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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
 Posted - 04/18/2009 : 8:08:55 PM
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I decided to try something new this week. Instead of looking at each of the local papers separately, I thought that I'd try to address them in one post. There are issues and themes that overlap and it gets a little repetitive addressing them in multiple posts. I'm sure there will be times when I'll post about a piece in one of the papers immediately but I think I going to try this format for a while to see if it works out.
I got a chance to compare the "articles" in the two page School Department ads this week and they are identical. So even though it appears that they are making an attempt to disguise these ads by including an article and varying the pictures, it's still pretty obvious what they are.
Speaking of School Department advertising, I find it to be a riot that both the Independent and the Advocate could write editorials about Smith vs. Foresteire that avoid mentioning the source of the latest go-round. Might they have to admit their own involvement in the matter if they did? Even though the tone of the two editorial were different, it's pretty clear that both blame Stat for the problem. And why wouldn't they? He's trying to kill the goose that's laying their golden eggs. Maybe once they come completely clean on the issue, I'll start to take these pieces seriously. Guess I won't need to worry about that.
A couple of points specific to the Advocate piece before I move on. Do they realize that Stat is not the only member of city government that has gets two paychecks from the taxpayers? How many others are employed by the state or other state agencies? Also, is it true that the problems between Smith and Foresteire began because FFF wouldn't support Stat for State Representative? I thought that their issues had been attributed to other things by the Advocate in the past.
I think that Keith Spencer and the Independent deserve a pat on the back for the writing and running the "Mayor Confronts Allegation" article; it helped to set the record straight. And while am at it, even though I don't agree with the Mayor's view on the legality of using a city phone number for a campaign sponsored activity, I do commend him for taking the issue square on.
Even though the ECTV piece from the Independent isn't posted anywhere on-line currently (sorry, it's too long for me to reproduce on the site), I can't let it go without comment. I certainly agree that ECTV's equipment was in desperate need of an update. The new equipment seemed to solve a lot of issues. Some people don't care for how the new bulletin board has been implemented; at least, some that is likely the normal resistance to change. I'm sure that, over time as it gets tweaked and people become more accustomed to it, it will become less of an issue. The only major issue that they seem to be having with what have installed so far is the audio that runs with the bulletin board. While things seem to be better than they were, it still necessary for them to pay attention to detail. From the one conversation that I had with Scott Counsell before he left, it sounds like lack of attention to detail was likely the source of many of the problems they were having with the old playback system. For example, FRiday, I saw two versions of the weekend programming schedule for ECTV-16 running back to back. They were very similar but one version had an additional program running each day. Yes, it's a little thing for sure. But, what it says to me is that although a lot of the symptoms have gone away, what about the root problem?
On more ECTV issue before I move on. It sounds like the camera upgrade in the City Council chamber might be hold because of potential wiring issues. The reason for that? To quote Alyson Dell Isola directly from the article "While there is plenty that needs to be done, we must be prudent with our spending, paying attention to these costs and any unforeseen needs in the future." Sounds like the ECTV budget reserve might be in better shape if Matt Laidlaw wasn't getting paid from it. What's he done for ECTV?. Still waiting for the City Council meetings online Matt. What's the hold-up?
Was it really necessary for there to be a full page ad in the Leader-Herald for Mayor's Clean-up Day? It was the same ad they've been running in all of the local papers for weeks now. All of the local papers ran the ad this week but why was the Leader-Herald singled out for a full page version of the ad? They seem to the only one that will offer up even mild criticism of the Mayor occasionally. Stealing a tactic from the superintendent's playbook? That may not be the best place to be borrowing from at this time.
Unless you happened to get a copy of the Advocate this week, you may not be aware that candidates for any municipal office can start pulling papers on Tuesday. That's the only news source in the city where I've been able to find that information, including the city web site. Let the insanity begin. The entire piece was hard to miss; it was printed inside a yellow box. Although the yellow highlighting was used in other places in the paper this week, the only other article that received the same full treatment was a brief article entitled "Wood Waste in full compliance". Seems a little misleading when all that contained was a summary of what Mrs. Mejia told the BOA on Monday night. "Full compliance?" I'm pretty sure that might draw some response.
Speaking of Wood Waste, there was a legal notice in the Advocate for their Zoning Board of Appeals hearing for Wood Waste. It is on May 4 at 7 PM in the Keverian room. Their petition requests an "Interpretation of Zoning Ordinance" that they were cited for , i.e., "Storage of goods in containers where all storage is contained within the building, not including storage of any raw or natural materials." To be honest, I've never been able to make heads or tails out of that particular section of the ordinance; it's very pretty poorly worded and it doesn't read any better when it's not taken out of context either. And as such, I have believed all along that is going to be very hard for them to make it stick, especially since it seems unlikely that the full weight of the Solicitor's Office will be behind it.
As far as the letter to the editor in the Advocate goes, Councilor Simonelli's heart may be in the right place but he's going to have a tough time unseating Alderman Marcus, "warts" and all, if Simonelli doesn't start considering what he's going to say before he opens his mouth.
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 04/25/2009 : 9:12:00 PM
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Let's take a look at some of the issues addressed in the local papers this week:
I happen to agree with the Independent's editorial on consolidations...to a point. Yes, it’s the way to go. But, it's too big of a change to be fast tracked just because budget season is drawing near. It has been rumored for over a year; why did the administration wait until it had to be done quickly? One of the reasons that we were told that it would take a while was that it would require a lot of changes to the ordinances. What did we get? About a page or so of new ordinance text. The other thing that an effort like this would need for it to have any chance of being on the fast track is transparency. I was told by an elected official that, from the information that they had received, it was very difficult to determine what jobs were being eliminated and why, separation incentive vs. layoffs. The council deserves to know this, especially since MGL doesn't allow layoffs in this type of consolidation. For the record, I hear that the administration's view is that any layoffs that would happen are a result of this is are because of economic conditions, not the consolidation. Certainly an issue that should be sorted out before charging ahead. Also, it hasn't been widely publicized but the administration issued some revised numbers that showed the cost reductions were less somewhat less than they originally projected. Still a significant savings from what I hear but how do you get the numbers wrong on something you want to fast track? And then we find out that it can't be implemented the way that they wanted to do it. Hmmm, I wonder if the Independent wishes that they could have a do over on that editorial; the administration might like one too.
Last week, I took the local papers to task for writing editorials about the latest investigation of the School Department without mentioning the nature of the investigation. So, the Independent, at least, gets credit for addressing that issue. But, they don't get credit for still telling only half the story. The reason that Stat and a lot of other people, as far as I can tell, have a problem with this practice is that in most other communities, the papers would consider this information news and would print it for free. I wouldn't even mind if the School Department provided all of the content; what's the difference between that and the press releases that make up a lot of the content of the local papers anyways. And if the Independent really wanted to put its mouth where the money is, they would have offered to stop accepting money for all School Department content except for those ads that the School Department are required to run by law. As for the content of the editorial, I still don't get why the School Department felt that they had to hire a lawyer at this time if they don't believe that they are guilty of anything and it's just an investigation at this point. And why does the paper feel that the investigation will be "ineffectual". If nothing else, it should settle this issue once and for all. Wouldn't that be a good thing, one way or another?
A couple of separate thoughts about the the letter to the editor in this week's Advocate. I agree that there was something "strange" about the way that the council handled the use of reserve funds piece. I've posted my opinion about the request before; I don't think that city council should be making such a specific request while the city is still in negotiations with the union. Tuesday night's action certainly prevented further discussion of it, for now anyways, in a televised, public forum. Councilors McKinnon and Peter Napolitano are both members of the Public Safety Committee and were both in attendance at the previous week's meeting; from what I hear, there was no discussion of sending the piece to Finance at that meeting. There's not really much that Finance can do with the piece, in my opinion. The numbers provided for Free Cash and Stabilization Fund are accurate as far as I know; I'm not aware of this other Reserve Fund but it seems like the union president has done his homework, so I won't doubt it. As far as I can see, it's going to be up to the Mayor, with the city council approval, to decide if he wants to tap into those funds or not.
