By Lisa Kashinsky

GROWING RANKS — The $56 billion budget Maura Healey signed into law this week puts more money behind the new governor’s expansion of the upper echelons of state government.

Healey has added more than $2 million in senior-level positions to the executive branch in her first seven months as governor, according to an analysis of salary information provided by her office.

They include her standalone housing secretary (Ed Augustus, salary: $181,722), climate chief (Melissa Hoffer, salary: $160,000), transportation safety chief (Patrick Lavin, salary: $325,000) and rural affairs director (former state Sen. Anne Gobi, salary: $117,000), plus a half dozen new undersecretary, deputy secretary and adviser positions sprinkled across her environment, housing and labor secretariats.

That price tag grows when factoring in veterans services, which was elevated to Cabinet level in March as part of the governance changes passed in the wake of the deadly Covid-19 outbreak at the Holyoke Soldiers Home. Veterans Secretary Jon Santiago earns $181,722 per year. His deputy secretary, Andrea Gayle-Bennett, is paid $160,000.

And Healey is adding another new position: a chief information technology accessibility officer tasked with making the state’s digital services more accessible and overseeing the Digital Accessibility and Equity Governance Board. A job listing sets a salary range of $100,000 to $175,000 for the post.

“We’ve restructured the executive branch to meet the moment and today's challenges, and to do so with urgency and equity for all people across the state,” Healey said at a recent press conference announcing her accessibility efforts.

Healey isn’t the first governor to tinker with the structure of the state government. Charlie Baker created an IT secretariat. Deval Patrick added an education secretary to his Cabinet.

Still, the conservative Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance cast Healey’s executive-branch expansion as contributing to government bloat. “Many of these new state positions with six figure salaries will do nothing more than continue to balloon our state budget,” Paul Craney, the group’s spokesperson, said in a statement to Playbook. “The focus should be stopping the outward migration of taxpayers and trying to attract taxpayers from other states.”

The governor and her administration argue that their higher-level hires are in service of making the state more competitive. Healey said splitting the housing and economic development secretariats helps the state increase its focus on housing affordability. Her office pointed to Gobi’s efforts to help farms devastated by recent flooding.

And her team noted efforts to expand the lower ranks of government, including by hiring dozens of new employees at the Registry of Motor Vehicles to help implement the new law granting undocumented immigrants access to driver’s licenses.

“The Healey-Driscoll Administration is proud of our efforts to bolster hiring, bring more people back into the workforce, and fill critical positions that have been vacant,” Healey spokesperson Karissa Hand said in a statement.

GOOD FRIDAY MORNING, MASSACHUSETTS. PROGRAMMING NOTE: I’m going on vacation! Massachusetts Playbook will be in the very capable hands of Kelly Garrity and Mia McCarthy through Aug. 22. Send them your tips, scoops, birthdays, schedules, fundraisers and more: [email protected] and [email protected].

TODAY — MBTA GM Phil Eng is on GBH’s “Boston Public Radio” at 11 a.m. Rep. Jim McGovern attends the Our Lady of Mount Carmel and Our Lady of Loreto Parish’s Italian Festival at 5 p.m. in Worcester.

THIS WEEKEND — Vice President Kamala Harris attends fundraising receptions on Martha’s Vineyard on Saturday. Sen. Elizabeth Warren is on WBZ’s “Keller @ Large” at 8:30 a.m. Sunday. State Sen. Susan Moran is on WCVB’s “On the Record” at 11 a.m. Sunday. New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu is on NBC10 Boston’s “At Issue” at 11:30 a.m. Sunday.

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— “Budget veto creates questions around future of Mass. youth suicide helpline,” by Katie Lannan, GBH News: “Around 1,700 young people in Massachusetts have texted a youth suicide-prevention help line since it launched last year, and the program’s operators are now wondering how they’ll keep it running after a funding cut in this year’s state budget.”

— “Proposed COVID and flu vaccination rules for health workers allow many exceptions,” by Kay Lazar, Boston Globe: “All health workers in Massachusetts would be required to receive COVID-19 and flu vaccinations under proposed new state rules, even as federal regulators abandon similar COVID vaccination requirements. But the new proposal allows so many exemptions — including for medical, religious, and personal reasons — that some health care leaders are pushing back.”

— “Battle of the (Long Island) bridge: Boston, Quincy at odds again after latest permit,” by Gayla Cawley, Boston Herald: “Boston Mayor Michelle Wu said a new state permit will allow the city to move forward with its years-long plan to tackle the opioid epidemic by building a bridge out to a future 35-acre addiction-recovery campus on Long Island. The latest approval, however, has reignited a five-year battle with the mayor on the other side of that prospective bridge, Quincy’s Thomas Koch, who says recreating that access point to Long Island will exacerbate traffic and safety issues. His legal team is preparing an appeal.”

— “Adding more housing units is key for new head of Boston Housing Authority,” by Rupa Shenoy and Laney Ruckstuhl, WBUR.

— “MBTA speaks on continuing worker shortage, safety progress,” by Grace Zokovitch, Boston Herald: “The agency has hired 782 new workers and lost 407 since the start of the year, Chief Workforce Officer Ahmad Barnes reported in a presentation to the board. The staffing count overall is still around 6,600, Barnes said, well short of the 7,600 positions budgeted for fiscal year 2024.”

