estate in the home by the parents is the greater likelihood of a child dying prior to the parents. With life expectancy so long with medical technology, it is not uncommon for one of the parents to reach the age of 90, 95 or even 100. Consequently, may have a situation where a child dies of some cause age 65 or 70. These situations unfortunately do occur. In the deed with a life estate plan, since the home was deeded directly to the children, the child who has now died has an estate that needs to be probated. If, however, the home was placed into an irrevocable trust, the predeceased child’s trust share would be held in further trust for his or her children. If that child had no children, his or her share would be distributed to the surviving siblings. This dispositive scheme would be pursuant to the terms of the trust, not the Last Will and Testament. There would be no involvement by the probate court. This would result in signifi cantly less legal fees, time and complexity when compared to the probate process. Joseph D. Cataldo is an Estate Planning/Elder Law Attorney, Certifi ed Public Accountant, Certifi ed Financial Planner, AICPA Personal Financial Specialist and holds a Master’s Degree in Taxation. There were no roll calls in the House or Senate last week. This week, Beacon Hill Roll Call reports on the percentage of times local representatives voted with their party’s leadership in the 2021 session. No more roll calls are planned in the House until January 2022. The votes of the 2021 membership of 28 Republicans were compared with those of GOP House Minority Leader Brad Jones (R-North Reading). The votes of the 2021 membership of 128 Democrats were compared to House Speaker Ron Mariano (D-Quincy). Beacon Hill Roll Call uses 90 votes from the 2021 House session as the basis for this report. This includes all roll calls that were not quorum calls or votes on local issues. THE DEMOCRATS: A total of 100 (78.1 percent) of the 128 Democrats voted with Mariano 100 percent of the time. That means that nearly four-fifths of the Democrats always voted with Mariano. Another 14 Democrats (10.9 percent) voted against Mariano only once. Only four Democrats (3.1 percent) voted with Mariano less than 90 percent of the time. The Democratic representative who voted the lowest percentage of times with Mariano is Rep. Erika Uyterhoeven (D-Somerville) who voted with Mariano only 84.2 percent of the time. She is followed by Reps. Mike Connolly (D-Cambridge) 85.5 percent; Rep. Colleen Garry (D-Dracut) 87.6 percent; Tami Gouveia (D-Acton) 89.7 percent; and Nika Elugardo (D-Jamaica Plain) 92.2 percent THE REPUBLICANS: None of the 28 GOP members voted with Jones 100 percent of the time. Twenty Republicans (71.4 percent) voted with Jones at least 90 percent of the time. Eight Republicans (28.5 percent) voted with Jones less than 90 percent of the time. The Republican representative who voted the lowest percentage of times with Jones was Rep. Joseph McKenna (R-Webster) who voted with Jones only 85.5 percent of the time. He is followed by Reps. Peter Durant (R-Spencer) 86.6 percent; Nick Boldyga (R-Southwick) 87.6 percent; Alyson Sullivan (R-Abington) 87.6 percent; and Marc Lombardo (R-Billerica) 87.7 percent. REPRESENTATIVES’ SUPPORT OF THEIR PARTY’S LEADERSHIP IN 2021 The percentage next to the representative’s name represents the percentage of times the representative supported his or her party’s leadership in 2021. The number in parentheses represents the number of times the representative opposed his or her party’s leadership. Some representatives voted on all 90 roll call votes. Others missed one or more roll calls. The percentage for each representative is calculated based on the number of roll calls on which Blessed Mother of the Morning Star Parish Christmas and New Year’s Schedule Friday, Dec. 24, Christmas Eve 4 pm 5:30 pm 7 pm 9:30 am Kreyol Family Mass St. Mary’s (bring a fl ashlight!) St. Mary’s Our Lady of Grace Saturday, Dec. 25, Christmas Day 8 am Our Lady of Grace St. Mary’s 11 am Our Lady of Grace Please note that there will be no 4 pm Mass on that Saturday Saturday, Jan. 1, Solemnity of Mary Holy Day of Obligation 4 pm 10 am 8 am 9:30 am 11 am Sunday, Jan. 2, Epiphany 4 pm Friday, Dec. 31 St. Mary’s Saturday, Jan. 1 Our Lady of Grace Saturday, Jan. 1 St. Mary’s Sunday,Jan. 2 Our Lady of Grace Sunday,Jan. 2 St. Mary’s Sunday,Jan. 2 Our Lady of Grace Advocate Call now! 617-387-2200 advertise on the web at www.advocatenews.net he or she voted and does not count the roll calls for which he or she was absent. Rep. Paul Donato 100 percent (0) Rep. Steven Ultrino 100 percent (0) HOW LONG WAS LAST WEEK'S SESSION? Beacon Hill Roll Call tracks the length of time that the House and Senate were in session each week. Many legislators say that legislative sessions are only one aspect of the Legislature's job and that a lot of important work is done outside of the House and Senate chambers. They note that their jobs also involve committee work, research, constituent work and other matters that are important to their districts. Critics say that the Legislature does not meet regularly or long enough to debate and vote in public view on the thousands of pieces of legislation that have been fi led. They note that the infrequency and brief length of sessions are misguided and lead to irresponsible late-night sessions and a mad rush to act on dozens of bills in the days immediately preceding the end of an annual session. During the week of December 6-10, the House met for a total of nine minutes while the Senate met for a total of 26 minutes. Mon. Dec. 6 House 11:02 a.m. to 11:04 a.m. Senate 11:34 a.m. to 11:40 a.m. Tues. Dec. 7 No House session No Senate session Wed. Dec. 8 No House session No Senate session Thurs. Dec. 9 House 11:08 a.m. to 11:15 a.m. Senate 11:06 a.m. to 11:26 a.m. Fri. Dec. 10 No House session No Senate session Bob Katzen welcomes feedback at bob@beaconhillrollcall.com Classifieds

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