So should the Mayor tap into these funds? I've also stated in the past that the "solution" to the city's current financial woes will likely need to consist of everyone doing their part. That would probably include some use of the city's reserves. But how much? The fire department and their union tells us that they are concerned about staffing levels. OK, what else would they be willing to give up to try to retain something close to the current staffing levels? The letter doesn't provide any clarity on that point. The only answers in that letter are using the city's reserves and raising more thru taxes. Prop 2 1/2 won't allow taxes to be raised very much and as Councilor Simonelli found out, there's not much of an appetite out there for paying more or new taxes either, even if it would be for public safety. I certainly don't envy the Mayor. He's never going to be able to make everyone happy on this one; I doubt that anyone could.
Some quick thoughts.
- A lot of pictures of the Mayor's Clean-up Day in the papers this week but, not many sightings of other elected officials in attendance. Not sure what, if anything, to make of that.
- The Independent has a piece about sex offender info being put back on to ECTV; I guess that they started re-running these PSA's on Friday.
- School department ads or free coverage of school events? A lot harder to tell this week.
- Sad to see, but not unexpected; the foreclosure listings in the Leader-Herald are growing again.
- The Advocate thought that Councilor Simonelli's comments/outburst at the CC meeting was the top story in the city this week? Really?
- Maybe not the best week for the Independent to have a cartoon of the Mayor asking "How'm I Doin'?". I'd guess that the Mayor may not be happy with the likeness either. |
Edited by - tetris on 04/25/2009 9:15:40 PM |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 05/01/2009 : 3:07:55 PM
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This week's look at the local papers.
As expected, little coverage by any of the papers as to why the ISD ordinance got referred back to the mayor. Best that I could find was in the Leader-Herald that it "apparently ran into a snag". Maybe not the exact quote, but it's close. What in-depth reporting by all of them!
It's pretty sad to see how out of touch that the Independent's editorial page can be with what's going on in the City of Everett. An editorial on getting Wood Waste involved in all development projects in city. In the same week as the details of the old City Yards fiasco came to light? A political cartoon on the ISD consolidation. The week after it came to light that the proper procedure hadn't been follow in order to make it happen? Could their timing be any worse?
And it's also sad that the Advocate was the only paper that reported that there was a new addition to the DeMaria family this week. Congratulations to the DeMarias by the way. I'm pretty sure that the other papers will report it next week; but, it just goes to show how NOT on top of things the local papers are.
Has the Independent had to cut back on their proofreader? The obituaries were to be continued on Page 13 of a 12 page paper. They also ran an older version of the School Committee membership in the Little League ads that still listed Mr. McLaughlin as committee chairman. As someone who has a hard time proofreading his own stuff, I know how tough it can be, even when you usually put a lot of effort into it; but then again, I don't publish a newspaper.
And since the issue was brought up elsewhere, why is it that some elected officials receive preferential treatment by the papers where others other don't? Of course, the question is highly rhetorical; it's likely about how the politicians spend their political advertising dollars. The real answer should be that no politician deserves preferential treatment by the papers. If the police department publishes an accurate arrest log (which they should) and a paper runs it, they should run it without modification. Both local papers that run the arrest log regularly ran it this week without any obvious modifications; let's just hope that they both did it for the right reasons though.
On the other hand, elected officials don't deserve to be bludgeoned by the local papers either. The Advocate uses every chance that they get to attack "Stat" Smith. I can understand that they may not agree with his vote on the sale tax increase: but, where was there any attempt to find out why he voted the way that he did? I'm not so naïve to expect a Smith quote to appear in the Advocate though; too much bad blood. Short of that, I would expect the news story to contain straight news and all of the commentary should have be saved for the comment piece. Would the net result have been any different? Probably not. But in place of all that, why not explain why the paper believes that the sales tax increase is the correct way to go? Although my preferred option is no new or increased taxes (or fees), the situation is so screwed up that I'm not sure that there is any other real choice at this point. But that's probably fodder for another post in a different thread. |
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michael
Senior Member
195 Posts |
Posted - 05/02/2009 : 07:04:30 AM
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| I agree tetris |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 05/10/2009 : 08:56:32 AM
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Here we go with again with this week's look at the news. Plenty of items to comment on this week. And lots of transcribing of materials from the papers this week to back up this post; I hope it was worth it.
Who deserve the credit? I really hope that this can be my last post on this subject. As I already stated a couple of times, everybody deserves their share of the credit. It doesn't seem that the Advocate agrees though. I don't think the other papers really took a position; they more or less reported what happened went down on Monday night, with one exception (we'll get to it) and maybe their views on Councilor Simonelli's attempt to be a glory hound, if you saw it that way. But not the Advocate. I think that the Advocate devoted one line in this week's edition to giving credit to anyone in the city but the Mayor and his administration. And even at that, the Mayor was even responsible for bringing the elected officials together on the issue. Huh? Did they write that with a straight face? I know that I could take a hit on this but, I'd even be willing to give Mr. Thibeault a tiny bit of credit, finally. But I wouldn't go totally overboard like the Advocate did.
The one exception I mentioned previously mention was in the Leader-Herald. I don't remember this happening Monday night but, in that paper, the citizens of the city got credit for their hard work on the issue too. Hey...Why Not! If the actions of private citizens spurred our elected officials into action by letting them know that we weren't satisfied with what was going on at Wood Waste, why don't we deserve some credit too? Even if no one is really looking for it. So, congratulations to all the private citizens who tried to do what they could on this issue, and not just the message board participants. And after all this, let's just hope that things turn out they way that they are supposed to or we'll have go back to working on it again. I don't think that most of us are taking our eyes off Wood Waste any time soon anyways.
Did Councilor Peter Napolitano really deserve the treatment that he got in the Independent and Advocate editorials this week? In my opinion, no, I already posted in another thread that funding for school crossing guards is something that would need to come out of city's portion of the school budget because it can't be counted towards net school spending. But, because the city normally only makes the minimum possible contribution to the school budget, there is no extra money in the School Department's budget that could be used for this. Maybe Councilor Napolitano can be accused of not doing his homework; I found this information rather easily. If he wasn't aware of this, maybe Councilor Napolitano was also not aware of the the actual state of the School Department's FY10 budget (no guarantee of full funding from the state...yet) because the latest information was only presented Monday night, at the same time as the Common Council was meeting. But, did he deserve to be savaged the way he was? Instead of taking the time to explain the legitimate reasons why this couldn't be done and educate the public in the process, both papers just thought it was better to stir the pot. Of course, many of us believe that the reason for all the money spent on School Department advertising in the local papers is to insure that they are always supporters of the School Department's agenda. So, perhaps they were asked (told?) to write these pieces. It may not seem like a lot of money when the subject is discussed at School Committee meetings; but, keeping papers running in this day and age requires every penny that they can get their hands on and paid advertising is their lifeblood.
If you read the Independent's editorial, you would think that the crossing guards have already been laid off this school year; that's not the case. In the case of the Advocate, where do you start? The last time that I recall anyone wanting to take money from the School Department budget was back in the Ragucci days. And all of that money had to be returned to the School Department in subsequent years in order to satisfy Chapter 70 requirements. Because of this, I don't think that anyone thinks it's a good idea anymore to go after school money that can't be considered a net school spending expense. And Councilor Napolitano did not ask the schools to run the crossing guard program, only consider providing at least some of its funding. How would this be any different than school nurses who work for the Board of Health but their salaries are paid for by the School Department? And did they get hung up on the word "reconsider" or what? What are they, the message boards? (Sorry!) I think that Councilor Napolitano was trying to choose his words very carefully last Monday night as to not offend anyone; well, I guess he failed at that in the Advocate's eyes. Accusing Councilor Napolitano of attempting to divide the city was laughable; but, it seemed that the Advocate was clearly headed down that path.
