PAYING ATTENTION!
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How Many City lawyers Does it Take to Screw In A
Lightbulb?
(Published
3/01/00)
The
Lawrence School Committee has officially hired Assistant
City Attorney Robert O’Sullivan to represent them in
the investigation of superintendent of schools Mae
Gaskins. Atty. O’Sullivan, who has an excellent
reputation in the legal community, has found himself in
the middle of the controversy surrounding conflict of
interest charges and political patronage in city hall.
Atty. O’Sullivan was initially chosen by Mayor
Dowling (who is also a lawyer) to represent the School
Committee without a vote of the committee, which is a
violation of School committee policy B-2 (published in
the last edition) and Mass General Laws. Dowling secured
the required votes of the committee more than two weeks
after Atty. O’Sullivan was already at the School
Committee table representing them at a previous meeting.
O’Sullivan was given access to sensitive school
department documents relating to the investigation of
Gaskins long before being officially hired during the
Gaskins meeting of February 10th.
School Committee members Mike Sweeney, and Ralph Carrero
voted against
Atty. O’Sullivan while the newest member Nancy
Kennedy, voted "present" saying she did not
have enough information to vote one way or the other.
Sweeney called the Mayor’s actions into question
saying that O’Sullivan works under the authority of
City Attorney Carol Hajjar McGravey, who answers to the
Mayor (and is the wife of City Clerk JamesMcGravey).
Atty. McGravey, signed several of the consultant
contracts being called into question by the School
Committee, making it a conflict of interest for
O’Sullivan to participate in the investigation.
"How can we expect Mr. O’Sullivan, to be
impartial while investigating these contracts when his
boss Carol McGravey signed them? This is clearly a
conflict here!" Sweeney said. School Committee
members Suzanne Piscitello, Carol Bannon, Martha Previtt
and Mayor Dowling voted to confirm O’Sullivan
anyway. O’Sullivan was reported in the last edition
of Rumbo, (as well as the Eagle Tribune) to be
a campaign contributor of Mayor Patricia Dowling.
"How can he possibly be objective?"
Sweeney asked. “O’Sullivan Works for McGravey,
while McGravey works for the Mayor. This is a serious
legal issue." McGravey and O’Sullivan, however,
are not the only City Attorneys who received work after
contributing to the Mayor’s campaign fund. Atty.
James Bowers was hired last week by Mayor Dowling to be
the city’s new labor negotiator in Atty. Carol
McGravey’soffice. Mr. Bowers contributed close to
$1,000 to Mayor Dowling’s campaign over the last two
years. Atty. Bowers’ name also appears on the sign
outside the law firm of Shultzand Hughes, along side
fellow attorney Patricia Dowling. Or at least it did.
Last week, Mayor Dowling’s name mysteriously
disappeared from the law firm office sign at the
corner of Lawrence and Common Street, which is located
less than a block from city hall. (See both pictures.)
Before Dowling’s friend and financial supporter
could be confirmed as yet another City Attorney, the
Lawrence City Council had to approve the appointment at a
public meeting. Despite the appearance of a conflict, the
heavy campaign contributions, and professional
relationship between Dowling and Bowers, that is exactly
what the council did. They appointed Bowers anyway.
District "A" councilor Patrick Blanchette voted
against the appointment questioning the inexperience of
Bowers in the area of labor relations, which was the
specialized field of law this job was posted for. With
the exception of District "C" councilor Nilka
Alvarez and Mr. Blanchette, the rest of the council
approved Bowers, taking the word of another Dowling
contributor, Carol Hajjar McGravey, who said that he
would receive "on the job training." and his
inexperience was not a problem.
Voting for Bowers appointment were At Large Councilors,
Michael Sullivan,
Marcos Devers, Frank Kivell, Julia Silverio from District
"B", Mark LaPlante from District "D",
Gil Freschette from District "E" and of course
long time mayoral supporter District "F"
councilor Marie Gosselin.
When questioned about the appearance of impropriety in
the Bowers appointment, At-Large Councilor Mike Sullivan
said "he was qualified to do the job. That fact
needs to overshadow any campaign contributions. If he was
a contributor and unqualified then that would be another
story." Patrick Blanchette, through his questioning
proved that Mr.Bowers, though an intelligent and
respected attorney, was, in fact, not qualified to do the
job of labor negotiator. Mike Sullivan voted to confirm
Mr. Bowers.
In Summary, we have the lead investigator for the School
Committee, Atty. Bob O’Sullivan, charging Mae
Gaskins with wrongdoing for giving out consultant
contracts. Those contracts were signed by his boss, Carol
Hajjar McGravey, (who works for the Mayor, and is the
wife of the city clerk). Both O’Sullivan and
McGravey contributed to the Mayor’s campaign. We
have the chairman of School Committee, Mayor Dowling,
giving jobs to School Committee members, Carol Bannon,
and Martha Previtt, both of whom push the Mayor’s
agenda at the table and have called for Gaskins to
resign. Mayor Dowling has hired (and the council
approved) another major campaign contributor, Atty. James
Bowers, who is not qualified in labor negotiations, yet
he was hired as the AssistantCity Attorney for labor
negotiations. And the voting public, through all this, is
somehow supposed to believe that our city government is
fair and impartial, works for the best interest of the
tax payers, and Mae Gaskins is just a cheat who is
stealing from our children. Wow!