Saying Goodbye to
Julie Silverio and
Correcting the Record on Her Way out!
06/10/03
Councilor Julia
Silverio has announced she is not seeking
reelection and has taken some parting shots on
her way out the door. Let me correct the record
for those of you who read Monday's Tribune
article and don't know the history. Silverio
NOT Seeking Reelection
Silverio blamed race and racism for her first
loss against Pauline Brown back in 1995. But for
those of us who were on the scene during that
election it seemed odd that she would continue to
try and rewrite history. I guess some people are
addicted to the victim mentality. Silverio, I
will tell you, was no victim.
Councilor Pauline Brown represented her district
more diligently than almost any other district
Councilor before or since. She campaigned on
issues like housing, residency and protecting the
city charter from those who circumvented it.
Pauline Brown served everyone in her district
regardless of race. The efforts of Ms. Brown on
the Council benefited everyone despite their
background. (Though some would argue that since
most of her constituents were Latino, that the
Latino population benefited more
from her service.)
Never once did Pauline Brown use race as an
issue. Never once did she refuse help to anyone
because of race. Never once did Pauline Brown
forget her Latino constituents or ignore the
issues important to them or anyone else. She
served with class and labored over every decision
with the nagging awareness that her decisions
were changing people's lives.
Despite this, an up and coming Julia Silverio ran
against Pauline Brown and played the race card
from the beginning of her first campaign. She
used code words like "diversity" and
"culture" to convince Latinos that
Brown was not representing them. Silverio told
Latinos that Brown was a racist and
"couldn't represent them" (by virtue of
her skin color). After losing her first bid,
however, Silverio ran again and stepped up her
racial rhetoric two years later.
On Spanish language radio programs she and her
husband told Hispanic voters that supporting
Pauline Brown was tantamount to being a traitor
to their culture. On one show she said that if
they voted for "this white woman" over
"one of your own" their voice would not
be heard in city hall.
Silverio even used the statue of liberty on one
of her fliers with the inference that Brown did
not care about immigrants and that Silverio would
if elected.
Pauline Brown refused
to get sucked into a racially charged public
relations war she couldn't win. Instead, she
continued to fight for better housing in District
"B". She fought for residency, the main
issue Latinos were concerned with for years. She
fought against the corruption in city hall and
focused on problems that affected her district
every day.
In the end, however, the ignorance of Silverio's
"us against them" campaign won out and
Brown was defeated. It was a sad day for
Lawrence. Since then Silverio has continued her
campaign of disinformation concerning race
relations in Lawrence and the events surrounding
her campaigns.
It is a perfect strategy in Lawrence to wring
ones hands and lament about the horrible racism
that keeps people down. It is Jesse Jackson
politics at it's worst. Once you convince a group
of people the system is against them, the only
way they can feel represented by government is to
get "one of their own" on the inside to
fight for "them". And that is the
strategy Silverio has used so brilliantly since
1995. The problem is, in doing so she has created
more resentment and distrust between Latinos and
non-Latinos and hurt the City of Lawrence in the
process.
Once elected, Silverio wasted no time playing on
the fear and ignorance of her constituents (much
of which she created) to paint herself as their
champion against the big bad racist officials of
the City of Lawrence.
She used her seat on the Council to grandstand
every time an issue came up that involved any
type of controversy. The main focus of her rants
was the supposed disparity between poor White
Lawrencians and poor Hispanics.
When the Lawrence taxi's (mostly owned and run by
Latinos) were not in compliance with the law and
the police were about to shut them down, Silverio
cried racism and advocated skirting the law just
for them. When other Councilors wanted to
increase the minimum lot size requirements for
building new homes (to prevent
overcrowding)…again she cried racism. The
evil Whites in Lawence were trying to stop
Latinos from getting adequate housing!
When audience members shouted at Councilor Gil
Frechette over the Weatherbee School renovation,
yelling "THEY ALL SMELL" in response to
his assertion that "this old school smells
bad" well, Silverio wasted no time playing
the grieving victim of racism. She burst into
tears and ran from the room in a spectacle,
claiming white audience members made a racist
comment against Latinos.
