Connector czar: It’s working great

The state's Obamacare czar yesterday proclaimed the Bay State to be "a million miles ahead of" last year's disastrous health care sign-ups, announcing the state has now enrolled 325,814 Bay Staters so far.

"That's a complete turnaround and, if we're being honest, not a lot of people thought it would be done," said Massachusetts Obamacare chief Maydad Cohen. "Just looking at the enormity of the problems and the calendar made even our biggest supporters skeptical."

To date, some 3.8 million users had accessed the state's pricey Obamacare website, and 440,546 users had determined which plans they're eligible for, Cohen said.

"The enrollment numbers themselves don't lie; the website is working," said Cohen. "People are getting insurance for themselves and their families and we're a million miles ahead of where we were last year — and that's an undisputable fact."

Open enrollment on the Health Connector website runs through Feb. 15. When the enrollment period started last year, the site crashed numerous times and it was plagued with problems for months, causing people to give up on trying to enroll and ultimately costing the state millions of dollars to fix.

It's hardly been a flawless process this year, as a representative from Attorney General Maura Healey's office noted during a conference call yesterday that many customers had called their hotline to complain.

A Healey spokesman said 131 consumer complaints had been received since open enrollment began on Nov. 15.

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The Ticker

TurboTax shuts off state tax return filing

TurboTax, the country's most popular do-it-yourself tax preparation software, said yesterday that it has temporarily stopped processing state tax returns because of an increase in fraudulent filings.

The Massachusetts Department of Revenue says 160,000 refunds are currently in the pipeline, and due to the increase in the filing of fraudulent tax returns nationwide, it will more carefully scrutinize information on returns.

Other state agencies have also reported a rise in filings with stolen personal information, said Intuit, the company behind TurboTax. Most victims found out that a fraudulent tax return was submitted in their name when they received a rejection notice after filing their returns, said Intuit spokeswoman Julie Miller.

There haven't been issues with federal returns to date because the Internal Revenue Service has implemented stronger fraud detection policies, Miller said.

Intuit is working with security company Palantir to investigate the problem. So far, there has been no security breach of its systems, the company said. Instead, it believes personal information was stolen elsewhere and used to file returns on TurboTax.

West Coast dockworkers won't handle cargo due to labor dispute

Terminal operators at the 29 U.S. West Coast ports won't handle cargo this weekend as a labor dispute with dockworkers escalates, their bargaining agent said. Loading and unloading of vessels at ports from San Diego to Bellingham, Wash., will be suspended through Monday morning, according to an emailed statement from the Pacific Maritime Association.

Shipping lines and terminal operators can't justify paying overtime to unionized dockworkers who are handling cargo at reduced levels of productivity, an association spokesman, Wade Gates, said in the statement.

Consumer borrowing picks up in Dec.

Consumer borrowing picked up in December as Americans used their credit cards more after pulling back the previous month.

Total outstanding non-mortgage credit increased by $14.7 billion to $3.3 trillion, the Federal Reserve said yesterday. Economists expected a $15 billion rise.

Revolving debt, which includes credit cards, increased by $5.8 billion to $887.9 billion, the largest increase since April. That's a positive sign of growing consumer confidence amid strong job growth and falling gasoline prices.

Non-revolving credit, which is mostly auto and student loans, rose by $8.9 billion to $2.42 trillion. Auto sales have reached near-record levels as Americans replace aging vehicles and lending standards ease.

• Citizens Bank announced that Bradley L. Mattox, left, has been hired as a vice president and relationship manager for Citizens Commercial Banking. Mattox joins Citizens in Boston from BNY Mellon, where he was a vice president and senior private banker.

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Activists to press for more affordable housing options

BOSTON — Increasing the number of rental assistance vouchers and preserving existing subsidized housing units are just two of the proposals included in a report to be unveiled by affordable housing activists at the Statehouse.

The On Solid Ground Coalition says Massachusetts needs to adopt a number of strategies ease the state's housing crunch, with making housing more affordable the top priority.

Massachusetts has struggled to get the homeless into permanent housing — particularly families temporarily housed in hotels.

