CLT
UPDATE
Monday, July 14, 2003
Finneran obfuscates, dissembles and
lies on Keller program
Weighty issues abound at the State House. This week House members have been busy restoring money that Gov. Mitt Romney vetoed from the state budget.
But, as recent tradition dictates, the focus of much energy is the power of House Speaker Thomas Finneran and perks for House members....
Because of this pressure, some House members find themselves in a common position - deciding between what is in the public interest or feathering one's own nest by sticking with the speaker. A committee chairmanship means thousands of extra dollars, and a tight leash that leads to Finneran's door.
If this scenario were not so commonplace, it would be surprising that lawmakers could devote so much time and thought to their own selfish interests while the state is sinking in red ink and thousands are receiving pink slips....
Massachusetts desperately needs a Legislature in which more than one party's interests can be heard.
A Patriot Ledger editorial
Saturday, July 12, 2003
Same old stuff on Beacon Hill
Sidestepping the tangled politics of Speaker Thomas M. Finneran's leadership pay raise bill, a coalition of citizen watchdog groups from across the political spectrum is opposing the measure on the basis that it violates the state constitution.
Lawmakers should heed the warning.
Common Cause, CPPAX and Citizens for Limited Taxation this week are urging lawmakers to sustain Gov. Mitt Romney's veto of the measure, House Bill
3743, on the basis that it removes the statutory checks and balances on pay raises and, therefore, most likely is unconstitutional....
With only a tiny minority party presence in the House, there are precious few restraints on the power of the inner circle of the
speaker's leadership team. House 3743 would aggravate an already unhealthy imbalance of power on Beacon Hill. Lawmakers should sustain the
governor's veto.
A Telegram & Gazette editorial
Saturday, July 12, 2003
Purse-string politics
House leadership pay raise plan may be illegal, too
There are lots of reasons why Massachusetts voters hold their Legislature in such low esteem. There are large ones, like killing the voter-approved Clean Elections Law without showing the courage to hold a roll call vote, and small ones, like packing the ABCC with politically-connected hangers-on. Let's look at the smaller outrage, which demonstrates again that even in times of fiscal crisis, it's business as usual in Tom Finneran's House....
Hence, the taxpayers will pay $940,000 to keep the hangers-on hanging on. Meanwhile, rape crisis centers across the state are closing because the Legislature can't come up with $1.7 million.
Maybe if the rape crisis centers hired more friends and relatives of state representatives, there would be someone to answer the phone the next time a rape victim called.
A MetroWest Daily News editorial
Sunday, July 13, 2003
Patronage at the ABCC
The state's chief park ranger for years has worked a second job as a full-time firefighter that requires him to play hooky five, six, sometimes seven days a month from his $51,000-a-year state gig.
What's more, a Herald analysis of his time sheets shows John Strazzullo got paid by the state for hours he was actually on duty at his $43,000-a-year Bedford Fire Department job, where he has worked full time since 1997.
But Strazzullo's bosses at the former Metropolitan District Commission say their chief ranger isn't really truant on the many weekdays he's out of the office because he has their blessing to put in his hours whenever it suits him....
While she said she has no reason to doubt Strazzullo, Citizens for Limited Taxation's Barbara Anderson said the state's record of safeguarding taxpayers' money doesn't exactly inspire confidence.
"Over the years, the no-show jobs have been such an epidemic in government, you tend to be suspicious," Anderson said.
The Boston Herald
Monday, July 14, 2003
Ranger roves to second full-time position
House Majority Whip Lida Harkins (D-Needham) boasted that the House set a record for the speed with which it overrode the [Boston Municipal Court] vetoes. And that's no surprise since the Legislature has always gone out of its way to protect its pet patronage haven.
Now Speaker Tom Finneran is likely to be making a big push on his new best friend in the Senate to come through on the BMC override. But after supporting Finneran's controversial pay raise plan, Travaglini can easily make the case that this is just too big and bad to swallow....
The ball is in Travaglini's court. We'll know soon enough if he really is the face of the new Senate or just more of the same.