Hack Tribune reporter
Mark Vogler retold her story in the paper the
next day as though it was fact, even though
Vogler admits he didn't even hear the comments. (No
Racist Remark Was Made)
Silverio even told Housing Authority Chairman
David Defillippo, at a public meeting, that she
was not voting for his renewal to the board
because she wanted someone hired who "looks
like us!" Translation: he was the wrong skin
color; white.
Even worse than Silverio pandering to a group of
people she helped convince are victims, she also
helped herself along the way. Her business grew
from a small travel agency on Jackson St. to the
booming travel business on Essex St. complete
with a State Rep. renting office space from her
in a building she got for a song.
Remember when Mayor Patty Dowling was taking
trips once a week on our dime? One of those
trips, paid for with public dollars, was booked
through Julia Silverio's travel agency. This came
at a time when Dowling had business before the
Council and Silverio sat on the Council. Conflict
of interest? You bet! But wait, there's more.
When the city settled a bogus lawsuit brought a
young student (who falsely claimed a Frost school
security guard raped her), Silverio snuck the
quarter million dollar financial transfer onto a
sub committee agenda. She assigned it a bogus
agenda number and placed it under the heading
"tax title".
Would you like to guess who the Lawyers were that
settled the case and pocketed more than $84,0000
of our tax money before the accused rapist even
went to trial? It was none other than the law
firm of State Rep. Arthur Broadhurst. Don't
forget, Broadhurst rents his Lawrence office
space in Silverio's building. None the less,
Silverio claimed it was just a mistake and an
oversight.
By the way, after sneaking in the illegal
settlement under a false agenda number and the
heading "tax title," the so-called
victim Broadhurst represented in the rape case
turned out to be a liar. The security guard she
was accusing of rape was found "not
guilty" and witnesses testified that she
threatened to make the false claim prior to the
rape supposedly taking place.
That's a quarter of a million dollars which could
have been spent to benefit Silverio's
neighborhood. Do you think Atty. Broadhurst had
trouble paying his rent to Councilor Silverio
that month?
Then there's the way
Silverio took care of her family.
Each year the Council gets to dole out Community
Development funds which come in through the
state. Organizations run by Silverio's husband
and daughter were both up for money and wouldn't
you know it? Silverio openly lobbied for her
husband's organization (he runs the Dominican day
parade) and the youth program her daughter helps
to run. Shamelessly Silverio even attacked fellow
Councilor Nilka Alvarez for not giving special
consideration to her daughter during the sub
committee process.
Now I ask you, those of you who pay attention, if
a native Lawrencian who happened to be white or
non-Latino engaged in this type of behavior would
they get a free pass in the community? You know
they wouldn't. And if you had to guess, do you
think a white elected official would get away
with selling travel tickets to a mayor while
sitting on the Council? Do you think Tom Duggan
would have gotten away with sneaking a $250,000
settlement transfer past the public and fellow
Councilors on a bogus agenda number? I can't
imagine!
But here she is, still riding high in the Latino
community on the fallacious claims of racism
after 4 years of back room deals. She is bowing
out of this year's race basically unscathed by
her misdeeds. And she continues to play the
divisive race game because it plays well among
Latinos who have been convinced (again, some by
her) that there's a secret handshake among whites
in the city to exclude "them" and let
everything else pass. Well it just isn't so.
Corruption in Lawrence is color blind. The only
color that matters to the hacks in city hall, is
GREEN!
It is so sad that Silverio didn't spend her time
exposing the truth during her four years on the
Council. It's a lost opportunity for all of us.
For instead of fighting against
corruption Silverio became part of it.
So, while you read the self-serving rants of
Julia Silverio in Monday's Tribune, please
remember the history of her antics and her
hateful agenda. Remember how she abused her
position on the Council. And remember how she
defeated a City Councilor with divisiveness and
drove a wedge between Latinos and non-Latinos in
the entire city.
And please, above all else, remember what Ms.
Silverio is all about when she decides to run for
Mayor in two years. Because the minute Latinos
outnumber non-Latinos at the polling booths, you
can bet Silverio will be there to divide people
based on race to achieve political power yet
again. And if there is nobody in the Latino
community to tell them the truth about her
history, she just might win!
And that will set back everyone in the city
regardless of race.
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