The report to be released Monday also calls on state leaders to expand the stock of affordable housing and for Gov. Charlie Baker to name a special secretary to work across state agency to address the housing problem.

One of Baker's campaign promises was to ease the number of homeless families in Massachusetts.

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Audi A4 earns a high grade

The efficient 2015 Audi A4 with go-anywhere, all-wheel-drive is a solid choice for the New Englander not willing to compromise on performance or craftsmanship.

Audi's quattro all-wheel-drive system intuitively sends power to the wheels with the most grip. Although our tester had 19-inch, low-profile summer tires, I found the sedan provided superb traction on both wet and snow-covered roads.

The quattro system, which has been around for more than 35 years, was equally impressive on dry roads, giving the A4 sharp handling with a decent amount of feedback and providing the driver with an intimate connection to the road. The A4's sport-tuned suspension settled through bumps on the corners and the sedan's electronic, speed-sensitive steering had a heavy, precision feel.

Under the hood, the A4 packs a turbocharged 2.0- liter, inline four-cylinder engine that cranks out 220 horsepower. Audi offers three transmission choices with the A4: a six-speed manual, a continuously variable automatic, and an eight-speed automatic with manual override. My tester had the eight speed with paddle shifters, which allowed me to take control of the sedan, especially through the corners and on steep highway ramps. The multitude of gears allowed for smooth downshifting and maximized the transfer of power from the efficient engine. The A4 balances a respectable amount power with decent fuel economy for an all-wheel-drive sedan. The A4 did 21 miles per gallon in the city and 30 mpg on highway.

Silver and gray trim highlighted my A4's black interior. Leather heated front seats were firm and supportive. The centerpiece of the A4's cockpit was a distinctive flat bottom steering wheel, which was part of the $1,500 sport plus package that included the paddle shifters, a black headliner, and 19-inch, 5-arm aluminum wheels with a titanium finish. Three-zone climate controls allowed driver and passengers to individualize the cabin temperature. While the A4 is listed as a five-seater, my children looked cramped in the backseat for the lift to school. The rear seats fold down with a 60/40 split.

Red backlighting on switches and buttons played well against the dark interior. A 7-inch display screen was neatly integrated into the A4's dashboard. Navigation, stereo, cellphone, and vehicle settings were controlled with a joystick knob surrounded by an array of buttons on the center console. While the center stack was imposing at first glance, I found operating the A4's infotainment features intuitive and straightforward. The cluster of controls reduced the need to drill down through layers of menus. A push-button ignition button was located beside a conveniently placed electronic parking brake control.

My only dislike with the A4 was the location of the cruise control stalk behind the steering wheel. I guess it's just a distinctive quirk with Audi, but cruise control is much easier to use when located on the steering wheel.

The solidly built Audi A4 starts at $37,600 and my tester topped out just over $46,000, which puts it in the mix with the other premium sedans from Germany, such as the BMW 3-series or Mercedes-Benz C300. The A4 is also worth a test drive when considering the Cadillac ATS, Lexus IS, or Infiniti Q50.

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Cambridge condo mixes style, comfort

This stylish new condo is one of three carved out of a long, narrow stucco house in North Cambridge that features a long front porch topped with private decks.

The end Unit 1 at 130 Rindge Ave. is the last of the condos for sale, on the market for $975,000, and it features three bedrooms and three levels of living space.

There's not much yard space around the 1875-built property, but the rebuilt front porch does overlook a large, open green space in front of the upscale Wyeth apartments next door. The house's exterior has been completely restored, with new black mullion windows and white trim.

The front porch leads into a foyer, with dark-stained red oak floors that are featured throughout the property, along with 9-foot ceilings with crown molding on the first floor.

To the left of the foyer sits a stylish recessed-lit kitchen,­ with 22 white-­painted wood cabinets and Carrara marble-topped counters with a white beadboard back­splash. There's also a separate Carrara-­topped gray-painted island with a breakfast bar that seats three as well as a double-doored pantry/storage closet. High-end stainless-steel appliances include a Bosch refrigerator and dishwasher as well as a professional-grade Viking gas stove and a matching microwave above.

Adjacent is a dining area, with glass doors that open out to a back porch and down to a private fenced-in patio.