A Boston Herald editorial
Monday, July 14, 2003
BMC ball in Senate court
Since 2000, the full House and Senate -- Democrats and Republicans -- have gathered in private meetings more than two dozen times, using the sessions to hash out everything from last year's $1.1 billion tax package to plans for a new Fenway Park -- all out of public earshot.
The practice of bipartisan, closed-door caucuses, so rare in other states, is commonplace on Beacon Hill.
Reporters and residents are barred from the tightly controlled meetings, during which Republican and Democratic members get a chance to air out their differences in secret.
The meetings would be a blatant violation of the state's open meeting law, designed to preserve the hallmark of open government, if the Legislature hadn't exempted itself from the provisions....
The bipartisan caucuses are highly unusual in other parts of the country.
"As far as a (legislature) going into a joint caucus? My guess is that's pretty rare," said Brenda Erickson, a senior research analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures.
A legislature may occasionally go into a closed-door session to discuss security or personnel issues, but not routine legislative business, Erickson said.
"I can't think of any other states that allow them," she said.
Associated Press
Sunday, July 13, 2003
House holds secret budget meeting
Part of the cost of the no-new-taxes budget enacted by the Legislature is a dizzying array of new and increased fees for everything from attending a state college to parking at a commuter rail station.
The new fees will get you coming and going: The fee for probating a will, a local attorney informs us, has just risen from $60 to $150.
The round of fee increases that went into effect with the new state budget July 1 will soon be followed by increased fees for local services, the product of a "municipal relief" bill enacted by the Legislature, that, like the budget, offers no tax revenue but lots of options for increased fees....
There's nothing wrong with charging a fee for a voluntary activity, especially if the fee bears some relation to the government's cost of providing that activity. But too many of the fees now being increased are simply cash cows for depleted public treasuries, bearing no relation to the cost of the service....
A case in point is the 300 percent increase in the fee to obtain a Firearms Identification Card, from $25 to $100, renewable every four years....
The fees also apply to Mace and pepper spray, which raises the bar for people looking for a non-lethal means of self-defense. With the new fees, a $10 can of Mace will become a $110 expense, not to mention the hassle of obtaining an FID card from the local police department.
You don't need an FID card to carry a baseball bat for your protection, and you shouldn't need one to carry pepper spray. We should be encouraging people in risky situations to carry non-lethal tools for self-defense. The FID requirement -- and the $100 fee -- discourage it. Both should be dropped.
A MetroWest Daily News editorial
Monday, July 14, 2003
Fees could cost more than money
Chip Ford's CLT
Commentary
Finneran's Pay-Raise Power-Grab continues to be the
hot topic, both on and off Bacon Hill. Fast-talking Finneran was Jon
Keller's guest on his weekly "Talking Politics" program
(Sundays at 8:30 am, TV-56), where Finneran continually asserted that
his proposal was simply to allow the Legislature to organize itself
"just as the governor is able to organize the executive
branch." Over and over he insisted that his proposal "is not
about pay raises" ... but the title of his bill, H-3743,
is "An Act Relative to the Compensation of Certain Members of the General Court."
Gee, now where could we ever have gotten the
idea that Finneran's Pay-Raise Power-Grab is about pay raises?
Keller wasn't buying Finneran's snake oil
sales pitch either. Finneran reiterated that it wasn't a pay raise
issue, adding "You may not believe me." Keller agreed, he
didn't believe him.
On the program Finneran also justified killing the
Clean Elections Law because the original ballot question was
misleading and deceptive, that voters didn't understand it would be
publicly funded with tax dollars. This from the Beacon Hill
Machiavelli who put Question 1 on the 1998 ballot titled "Setting
Compensation of State Legislators," which advertised in its
summary: "This proposed constitutional amendment would prohibit
the state Legislature from changing the base compensation received by
members of the Legislature as of January 1, 1996."
Ironically, it left the determination of the
biennial adjustment (to wit: increase) to their salaries up to the governor
-- who Finneran is now attempting to cut out of pay increase decisions
when anointing any number of new acolytes.
