A NECSEMA Transparency Project
Public records obtained under G.L. c. 66, § 10
The substantive documents in Milton’s production, in the order the events occurred: what each one is, what it says, and a link to the file. The complete production is in the document library on the main Milton page.
Milton released four documents, the thinnest production on this site. Two of them — the entire town-side production — are image-only scans with no text layer; the passages quoted below were read from the page images, and the underlying text carries scanning artifacts. Milton removed the birth-date provision from its draft and adopted a different measure; it appears on no published adoption list.
Nothing is characterized or interpreted. Where a document is ambiguous, it is quoted and left ambiguous.
I request all records, including but not limited to emails, text messages, letters, memos, contracts, invoices, grant applications, meeting minutes, public notices and draft documents from January 1, 2023 to present
Seventeen categories of correspondent are named, with contracts, payment records and grant applications. The letter copies one Board member as “Board of Health Chair”; the town’s minutes list a different member as Chair.
I’ve attached a community assessment for the Nicotine Free Generation, in case your board is considering it with their tobacco revisions. Let me know if you have questions ahead of time or we can talk about it more on Monday night.
The signature states that the Tobacco Control Program “is funded through a grant from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health” and that technical assistance to local boards “does not constitute legal advice.” The named attachment, a draft health equity impact assessment, is not produced. The email is the earliest item here after a single 2017 press release.
Free for MHOA members! $25 for non-members.
The same webinar as in Mansfield’s production. Presenters: a senior staff attorney at the Public Health Advocacy Institute and the tobacco prevention coordinator for seven Mystic Valley municipalities; continuing education credit was offered. The scan drops the right-hand edge of several lines, leaving the descriptive paragraph incomplete. No reply from the Health Director appears, and nothing records whether she attended.
Additionally, as a Milton resident, I would urge you to oppose NFG and any restriction on nicotine pouches.
Sender and recipient fields are illegible in the scan; only the signature block identifies the writer. The letter named as attached is not produced. NECSEMA funded the records requests behind this site.
FYI another email
The forward’s entire body is those three words. The underlying message, subject “Oppose the Generational Tobacco Ban,” goes to the Board of Health, Select Board and Town Administrator: “I oppose this policy because it proposes restricting adults’ freedom to choose for themselves.” The writer’s name is redacted. It was sent the day the Board is recorded elsewhere as striking the birth-date provision from its draft; no minutes of that meeting are produced.
When a person is 21 years of age, that person is an adult and should be able to use legal adult products.
Three messages titled “Say NO to Nicotine Free Generation (NFG) Regulations,” each with the same four bulleted arguments word for word; sender fields blank or redacted on all three. The same bullets appear in the Hopkinton, Dover and Mansfield productions. No reply from the Health Director to any opposition email appears here.
The Board voted unanimously in favor. The Health Director stated that Milton tobacco retailers had been notified and that the Board will sign the new Regulations which will go into effect June 1, 2025. The Public Hearing was closed at 7:22 p.m.
The hearing ran 7:08 to 7:22 p.m. The motion approved two chapters of the town’s tobacco regulations, unanimous, without a count and with no dissent. Three supporters are named, all from outside Milton: a Boston Medical Center physician, a Boston University law professor and the Public Health Advocacy Institute. No birth date, no “born on or after,” no milligram cap appears; “nicotine free generation” appears only as what those speakers supported. The adopted regulations are a listed packet item but are not produced; the PDF ends mid-sentence two pages in.
The Town responded with a single attachment consisting of Board of Health meeting minutes from April 2025.
One set of minutes “is unlikely to represent the full universe of responsive records,” the letter states, tabulating what nine other municipalities charged: four nothing, the highest $625. The production that followed added the nine-page email compilation, still with no contract, payment record or grant application, no text messages, no correspondence with any named organization, and nothing from calendar 2023 or the first five months of 2024.
Please invite us to make a presentation about NFG. We have been speaking with boards of health, other government entities, and community groups.
The latest item here, the same monthly newsletter that appears in Conway’s and Easthampton’s. The Health Director’s copy is the one produced; the recipient line is the sender’s own address. The page ends mid-sentence at the break.