With the primary election set for Sept. 8, candidates for the 2nd Middlesex Senate seat and the 26th Middlesex House seat gather for a Matahari Women Worker's Center roundtable forum, including Sen. Pat Jehlen and her challenger, Cambridge City Councilor Leland Cheung, and Rep. Tim Toomey and his challenger, community organizer Mike Connolly, CIC Cambridge, One Broadway - 5th floor, Cambridge, 7 p.m.
| Today's News |
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| Paul LePage: Maine’s Hamlet? |
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Maine Gov. Paul LePage, who brought his one-man show to Boston earlier this week, now seems to be struggling with the weighty issue of whether or not he should resign from office in the wake of a string of controversies he’s sparked over recent weeks, from accusing blacks and Hispanics of bringing drugs into his state to leaving an obscenity-laced voicemail for a Maine lawmaker. The Portland Press Herald’s Eric Russell reports that LePage at one point in a radio interview yesterday indicated his willingness to resign from office, then only hours later tweeted: “Regarding rumors of resignation, to paraphrase Mark Twain: The reports of my political demise are greatly exaggerated.’”
The Globe’s Michael Levenson has more on the controversy. And the Herald this morning is suggesting that maybe it’s time for LePage hang it up: “Far be it from us to tell Mainers how to govern themselves but LePage is spreading fear and mistrust well beyond his state’s borders. Yesterday he expressed regret for his tirade against a Democratic lawmaker (the same one he said he’d like to challenge to a duel) and even wondered whether it might be time for him to resign. To ask the question, governor, may be to answer it.”
In a way, it’s sort of sad to witness all of this. It’s like watching a troubled person cracking up in public, in a Jimmy Piersall kind of way, and it’s not fun to watch. The Portland Press Herald also reports that it’s gotten to the point that protestors are now urging LePage to either resign – or get help. Maybe it’s a case of both? |
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| JFK Library selects new chief following recent upheaval |
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Steven Rothstein, a longtime Kennedy family ally who has led Citizen Schools and the Perkins School for the Blind, has been tapped to oversee the John F. Kennedy Library, following the tumultuous tenure of Heather Campion, who resigned in December amidst major staff departures and complaints about her leadership style, reports the Globe’s Jim O’Sullivan. (Fyi: Here’s the library’s press release confirming Rothstein’s appointment.) |
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| DCR leaders suspended after Esplanade party |
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Two employees at the Department of Conservation and Recreation have been suspended and ordered to repay $800 in state funds after using public resources to host a private pre-July Fourth party complete with golf carts used to shuttle guests to the Esplanade, Mike Beaudet of WCVB reports. DCR Commissioner Leo Roy and Deputy Commissioner Matthew Sisk voluntarily reported the party—and the public resources used to prepare and hold it—after Beaudet began asking questions. The employees have been suspended without pay, ordered to reimburse the state and will be required to undergo additional ethics training.
WCVB |
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| No delay: Elderly care waiting list starts tomorrow |
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Starting tomorrow, some elderly residents seeking home care services will be put on a state waiting list because of recent budget cuts, reports MassLive’s Shira Schoenberg. The Executive Office of Elder Affairs estimates that 184 seniors a month will be added to the waiting list, eventually creating an average of 670 people on the list in any given month, she reports.
MassLive
| Gun maker sues Healey, accuses her of conducting a ‘fishing expedition’ |
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The oil and gun lobbies really loathe Attorney General Maura Healey, don’t they? Earlier this week, ExxonMobil called Healey’s investigation into what the oil industry has known about climate change an “indefensible, partisan and unconstitutional” action. Now Remington Arms Co., in a separate legal action, is suing Healey, saying she’s conducting an unconstitutional “fishing expedition” by seeking personal information about gun owners, reports Greg Ryan at the Boston Business Journal. In March, Healey demanded a number documents from the gun maker to see if it was complying with Massachusetts consumer protection law, including complaints from consumers about the safety of Remington’s guns and ammunition, according to the lawsuit.
