Berkshire County — Brendan Phair, a Pittsfield resident, is running against State Rep. Paul W. Mark (D) for a State Senate seat in the November general election. The seat has been left vacant by Sen. Adam Hinds, D-Pittsfield, who did not run for reelection because he was running for lieutenant governor. However, Sen. Hinds’ campaign was not successful, and he resigned on September 25 to become the CEO and executive director of The Kennedy Institute.
While State Rep. Mark has 11 years of experience as an elected official for the state, Phair does not have the same experience. Phair has served as a paraprofessional for the Pittsfield School District for the past 10 years. He originally started his work in the district in 2008 as a tutor.
“I’m running because I am concerned about the direction that the state is going in,” Phair said. “It has become increasingly difficult for people and families to make ends meet. I think that was true even before inflation got bad. We have had our population declining here in western Massachusetts, and it’s sad to see people leaving and going to other states.”
Phair said that to help residents, he supports the idea of tax relief for senior citizens and farmers. “There’s nothing revolutionary here with my ideas, and I am not trying to reinvent the wheel,” he said. “I think that farmers should get a tax rebate in the form of a fuel tax rebate for the fuel that they use. Seniors, if they qualify by being in a certain income bracket, should receive some tax relief. I think we should look into reducing the meals tax and the sales tax from 6.25 percent down to 5 percent. I think we should get rid of the quarterly inventory tax that businesses pay on appliances that they use. They’ve already paid taxes when they purchased the appliances.”
Phair added that he thinks that the threshold on estate taxes should be raised. “Massachusetts has the lowest threshold on the estate tax,” he said. “It’s at $1 million, and if it was raised to $2 million, it could help the state.”
Phair said that he is against the passage of the ROE Act, which was approved by the state Senate and House of Representatives in 2020. The ROE Act expanded abortion access, lowering the age from 18 to 16 for individuals who can seek an abortion without the consent of a parent. It also allows abortions after 24 weeks of pregnancy when it is deemed necessary by a physician, or due to cases of a fatal fetal anomaly. “There wasn’t any language in the legislation that required life-saving medical care for babies that survived an abortion,” Phair said. “They took that language out. It’s kind of unclear as to what will happen to a baby if they survive an abortion. I’m really upset about that. I’m very much opposed to The ROE Act.”
Phair said that “I support abortion only in cases of a true medical emergency, or if someone is a victim of rape … I don’t believe in abortion for incest unless it involves an underage female,” Phair said. “That would be statutory rape or forcible rape. If it’s two adults, family members, who make the incredibly bad decision to engage in sexual relations, and the woman becomes pregnant, I don’t believe they should be allowed to abort the baby.”
Phair said that he is also against a recently approved climate and clean energy bill, which Gov. Charles Baker signed in August, that will ban the sale by automotive dealerships of gas and diesel-powered vehicles starting in 2035. “We would have to go to other states or neighboring states to purchase a gas or diesel powered vehicle,” Phair said. “Our auto market would lose out and suffer. Other states would benefit from the sales of vehicles and Massachusetts would lose out on tax revenue. I’m not against electric vehicles, I’m against mandates.”
As for the state’s finances, Phair said that “I’m concerned about the state’s budget being out of control … The budget 12 years ago was $30 billion, and now it’s $53 billion,” he said. “I don’t think that it is a trajectory that we can stay on that is sustainable. I think we need to control spending and not increase it by four or five percent every year. I think we should limit the increase to one to two percent every year. To do this, we need to expand the taxpayer base and attract more companies here. We wouldn’t have as much of a concern with an ever-increasing budget if we did that.”
