Hopkinton Health Director Shaun McAuliffe told the Independent (“McAuliffe responds to convenience store lobby claims over tobacco regulations,” Oct. 9) that the town is “not colluding” with outside agencies on Nicotine-Free Generation, and that any claim the public lacked a voice is untrue. His own emails, released under the public records law and posted in full at RealTruthMA.com, say otherwise.

On April 14, 2025, 30 days before the Board of Health’s public hearing, Mr. McAuliffe wrote to an official of the Massachusetts Municipal Association: “My Board is committed to passing this.” In the same email, he said he intended to “rally the parents.” The day before, he told the Select Board chair that the commonwealth had assigned NFG staff and MMA representatives “to insulate us through the remainder of the process.” That goes well beyond the routine drafting help he described to the Independent.

The testimony was prepared the same way. A coalition organizer supplied fill-in-the-blank templates for a “community member” and a “youth.” Nine days before the hearing, the regional tobacco coordinator predicted “the usual opposition” and said the convenience store community would “drum up some local retailers.”

Opposition to NFG grows on its own. Communities across Massachusetts have rejected it, because it permanently bars adults 21 and older from buying legal products, pushes sales to the next town and the illicit market, harms small businesses and changes nothing for anyone under 21 to whom these sales are already illegal.

The board held its hearing on May 14 and adopted the regulation unanimously. Hopkinton residents deserved a hearing whose outcome had not been settled a month in advance. The record shows they did not get one.

— Peter Brennan, executive director, New England Convenience Store & Energy Marketers Association

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