Both of these cases shouldn’t be confused with Healey’s recently announced crackdown on “copycat” assault weapons, yet another action that has drawn intense criticism as well as praise for her action.
BBJ |
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| Lights, camera, action? Walsh says body cam preparations to continue |
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The Boston police department will continue to ready the launch of its controversial body camera test program so that it can start as soon as a legal challenge filed by a police union is resolved, Antonio Planas and Dan Atkinson of the Herald report. The Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association has asked a judge for an injunction halting the pilot program long set to launch tomorrow. That request will be the focus of a court hearing on Thursday. “We’re training the officers and we’re ready to implement the program as soon as the court date’s over, we’re ready to get going,” Walsh said.
Boston Herald |
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| Forget Charlie Baker. Donald Trump has Fred Smerlas at his back |
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Many big-name Massachusetts Republicans, including Gov. Charlie Baker and former Gov. Mitt Romney, may be shunning Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump. But not Fred Smerlas, the former Waltham High, Boston College and NFL football star who’s scheduled to headline a fundraiser for Trump this evening in Hingham, via the Make Massachusetts Great Again PAC, according to the group’s Facebook page. The political action committee, which is separate from Trump’s campaign, was formed earlier this year, MassLive has reported. |
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| Carmen’s union launches anti-privatization ad campaign |
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The Boston Carmen's Union Local 589, which represents about 60 percent of the MBTA’s 6,500 employees, launched a newspaper and online ad campaign yesterday to protest plans for the privatization of many T services, reports SHNS’s Andy Metzger (pay wall). "Privatization is not a magic wand," reads the open-letter ad, which is also available on the union’s web site. "There is no magic wand to cure the lack of investment and benign neglect of management over the past 20-plus years."
SHNS (pay wall)
| Brain surgery be damned: Donnelly vows to run for re-election |
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State Sen. Ken Donnelly, who had to be rushed to the hospital during the waning hours of the legislative session and who later underwent brain surgery to remove a tumor, is serving notice he won’t be pulling out of the September Democratic primary and has every intention of returning to the Senate. “I want all of you to know that it is my expectation and goal to return as your voice and your vote when the new legislative session begins in January 2017,” the Arlington Democrat wrote in an op-ed in the Arlington Advocate at Wicked Local. “I hope this bump in my personal life’s road will make me, as I saw it make so many of them, a stronger, more caring and more effective state senator.”
Wicked Local |
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| GateHouse down 40 staffers after latest buyouts, layoffs |
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GateHouse has 40 fewer staffers at its New England newspapers following the latest round of buyouts and layoffs at the media company, Don Seiffert of the Boston Business Journal reports. Despite current and past cutbacks, CEO Kirk Davis tells Seiffert the company sees growth opportunities in some areas, including in some business-to-business publications it has recently purchased.
BBJ |
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| We’re number one … in campus food |
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After years of moving up the Princeton Review list of best campus food quality options, UMass Amherst has claimed the top spot on this year’s rankings, Spencer Buell of Boston Magazine reports. The campus prepares 45,000 meals daily and students and staff enjoy their food at a host of various outlets, including food trucks and through a delivery option. The school says it has doubled participation in its meal program since 1999 and is now the largest campus dining services operation in the country.
Boston magazine |
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| Nantucket uproar: ‘This is worse than the Zika virus!’ |
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Heading into the long Labor Day weekend, reality TV star Kourtney Kardashian is apparently horrifying residents of the state’s most famous fantasy island, i.e. Nantucket, with rumors she’s purchased a home on the resort get-away sandbar that completely rebuilt its downtown to look a quaint fishing village museum that has no resemblance to its former reality. “This is worse than the Zika virus!” the Herald’s Track quotes one longtime Nantucket resident. The rumor doesn’t appear to be true. But don’t you wish it were a reality, if only for the entertainment value?
Boston Herald
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