State Representative Carmine Gentile is running for re-election in the 13th Middlesex District.

Raised in Watertown, Massachusetts, Carmine was the first in his family to graduate college. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Tufts University and his juris doctor from Suffolk University Law School. For the past 30 years, Carmine has represented children, parents and small businesses and has regularly provided free legal services for adults and children in need through his law firm in Framingham. While he has largely curtailed his practice to focus on his work as a legislator, his career as a lawyer has given Carmine an understanding of the wide variety of challenges faced by residents and businesses in the MetroWest.

Carmine is heavily active in the local community and has a deep understanding of municipal budgets and the impact of state legislation on our communities. He has served as a soccer coach, Scoutmaster for Boy Scout Troop 63, President of the Sudbury Rotary Club, and a member of the Sudbury Finance Committee, Board of Registers, Planning Board and the Town Manager Search Committee. Currently, Carmine is a member of the Sudbury Council on Aging, Vice Chair of the Sudbury Democratic Town Committee, a Trustee of the Sudbury Housing Trust and an Assistant Scout Master and Merit Badge Councilor for Boy Scout Troop 63.

Carmine is particularly committed to his work around domestic violence, an issue that affects families in every community. He has worked with the Sudbury, Wayland, Lincoln Domestic Violence Roundtable to provide assistance, information, education and community outreach to those in need. In partnership with other passionate volunteers, Carmine has planned White Ribbon events focusing on small group discussions about being a part of the solution in ending gender-based violence. This was scheduled to culminate in a large event, “Tough Guys and Gentle Men: Healthy Men in the Age of #Me Two”, which the COVID-19 emergency caused to be postponed.

In the legislature Carmine has many achievements. He filed and passed legislation to test, track and report in real time to survivors the results of sexual assault kits. He was later able to obtain $8 million in funding to centrally store the kits, cover the cost of testing and guarantee appropriate funding for the program within the Executive Office of Public Safety. When the legislature debated the Student Opportunity Act, a bill to update and transform public school funding, Carmine was successful in obtaining school district partial reimbursement for special education transportation expenses – a benefit that had been sought unsuccessfully for years. Carmine, working in close partnership with local leaders, also fights every year for district priorities in the budget.

He was recognized by Speaker of the House, Robert A. DeLeo, for his leadership on the issue of campaign finance reform. Following the November 2018 general election and adopting of that year’s ballot question #2, he was appointed by the Speaker to the Massachusetts Citizens Commission Concerning a Constitutional Amendment for Government of the People. This Commission is tasked with considering and recommending potential amendments to the United States Constitution to establish that corporations do not have the same Constitutional rights as human beings and that campaign contributions and expenditures may be regulated. Carmine, working with other Commissioners, was able to fashion two proposed Amendments to the United States Constitution to reverse the harm done by the Supreme Court’s Citizen’s United v. Federal Election Commission ruling. Carmine and other Commissioners will work with others throughout the country in a non-partisan effort to pass the 28th and 29th Amendments to our Constitution, allowing Congress and the states to regulate and limit campaign spending once again.

Currently, Carmine serves on several Joint Committees in the legislature: Children, Families and Persons with Disabilities, State Administration and Regulatory Oversight, Elderly Affairs, and Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture. His legislative initiatives this session include prohibiting the use of glyphosate (commonly known as “Round-Up”) in the Commonwealth; protecting consumers and tax payers from financial stress during the pandemic by waiving late fees and credit card debt collection and extending the state income tax filing deadline; increasing the wages of home care workers essential to seniors and persons with disabilities who wish to remain in their homes. He also is leading the fight on legislation to protect survivors of rape and their children, establishing energy neutral building standards, reducing drug costs through transparency, protecting the Senior Citizen Property Tax Exemption, expanding Community Preservation Act (CPA) funding, and making public higher education in Massachusetts free for residents of the state.

Carmine and his wife, Linda, are longtime Sudbury residents and raised two children in local public school systems. Their commitment to the community has been passed on to their two children. When their daughter, Sara, was 12 she brought a successful petition article before the Sudbury Annual Town Meeting to bring ice cream trucks back to Sudbury after many years of banishment. Sara continued her community efforts at college and business school and is now a consultant living with her husband in Wayland. Their son, Andrew, a former Eagle Scout, is a health care management professional who this spring assisted Marlborough Hospital in ramping up for the COVID-19 surge. Carmine’s children provide him motivation to continue his work in service to the Commonwealth and the communities of Sudbury, Wayland, Marlborough, and Framingham.