Relief may be on the way for businesses struggling with high energy bills, the state’s economic development secretary said Monday.
“I will also say, without tipping our hand to programs that maybe the governor is not ready to talk about yet, we do have a whole bunch of ideas on mitigating some of the energy costs for businesses, particularly small businesses,” Economic Development Secretary Eric Paley said during a budget hearing in Barnstable. “We’re working through that.”
Massachusetts is wrangling with a raft of affordability challenges, including soaring housing and health care costs that are threatening the state’s competitiveness and prompting businesses and residents to leave. Sen. Kelly Dooner, a Taunton Republican, asked Paley whether steep utility costs are also driving businesses out of the state — and what the Healey administration is doing to staunch the migration.
“I will say it’s a huge problem,” Paley replied, saying he’d defer to Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Rebecca Tepper to share solutions. Tuesday’s budget hearing also includes the energy secretariat.
A decade ago when manufacturing businesses were considering setting up here, “site selectors” did not even include energy within their top 10 list of questions, Paley said. Today, energy is the “number one question” — and Paley said it’s not just about Massachusetts having “extremely expensive energy.”
“But on top of that, knowing for certain whether you can even get the level of energy you want at a site is something that’s difficult to do, and it can take several years for the utilities to get that set up,” Paley said. “That is an enormous challenge as we think about helping companies’ site opportunities for building here in Massachusetts.”
The Healey administration is working with utilities to tackle the problem, Paley said.
Bay Staters continue to deal with high energy bills from the bitter cold winter. Gov. Maura Healey in January announced the state would spend $180 million to deliver temporary relief, though ratepayers will still be on the hook for covering deferred payments during off-peak months.
The House recently passed an energy bill designed to save ratepayers $9 billion over the next decade, but Speaker Ron Mariano admitted in a TV interview Sunday that the package is “not going to help much at all next winter.”
Massachusetts logged a net loss of 33,340 residents to other states between 2024 and 2025, according to census data. Paley sought to put that number in perspective and chastised journalists as he made his point.
“In the last three years, we’ve grown 125,000 people, and this year alone, we grew over 15,000 in population,” Paley said. “The reconciliation that, for whatever reason every news reporter does not want to include in their headline, is we make up for domestic outmigration with immigration.”
As immigration slows due to federal policy shifts, Paley said he’s worried Massachusetts “really could lose population.” The secretary said he’s also monitoring a growing trend of outmigration among residents ages 22-35, as he reflected on the lack of new businesses launching here.
“We have pretty low business starts. We’re a bottom-five state right now on business starts, and that’s really concerning to me,” Paley said. “We charge a higher fee to register an LLC than any state in the country by quite a bit actually. It cost $500 in the first year to register an LLC.”
Paley noted that’s not the only fee businesses face in their first year when they tend to have fewer resources.
“We shouldn’t make it so hard to start a business,” Paley said.
The Executive Office of Economic Development is incorporating AI into software that connects businesses with state resources and funding.
Staffers with the Massachusetts Office of Business Development can already use AI and pinpoint programs for companies to apply to, Paley said. He wants potential applicants to have a similar experience when they use the state’s “Business Front Door” platform.
“What we’d like to do going forward is AI-enable that, so 24/7 you can instantly get feedback about what programs are relevant to you,” Paley said.
Alison Kuznitz is a reporter for State House News Service and State Affairs Pro Massachusetts. Reach her at akuznitz@stateaffairs.com.
