When the Boston police arbitration award first popped two Fridays ago, it looked like an issue that could be trouble for mayoral candidate Marty Walsh. By this weekend, there seemed to be little doubt that the union muscle that has been the mainstay of Walsh’s rise in politics may also prove to be an Alcatraz around his neck.
Walsh was the first one out of the gate saying the arbitration award of 25.4 percent increase over six years was “out of line.” He encouraged the two sides to return to the bargaining table, but said he did not support a city council vote to reject the deal, calling that a violation of the tenets of collective bargaining. By the time his opponent, John Connolly, stepped forward several days later to say he would vote against the award as a city councilor, Walsh’s early move seemed undermined by the fact that he is the sponsor of legislation on Beacon Hill that would strip from city councils the authority to approve or reject arbitration awards. Under Walsh’s bill, the police arbitration award would now be a done deal, a fact he acknowledged last week after some fairly inartful attempts to suggest otherwise.
That was followed on Saturday by a front-page Globe story pushing back further on any efforts by the candidate to argue that his bill would provide added financial safeguards for cities and town. The article quoted government watchdogs saying the bill “would actually do the opposite.” Walsh pointed to a provision in his bill that says an arbitrator must include consideration of whether a community can afford the contract award, but the article says that is already part of state law. Michael Widmer, president of the business-funded Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, called the bill “a step backward for financial accountability to the taxpayer.”
The problem for Walsh is that the issue goes to the heart of his biggest vulnerability — a perception that the Dorchester state rep, who also served until recently as the head of the Boston building trades union, is too beholden to union interests. Saturday’s story reports that Walsh wrote the binding arbitration bill with the state firefighters union and first filed it in 2002. He has refiled it five times, according the story, most recently in January. Being the unions’ go-to guy on Beacon Hill can raise your profile and make you a hero to many. Bringing that profile to a mayor’s race can raise doubts and questions.
Do union matters become, the defining issue of the mayor’s race? The guy who has been the labor champion in the Legislature is now fervently hoping they do not.
–MICHAEL JONAS
BEACON HILL
The Globe reports that Massachusetts state government isn’t the only public contractor to have problems with Deloitte Consulting‘s work on big IT projects, as the paper details projects the consulting giant has run in Florida, California, and Pennsylvania came in “behind schedule, over budget, and riddled with problems.”
MUNICIPAL MATTERS
A special perk that increases the pensions of police and fire workers is coming under fire in Lowell, the Sun reports.
A Herald editorial criticizes Boston‘s handoff of Yawkey Way to the Red Sox.
NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON
Welcome to a new week of government shutdown, which looks a lot like the past week only worse, as Speaker John Boehner seems ready to go for broke, in every sense of the word. The shutdown begins to ripple through local higher ed circles, as Northeastern University president Joseph Aoun complains to Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that as many as two dozen active-duty service members may not be able to begin classes at Northeastern next week because their tuition assistance has been held up. Paul Krugman argues that the GOP’s leadership is both radical, and deeply incompetent. Economists begin worrying about the shutdown’s long-term effects.
Here’s a solution to the whole mess from University of Chicago law professor Eric Posner, writing for The New Republic: Three ways President Obama could raise the debt ceiling without Congress.
Residents of Newtown, Connecticut, vote to demolish the Sandy Hook Elementary school, the scene of a mass shooting last December, NPR reports (via WBUR).
The National Review marks the 100-year anniversary of the federal income tax.
The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal both offer previews of the Supreme Court’s upcoming term.
ELECTIONS
The Lawrence Teachers Union endorses Dan Rivera for mayor, saying incumbent William Lantigua “abandoned the school system,” the Eagle-Tribune reports.
Peter Gelzinis reports that Boston Mayor Tom Menino is quietly putting financial support behind John Connolly; Gelzinis says that personal antipathy between Menino’s circle and Marty Walsh cuts more deeply than any resentment Menino holds against Connolly, who challenged the mayor early this year. Connolly tells the Herald today that he hasn’t asked for Menino’s support.
RELIGION
Rev. Matt Malone, former deputy director of MassINC and now editor of the Jesuit magazine America, reflects on the big coup of being the exclusive English-language outlet that first published the recent interview with Pope Francis.
BUSINESS/ECONOMY
The national Girl Scouts of America has cut 25 percent of its staff because of declining membership, a trend the organizations is looking to reverse with a membership drive featuring First Lady Michelle Obama.
TRANSPORTATION
Boston Harbor Cruises plans to run ferry weekend service between Hingham and Salem over three weekends during the Halloween season, the Salem News reports.
The Worcester Regional Transit Authority is buying 11 acres for its new $60 million vehicle maintenance and operations center, the Telegram & Gazette reports.
Illinois, Indiana, and California are approaching a federal deadline to help fund Amtrak operations in their states or lose rail service, Governing reports.
The Fall River Herald News has a wrap-up of the 20-year effort to get the South Coast Rail up and running and plans by area legislators to make sure the project is underway before Gov. Deval Patrick leaves office.
ENERGY/ENVIRONMENT
The Christian Science Monitor provides an in-depth analysis of how energy efficiency is reshaping electricity usage and costs.
The Cape Cod TImes suggests that lawmakers need to go back to the drawing board on federal flood insurance reforms that are actually producing higher premiums.
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
Jared Remy tells the Herald in a jailhouse interview he didn’t kill his girlfriend.
MEDIA
Fall River Mayor Will Flanagan says a local businessman has placed a bid to buy the Herald News but the publisher of the paper, part of GateHouse News which just bought a bunch of other local papers, says the mayor is spreading “unsubstantiated and untrue rumors.” In its story on the mayor’s claim, the Herald News points out it has been investigating the ties between Flanagan and the businessman, Joseph Ruggerio, who federal prosecutors are eyeing for alleged connections to the Rhode Island mob.