Both papers missed the mark on where Councilor Napolitano thought that the money might come from, an increase in state funding to the schools. But now that we know that it can't be done from those funds and those funds may not even make it to the schools. And, they also both got it wrong that it is Councilor Napolitano's responsibility to help the mayor and the administration find the money for the budget for crossing guards, at least until the administration releases its budget to the City Council. As I understand it, I believe this issue may have first seen the light of day in a committee meeting where it was raised by members of the police department, wondering why the school's couldn't pick up the cost. Maybe this was another of those issues that the City Council shouldn't get involved with until they actually get to see the Mayor's budget; let it be the administration's problem until then. Let's just hope that when this issue gets taken up by the School Committee, that they handle it in a more responsible manner.
As I just got through posting about, I don't think that the City Council should be involving themselves in issues that affect the budget before they actually see the budget .I've been posting that same thought for some time now. Of course, the council members haven't been able to help themselves but I have to commend them for not going overboard, like I thought they might. But I think that the Advocate wants to have it both ways. Currently, they're putting heat on the council for not offering budget cuts that would allow police and fire jobs to be saved. In the same edition of the paper, they are tearing Councilor Napolitano apart for looking into an idea for avoiding police layoffs. You can't win with that paper.
I also noticed that both the Advocate and the Independent came out in support of the mayor in not using rainy day funds to backfill the budget. I think that it would be a mistake for the mayor to tip the city's hand while it is still in negotiations with the unions; so, I won't hit him to hard on this, now anyways. I believe that there is a use for rainy day funds; but, you only use them when it is truly raining. There's probably been misuse of these funds in the past in that regard and I'd like to see that stop; but, it's raining now and probably next year too. Some use of these funds in these two years would probably make sense; but, they are not so plentiful that they can be used to cure all of the city's current financial woes either, without putting the city's financial future totally at risk. There needs to be a balance and it will not be easy to determine. The mayor also seems to think that the city well still be safe even if cuts become a reality. None of the papers weighed in on that issue; but, since I neglected to address it earlier in the week, let me comment on it now, Let's hope that the Mayor gets this one right; it's probably the most important decision that he's had to make during his time in office. His justification for this statement seemed to be at least somewhat based on a comparison of public safety personnel per square mile in relation to other cities. There could be a couple of issues with that train of thought though. First, how safe are those cities? And secondly, do they have all of the same unique public safety challenges that Everett faces?
Perhaps the most underreported, significant piece of news in this week's papers came from the local politician's Mother's Day ads in the Advocate. Very prominent in these was an ad from Joe McGonagle, Common Council candidate from Ward 6. Living in Ward 6, McGonagle had a tough decision to make on which seat to run for. Alderman Sachetta, frankly, has been somewhat of a disappointment as Alderman. But, the Sachetta name carries a great deal of cache in the city and his family supported McGonagle in the last mayoral election. But a council seat in Ward 6 is no slam dunk either. All of the present officer holders have their own constituencies and may by hard to unseat; but, none of them are without there flaws either. Two years ago, Cynthia Sarnie seemed to be on her way to becoming, at least, a minor rising star in the local political scene; now, not so much. Anthony Ranieri, you either love him or you hate him. Me? Let's just say that I'm not in favor of anyone who holds a job with the city also being an elected official in the body that governs that job, even though it's allowed under state law. And, it's a mystery how he still holds that position since it was eliminated in the last budget. Catherine Tomassi-Hicks? Her strength and her weakness seem to be the same thing, that she's Catherine Tomassi-Hicks. So, I think that any of them may be beatable; but, it may not be easy. By running for a council seat, I think that McGonagle is showing that he's willing to start at the bottom again. But, I think he's shown in the past that he is more alderman material than others that presently hold the seat. I would have liked to have seen him go for the At-Large seat if he didn't want to go against Sachetta. I think that it has been proven twice in the last few years that Alderman Matewsky could be vulnerable in a citywide election against the right opponent.
Some shorter thoughts from this week's papers:
- Did anyone else notice that the lead story in the Advocate was a copy of a City Hall press release with slightly modified headlines? What journalism!
- I suggest that the Advocate watch a replay of last Monday's Common Council meeting. Mayor DeMaria laid down his "jumping jacks" quip on Councilor Simonelli before Simonelli ever got up to speak on the Wood Waste pieces. Do I think the councilor would have acted any differently when he finally got up to speak on the issue if that hadn't happened? Probably not. Badgering? Well, maybe. But, I think that's just more that Councilor Simonelli doesn't know how to ask tough questions without getting confrontational.
- Did anyone know that there was City of Everett Cup Race at Suffolk Downs last week? And wasn't it appropriate that cup was accepted for the city by someone from Somerville? And please, I'm not picking on the child in any way; instead, the lack of thought that went into it.
- I actually was able to glean a couple of other nuggets out of the Leader-Herald this week. A good week for them in that regard, as minor as this stuff may seem. Did I actually see something that looked like a real article about a School Department event, on the front page of the paper no less, that didn't look like a paid advertisement? Of course, I can't be sure about that but I'm going to stick my neck out and ask "Will wonders never cease?"
- The other thing that I found out by looking at the Leader-Herald this week I probably wouldn't have noticed except for the co-incidental side by side placement of an ad and a brief article. It seems as if the annual Police Memorial ceremony is scheduled for the same date and time as the Mayor's re-election campaign kick-off event. Oops! Who's in charge of scheduling? Looks like they have some 'splainin' to do.
- I'll readily admit that the full page School Department legal ad needed to be that big for all the languages it was printed in; but, was it necessary to be in all three papers? Same for the legal ad about the scheduling their annual public hearings. That was kind of big too. I suppose that it could have been three separate legal ads, so I won't protest too loudly about that though. I don't know how the full page ads for the drama club are paid for but a full page for that in three papers seemed to be overkill as well.
- Speaking of School Department advertising, Stat Smith is probably happy that Peter Napolitano got chosen as the School Department's whipping boy this week. With the exception of the Independent's vague editorial, Smith got off almost scot free this week. Don't worry Stat, there's always next week.
- And what exactly is the purpose of a vague editorial? If you don't follow the school committee meetings, were you supposed to know what they were talking about? And I know I promised a post about last Monday's school committee in that thread. It's in the works, but to be truthfully, it's been a difficult post to put together and the papers have let me off the hook by their lack of coverage of the meeting. It's coming though.
- The only real mention of Stat Smith is the papers this week was in the Independent's Eye of Everett column where he was praised by Augie Parziale for voting against the sales tax increase. No big surprise there given Augie's strong Republican leanings. But as with the Advocate last week, no mention of why or why not it's a good idea. I know that I mentioned a possible post last week about how the state might address its financial woes; but, the truth is, at least at this time, I have no clear idea either.
- Last, but never least, I can't tell you how much of a kick that I get out of the Rite-Aid holiday booze sale ads that appear in the Advocate. Nothing says Mother's Day more to me than a booze sale. But seriously, Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there. |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 05/17/2009 : 10:36:48 PM
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I was hoping for a brief look at this week's local papers because, frankly, I could use a break. I doubt that it is going to turn out that way though.
- What more could I possibly say about school department advertising? Maybe that's the point, just keep wearing you down until you accept it as routine.
- I thought Senator Galluccio's letter in the Independent and the Leader-Herald was honest and fair. When I first saw it, I was ready to write a knock on the Independent for running a editorial on the same page rehashing it. But after I read the editorial and saw that it was more of an urging to actually read the letter, my mind was changed. It's worth reading if you get a chance or haven't already.