Back inside, to the right of the foyer sits a good-sized recessed-lit living room with crown molding and four six-over-six windows on three sides.

Oak stairs lead up to three oak-floored bedrooms on the second floor with a window at the top of the landing.

The master suite covers half the second floor, with oak flooring, crown molding and recessed lighting. Two front windows bring in light and a pair of glass doors lead out to a private deck over the front porch with views of the open space next door.

The master suite has four closets, all with built-in shelving. The stylish en-suite bathroom is completely marble finished — from its small tile floors to gray tile around a deep soaking tub and shower. And there's a Carrara-topped double-sink wood vanity.

The second bedroom features two windows, two closets and an overhead light/fan. Across the hall sits a small third bedroom best suited as a home office or nursery. It has one deep closet.

The second full bathroom on this floor is equally stylish, with green-and-white small tile marble floors and white marble tile surround with small green tile inlay around a deep soaking tub and a shower. This bathroom also has a Carrara marble-topped wood vanity.

The unit has a fully finished basement, with oak stairs leading down to a carpeted family room.

The large family room has one window and two closets. One holds the unit's two-zone high-efficiency heating and cooling system, and the other has a washer-dryer hookup as well as a Navien tankless water heater.

There's a full bathroom on this level, with small white ceramic tile floors and white ceramic tile surround for a deep soaking tub and shower.

The condo comes with two outdoor parking spaces on a long shared driveway.

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NBC launches internal probe on Brian Williams claims

NEW YORK — NBC News has assigned the head of its own investigative unit to look into statements that anchor Brian Williams made about his reporting in Iraq a dozen years ago, an episode that's ballooned into a full-blown credibility crisis for the network.

NBC News President Deborah Turness announced the probe in an internal memo on Friday. Williams has apologized for falsely saying on the air that he was in a helicopter hit by a rocket-propelled grenade while in Iraq in 2003, and Turness said Friday the anchor expressed his regrets to his colleagues for the impact the episode has had.

"As you would expect, we have a team dedicated to gathering the facts to help us make sense of all that has transpired," Turness wrote. "We're working on what the best next steps are."

Richard Esposito, who has worked at the New York Daily News, New York Newsday and ABC and is now at NBC, is leading the investigation.

Williams anchored "Nightly News" from New York on Friday, making no mention of the criticisms of his work.

Questions were also raised about statements Williams made on coverage of Hurricane Katrina, which was one of his proudest moments at NBC. In a 2006 interview with former Disney CEO Michael Eisner, Williams twice referenced seeing a body float down a street in New Orleans.

"When you look out of your hotel room window in the French Quarter and watch a man float by face down, when you see bodies that you last saw in Banda Aceh, Indonesia and swore to yourself that you would never see in your country," Williams said.

Several minutes later, Williams again talked about seeing the body as he discussed how it felt to cover the storm.

"I felt something get dislodged that changes the usual arm's length relationship between me and the stories I cover. These are Americans. These are my brothers and sisters. And one of them was floating by."

The remarks drew suspicion because during Katrina, there was relatively little flooding in New Orleans' French Quarter.

Williams was staying at the Ritz-Carlton hotel in New Orleans, according to an NBC source who requested anonymity because the person was not authorized to speak on personnel matters.

Capt. James Scott, who was a police commander in the downtown area at the time of Katrina, said he saw a body floating along Rampart Street on the edge of the French Quarter. "It was floating with the water," he said.

The body Scott saw was about four blocks from the Ritz-Carlton, which was surrounded by up to three feet of water, he said.

Alex Brandon, a Washington-based photographer for The Associated Press, was working in New Orleans during Katrina and said there was enough water to launch a flat-bottomed boat from in front of the Ritz. He also said he photographed a dead body floating on Canal Street a few blocks from the Ritz.

The story originally called into question about Williams' wartime reporting experience has made him a subject of mockery, including a New York Post front cover that depicted him with a long Pinocchio's nose, over the headline "A Nose for News."

He's the leading man at the network's news division, whose nightly newscast has topped its rivals in ratings for the better part of a decade. As a frequent talk show guest and one-time "Saturday Night Live" host, his celebrity transcended the news division.

