Massachusetts House Passes Haverhill Age-Waiver Bills, Chicopee Charter Update in Brief Session

BOSTON — April 2, 2026 — The Massachusetts House advanced more than a dozen local and special bills in a brief informal session Thursday, April 2. Acting on unanimous voice votes throughout, the chamber passed to enactment seven engrossed bills including four civil-service age-exemption measures for firefighter and police officer candidates in Haverhill — covering Stephen Justice, Javier Vargas, Brittany Spruill, and Freddy Castaneda — along with a bill renaming Williamsburg's Board of Selectmen to Select Board and a measure making Chicopee's city charter gender neutral. Two additional Haverhill age-waiver bills, House 4476 for Kenneth Navarro and House 4477 for William Rob Cargill, were passed to be engrossed, as was House 4738 on Holyoke City Council special meetings. Senate Bill 1859, providing for the retirement of former Attleboro firefighter Walter L. Girton, was amended by Representative Thomas P. Walsh of Peabody to substitute the text of House document 5331 before passing to engrossment. The House also ordered to third reading four local bills covering senior property tax measures in Auburn and Sudbury, a Salem parking-space excise, and a Falmouth land disposition.