The sneaky language in his proposed constitutional
amendment was "changing the base compensation." It said
nothing about "per diems" or "office expenses,"
both of which have since doubled as we predicted before the 1998
election; we warned that with money grabs, legislators are very devious
and shameless and will always find another way to pad their wallets.
I'm confident that the 60 percent who voted for his
constitutional amendment believed adopting it would end the regular
legislative money grabs -- but here the pols come again grabbing for
still more -- because Finneran also left "leadership
stipends" out of his proposed constitutional amendment. I wonder
how naive, deceived and abused those voters are feeling today?
Finneran, with a wave of his imperial
scepter, should put another constitutional amendment on the 2004
ballot repealing the Legislature's automatic,
constitutionally-protected pay raises to learn if voters have since
changed their minds ... as he did with the Clean Elections Law. You
know, just to be honest and consistent for once.
"How did you ever get so cynical," we're
asked.
How can you be anything but cynical when you
learn that Massachusetts is the only state in the union that
holds "secret sessions of the Legislature" including
closed-door meetings on the state budget.
"That's a secret session of the Legislature and if it isn't outlawed by Massachusetts law now, it should be,"
the head of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government and past president of the National Freedom of Information Coalition.
This Virginia government watchdog doesn't
appreciate that in the People's Republic of Taxachusetts government
doesn't operate like anywhere else in the United States. Laws that
apply to the rabble and unwashed masses simply don't apply to our
legislative aristocracy ... like open meeting laws.
The Associated Press reported: "Massachusetts adopted its first open meeting law in 1958. The law was largely revamped in 1975....
However, state lawmakers carved out a specific exemption for 'the general court or the committees or recess commissions
thereof.' The 'general court' refers to the Legislature."
Of course they did. The laws they impose are
intended for us peons, as they exempt themselves and thumb their noses
at the world.
"How did you ever get so cynical," we're
asked.
The answer is self-evident.
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Chip
Ford |
Your state rep and senator
need to know you oppose the Finneran Pay-Raise Power-Grab and will not
forget how they vote.
This is a critical turning
point in Massachusetts history, a point that will define our very form
of government.
Don't let it pass by without
voicing your opinion. Find
your rep and senator now, and let him or her know where you stand:
for democracy or for a "Finneran Rules" autocracy.
When you call, just tell
whoever answers the phone that you're a constituent and would like the
representative or senator to sustain the governor's veto on the
Finneran Power-Grab. If there's a question, refer them to the CLT memos
that were delivered to their offices on June
25 and July
9.
The Patriot Ledger
Saturday, July 12, 2003
Editorial
Same old stuff on Beacon Hill
Weighty issues abound at the State House. This week House members have been busy restoring money that Gov. Mitt Romney vetoed from the state budget.
But, as recent tradition dictates, the focus of much energy is the power of House Speaker Thomas Finneran and perks for House members. The issue is allowing the House speaker - and the Senate president - to create new committees and give pay raises to committee chairmen, without a sign-off from the governor, as now required by law. In other words, it allows the leadership to do whatever it wants, including spending public money, with no oversight.
Romney wisely vetoed this bill, which first passed the House by a two-thirds margin in April. And public interest groups such as Common Cause and Citizens for Limited Taxation and Government, along with Citizens for Participation in Political Action, have taken Romney's position on the measure. They have pushed the issue into the public's consciousness and are threatening to put it on the ballot if the Legislature decides to override.
Because of this pressure, some House members find themselves in a common position - deciding between what is in the public interest or feathering one's own nest by sticking with the speaker. A committee chairmanship means thousands of extra dollars, and a tight leash that leads to Finneran's door.
If this scenario were not so commonplace, it would be surprising that lawmakers could devote so much time and thought to their own selfish interests while the state is sinking in red ink and thousands are receiving pink slips.
While this Democratic drama is playing out, Romney has signaled once more that he will not follow his Republican predecessors Weld, Cellucci and Swift and ignore the fortunes of the Republican Party in the Legislature. Romney has designated one of his gubernatorial campaign aides to round up GOP candidates to run for the State House.
