State Tax Reductions, Voter Photo IDs, Rent Control, MBTA Zoning Repeal Clear MA Ballot Hurdle: AG's Office

MASSACHUSETTS — Bay Staters could go to the polls and have a say on whether to lower the state's income and sales tax, eliminate the gas tax, require photo IDs to vote, repeal the MBTA Community zoning law and establish statewide rent control, though ballot initiatives that advanced to the next stage in the process of appearing on the 2026 state ballot.

The Attorney General's Office said that 44 initiatives — several of which were multiple versions of essentially the same proposal — advanced to the signature-collection phase of the process.

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Proponents of a proposed law that was certified may now gather and file with the Secretary of the Commonwealth the signatures of 74,574 registered voters by Dec. 3, 2025.

Once these signatures are verified, the proposal will be sent to the State Legislature in January 2026 for consideration on or before the first Wednesday of May 2026. If the Legislature does not enact a
proposal, proponents must gather 12,429 additional signatures from registered voters by July 1, 2026, to place the proposed law on the November 2026 ballot.

Forty-seven ballot initiatives were submitted to the AG's Office, with the AG approving 44 to move to the signature process.

Those include:

• A proposal to eliminate the law prohibiting those in prison from voting in state elections
• Multiple proposals to require government-issued photo identification for all voters to be shown at the polls or submitted as part of the mail-in voting process
• A proposal that would make all information collected by the Registry of Motor Vehicles subject to Freedom of Information Act requests
• The allowance of same-day voter registration and changing of party affiliation at the polls
• The elimination of party-affiliated primaries in favor of one ballot that would advance the top two candidates to the general election, regardless of party
• The elimination of the state gas tax (currently 24 cents per gallon) by 2036
• The lowering of the state income tax from 5 percent to 4 percent over three years
• The lowering of the state sales tax from 6.25 percent to 5 percent
• Restricting the amount of landlord rent increases to the increase in the Consumer Price Index or 5 percent per year for most non-owner-occupied properties
• Creating a provision for recall elections for most statewide offices
• Repealing the MBTA Community Act that requires cities and towns with proximity to public transportation to expand zoning to allow more "by-right" multi-family housing

A full list of ballot initiatives and their summaries through the AG's Office can be found here.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)