- A tale of two papers. It was pretty clear that the genesis of two stories in the Leader-Herald and the Independent this week came directly from press releases from City Hall. These were the budget and the illegal rooming house stories. But there appeared to be a differences between these two sets of stories. The Leader Herald appears to have just printed the press release as a story. We'll know once the press releases hit the city web site. Isn't it funny that the city web site usually gets way out scooped by the local papers in regards to press releases? On the other hand, Keith Spencer in the Independent took the information from the press releases and added other pertinent information to make an actual story out of it. I mean, don't you think that if you are reading a budget story on Thursday that you'd like to know that the budget is going to be presented to the City Council that evening? The only way that it you could have possibly thought something was up in that regard from reading the Leader-Herald was to go to the ECTV listings and scratch your head trying to figure out what this joint convention they are replaying this weekend might be. As much as I rag on the Independent, it's good to see that they at least attempt to do some journalism. And that's no faint praise for you Mr. Spencer; I think you do a pretty good job; it's some of the other stuff that drags the paper down (we'll get to it).
- If you do bother to read anything in the Leader-Herald on a regular basis, I'd suggest the lead stories about the weekly City Council meetings. There's usually a nugget or two buried in there but they may not be obvious. This week, the two things that I found were them wanting to know why some local politician is pushing for 2 AM bar closings and why items were added to this week's BOA agenda under suspension. I think they are a little late to the table on the bar closings, that's pretty much dead (but the door may still be open a crack). I couldn't agree more with the items under suspension comment. I meant, but neglected to include the same comment in my post BOA meeting comments. There's just no need or good reason to do it in most cases.
- When's the last time that the Leader-Herald ran an original editorial about local issues? It's a shame because, when then try, they are capable of doing pretty good stuff.
- Good to see that the Independent finally ran at least a brief piece on why the Mayor's attempt to create an ISD got side tracked. It sometimes seems as if the paper is almost afraid to run anything that shows the Mayor or his administration in a bad light, even if it based in fact. I wonder why this piece finally made an appearance in the paper almost three weeks after the fact?
- On the other hand, is Augie Parziale living under a rock? If you read the piece his piece on Jason Marcus, it made it seem as if the incident in question happened last weekend. The Independent is the only local paper that's even mentioned this incident before. Doesn't he even read his own paper? Doesn't he have an editor? This is the second time in two weeks where the editorial page of the Independent has had major factual errors. Is someone asleep at the wheel?
- I don't know what to think about the editorial in the Independent entitled "The mayor’s imperative". May be part of my problems with it stem in part from its set-up. I hate when blanket statements are made that not everyone will necessarily agree with; there's a way to do that without stretching the truth. I do believe that the Mayor is an opportunist, but not necessarily in a good way. Consolidations saving money? While that may be true to an extent, the last time that we looked at it critically, in last year's budget cycle, it seemed to be about something more than just saving some money. The savings just weren't all that great either. I'll go back and take at them again at some point in the upcoming budget cycle as long as we get enough information to do so. I think that would be interesting exercise. So, I just started off on the wrong foot with this piece.
I agree with, and believe that the Mayor does too, that one of the most important things that he can do for the city is to grow the tax base. But that's where I lose the Independent. Selling off prime pieces of city land? There is probably only one "prime" piece of city land to be had no matter how you look at it, the old high school or the current city hall, and I'd hardly classify either as really "prime". Everett has the same opportunities as Chelsea does? I don't usually venture too far into Chelsea to know what's going on there. The new Market Basket (that's about as far as I go) is impressive and could possibly be the final death blow for the Stop & Shop in Everett. Other than that, I don't know. More potential in a down economy? I'd hazard a guess that the Chelsea projects were conceived and started before the economy hit rock bottom; but, I would say that Everett needs to be poised to strike when things do turn around. Much more usable land? Everett does have two large pieces that could be developed; but until access to them is improved, it will be a difficult, almost impossible, sell to convince anyone to develop them. Expansion of existing operations? I'd think that unless expansion could be done within a business' current footprint, it would be next to impossible because most of them would appear to be fairly land bound. So, while I agree with the main point of the article, I'm a lot less comfortable with a lot of the paper's supporting arguments.
I realized while I was writing these comments that maybe the reason that I had such a problem with this piece was that it was written from a more optimistic point of view while I tend to be more realistic, from my point of view anyways, or pessimistic, as I have been told plenty of times. Here's one time that I'd like to be proven wrong; but, I'm not going to hold my breath. Pessimistic it is, I guess, in this case anyways.
- Councilor Napolitano's letter to the editor in the Advocate was a little too diplomatic for my tastes; but, maybe it had to be. I'm not suggesting that he go to war with the School Department; I thought that he got it right there. The problem I had was with the stirring of the pot that both papers did with the issue. Maybe it’s not the best thing in the world to take on the newspapers in an election year. That's not an issue that I have to concern myself with though.
- Since it was missing from last week's Advocate, you just knew that this week's paper would have the customary rip job of Stat Smith as a result of the last School Committee meeting. So the Advocate thought that the School Committee was compelling television before Stat was voted on to the committee? You still can't convince most people to watch it because mostly, it has always been like watching paint dry. It has always had its moments from time to time;. there's just more of those moments now. I've written enough in the past on why that is and my feeling why both camps share the blame. But since this is a post that is supposed to review the newspapers coverage of events, let's focus on that aspect. Ripping Stat for having a narrow agenda on the School Committee seems unfair; most of the members of the committee seem to have no agenda at all, other than the one they are given. The majority of them just sit there like lumps on a log most of the time, at least at the televised meetings. Like him or not, David Ela seems to be the one that does the majority of the heavy lifting on the School Committee and actually does a very good job of it.
I thought that it was a good idea the paper actually focused on events in the past where Stat hasn't been the watch dog that he claims to be. I wasn't paying as much attention to the local political scene in the time frame that they are referring to, so I can't support or dispute what the are present as facts. However, since it should be fairly east to prove or dispute what they are presenting as fact, I'll accept them as so for now. So if these things are true, what ever made the Advocate think that Stat would ever be a watch dog on the School Committee? The answer is that they didn't; it was likely just an effort to get the casual reader to think that they were behind Stat when he got elected to the School Committee. Most of us know that is anything but the case.
A better than normal effort but this piece still doesn't get a passing grade. The space could have been used to actually address a real, more important issue that came out of the last School Committee meeting, i.e., where is the funding for the schools going to come from in the future if the state can not committed to fulfilling its Chapter 70 funding requirements.
And as far as the picture and the caption that went along with the Smith commentary goes, if you watched the meeting, you know where that comes. It seems that The Advocate was snapping so many pictures of Stat at the last meeting that it got under his skin; Stat interrupted the meeting to let this fact be known. So Stat wasn't staring off into space, he was just being distracted by the camera. I thought that the papers were supposed to report the news, not make it.
- I don't think that the Advocate commentary on the proposal to eliminate the primary broke any new ground but I posted it because I think it is an important issue. I'm actually kind of torn about eliminating the primary. In a year like this where the city could use every dollar it can find, it might be a good idea. There really doesn't seem to be a race this year, so far anyways, where it would seem to make much of a difference. But I do agree that it would set a bad precedent in years when it can make a difference. And who am I really to determine that it won't make a difference this year. As it stands right now though, it could be a moot point anyways. From the list of people who pulled nomination papers that got posted on the board last week, there appeared to only be one race that would require a primary. And in that race, three of the four names pulled papers for multiple seats. I think that this will likely sort itself out because there is an option for these folks where they might be able to walk into a seat just by filing valid nomination papers. And it will be a shame if egos get in the way and doesn't sort itself out. |
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Tails
Administrator
2682 Posts |
Posted - 05/17/2009 : 11:31:40 PM
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quote:
Originally posted by tetris
- On the other hand, is Augie Parziale living under a rock? If you read the piece his piece on Jason Marcus, it made it seem as if the incident in question happened last weekend. The Independent is the only local paper that's even mentioned this incident before. Doesn't he even read his own paper? Doesn't he have an editor? This is the second time in two weeks where the editorial page of the Independent has had major factual errors. Is someone asleep at the wheel?