Romney won last year on a pledge to reform state government, but he cannot get far with a Legislature that does not have enough Republicans even to sustain his vetoes. Republicans were encouraged by the May election in Braintree for an open legislative seat. In this overwhelmingly Democratic district, an unknown Republican, Matt Sisk, lost by just 417 votes.
Massachusetts desperately needs a Legislature in which more than one party's interests can be heard.
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The Worcester Telegram & Gazette
Saturday, July 12, 2003
Purse-string politics
House leadership pay raise plan may be illegal, too
Sidestepping the tangled politics of Speaker Thomas M. Finneran's leadership pay raise bill, a coalition of citizen watchdog groups from across the political spectrum is opposing the measure on the basis that it violates the state constitution.
Lawmakers should heed the warning.
Common Cause, CPPAX and Citizens for Limited Taxation this week are urging lawmakers to sustain Gov. Mitt Romney's veto of the measure, House Bill
3743, on the basis that it removes the statutory checks and balances on pay raises and, therefore, most likely is unconstitutional.
A Supreme Judicial Court finding on legislative compensation supports the groups' view. Sections of the constitution concerning legislative compensation require that the "General Court" - that is, both the House and Senate - pass laws regarding compensation.
The House leadership pay bill fails the test because it does not require bicameral approval.
With only a tiny minority party presence in the House, there are precious few restraints on the power of the inner circle of the speaker's leadership team. House
3743 would aggravate an already unhealthy imbalance of power on Beacon Hill. Lawmakers should sustain the governor's veto.
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The MetroWest Daily News
Sunday, July 13, 2003
Editorial
Patronage at the ABCC
There are lots of reasons why Massachusetts voters hold their Legislature in such low esteem. There are large ones, like killing the voter-approved Clean Elections Law without showing the courage to hold a roll call vote, and small ones, like packing the ABCC with politically-connected hangers-on. Let's look at the smaller outrage, which demonstrates again that even in times of fiscal crisis, it's business as usual in Tom Finneran's House.
The Alcoholic Beveridge Control Commission is essentially an appeals board for licensing and enforcement actions made at the municipal level. Why it needs 11 investigators, especially ones authorized, according to an internal memo, to carry firearms and "use deadly force" is beyond us. Another memo obtained by the Boston Herald authorized the investigators to take an hour off a day to pursue a "fitness program" of their own choosing. Anyone for golf?
Gov. Mitt Romney saw this gravy train for what it was and, soon after taking office, threw out the guns and golf policies and laid off the 11 investigators. Somehow the Commonwealth has survived their absence.
But unlike the hundreds of teachers, social workers and firefighters laid off because of the state's budget shortfall, the ABCC investigators had friends -- and relatives -- in high places. The investigators include the son of a state representative, the brother of a state representative, a former aide to a state senator, the former driver for House Ways and Means Chairman John Rogers, a former aide to the secretary of state and the next-door neighbor of a governor's councilor. Coincidence? We think not.
Responding to the grave injustice done to these good ol' boys, the House restored the positions in the budget, knowing that union rules require the employees laid off to be the first hired back. Romney vetoed the provision. This week, the Legislature overrode the veto, in the process moving supervision from the ABCC to the office of Treasurer Timothy Cahill, a Democrat who presumably will be more sensitive to the employment needs of loyal Democrats.
Hence, the taxpayers will pay $940,000 to keep the hangers-on hanging on. Meanwhile, rape crisis centers across the state are closing because the Legislature can't come up with $1.7 million.
Maybe if the rape crisis centers hired more friends and relatives of state representatives, there would be someone to answer the phone the next time a rape victim called.
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The Boston Herald
Monday, July 14, 2003
Ranger roves to second full-time position
by Thomas Caywood
The state's chief park ranger for years has worked a second job as a full-time firefighter that requires him to play hooky five, six, sometimes seven days a month from his $51,000-a-year state gig.
What's more, a Herald analysis of his time sheets shows John Strazzullo got paid by the state for hours he was actually on duty at his $43,000-a-year Bedford Fire Department job, where he has worked full time since 1997.
But Strazzullo's bosses at the former Metropolitan District Commission say their chief ranger isn't really truant on the many weekdays he's out of the office because he has their blessing to put in his hours whenever it suits him.
