Welcome to the Radio Boston live webchat. We’ll run a chatroom like this every week while the show is live and on the air, Fridays from 1-2pm Eastern Time. Log on and listen in to our live stream: www.wbur.org/listen.

Today, our chat is moderated by Boston Phoenix columnist, David S. Bernstein.  We’re talking about the power of the Massachusetts Speaker of the House Sal DiMasi and the culture of the State House.

There is jockeying for power at the Massachusetts statehouse with house speaker Sal Dimasi under an ethics cloud. Will there be a leadership fight? 

Take a slideshow tour of the Massachusetts State House with 3rd graders from the Lawrence School in Brookline.

The House of Representatives Recent History: A Timeline

Pan the timeline by dragging it horizontally. Click on a name or date for more info and photographs. 

Timeline produced by Frannie Carr and Jesse Costa

Democrats don’t always vote in line with the leadership and when they don’t it’s called voting "off". To check out a compliation of who has cast the most and least votes against Speaker DiMasi in recent years read on…

Do you need help figuring out how to pay for college?Want to know about the most and least expensive colleges in Massachusetts? Click on the "more" link below and read on.

Pictured at right: Medford High School student, Michael Maloney, Amanpreet Singh, Ashley Martignetti

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Plus: the top 10 most expensive schools in Massachusetts, the 10 cheapest, how costs have been rising, resources for students and parents, and thoughts from financial advisors and a dean of admissions.

Massachusetts has long poured its energies into environmental protection. Shift the focus to energy efficiency itself and the rose-tinted view gets murky. Recent studies estimate that the state pumps out 87 million tons of carbon per year. The Bay State is not an efficiency leader, but solidly in the middle as the 25th highest carbon emitter in the U.S.

So, can the Bay State lead from the center? There are those who say, yes. But not at the state level. They point to ciities and towns that are taking the lead in efforts to reduce global warming gas emissions. From the first-in-the-nation Cambridge Energy Alliance, to enery task forces from Amherst to Salem, Massachusetts towns are revitalizing that old bromide, "Think global, act local."

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Plus, in our web specials: David poses with wind-blown hair in a video-short from Salem, and add ‘energy efficiency’ to the eye-of-newt witches brew as Salem tries to put a hex on global warming…

The Archdiocese is 200 — As the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston celebrates its 200th anniversary, we’ll look at who is Catholic, what that means for both parishioners and the church and what it signifies about the power of the church in Massachusetts.

Are you a Catholic church parishoner?  Tell us what it means to you. 

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Plus, in our web specials: From Latin to Cape Verdean Creole, listen to Boston Catholicism’s past, present, and future…

It’s override season in Massachusetts, a time when many voters will decide whether to approve tax increases above the two and a half percent allowed by state law. But this year the override debates are especially divisive — in large part because of the sluggish economy.

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This week Radio Boston is going on location. We broadcast from Athol’s Memorial Town Hall. 

Residents from the town of Orange participate in the tolling of the town bell for 4,000 seconds to commemorate Americans killed in Iraq.

We’re talking with veterans from north central Massachusetts about their experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan and what they think now that they’re home.

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It’s that time of year, when high school students are eagerly awaiting acceptance to the school of their choice.  But for many student athletes the decision was made months ago and they even have scholarships in hand.

How do some student go from scholar athlete to scholarship athlete?  What kind of recruiting tactics are colleges using?  And is it a good idea for students to make verbal commitments to colleges as early as their sophmore year?

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The stories are heart wrenching and they all have a common theme: a young person who has lost to heroin. State officials say there has been a dramatic increase in the number of arrests for heroin and a dramatic decrease in the average age of an addict. They blame a deadly combination of low cost (around $4 a bag) and high purity (80-90%, which means it’s easy to ingest and highly addictive).  The most recent data available shows that 544 people died of heroin or opiate use in 2005.  The increase in heroin use and the alarming number of overdoses has led Massachusetts health officials to launch a program to try to save addicts by distributing the medication Narcan, which can save someone who has overdosed.

Why are heroin addicts getting younger? Why is the drug so cheap? What can be done to stop what one doctor calls, "a silent epidemic?"

It’s not exactly news that circulation and staff are down at Massachusetts newspapers. The Boston Globe has made its fourth buyout offer to employees since 2001. Circulation is down again at the Boston Herald. Will there be breaking news that nobody knows about? Where do you go to get your news and information?  

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Plus, in our web specials: Meet the Blogfather…. and, some of the best media criticism out there at MediaNation.