Embryonic Stem Cell Bill Now Law
       The House and Senate on Tuesday afternoon overrode Gov. Mitt Romney's veto of legislation sanctioning embryonic stem cell research. The House rejected the veto by a margin of 112 to 42, while the Senate defeated it 35-2. The votes capped months of debate over the moral, ethical, and scientific implications of cloning human embryos for research.
       The law bans reproductive cloning and will require the state Department of Public Health to begin creating a regulatory framework for stem cell research. Speaking with reporters following today’s session, Senate President Robert Travaglini said he imagines an economic stimulus bill being developed in the Senate could be a vehicle for offering state money to assist researchers working on stem cells.
        “It certainly would seem to be a compatible portion to have with that,” he said. Travaglini, along with chief authors of the legislation, Sens. Bruce Tarr and Jack Hart, said state leaders are monitoring how California is progressing in the research
field, given the $3 billion in bonds approved by the voters last year. They will now see what kind of progress can be made in Massachusetts before deciding how much state money to dedicate to the field, senators said.
       “After a certain time has lapsed, we will evaluate how the law has worked,” Travaglini said. “That will happen going forward.”

What's Next? Health Care, Jobs, Auto Insurance
       So now that the budget is before a conference committee and the embryonic stem cell research bills is on the lawbooks, what’s next on Beacon Hill?
       “You're going to see the health care debate start to heighten and heat up,” Senate President Robert Travaglini told the (State House) News Service after Tuesday’s Senate session. “You're going to see the auto insurance reform stuff start to heighten and heat up. You might see some follow up action in the form of an economic stimulus bill or something along those lines - an investment bill here in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.”
       A hearing on health insurance expansion bills is set for next week, the so-called jobs bills remain under construction, and hearings on auto insurance reform proposals have not yet been held. Gov. Mitt Romney plans to hold a press conference Wednesday on the subject of auto insurance, said Romney spokesman Eric Fehrnstrom, who declined further comment. In April 2004, Romney appointed a six-member task force to review the state's auto insurance policies with the hopes of creating a more competitive system.