"He heads up a department which is a 24-hour, seven-day-a-week operation," said Executive Office of Environmental Affairs spokesman Felix Browne. "It allows John flexibility in his work hours."
Strazzullo, 34, of Melrose, has been on the state payroll since 1995 as a ranger then chief ranger for the MDC, which is being folded into the new Department of Conservation and Recreation.
"I'm not at liberty to talk to any reporters without getting clearance," Strazzullo said when first contacted by the Herald last week. He didn't return subsequent calls.
A Herald comparison of DCR payroll records and Bedford Fire Chief Kevin MacCaffrie's staffing records revealed Strazzullo was credited for working 59 hours at the DCR so far this year on days he actually was on duty at the firehouse. DCR officials later claimed a clerk incorrectly entered Strazzullo's hours into the system on two occassions, both of which happened to be days Strazzullo was working at the firehouse.
Even allowing for the errors, the chief ranger has pocketed the equivalent of a week's DCR pay, nearly $1,000, so far this year by putting in for hours he was on duty at the firehouse, the comparison shows.
Strazzullo's time sheets also reveal a pattern of his state duties taking a back seat to his firefighting career. Strazzullo has worked nearly 100 weekday shifts at the firehouse since the beginning of last year.
Former MDC honchos, who now head DCR's urban parks division, shrugged off the weekday abscences through spokesman Felix Browne. Browne said Strazzullo need not be at work any particular day or time because some of the roughly 100 park rangers he supervises are on duty at all times.
Browne said Strazzullo occasionally works weekends to make up for time missed while he's at his firefighting job. More often, though, Strazzullo put in for comp time or holiday pay on days he was scheduled to work at the firehouse.
Bedford firefighters typically pull two 24-hour shifts a week. Last week, Strazzullo worked Monday and Wednesday. This week it's Tuesday and Thursday, and next week he's scheduled to work Wednesday and Friday. Because of his firehouse schedule, Strazzullo's DCR workweek often gets cut into an abbreviated jumble.
In the last week of May, for example, Strazzullo worked for the state just three days totaling 25 hours. He put in for comp time to cover the two days he wore his firefighting helmet.
Under the state's flextime program, Browne said, every one of DCR's more than 700 full-timers are eligible to set their own schedules as long as their bosses agree and they put in the required 40 hours a week.
Paul Dietl, the commonwealth's deputy chief human resources officer, said state departments and agencies should have written flextime policies that include core hours during which all employees must be at work regardless of their flextime arrangements.
"We strongly recommend core hours," Dietl said.
DCR has no written flextime policy or core hours.
William McKinney, the acting director of DCR's urban parks division and the former acting MDC commissioner, declined to be interviewed. In a two-sentence e-mail sent to the Herald, McKinney said Strazzullo's "expert knowledge of public safety is an invaluable asset to the Department of Conservation and Recreation."
Bedford Fire Chief Kevin MacCaffrie said Strazzullo's state job doesn't interfere with his firefighting. "He's a good employee," MacCaffrie said.
Browne maintains state taxpayers are getting their money's worth, too. He described Strazzullo as a hard-working rising star who consistently earns excellent performance ratings and who rocketed from park ranger to chief ranger in just five years.
"You don't do that by shirking your duties," Browne said.
While she said she has no reason to doubt Strazzullo, Citizens for Limited Taxation's Barbara Anderson said the state's record of safeguarding taxpayers' money doesn't exactly inspire confidence.
"Over the years, the no-show jobs have been such an epidemic in government, you tend to be suspicious," Anderson said.
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The Boston Herald
Monday, July 14, 2003
A Boston Herald editorial
BMC ball in Senate court
Senate President Robert Travaglini (D-East Boston) set the Senate in a new, constructive direction with his handling of the fiscal 2004 budget. His handling of the governor's vetoes of the expanded purview of the Boston Municipal Court will determine whether his newly minted reputation is deserved.
House Majority Whip Lida Harkins (D-Needham) boasted that the House set a record for the speed with which it overrode the BMC vetoes. And that's no surprise since the Legislature has always gone out of its way to protect its pet patronage haven.
