Attorney General Maura Healey
BOSTON (AP) — Gov. Maura Healey announced Friday that she is appointing Democratic state Rep. Jon Santiago to serve as the state’s first Cabinet-level veterans’ secretary.
The action comes after lawmakers last year approved a bill creating the Executive Office of Veterans’ Services in response to the deaths of dozens of veterans who contracted COVID-19 at a Massachusetts veterans home in 2020.
Santiago’s responsibilities will include helping oversee the superintendents of the state’s two veterans homes.
The coronavirus outbreak at the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke in the spring of 2020 was one of the deadliest outbreaks at a long-term care facility in the U.S.
BYSTEVE LeBLANC, THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
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