I just wanted to say how DARE Augustine write that piece and comment about Jason being 60 and this is the first time this happened to HIM.
Did Augustine run a criminal report before publicly trying to put doubt in peoples minds about an alleged VICTIM of a crime.....I doubt it! Why now, and why the same week Jason pulls papers for 3 seats.
I will just say this....that woman did not scout him out and there are witnesses to the fact. Augustine had no right to comment like that with an ongoing investigation. That's part of the reason a lot of victims do not come forward because of cowards like that. You want to write the story.....fine. DON'T put your personal two cents in when you were not there! |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 05/25/2009 : 10:26:41 PM
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A pretty late, but hopefully fairly short, look at the news presented in last weeks's local papers.
Both the Leader-Herald and the Advocate ran the annual message from FFF about the School Department budget. I'll save most of my comments about the School Department budget until after Thursday night's budget hearing. However, one thing about this piece really bothered me, as it does every year. I didn't take the time to put the various headlines in the article back to their bold fonts, which you lose when you copy something into the website editor. But, one headline still sticks out at me, "CITY TO TAKE $11 MILLION OF STATE AID." I thought that the School Department has toned down that somewhat misleading rhetoric this year. While the statement maybe technically correct, the city does not actually take away $11 million of the School Department's state aid and keep it for itself. The things that are paid for out of this money are health insurance for School Department employees and retirees, retirement payments for School Department employees that are eligible for the city's retirement plan, payment for nurses that actually work for the schools, Charter School tuition and the School Department's portion of stadium expenses. Does anyone actually think that the School Department shouldn't pay for most, if not all, of these expenses? The only money that the city gets to keep from the schools is to pay for their use of services from the city departments as a percentage of the budget. This year, that amount is currently $422,000 plus some portion of the health department expenses above and beyond the school nurses. Some of that info is in the article but it is not any where near as clear as it needs to be. These types of misleading statements continue to attempt to divide the community; it needs to stop.
While we're on the subject of the schools, how are the papers going to make it thru the summer without their full page school department ads? Good thing it's an election year; the political ads should help to make up some of the shortfall.
While we're on the subject of political advertising, I noticed that there was a Memorial Day ad from Joe King in the Leader-Herald. I noticed that his name did not appear on the nomination paper list that Massdee posted a couple of weeks ago. I wonder if this ad signals his intentions or if he's just showing his patriotism?
I was surprised but I actually found myself agreeing with most of Augie Parziale's layoff piece in his Eye on Everett column. I expected much more probing questions at the special Board of Aldermen meeting last Tuesday about why the Mayor had such a sudden change of heart about using reserve funds to plug shortfalls in the city's budget. I think that Alderman Marchese started down that path but he really didn't ask the tough questions and neither did anyone else. Like Augie, I was sure that the transfer would pass but I'm also surprised that no one voted against it. I guess that no one wanted to appear to be anti-union. How about somebody being pro-taxpayer for a change? I'll agree with the mayor that a lot of things can happen between now and when the tax rate gets set but I'm far from convinced that it will be possible to make up a $5.1 million shortfall in state aid. And who would have thunk it? The Mayor and Councilor Simonelli are actually on the same page about something. Weren't the Mayor's remarks last week about taxpayers being willing to pay more for public safety the same thing that Councilor Simonelli said a few weeks ago? And wasn't Simonelli vilified for it? Let's see if the Mayor gets the same treatment for what amounts to be similar comments.
Speaking of Simonelli, there was an article in last week's Advocate about his "adventures" at last Monday night's Common Council meeting. I didn't post it because it was mostly factual; but, there were a couple of "opinions" thrown into it. I got me to thinking about what is appropriate to be in a "straight" article and when does a piece need to labeled as commentary. The best I could come up with is that, just like most message board postings (myself included), the articles that appear in the Advocate have to all be considered commentary until proven otherwise.
The Advocate wasn't the only paper that I had to explore that same issue with though this week. I mentioned last week that the Leader-Herald main article usually has a few nuggets in it but you usually have to dig for them. This week, it would have been hard not to trip over them. I can't say that their comments weren't legitimate but it still bothers me that a news article contains major commentary in it. But I have a solution for the Leader-Herald. I think that it is long past time for them to rethink their editorial page content. They need to run at least one locally focused editorial every week, if not more. Then they would have somewhere to run their commentary, which isn't half bad, on a regular basis..
And last, and never least, the Rite-Aid holiday booze ads now contain pictures! What will they think of next? |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 05/31/2009 : 10:29:59 AM
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A fairly short (for me anyways) look at this week's local newspapers.
Keith Spencer tried to make an article out of the School Department's annual budget press release; but, how much could he really do with it? It still contained the same, somewhat misleading "headline" that I had objected to with the press release when it was printed in the other two papers last week though.
I'm pretty much in agreement with the Independent's main editorial this week And even though not all of the same details from the state apply, isn't the situation in the city somewhat the same?
At the same time, two weeks in a row, I find myself on the same page with Augie Parziale; how weird is that? Let's face it, how much new development is there going to be online by the time that FY10 tax rate needs to be calculated? Hell, the city will be lucky to get significant new growth on the tax rolls by the time that the FY11 tax season rolls. I realize that there are still a lot of balls up in the air; but, if the Mayor has a real plan, I think that he needs to reveal it to the city as soon as he possible can.
I think whoever put the Independent together this week was sleep walking again. There were two items in the "From the Mayor's Office" column that referenced accompanying pictures; problem is there were no pictures included in the column. And it was little liberal to label a photo taken at the Memorial Day services a picture of local politicians when Claire Laidlaw and John Ragucci were in it.
It is Everett Day at Suffolk Downs on June 13th. Why didn't they save the Everett Cup to be run on that day? I wonder who will represent the city this time?
No good "nuggets" to be found in the Leader-Herald lead story this week. There was an original editorial in the paper about on heavy trucking though. Maybe an interesting issue but the most important issue to tackle after weeks without a local issue oriented editorial? Even at that, a good half of the commentary was recycled from an old NY Times article and a similar editorial that they ran last year. The prior editorial couldn't have garnered much notice if we're still at the same point now though.
Why was Councilor Simonelli's Ward 2 Aldermanic candidacy announcement printed all in italics in the Leader-Herald? Just weird.
The most interesting piece of news in the Leader-Herald this week?. The legal notice for a Zoning Board of Appeals meeting for the new Restaurant Depot building. Since it doesn't appear that the sale has closed, here's an opportunity to try to stop this project if you feel that it will stunt the growth of Everett for decades to come. Me? Sorry, I just couldn't endure the harassment that would likely follow if you tried to get in the way of this.
Beside the update to the list of names running for office, which I've posted elsewhere, I don't think that the Advocate lead story shed any new light on the upcoming elections. Too bad. Or was it just another excuse to slam Stat Smith?
I had to think a lot about what I could say about the Advocate's commentary about the Mayor. I decided to go with a somewhat diplomatic approach and just say that it wasn't my cup of tea. I tend to like a more balance approach to looking at things. I'm not going to try to minimize any of the Mayor's accomplishments but I'd think that even he would admit (as he did in his mid-term address) that there have been at least some bumps and bruises along the way. In my view anyways, the last 17 month haven't been all the bright, rosy picture that the paper printed; but, I guess that they are entitled to their own opinion too.
Alderman Matewsky was probably glad to see that the public notice for the ordinance change to allow for a 15 minute parking spot on Clinton Street finally in the Advocate this week. Can the guy ever not embellish the true? It was passed five weeks ago not seven. The Mayor took the two full weeks he's allowed to sign the ordinance (I guess the 10 days in MGL Chapter 39: Section 4 refers to business days). But, it does seem that the alderman did get a little bit of a run around as to why it took three weeks to get from the Mayor's desk to the newspaper.