He apologized on the air Wednesday for telling his story about the supposed grenade attack as recently as last Friday on "Nightly News." He admitted that his helicopter was not hit by a grenade after war veterans had come forward to question the account, some even disputing whether Williams' helicopter was in a group that came under direct attack.

NBC News needs to look at not only Williams' story about the helicopter, which has changed in details as he's talked about it over the years, but whether anybody else at the network knew that he was spreading a falsehood and did anything about it, said Kelly McBride, an expert on ethics for the journalism think tank the Poynter Institute.

"He is the front man of 'Nightly News' and is seen as the primary arbiter of the facts," McBride said. "For him to get something wrong on something he was involved in casts doubt on his ability to get any facts right."

NBC News must also weigh his importance to the news division and the work he has done since taking over as top anchor from Tom Brokaw in 2004, she said. Brokaw, for his part, on Friday denied a published report that he had suggested Williams be dismissed.

"Brian's future will be decided by him and the executives of NBC News," Brokaw said.

That would be Turness and her immediate supervisor, Pat Fili-Krushel, who had seen "Nightly News" as a bright spot for the network as they tried to correct ratings problems at the "Today" show and "Meet the Press." NBC's corporate parents at Comcast would likely weigh in as well.

Meanwhile Friday, CNN said it was stepping back from its own report Thursday, quoting Rich Krell, a veteran who claimed to pilot Williams' helicopter in Iraq. Krell had said Thursday that the helicopter had taken small arms fire — if not a grenade attack — but said Friday that he was questioning his own recollections after being contradicted by other veterans.

____

Associated Press writer Cain Burdeau in New Orleans contributed to this story.

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RadioShack to shut 43 Bay State stores

Liquidation sales started at more than 1,700 RadioShack stores yesterday, a day after the 94-year-old consumer electronics chain filed for bankruptcy protection with plans to close up to 2,100 stores, including 43 in Massachusetts.

Discounts of up to 50 percent off original prices are being offered on the stores' entire inventories under store-closing sales.

RadioShack gift cards will be honored for 30 days.

The Fort Worth-based RadioShack hopes to sell 1,500 to 2,400 other stores to hedge fund Standard General, its lender and largest shareholder, through a court auction process. Up to 1,750 of them would operate as co-branded stores with Sprint. The mobile carrier would set up stores-within-stores at those locations, which also would sell RadioShack merchandise.

RadioShack could not specify how many Massachusetts locations were included in that group. The company got its start in Boston as a ham radio seller in 1921.

RadioShack listed assets of $1.2 billion and $1.3 billion in debt in bankruptcy documents. Its revenue has been significantly declining over the past three years due to increasing competition from online and big-box rivals and its failure to become a destination for mobile phone buyers. RadioShack generated $3.4 billion in revenue in 2013, but posted a $344 million net operating loss. "Despite numerous initiatives and extensive work by management, RadioShack's performance continued to suffer in 2014," the company said in court documents.

The more than 1,100 RadioShack stores operated through franchise agreements are independently owned and are not part of the bankruptcy process.

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Jobs galore in January

A blockbuster January jobs report — with accelerated hiring, rising wages and more people looking for work — signals a recovering economy and sets up the labor market for a strong year, economists say.

"January was great, November and December were revised up, 1 million jobs in three months is incredible," said Doug Handler, chief U.S. economist for IHS Global Insight in Lexington. "This is a really great release, it is going to continue to spur optimism."

Among the news yesterday from the federal Department of Labor:

• 257,000 jobs added in January, above economists' expectations, and the new jobs were across nearly all industries, including benchmark sectors such as construction and manufacturing.

• Upward revisions for December and November, including 414,000 jobs added in November, making it the best month for job creation in 17 years.

• The unemployment rate rose 0.1 percent to 
5.7 percent, but even that was good news. More than 1 million people re-entered the workforce, likely more confident in their ability to get a job. The unemployment rate only counts people who either have a job or looked for a job within the past four weeks.

• Average hourly wages rose by 12 cents last month, the largest increase since 2008. Hourly wages have been stagnant recently, but economists expect earnings to rise as employers have to work harder to hire potential new employees who have more jobs opportunities.

