Kevin Cullen, in a column in today’s Boston Globe, shines a light on how Gov. Deval Patrick is insisting on political loyalty as he assembles his leadership team for a second term. There’s certainly nothing wrong with wanting to reward your political supporters, but it’s a risky time to be overt about it, particularly with the patronage scandal brewing at the state’s Probation Department.
Cullen’s column focuses on Tom Kelley, who headed the state’s veterans’ services office until he was let go over the holidays. Kelley says his boss, Health and Human Services Secretary JudyAnn Bigby, told him the Patrick administration wanted to go in a different direction, “but she couldn’t tell me what that direction is.”
According to Cullen, the real reason for Kelley’s dismissal is because he wasn’t willing to be a campaign asset. Kelley has had remarkable longevity on Beacon Hill. He was appointed by Gov. Paul Cellucci in 1999. He even gave $200 to Kerry Healey, Patrick’s Republican rival in 2006. Yet Patrick kept Kelley on when he came into office. Kelley’s backers say he has survived because he is very good at what he does.
But as he enters his second term, Patrick is making sure jobs in his administration go to loyalists. CommonWealth gave the first hint of this shift in a Back Story column written just before the holidays. A large group of the governor’s advisors from inside and outside government gathered for two days of meetings at an unusual location – state Democratic Party headquarters. It was all very hush-hush, ostensibly to discuss policies and priorities for the second term. But the group met with each of the governor’s cabinet secretaries individually and apparently discussed who on their staffs should stay and who should go.
Kelley turned out to be one staff member who had to go. Cullen, in his column, said you can’t sack a Medal of Honor winner like Kelley with no one noticing. He notes Kelley’s supporters are sending letters to the governor and plan to picket his inauguration on Thursday. It could get messy. “The job shouldn’t be political, and by doing this they are making it political,” Kelley says.
“Deval Patrick had every right to replace Tom Kelley,” Cullen writes. “That doesn’t make it right. Or smart.”
–BRUCE MOHL
BEACON HILL
Legislators take a small pay cut, the Sun Chronicle reports. Lawmakers on the Cape opine on the tiny pay trim.
Gov. Patrick is mum on Dominic Cinelli’s parole decision, while House Speaker Robert DeLeo says he is considering legislation that would limit which inmates can receive parole. Cinelli was on parole when he gunned down Woburn police officer John Maguire on Dec. 26. Here’s the Herald’s version of the story and here’s the Globe’s version. Middlesex DA Gerard Leone is also calling for changes in the way parole operates. Meanwhile, NECN reports that the murder of Maguire is prompting calls for the passage of Melissa’s law. The Herald, on its editorial page, says the Cinelli parole case suggests the executive branch of government, where parole is located, is the wrong place to put probation.
All but six schools met a Dec. 31 deadline for filing bullying-prevention plans with the state, the Globe reports.
MUNICIPAL
After a recent Supreme Judicial Court ruling on snow removal by property owners, Newton aldermen are having a tough time deciding who shovels what after a snowstorm.
Mayor Michael Bonfanti of Peabody tearfully announces that he will not seek reelection when his fifth term ends at the end of this year, the Salem News reports.
A Gloucester city worker who was fired after beach parking fees went missing files a lawsuit suggesting TD Bank was responsible for the losses, the Gloucester Times reports.
Steve Murphy, who has had no luck winning support from voters for any office other than the Boston City Council slot he has held since 1997, won the unanimous backing of his colleagues yesterday to become the new council president.
The owner of a Dartmouth home that has been the site of raucous parties by UMass Dartmouth students is the focus of health, zoning, and criminal violations from town officials, according to the New Bedford Standard Times.
NATIONAL
Strained states are passing laws to deal with labor unions, particularly those representing public sector workers, according to a story in The New York Times.
California and New York may get the headlines when it comes to budget woes, but Texas, “America’s Ireland,” is also on the verge of fiscal collapse. Business Insider via Talking Points Memo.
WASHINGTON
The GOP is setting a huge target – about $100 billion – for its budget ax, The New York Times reports. With a reenergized Republican-controlled Congress, the National Review says the binge is over, the Lenten season has begun, and it’s time to reflect and repent on our spending excesses of the last two years. Yet NECN’s Jim Braude says the Republicans in Washington promised change but aren’t delivering any.
MEDIA
The press operates very differently in England, with no attempt at unbiased reporting. WBUR asks if the English approach makes sense.
ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT
Governing magazine examines the struggle to build offshore wind farms.
The state’s attorney general is looking into allegations that a huge North Shore waste incinerator, Wheelabrator Saugus, has violated environmental protection laws.
POLITICS
Upset with the tough political ads financed by the US Chamber of Commerce, the Central Mass South Chamber is ending its association with the umbrella group. CommonWealth’s Jack Sullivan looked at this issue earlier and found local chambers are split on the issue.
PROBATION
Once embattled and now former Probation Commissioner John J. O’Brien did, indeed, file for his pension when he turned in his sudden resignation on New Year’s Eve. The Boston Herald calculates his pension at about $52,000 a year based on O’Brien being the sole beneficiary while the CommonWealth story pegs the number a little lower because the 53-year-old O’Brien chose the reduced option that will ensure his wife gets a monthly check after he dies.
ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
Berkshire officials mull over how to attract Hollywood film and other media producers after the reorganization of the state’s film office.
LOTTERY MANIA
The usual media hoopla is attending the news of a bulked up Mega Millions lottery jackpot. An impolitic question at this time of heavy breathing over one-in-a-zillion chances at riches: What is it about a $330 million jackpot that average Joes get so excited about that a prize of, say, a measly $5 million just can’t do?
MILITARY
In the American Spectator, Jed Babbin, undersecretary of defense in Bush 41, says even if Ivy League schools reverse their bans on ROTC, the military should stay away from those left-wing campuses because the officer material is not any better and in many cases worse.
TECHNOLOGY
The Norfolk Registry of Deeds is moving into the brave new world of computers after posting more than 27,000 volumes of records dating to 1793 on its online database, including deeds between John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams.
GAY MARRIAGE
The state’s highest ranking Episcopal bishop performed a first for him and the church: He presided over the marriage of two female Episcopal priests, the Brockton Enterprise reports.
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