— “Judge urges settlement in case of eBay’s bizarre stalking of Natick couple,” by Aaron Pressman, Boston Globe: “Four years after they were subjected to criminal harassment and stalking, Ina and David Steiner are still waiting for the legal system to determine whether they should be compensated for emotional distress, damage to their reputations, and other effects of a bizarre intimidation campaign launched by employees of eBay.”

— “Jack Teixeira, Air National Guardsman accused of leaking top secret information, urges judge to set him free pending espionage trial,” by Shelley Murphy, Boston Globe: “Lawyers for Jack D. Teixeira, the Massachusetts Air National Guardsman accused of leaking top secret information on the internet, argued in court filings Thursday that the government has failed to show that the 21-year-old ‘has an actual ideological desire to harm others’ and urged a judge to release him on bail while he’s awaiting trial on espionage charges.”

— “Southampton couple seeking to adopt sues state DCF, claiming bias against Catholic faith,” by James Foster, Springfield Republican: “A Southampton couple seeking to adopt filed a discrimination lawsuit this week against employees of the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families. They allege an agency worker raised questions about their fitness to parent because of their religious beliefs. Specifically, they claim the agency flagged their eligibility because the couple believes a LGBTQ child ‘would need to live a chaste life.’”

— “Supreme Court temporarily blocks $6 billion Purdue Pharma-Sackler bankruptcy,” by Brian Mann, NPR.

STEP INSIDE THE WEST WING: What's really happening in West Wing offices? Find out who's up, who's down, and who really has the president’s ear in our West Wing Playbook newsletter, the insider's guide to the Biden White House and Cabinet. For buzzy nuggets and details that you won't find anywhere else, subscribe today.

— From the opinion pages: “Elizabeth Warren Is Having a Moment — Inside the GOP,” by Noah Rothman, National Review: “This week, Senators Rick Scott and Ted Budd joined Warren in calling on the Defense Department to invest in child-care programs for America’s servicemen and -women. … Warren has also secured the support of Republican senator Lindsey Graham in her effort to rein in and regulate America’s tech sector.”

— “Pot boss O’Brien apologizes as Massachusetts weed sales hit all-time high,” by Matthew Medsger, Boston Herald: “Cannabis board boss Shannon O’Brien is apologizing for her recent outburst saying she was too blunt in saying the state’s legal weed rollout was in a ‘crisis.’ It came on the same day the commission announced the Bay State has hit a new one-month high in legal weed sales — $136 million in July.”

— “Access to health care bylaw advancing in Amherst,” by Scott Merzbach, Daily Hampshire Gazette: “Before a revised bylaw designed to protect reproductive rights and gender-affirming health care in Amherst comes to the Town Council, another legal review is being sought by proponents, as they also make sure its content will be consistent with plans the public schools have unveiled for ensuring the safety and treatment of LGTBQ+ students in the new school year.”

— “Hurst Is the Second to Contest Mayoral Airwaves in Springfield,” by Matt Szafranski, Western Mass Politics and Insight.

— “Justice Department closes Everett racism probe ‘without a finding’,” by Liz Neisloss, GBH News: “Fourteen months after it began, a federal civil rights probe into allegations of racism in Everett’s city government has closed without a finding, according to city officials. … The inquiry began in the spring of 2022 under then-U.S. Attorney for Massachusetts Rachael Rollins. At the time, Rollins said a probe was needed after a barrage of incidents, which included the sending of racist texts involving city officials, as well as a lawsuit claiming discrimination and harassment by Mayor Carlo DeMaria and other officials that was filed by the city's school superintendent, Priya Tahiliani, and her deputy. That lawsuit is ongoing.”

— “Mayor Jon Mitchell and coalition want NOAA to move to New Bedford,” by Frank Mulligan, Standard-Times: “Mitchell sent a letter co-signed by more than 50 business and civic leaders to NOAA Administrator Richard Spinrad this month making a pitch to consolidate its Northeast facilities in New Bedford.”

— “After latest attacks on liberal arts education, New England college presidents double down,” by Hilary Burns, Boston Globe.

— “UFO sightings increase after Congressional hearings; Here’s where in Mass.,” by Heather Morrison, MassLive.

— COURTING SUNUNU (VOTERS): A new ad from pro-Ron DeSantis super PAC Never Back Down illustrates how much sway New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu could have in his state’s presidential primary. The 30-second spot geared toward the Granite State shows former President Donald Trump insulting Sununu at a rally. It then cuts to a clip of DeSantis saying “that is not the way we win as Republicans. The way you win as Republicans is to unite Republicans.”

Never Back Down is courting Sununu voters. But it remains an open question how much overlap exists between fans of the more moderate outgoing governor and DeSantis, whose conservative, culture-war politics are often out of step with New Hampshire voters’ views on issues like abortion.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY — to state Sen. Jamie Eldridge, Megan Alberto, Dan Wolf, founder and CEO of Cape Air; and Axios Boston’s Steph Solis. Happy belated to the Boston Globe’s Lissandra Villa de Petrzelka, who celebrated Wednesday.

HAPPY BIRTHWEEKEND — to Lauren Collins Cline, who celebrates Saturday; and to Sunday birthday-ers state Sen. Patrick O’Connor, Boston City Council President Ed Flynn, Josh Romney, Nicholas Hull, Eric M. Nelson and Denise Perrault.

NEW HORSE RACE ALERT: NOW THIS IS PODRACING — Hosts Steve Koczela and Jennifer Smith break down Gov. Maura Healey’s state of emergency over the migrant surge. Then, what Ohio’s ballot question results say about public support for abortion protections. Subscribe and listen on iTunes and Sound Cloud.

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