The interesting legal notices continued with this week with notice in the Advocate that the School Department has gone out to bid on repairs to the School Administration Building. Not a total surprise because this had been mentioned at a prior School Committee meeting. I still don't get though. If the city's in the process of deciding what to do with the building, why invest the money in it now? I think there's a good chance that if the building were sold off, it would not be reused in its current state. And exactly where is money for this coming from? Just another example of FFF doing whatever he wants to.
And speaking of that, the pre-summer school advertising blitz continues. You'd think that with the IG's office investigating this situation, they might have slowed down. I think that it is getting harder and harder for the average person to determine what's an ad and what's free newspaper coverage. Summer can't come soon enough. |
Edited by - tetris on 05/31/2009 10:35:02 AM |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 06/08/2009 : 2:10:09 PM
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A very late(again) look at last week's local papers:
I'm surprised that Keith Spencer's article about the renovations at the Parlin didn't garner any reaction on the boards. Of course, if I remembered to post it sooner, maybe it would have. What I thought that the article was missing was an explanation of why a lot of the work is scheduled to be done during the school year rather than during the summer. If anyone remembers, I've posted previously in the school committee thread that the architect who had been handling the project had passed away and the contract was tied up in probate. Seems like that the situation was resolved but the project got delayed as a result. It also probably didn't help that the vote for the financing of the project, which initially had been done a year ago, had to be redone. What I could have done without in the article was perpetuating the "myth" that the majority of the people who came out to support the project did so of their own accord.
The Independent printed a press release from City Hall about the summer jobs program. If you're interested, it can be found on the city web site. I thought that it was interesting that a program supported with an annual $60,000 grant will only be putting two groups of 10 kids to work for 4 week sessions. While I'm certain that there could be some minor overhead costs that need to be paid for out of the grant, how much are these kids going to be paid? Or where else is this money going? I've posted recently that under MGL, it appears that the City Council should be approving all grants that the city receives. After accepting the grant, they have no further control over how the money will be spent though. So if they ever correct this practice, the acceptance of the grant needs to be more than just a rubber stamp.
For the third week in a row, I find myself pretty much in agreement with at least one of Augie Parziale's Eye on Everett pieces. I think that Councilor Anthony Ranieri, as a private citizen, has all the right in the world to be against the proposed development at 66 Main Street and should attend the ZBA meeting to let his displeasure with the project be known. But, I think that for him to stand up and ask for the rest of the Common Council to interrupt their own meeting to attend the ZBA meeting en masse with him was just wrong. If any of them also wanted to attend the meeting of their own free will and that led to the lack of a quorum, I would have been fine with that, except for the fact that these meetings shouldn't be scheduled at the same time for just that reason.
As far as the other Eye on Everett piece, I didn't get it. In one place, it says that Jason Marcus may be looking to get out of politics; it ends up by saying that he's probably going to be on the ballot this fall. It never mentions that Marcus has also pulled papers for the Common Council. Would a Ward 2 Council race (if there even is one) be easier because if Marcus has any support left, it likely be concentrated in his home ward and those are the only ones that could vote for the seat? Parziale seems to be as confused about Marcus' real intentions as the rest of us appear to be. One more thing about the piece though. I can't imagine that Councilor Simonelli could have been too pleased that Parziale made Mike Mangan the front runner for the Alderman's seat. It not too often that someone from outside the current Everett political scene would be considered a favorite over a current office holder. Why is that? It's likely one of two things and you'll make up your mind which, depending on which side of the fence you sit.
Legal ads continue to be a source of interesting information in the papers lately. The Independent ran one about the schools going out to bid for Nike athletic supplies. There been a debate going on over on Topix about the money spent on school athletics. At some point, someone made the statement that Nike donated atheletic equipment to the schools. It may have been true that Nike donated something to the school in the past but for the last two years, the bids that have gone out for school athletic equipment specify that it must be Nike equipment. So, if the schools did receive a donation in the past from Nike in the past, it appears that Nike may be getting paid back in some degree for that donation.
The other new legal notice that caught my eye this week was a bid notice in the Advocate. That one was for a new roof at the School Administration building. Last week, there was one for new siding and windows at that building. Last year, the hardwood floors were redone there as well. I don't know what the Mayor's building study will say, but I'm pretty certain that the School Department won't be willing to give up their Administration Building for as long as FFF remains superintendent.
The Leader-Herald's lead story once again featured a nugget which I've reproduced below because I agree so much with it.
"Some members still don’t seem to have grasped the concept of placing items on the agenda under suspension. Item #21 on Monday night’s calendar was a resolution that a Certificate of Habitability be included in either the water bills or the tax bills and invite Mr, Champi, the Director of the CETF to attend next meeting to discuss an aid for proper enforcement strategies.
Is there an urgent situation here or did someone realize that they hadn’t thought the matter through thoroughly when it was before the Council weeks ago."
The Leader-Herald finally had a pertinent, completely new editorial this week. I was in agreement with the overall theme of the piece, providing more information about what's on the City Council agenda. They're a little late to the party though. I've been advocating that for a long time though. If the piece that was on the City Council agenda a few weeks ago about making committee reports available on the city web site ever gets implemented, perhaps the paper's issue would get addressed as well. If not, they have just refined the issue even further. I'm not sure that I agreed with the specific example that the paper gave, i.e., the Social Host ordinance, but that might just be because the paper was guilt of the same oversight that they made about the city. Why didn't the paper print the text of the ordinance? Instead, we just get to see their interpretation of it.
All of the papers had something in them about Sal DiDomenico's time this week. He seems to be building up a pretty big war chest. We're all pretty sure that he has higher aspirations than his current seat. Honestly though, I have to say that I'm pretty disappointed in his performance lately. Two years ago, he was a rising star and it appeared he could have easily been the leader of the next generation of Everett politics. However, since he's gone to work for Senator Galluccio, he just been another one of the mostly invisible people serving on the Common Council. I believe that he needs to do something to change that sooner rather than later.
Not a lot to work with in the Advocate this week. One thing that I wanted to comment on though was that they neglected to include Alderman Nuzzo as one of the sponsors who wanted to sign on as a sponsor to the fully empowered Traffic Commission ordinance in their lead article. Based on the latest rumors, maybe they just got ahead of themselves and forgot he was still an alderman at the time. One final question to ask about this week's Advocate. Where was the piece praising Stat Smith this week because he had a piece on the School Committee agenda that concerned an education item? Of course, it just as easily could have been a rip since the issue concerned outsourcing additional special education services and this is an issue that needs to be negotiated.
And finally, the amount of school advertising in the papers continues to blow my mind. I was talking to my sister-in-law yesterday who works in administration in another local school system and she just couldn't believe it. How will I end these posts in the summer when the school advertising goes for a while? |
Edited by - tetris on 06/08/2009 3:13:12 PM |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2009 : 7:44:43 PM
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I’ve wanted to resurrect this thread in some fashion for quite a while now. With the election less than a week away now, it’s well past time. I’ve been trying to think of ways to do it without posting all of the articles that I’m commenting on since that seemed to offend some people. And after reading some of the stuff that the Advocate has been printing this summer and into the fall, I get that point.
My first thought was to create a separate site that contained a searchable archive of articles. My initial idea was to share that site with everyone. If you wanted to reference an article that I was writing about, you could go there to find it rather than me posting them here. If you chose not to, you might not understand everything that I was trying to say, but at least that would be your choice. I have actually done that and have continued to update that site regularly.
However, the problem with giving everyone access to that site is that I was unable to build it in such a way that it wouldn’t compromise my identity. Unfortunately, that’s something I feel the need to guard very closely. But if you read one of these posts and would like a copy of an article I’m referencing, I will be able to provide them via a PM.
I’m hoping that won’t be necessary very often though. My current plan is to write more generally about the papers than I have in the past so that everybody can follow along without having detailed knowledge of every article. Please let me know if I miss that mark since I do tend to get wrapped up in these things sometimes. Writing in this fashion, I may not have a post for this thread every week but only when warranted.