Now Speaker Tom Finneran is likely to be making a big push on his new best friend in the Senate to come through on the BMC override. But after supporting Finneran's controversial pay raise plan, Travaglini can easily make the case that this is just too big and bad to swallow.
It's bad enough that the BMC's budget swamps that of similar courts that are struggling just to have the basics like interpreters and court reporters on hand.
But there is no justification at all for making an already unwieldy court management challenge even more difficult by essentially creating a new district court system just for Boston.
And while the BMC has long been criticized for its too-rich budget and insider connections, recent revelations about a courthouse culture which tolerated sexual harassment and retribution only reinforce that its excesses need to be reined in.
The ball is in Travaglini's court. We'll know soon enough if he really is the face of the new Senate or just more of the same.
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Associated Press
Sunday, July 13, 2003
House holds secret budget meeting
By Steve LeBlanc
On June 18, the entire Massachusetts House crowded into a State House hearing room, strung velvet ropes at the doors to keep the public and press out, and hunkered down to talk about a final version of this year's $22.3 billion budget.
Not a word of what they said or did was recorded. Two days later, the Legislature approved the spending plan.
Since 2000, the full House and Senate -- Democrats and Republicans -- have gathered in private meetings more than two dozen times, using the sessions to hash out everything from last year's $1.1 billion tax package to plans for a new Fenway Park -- all out of public earshot.
The practice of bipartisan, closed-door caucuses, so rare in other states, is commonplace on Beacon Hill.
Reporters and residents are barred from the tightly controlled meetings, during which Republican and Democratic members get a chance to air out their differences in secret.
The meetings would be a blatant violation of the state's open meeting law, designed to preserve the hallmark of open government, if the Legislature hadn't exempted itself from the provisions.
Few other states allow similar bipartisan sessions except under narrow circumstances, according to national legislative observers.
"It's extremely unusual for both parties to go into closed-doors caucuses to talk about the budget or Fenway Park," said Frosty Landon, head of the Virginia Coalition for Open Government and past president of the National Freedom of Information Coalition. "The budget is at the top of the list of what should always be acted on publicly and discussed publicly."
"That's a secret session of the Legislature and if it isn't outlawed by Massachusetts law now, it should be," he added.
Court officers are typically posted at the doors of the private sessions to block the public from entering. There are no minutes or public record kept by the House clerk's office.
Since 2000, the House has held at least 22 of the private, bipartisan caucuses. The Senate has held at least five. Lawmakers also have held more than 100 party caucuses in private.
Legislative leaders say the sessions give lawmakers the freedom to ask questions out of the glare of the media.
As recently as this past week, House Democrats and Republican interrupted a public veto override debate to gather for a private presentation on an economic development bill sponsored by House Speaker Thomas Finneran, D-Boston.
House Ways and Means Chairman John Rogers, a member of Finneran's leadership team, compared the closed-door caucuses to a "family sitting around a kitchen table."
"Legislators...have not only the right, but the obligation to confer in private and to freely and frankly exchange ideas as a family does," said Rogers, D-Norwood. "So long as no formal decisions are made behind closed doors, I think the people encourage that level of candor."
While the legislative process is overwhelmingly public, "after a while, that public process comes to a halt at some point where it is no longer conducive to reaching an agreement," he added.
But critics say the meetings should be banned under the state's open meeting law, which requires virtually all other governmental bodies -- from city councils to library boards of trustees -- to meet in public.
"It's outrageous. It's the public's business being done in secret," said Pam Wilmot of Common Cause of Massachusetts, a political watchdog group. "There is no valid reason for that other than the convenience of the public officials and fearfulness of the public."
The open meeting law is routinely used to require government officials to conduct business in public view.
In 1997, a Chicopee city solicitor tossed out a vote by license commissioners who, at an unannounced New Year's Eve meeting, approved a nude dancing permit. Two years later, a state representative cited the law to force the state Gun Control Advisory Board to meet in public.
Massachusetts adopted its first open meeting law in 1958. The law was largely revamped in 1975.
