This was the week that was in state politics Sen. Joyce (D-Milton) ethics probe has tongues wagging - Baker out on a snowy limb with Obama - "Mayor" Hedland (R-Weymouth)?
ARTICLE | Politics | May 10, 2015 06:00 AM | By Matt Murphy, State House News Service
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Sen. Joyce (right), a top deputy to Sen. Pres. Rosenberg relented to pressure Friday to cooperate with an ethics investigation into allegations he improperly used his office to benefit his legal clients, & agreed to relinquish his leadership. SHNS photo.
WEEKLY ROUNDUP - THE OTHER MAN FROM MILTON
Recap and analysis of the week in state government
STORY OF THE WEEK: State workers get green-light to file for early retirement, while Sen. Brian Joyce (D-Milton) submits to ethics probe.There are limits to power, and eventually those limits will be tested.
Gov. Charlie Baker's power of persuasion, both with the Obama administration and the Legislature, is about to be measured after the governor went out on a limb asking the feds to reconsider their decision to hold back on some disaster funding to pay for snow cleanup.
And as he and his deputies continued to pitch to skeptical lawmakers his plan to overhaul oversight of
the MBTA, the governor acknowledged quietly requesting a week ago some latitude, previously denied, to ignore aspects of the Affordable Care Act that he worries will hurt small businesses.
But while the governor has some margin for error given his sky-high approval ratings and yet another win under his belt this week after lawmakers delivered to him an early retirement bill, good will toward Sen. Brian Joyce may be in shorter supply.
Joyce says he'll cooperate with an Ethics Probe
The Joyce (SHNS photo on the right) situation had tongues wagging this week during the layover between the completion of the House budget and the unveiling on Tuesday of the Senate's proposed spending plan.
The Boston Globe, in a long-rumored story last Sunday, sketched out ways Joyce may be blurring the lines between his legislative and legal work, one of which pays more bills than the other. The allegations in the article come after previous reports that Joyce may have secured illegal discounts on pricey designer shades he gave as gifts to his colleagues.
So what if he turned his son's graduation party into a "friend-raiser," commutes to Beacon Hill in a $749-a-month, constituent funded Jeep, and goes the extra mile for his clients?
Someone of Joyce's experience must know where to draw the line, even if it is a little curved, right?
That was the question Senate President Stanley Rosenberg raced to answer in the latest challenge to his fledgling presidency that was supposed to be focused on public policy and open debate over power and politics, but which has struggled to stay out of the mud.
Joyce, a Milton Democrat, kept a low profile for the week as Rosenberg consulted with colleagues and considered his options for dealing with his assistant majority leader. Should he force Joyce, an early supporter of his candidacy for president, to give up his leadership post? Would he call for an ethics investigation? Or should he just live and let live?
The decision came late Friday afternoon when, after resisting entreaties to back down and submit to an Ethics Commission investigation, Joyce had a change of heart and agreed to cooperate with an Ethics Commission probe, which Rosenberg promptly requested. Joyce also agreed at Rosenberg's insistence to "temporarily and voluntarily" step down as assistant majority leader and chair of the Committee on Bills in Third Reading, helping remove a major distraction before the Senate begins its budget debate a week from Tuesday and all the attention will be on that chamber and where it is spending money.
Baker, DeLeo agree Ethics Commission should investigate
House Speaker Robert DeLeo avoided piling on his Senate counterpart, with whom he's had a few differences early in the session, saying only that he agreed with Baker that it's up to the Ethics Commission whether to investigate.
That said, DeLeo said he is interested in taking a fresh look at the ethics and conflict law loopholes that Joyce may be driving his $749-a-month Jeep Grand Cherokee straight through.
Baker said DeLeo had discussed revisiting ethics laws in private meetings long before the Joyce controversy surfaced, stirred by questions raised in the media in January over whether a Dorchester charter school teacher had violated ethical limits on gifts when she donated $150,000 in prize winnings back to her school.I do think we need to take a look at our conflict of interest laws and other such ethics - possible ethics violations as we move forward.
House Speaker Robert DeLeo (SHNS photo on the right) said.
While DeLeo was willing to give Rosenberg some space to deal with Joyce and his own membership, the speaker did not parse words when asked whether he agrees with Senate leaders that the budget bill referred from the House is a so-called "money bill," and therefore subject to the addition of tax policy changes.
"No, I would disagree", DeLeo said.
The speaker's position is unlikely to stop the Senate from considering tax policy in two weeks when it opens debate on its version of the budget. It does, however, raise a possible dilemma for when the budget moves into conference just ahead of the July 1 start of the new fiscal year.
Differences between the branches were temporarily put aside on Monday when they rushed compromise early retirement legislation to the governor's desk, clearing the way for thousands of state executive branch employees to pad their pensions and retire on June 30.
Negotiators brokered a deal last Friday that would cap the program, based on seniority, at 5,000 employees, but retirement board officials are skeptical that it will have to turn people away.
Baker, who signed the bill immediately, remains confident he can entice about 4,500 workers to clear off the payroll without having to resort to layoffs or sacrifice quality of service for constituents. The governor, the speaker and the Senate president are all banking on the program working in order to save $170 million and balance the fiscal 2016 budget.
After 22 years a Senator, Mayor Hedland?
Sen. Robert Hedlund (SHNS photo on the right), a Weymouth Republican with over 22 years under his belt in the Senate, is also looking forward to the Senate budget debate, and hoping to make it his last.
Hedlund confirmed this week that he will officially launch a campaign for Weymouth mayor on June 4 after the budget process concludes.
Albeit in a non-partisan race, he plans to challenge Democratic incumbent Susan Kay in a multi-candidate field, continuing the trend of state lawmakers looking to return to local government, rather than vice-versa.
Rosenberg and Bialecki owned and profited from casino stock as they were active casino cheerleaders.
Senator Petrucelli and the late Mayor Tom Menino maintained "CHARITIES" that were not required to disclose their donors when Richard Fields, an out-of-state owner of Suffolk Downs made generous contributions.
It is only because of the great investigative reporting of the Boston Globe that the information was public.
Who else? What else?
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