All this doesn’t mean that I won’t drill down on specific pieces from time to time and when I do, I’ll probably post the accompanying article. I may also expand the thread a bit and look at other forms of media that are pertinent to the city as well.
I plan on posting a couple of pieces in this thread in the next day or so. One will look at how the landscape of the Everett news outlets have changed since I lasted posted on this topic. The second will take a little bit of a look at the stories that the papers are currently covering, and may be more importantly, the ones that they aren’t, especially going into the election. |
Edited by - tetris on 10/27/2009 7:47:20 PM |
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massdee
Moderator
5299 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2009 : 7:58:18 PM
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Glad to read you are going to be doing these types of posts again. It's been far too long.
"Deb" |
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Tails
Administrator
2682 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2009 : 9:29:48 PM
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| Oh, I look forward to this especially on the news outlets. |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 10/27/2009 : 11:25:33 PM
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How has the landscape of the local papers changed since last we posted on this topic? Let’s look at the Independent first as it seems to be the one that has gone thru the most changes. First, Keith Spencer jumped ship and went to the Advocate. It has left a big hole in the paper but they have been able to muddle along without him. Their coverage of the city seems less robust now though. More on Mr. Spencer later.
A few weeks after that, Augie Parziale disappeared from the paper’s editorial page. Although I had trouble accepting some of the Republican leanings in his national/global pieces, I always thought his Everett pieces were an interesting read even if I didn’t always agree with them.
The loss of Augie Parziale has led to some interesting choices to fill the paper’s editorial page. Printing whatever portion of that week’s City Council meeting report will fit on the remainder of the page is something that the paper has done before but not with any regularity on the editorial page. Other weeks, we get some interesting choices such as an editorial on Homecoming by the Superintendent; but to be fair, all three papers ran that. But the most interesting choice for editorial content in this time frame to me though was the week that they ran their regular “From the Mayor’s Office” feature on the editorial page. It seemed like a strange choice of content for that slot; then again, maybe not.
There also seemed to be a shift in what the Independent is using for a lead story. They seemed to have ripped-off the Leader-Herald’s practice of usually going with a general coverage story on that week’s City Council meeting. Not original, but I think that the actually do a better job of it than the Leader does; theirs seem better structured to me anyways. Last week, that mold was broken though as it seemed that all of the major content was geared towards the School Department. I guess we’ll have to wait and see what direction this is headed in.
On the plus side though, the Independent has made some major improvements to their web site (You must be logged in to see this link.). Beginning in the middle of September, they started archiving the articles posted on the site. No idea yet of how long they intend to keep articles in the archives but this would seem to eliminate the need to post the majority of their articles on this site. They don’t post and archive everything they print in their regular edition though.
Occasionally, I’ll still find something that I want to save that’s not on their site. But they have also added another feature to their site that saves me from having to transcribe those any more. There is now a link to a PDF version of the current edition of the paper. As long I grab what I want during the current week, I can copy what I want to save, with just some reformatting to turn the text into a Word document.
The only drawback that I have found with the improved site is the updating of it. So far, it’s been better than the old version, which some weeks didn’t get updated at all. So far, the improved site has been updated every week but the timing of the updates has been inconsistent. One week, it was updated on Tuesday evening; another week it was Saturday morning. I’ll take it though.
So, on to the Advocate. When Keith Spencer left The Independent, he moved over to the Advocate. I thought it was a good move as it brought a different point of view to the paper. For a while, it seemed that he was being given more and more to do at the paper each week. But for the last couple of weeks, he’s been totally MIA. That’s too bad. I asked around a bit as to what happened but I couldn’t get any definite answer. Perhaps he’s just lying low for the time being. Since he’s also a School Department employee, perhaps he just wants to stay out of the fray until after the election. Maybe we’ll get a better answer of what’s going on with him in the next couple of weeks. I enjoy a lot of his stuff and hope to see his work again.
Other than that, I guess the best way to describe what been going on in the Advocate is that they are doing what they do best. Their focus since the middle of summer, of course, has been the School Committee races in the upcoming election. Their commentaries have been over the top, hammering home the same points, week after week. They go in a different direction once in a while but that doesn’t stop them from working in at least some of the same old points, over and over again. The commentaries also seem to get longer every week.
And honestly, these pieces have been pretty brutal. The label that they’ve applied to the candidates that they are opposing is pretty demeaning and was never even fully explained until one of these candidates called the paper on it. The explanation given for it was pretty lame. It’s nothing more than a manipulation of words to create a derogatory label. However, it’s likely that it probably happened the other way around though; the term can first and the explanation is just a lame way to justify it. I wouldn’t have a problem if the paper described these candidates as “Not a fit” for the job. The term they are using is just a way to hang a label on that group. From some of the things that I’m reading and hearing, it seems that it may be a tactic that could blow up in their face. I hate to think what we’ll be reading in the paper if the candidates they are backing lose their majority on the School Committee.
From what I hear, The Advocate is also up to playing their old tricks of playing favorites by refusing to run ads and announcements for certain candidates under the guise that they ran out of space in that week’s edition. It seems strange that those editions contain multiple slots for other candidates though. It hardly seems fair not to provide equal access but I guess that’s their call.
Then there’s the special editions being delivered to homes with a political ad for a school committee member on the front page rather than the political ad that ran in the regular edition. It seems like “Stat” Smith’s quest to unseat the Superintendent may have an unintended consequence. Between the ads that the School Committee members are running and the special versions of the paper, it appears that the Advocate could be making a nice chunk of change on these races. I almost hate to bring it up, but one has to wonder where that money is coming from. The incumbents have never needed to raise much money to run for their seats and I don’t see many (any?) fund raisers for them now. I have no proof of anything but let’s just hope that it’s coming from the money that they now receive for serving on the School Committee or some other valid source.
The Leader-Herald? Not really much to say about them. I don’t think that the paper has changed much in all the time I’ve lived here. But in my next post, we’ll take a look at a recent editorial in it, as well as some of the other stories that all of the local papers have and haven’t been covering. |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 11/02/2009 : 09:35:03 AM
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I had another post almost ready to go for this thread when I decided to stop and wait for last week’s editions to complete their pre-election coverage. I think I might have made a mistake because last week’s papers probably deserved a post all of their own. So I’m going to try to merge all my thoughts on the local paper’s election coverage and save some other thoughts for another time. Lots to cover, time to get a move on.
Is there really an election in the City of Everett tomorrow? And does it have any races other than the School Committee? You wouldn’t know it if you ready some of the papers, especially last’s week’s Independent. I’m not sure you’d realize it except for all the campaign announcements and advertisements in the paper. Their editorial on the election was only about the school committee races. It recommended that ALL of the incumbents be returned to the committee; how did that slip by? The lead story was on the renovations at the Parlin School. Really? These were approved months ago; actually, they were first approved more than a year ago. And they haven’t been started yet? While there may be reasons for that, I wouldn’t be proud of the fact. Let’s face it, old news.
Speaking of old news, Stat Smith won’t give the School Department a CORI report? Where did the Advocate come up with that one? Isn’t that something that FFF screamed at Stat Smith months ago at the end of a School Committee meeting? Hey, it’s their paper and they can print almost anything that they want. But when I pick up a newspaper, I’m usually looking for news.
Speaking of which, the piece from the former Chelsea policeman seemed a little dated; I wonder how many times the paper has recycled that piece over the years.
Isn’t there something very similar about all of the “FFF Seven’s” (for the lack of a better term) campaign ads? They all stress qualifications and experience, same as the Advocate. Coincidence? I think not. And all of the ads have that same familiar look that we’ve seen before too. Looks like FFF’s media guy has been busy.
A question for the Advocate. Since no one else beside the “FFF Seven” has the experience and qualifications for the job, just how are we supposed to fill the other two seats on the School Committee? Or doesn’t that matter?
