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For starters, two projects which he claims credit for – the new Lawrence High School and the new State Transportation Center on Merrimack Street – are completely funded by the state and were in the works long before he became mayor. I understand politics - some take credit for anything good that happens – but it is a real reach, even for a politician, for him to say that without him these things would not have happened. But if one is to take the credit for someone else’s good, one must also take the blame for the bad that has happened as well. As the chairman of the Lawrence School Committee, the mayor must be held accountable for the escalating conflict during these last two years between School Committee member Amy McGovern and School Superintendent Wilfredo Laboy. The recent criminal investigation stemming from a confrontation involving the two in mid-June is a symptom of a hostile atmosphere that the mayor has allowed to fester because of his hands-off approach to the School Committee’s business. The mayor’s lack of leadership as the Committee chairman enabled the tension between a school committee person doing her job as a policy and fiscal watchdog and the superintendent to escalate into criminal assault and battery charges being leveled by each at the other. Further, it took five weeks for the mayor to finally come out and ask the two parties to sit down and discuss the matter and to put this latest confrontation behind them. I began talking about a resolution soon after it happened. A true leader would have had this conversation with the two participants the day after this occurred. But the mayor could not be bothered until it became all too obvious that this incident would leave another blight on our already shaky city image. And as we move closer to the preliminary election in late September, the operative word this campaign season seems to be “investigation,” as there are numerous investigations on-going for which I doubt we will see any substantive conclusions any time soon. The tradition in our city is to sweep such investigations under the rug, and this tradition runs strong in the Sullivan administration. Earlier this year, the federal Housing and Urban Development Agency froze nearly $4 million in monies earmarked for Lawrence because an investigation revealed that the mayor does not have HUD-approved personnel serving in key economic development posts. At least $1.6 million is still unavailable to the city because the mayor has not implemented a HUD-approved infrastructure compliance program. How many opportunities have we lost as a city because the mayor cannot follow these federal guidelines? On May 17th, City Councilor Israel Reyes, during the Council’s review of the mayor’s ill-conceived, incompetent and unpro-fessional attempt to fire Roger Twomey as chairman of the Licensing Board, alleged that a member of the mayor’s Licensing Board took a $4,000 bribe to deliver approval of a liquor license to an applicant. It was not until I began demanding an accounting of this allegation from the mayor that he finally asked the chief of police to investigate. I, not the mayor, asked the Essex County District Attorney to look into this matter, and I eagerly await his independent findings. Please let me caution that the Essex County DA, as a matter of policy, neither can confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation. The city’s so-called investigation is not laboring under this restriction. I have been promised several times by the mayor that the results are forthcoming, but we still, after nearly three months, have yet to receive a report from the mayor as to the findings of his investigation. But, oh how big a magic carpet the mayor must have. Several weeks ago it was revealed that the agency in charge of providing jobs training monies and programs for Lawrence, ValleyWorks Career Center, was sitting on a $1.2 million slush fund to pay for Lawrence’s salaries and fringe benefits and “to protect Lawrence,” according to its director. In other words, the money was not being used for its intended purpose – jobs training. The Worker Investment Board, which the mayor controls, is now investigating, and the city’s legislative delegation has also begun to look into the matter. During the City Council’s recent budget deliberations we heard details about yet another state investigation into the manner in which the city administers its building inspections. We learned that the state has the city’s inspections department under investigation for the manner in which it conducts, or rather does not conduct, its inspections. For example, we do not have inspectors who are state certified; we do not have enough inspectors; and we have one inspector currently serving a suspension – paid – for an unknown misconduct. We learned that the state board overseeing this department intends to have continual oversight of the situation until the mayor and his appointees can comply with state regulations. Under questioning, the chief of the city’s Inspectional Services Department admitted she saw no need to share this information with the Council as the state investigations were beginning. Finally, as we continue to throw light onto the mayor’s budget and more particularly the mayor’s proposed revenue figures for the next fiscal year, we see he is storytelling fiction worthy of Mark Twain. The mayor’s budget director admitted the city has a $6.5 million structural deficit. Some estimate that, because the mayor is using faulty revenue numbers that the state Department of Revenue already rejected once in last year’s budget, we are looking at an almost $10 million budget deficit for the fiscal year that began on July 1st. The DOR is investigating these revenue projections once again and there is nothing that has changed from last year to allow one to think that these faulty projections will be accepted this year. As these investigations continue in the dark of night, a reasonable person must ask: “How big a broom and rug does the mayor have? How long must this continue? How long must our city face the incompetence of this administration that threatens any improvement in our economic development, schools, or quality of life?” A mayor, as
the city’s CEO, must establish a mindset for its
employees and residents to follow. I will not tolerate
unprofessional and unqualified appointees to hold office
in City Hall. I will be truthful with our residents and
taxpayers and put forth a spending plan that is in
balance and does not continue to depend on annual
bailouts from the state. I will throw away the broom and
rug that this mayor has made a staple of his
administration as we sweep away the incompetence in City
Hall. Until this happens, we as a city cannot begin to
move forward. We need to work together to build our One
City with the One Vision that will allow us to fulfill
the promise of this once great city and work together to
create jobs, economic growth, improve schools, and have
safe and clean streets. Marcos Devers is a memebr of the Lawrence City Counicl and is a past president. He is the former acting mayor and a member of the Lawrence City Democrat Committee. *Send your questions
comments to ValleyPatriot@aol.com |
Last month, the mayor of Lawrence
began running advertisements touting the alleged success
of his administration over the last three years and
asking voters to “take a hard look at
Lawrence.” So I did.