Kenneth J. Donnelly (July 15, 1950 – April 2, 2017) was a

Massachusetts state senator The Massachusetts Senate is the upper house of the Massachusetts General Court, the bicameral state legislature of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Senate comprises 40 elected members from 40 single-member senatorial districts in the st ...

for the Fourth

Middlesex Middlesex (; abbreviation: Middx) is a Historic counties of England, historic county in South East England, southeast England. Its area is almost entirely within the wider urbanised area of London and mostly within the Ceremonial counties of ...

district, which included his hometown of Arlington and several other cities. He was a

Democrat Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to: Politics *A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people. *A member of a Democratic Party: **Democratic Party (United States) (D) **Democratic ...

who served from 2009 to 2017. Donnelly graduated from the

University of Massachusetts Amherst The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...

with a BA in

Labor Studies Industrial relations or employment relations is the multidisciplinary academic field that studies the employment relationship; that is, the complex interrelations between employers and employees, labor/trade unions, employer organizations, a ...

. He was a retired lieutenant with the Lexington Fire Department in

Lexington, Massachusetts Lexington is a suburban town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is 10 miles (16 km) from Downtown Boston. The population was 34,454 as of the 2020 census. The area was originally inhabited by Native Americans, and was firs ...

. On June 17, 2014, Donnelly endorsed fellow Democrat

Don Berwick Donald M. Berwick (born September 9, 1946) is a former Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). Prior to his work in the administration, he was President and Chief Executive Officer of the Institute for Healthcare Im ...

in the

Massachusetts gubernatorial election, 2014 The 2014 Massachusetts gubernatorial election took place on November 4, 2014, to elect the Governor of Massachusetts, concurrently with the election of Massachusetts' Class II U.S. Senate seat, and other elections to the United States Senate i ...

. Donnelly died on April 2, 2017, in Arlington, Massachusetts from complications of a

brain tumor A brain tumor occurs when abnormal cells form within the brain. There are two main types of tumors: malignant tumors and benign (non-cancerous) tumors. These can be further classified as primary tumors, which start within the brain, and seconda ...

, aged 66.

References

1950 births 2017 deaths 20th-century American firefighters Democratic Party Massachusetts state senators People from Arlington, Massachusetts University of Massachusetts Amherst College of Social and Behavioral Sciences alumni 21st-century American politicians Deaths from brain cancer in the United States {{Massachusetts-MASenate-stub