You can find out some interesting things when you read someone’s qualifications. For example, I didn’t know that Mr. Carreiro is the chairman of the Everett Housing Authority Board. You know, that authority that’s responsible for Glendale Towers where they have a huge bedbug issue. Oh, wait, according to The Independent, that’s only a problem that we should lay at “Stat” Smith’s feet, along with every other problem in the world.
I agree that qualifications and experience are two good criteria to judge a candidate upon. But, aren’t the actions or, probably more appropriate in this case, the inactions that an elected official is responsible for while they’re in office just as, if not more, important?
Joe Guiliano had been pretty unscathed in this “witch-hunt” until the last few weeks. But how dare he question spending money on a pre-school program? And for all of the scolding that the Advocate does about members of not understanding how school finances work, I think that they could have been a little more honest about where the money is going to come from for the program. Yes, it is a grant from the Federal government but, as I understand it, it’s the same grant that is going to make net school spending whole. Therefore, something else may be suffering as a result. I’m not necessarily against expanding the three-year old program but there’s nothing wrong with asking questions about it. I’d like to know if other area of the School Department will be receiving less funding as a result of this expenditure but that question was never really asked at the School Committee meeting.
You probably could have guessed that I couldn’t make it through one of these posts without at least one direct reference to something in the papers. Well, to wrap up this look at the School Committee election coverage, here is a quote from a recent commentary in the Advocate:
“You can tell it’s election time because “sleaze politics” is raising its ugly head once again in the city of Everett. The unsigned “sleazy” political flyers are starting to circulate — full of scurrilis character assassination charges and innuendos that are an embarrassment to anyone interested in good government. Can there be any doubt about the origin of the “sleaze”?”
Surprisingly, there has been very little coverage of any of the other races in the city. I think that there are three very interesting and important aldermen races and, for the most part, they are flying under the radar. Some of the council races are interesting but there’s been very little coverage of them in the papers, only the obligatory shot at Carlie Smith by the Advocate. The Ward 5 Council race seems to be drawing some interest over on Topix though. Adam Ragucci is also trying to stir up some interest in his campaign over on Topix but, in my mind anyways, he seems to dig himself a deeper hole every time he posts there.
For some reason, I expected to see more in the papers about Charter Review. But if what we missed out on was more pieces like the editorial in a recent Leader-Herald, we didn’t miss out on much. That piece was all over the place. Were they for it or against it? I guess that depended on which part of the article you were reading. I particularly didn’t care for the inference in it that, as a city, we aren’t intelligent enough to handle Charter Review.
The only real good Charter Review piece in the papers in recent weeks came from Keith Spencer in last week’s Advocate. It was good to see him back. Hands down though, the best coverage of the Charter Review question this fall has been the special that ECTV did. It was very informative and well put together, one of the best pieces that I can ever remember them doing. Very professional and pretty balanced. It was a very good primer for people who haven’t been plugged into the issue before now and even those of us that have been following it for a while probably got something out of the show. |
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tetris
Moderator
2040 Posts |
Posted - 11/09/2009 : 07:20:05 AM
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Not a ton to comment on in the local papers this week. But I‘ve found a few things to look at. Also, in an effort to expand the scope of this thread, we’ll take a little bit of look at ECTV’s election night coverage and the on-going updates to the city’s web site.
Let’s start with the election coverage in the newspapers. I fully expected The Advocate’s post-election coverage of the School Committee race to be as over-the-top as their pre-election coverage; I didn’t think that it was. Don’t get me wrong, they certainly made their point strongly but I was expecting something much, much worse. Oh well, there’s always next week.
That doesn’t mean that The Advocate let up on “Stat” Smith; they are already predicting that he will lose his State Representative’s seat next year. And just to prove that politics make strange bedfellows, one of the people that they are pushing to take on Smith is Robert Van Campen. In the recent past at least, Van Campen has not been an Advocate favorite. But in this week’s Sounds of Everett piece about Smith, they had nothing but nice things to say about Van Campen. It’s kind of funny too since, in an earlier piece in the same column, they gave Van Campen a “shot”. That piece gave The Advocate’s interpretation of the Mayor’s “vote of confidence” and they used Van Campen’s vote total last Tuesday as a basis of comparison even though he wasn’t the unopposed Alderman with the highest vote total. Is there more of a motive behind pushing Van Campen as a Smith opponent other than their hatred for Stat?
A couple of press releases in the local papers caught my eye this week. $75,000 for a canoe/kayak launch on the Malden River? Not exactly what I’d expect the money would go to if I had purchased one of those specialty plates. Also, I was very surprised to see a press release about the city employee who was alleged to have stolen the meter receipts; those things usually are never acknowledged in the papers, accompanied by a picture of the suspect no less. The press release was quick to point out though that the accused was hired by a previous administration. And although the evidence may seem to be overwhelming, I was very surprised with the tone of the quote attributed to Chief Mazzie. I thought that it was supposed to be innocent until proven guilty in a court of law?
I noticed that both of these press releases contained grammar and/or spelling errors. For example, there’s no need to use both “$” and “dollars” to describe a dollar amount. And when the same errors appear in every paper, you just can’t blame the papers either. But let’s not let the papers off the hook. How can any of them get the names of political candidates wrong after the election is over? To make it worse, they were incumbents too. Factual errors get me too; weren’t Stat and Stephanie Smith both on the Common Council at the same time during her first term? I know we all make these kinds of mistakes but shouldn’t the papers be held to a higher standard?
One thing that The Advocate did get right, at least in one place in the paper, was something that most of us have gotten wrong. That was the turnout in last week’s election was closer to 33% than 25%. Think about it; approximately 6,000 out of 18,000 eligible voters went to the polls last week. So where did most of us get this bad info? ECTV. Where did they get it? Who knows but again they have to be held to a higher standard too.
Overall, I thought that ECTV’s election night coverage was OK. Nothing really good but nothing really bad either. I did like the fact that they tried to do something different than in the past by having some taped pieces with some substance to fill a part of the time before the results came in. I’m not sure that I got a whole lot out of those particular pieces though. When you only do a live broadcast once every two years and a good portion of the crew is new, I’m not sure that you should have any high expectation to begin with. I think that they were trying very hard to follow a format; it didn’t seem to help that the Mayor chose to read some of the results before they had planned to.
The article in The Advocate about ECTV’s new set was accompanied by a picture of the entire ECTV staff. Where was Matt Laidlaw? C’mon. How does the administration continue to justify paying his salary out of that budget? It’s pretty clear that he has next to nothing (if anything) to do with that operation.
To wrap up this post, a brief look at the on-going upgrades to the City of Everett website. I know that a lot of web sites change their formats all of the time. But those are websites that do it to attract additional traffic. I see the city’s website as more of a resource site, the type of site where go to find information or communicate with the site owner. As such, I had no real problem with the previous city web site.
The only improvements that I would have desired for the site would be to add some additional content (City Council meeting handouts, committee meetings reports, more information about the various boards, etc.) and perhaps to make the access to the information in the E-Gov folders more graphical. I have no problem navigating those folders but that’s just me.
The only real changes to the site that I have seen so far are a change to a Crimson Tide Red motif and expanded text for press releases on the home page. There could be more but that’s just what jumped out at me. When upgrading a web site in a live mode, there is bound to be some bump and bruises along the way. One that I’ve noticed so far is that there is no longer a direct link to the charter on the City Clerk’s page. The charter’s still on the web site though; you just have to locate it in the right E-Gov folder. One might think that would be something that people would have be interested in the last couple of weeks but I’d guess I’m probably the exception rather than the norm. I’ve also noticed that the ECTV webpage was not available this weekend but I’m not sure if that’s a related issue or not.
It’s probably not really fair to fully judge the enhancements until they are complete though. We’ll try to reserve full judgment on the improvements to the site until then.
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