Still, one month isn't enough to put wage worries away for good.

"Years of stagnant growth cannot be discounted after one better-than-expected monthly increase," said Lindsay Piegza, chief economist of Sterne Agee, in a research note. "We remain cautiously optimistic (on wages)."

Handler said the rise in wages may not be due to job market pressures, but instead may reflect the fact that 20 states raised their minimum wage in January.

Even with questions over the outlook for wages, the year is starting off on the right foot, economists said.

"The labor market was about the last thing to recover from the Great Recession, and in the last six months it has picked up steam," said Bill Hampel, chief economist at the Credit Union National Association.

"I think we do have a ways to run in 2015," Handler said. "It's going to be a great year."

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Judge upholds ride-share rules

A bid by taxi medallion owners to halt regulations that have legalized transportation companies including Uber and Lyft has been rejected by a federal judge.

"Plaintiffs have failed to convince this court that medallion owners have a protected property interest in the market value of their medallions," U.S. District Judge Nathaniel M. Gorton said yesterday in a court order. "Purchasing a taxicab medallion does not entitle the buyer to 'an unalterable monopoly' over the taxicab market or the overall for-hire transportation market,"

Gorton said the Boston Taxi Owners Association was not convincing in its argument for a preliminary injunction, rejecting its claims of violation of equal protection and "unconstitutional taking of their property."

The association has sued both Boston and the state in an effort to halt state regulations for Uber and Lyft that it sees as unfair. Initial statewide regulations for so-called transportation network companies went into effect last month, but require legislative approval.

"In order for Massachusetts' economy to thrive, we must continue to embrace technology and innovation as a means for growth," Gov. Charlie Baker said in a statement.

Boston is in the middle of its own regulatory process, with a Taxi Advisory Committee that has been looking at the issue for months. A spokeswoman for Mayor Martin J. Walsh said the city is pleased with the decision.

A lawyer for the Taxi Owners Association did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

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Environmental group promoting illegal fishing crackdown

A nonprofit group says its new live satellite system will help regulators deter illegal fishing, a problem federal regulators say costs more than $9 billion around the world every year.

"Project Eyes on the Seas" was launched in January and uses multiple sources of satellite tracking data to monitor vessels, according to Washington, D.C.-based Pew Charitable Trusts. The system then links to information about the vessels' ownership history and country of registration, said Tony Long, director of a Pew project to end illegal fishing.

Long said the information alerts authorities to "suspicious vessel movements" on the ocean.

The system itself is a video wall with a map of the world that has colored dots that show the location of vessels. Pew hopes to convince regulators to tap into the system remotely via the Internet, Long said.

Chile and the island nation of Palau are signing on, and the nonprofit hopes to work with the United States, England, and other nations, Long said. He declined to say how much the nonprofit will charge for use of the service.

"If the U.S. closes down on illegal fishing, it forces change," Long said.

The global value of illegal fishing is estimated to be between $9 billion and $12 billion annually, according to federal statistics.

In New England, one of the U.S.'s most active fishing areas, between 12 and 24 percent of the total catch of species such as cod, flounder and haddock was taken illegal in 2010, according to a study in the journal Marine Policy. Ben Martens, executive director of the Maine Coast Fishermen's Association, said Pew's project could potentially be a "way to use technology to try and deal with an issue that we have been having a hard time figuring out."

Pew Charitable Trusts is a public policy organization that focuses some of its efforts on protecting marine resources and curbing overfishing. Recently, the organization has opposed proposals to reopen closed New England waters to commercial fishing.

Pew plans to present the technology to the federal Department of State, which has led efforts in deterring illegal fishing, Long said. The state department released a statement that the agency "is committed to combating illegal fishing and we encourage the development of innovative tools to fight this enormous international problem."

The technology will also be available to private industries, seafood producers and fishery managers, Pew officials said. German retailer Metro Ag is considering using the technology. Company vice president Jürgen Matern said the technology will help "guarantee legally-caught, healthy and sustainable fish."

British company Satellite Applications Catapult built the technology, which Long said cost about $1.5 million.

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