Hours after Massachusetts reached a $56 million settlement agreement for the COVID-19 outbreak at the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke, Gov. Charlie Baker said he hopes the families of veterans who succumbed to the virus will gain “some closure.”
Baker, during an interview Thursday morning on WBUR’s Radio Boston, called the outbreak a “terrible, terrible, terrible tragedy.”
“I think the fact that people engaged in what I would describe as a good-faith discussion about how to deal with this issue was a positive one,” Baker said. “And I’m glad we have a resolution.”
Eighty-four veterans died of coronavirus-related complications at the state-run home at the start of the pandemic in spring 2020, in addition to scores of residents who contracted the virus.
The settlement announced Thursday comes almost two years after plaintiffs filed a $176 million class action lawsuit in federal court against state officials and ousted leaders.
It would cover veterans who lived in the Soldiers’ Home between March 1, 2020 through June 23, 2020 and became infected or died of the virus within that time window, the Baker administration said. Loved ones of deceased victims would receive at least $400,000 under the settlement, and those who survived the illness would get at least $10,000.
“There is no amount of money that can compensate our clients for the loss of their loved ones,” Tom Lesser, the plaintiffs’ lawyer, said in a statement provided by Baker’s office. “But our clients are grateful that the Commonwealth has acted to resolve this matter without the need for protracted litigation by agreeing to compensate both the families of those who died of COVID, as well as the veterans who survived. The settlement is fair and just.”
Baker will file legislation “in the coming weeks” to handle the $56 million in settlement claims, administration officials said Thursday.
Asked to contemplate the biggest “mistake” made during the pandemic, Baker invoked “many of the issues” surrounding long-term care facilities that were devastated by a crushing wave of cases. Massachusetts was “slow to respond,” Baker acknowledged before he touted the commonwealth’s subsequent progress.
“Once we did, we did many things that were nation-leading with respect to how to protect seniors and folks in long-term care facilities,” Baker said during the WBUR interview, without delineating examples. “But that would probably be the thing that I would have liked to have gotten to faster.”
Baker, reflecting specifically on the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke, recounted how he called about 100 families who were mourning loved ones, with some lasting just five minutes and others spanning an hour. In-person meetings were not possible at the time due to the pandemic, Baker said.
“That was my opportunity to both express my grief and to give people a chance to talk to me about their family member, about the home, and the circumstances and situation,” Baker said.
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