According to an outline of the law compiled by the state Attorney General's Office, it is intended to "eliminate much of the secrecy surrounding the deliberations and decisions on which public policy is based. It accomplishes this purpose by requiring open discussion of governmental action at public meetings."
However, state lawmakers carved out a specific exemption for "the general court or the committees or recess commissions thereof." The "general court" refers to the Legislature.
The bipartisan caucuses are highly unusual in other parts of the country.
"As far as a (legislature) going into a joint caucus? My guess is that's pretty rare," said Brenda Erickson, a senior research analyst for the National Conference of State Legislatures.
A legislature may occasionally go into a closed-door session to discuss security or personnel issues, but not routine legislative business, Erickson said.
"I can't think of any other states that allow them," she said.
The caucuses are used by Democratic leaders to weigh support or help craft policy decisions well ahead of formal, public debates on the House or Senate floor.
Throughout the spring of last year, Finneran held a series of the closed-door caucuses in part to build consensus for what would ultimately become a $1.1 billion package of tax hikes -- an idea that was immensely unpopular among lawmakers at first.
"The tax package did not exist at the beginning of that process," said state Rep. Jay Kaufman, D-Lexington, who attended the caucuses and said he has mixed feelings about them. "Could that have happened without convening a caucus? Sure. But there is something to be said for group dialogue."
Finneran said the practice was needed to block the media from the rougher edges of the political process.
"The Legislature in its wisdom has decided that the hurly-burly of some of the legislative debate is probably best handled away from you folks, to be perfectly blunt about it," he told reporters at the time.
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The MetroWest Daily News
Monday, July 14, 2003
Editorial
Fees could cost more than money
Part of the cost of the no-new-taxes budget enacted by the Legislature is a dizzying array of new and increased fees for everything from attending a state college to parking at a commuter rail station.
The new fees will get you coming and going: The fee for probating a will, a local attorney informs us, has just risen from $60 to $150.
The round of fee increases that went into effect with the new state budget July 1 will soon be followed by increased fees for local services, the product of a "municipal relief" bill enacted by the Legislature, that, like the budget, offers no tax revenue but lots of options for increased fees. In many MetroWest cities and towns, fees were booming even before the Legislature finished its work. Want your trash picked up, your child bused to school or granted a spot on a Sports team? Open your wallet.
We don't buy the rhetoric that brands every fee a tax. There's nothing wrong with charging a fee for a voluntary activity, especially if the fee bears some relation to the government's cost of providing that activity. But too many of the fees now being increased are simply cash cows for depleted public treasuries, bearing no relation to the cost of the service. As such, they put an inappropriate burden on some individuals to pay the cost of government for everyone.
Those who have imposed these fees should monitor them for fairness, and for unintended consequences. Unreasonable fee increases can discourage demand for a service, throwing off revenue projections and leaving services underutilized. Some fees can encourage non-compliance, which can have dangerous consequences.
A case in point is the 300 percent increase in the fee to obtain a Firearms Identification Card, from $25 to $100, renewable every four years. In theory, gun permits allow the state and local police departments to track hundreds of thousands of residents who own guns. In practice, the state has been unable to say with certainty how many registered guns are in the state -- people move out of Massachusetts all the time, presumably taking their guns with them, but without terminating their gun permits -- let alone how many unpermitted guns are out there.
The worry here is that many gun-owners, faced with a $100 fee to renew their FID cards, will let them expire. They, and state and local law-enforcement officials, will forget all about the little-used rifle in the basement or the dusty old handgun in a box in the closet. Or people who have guns they don't want anymore may hesitate to turn them in because they don't want to pay overdue fees.
The fees also apply to Mace and pepper spray, which raises the bar for people looking for a non-lethal means of self-defense. With the new fees, a $10 can of Mace will become a $110 expense, not to mention the hassle of obtaining an FID card from the local police department.
You don't need an FID card to carry a baseball bat for your protection, and you shouldn't need one to carry pepper spray. We should be encouraging people in risky situations to carry non-lethal tools for self-defense. The FID requirement -- and the $100 fee -- discourage it. Both should be dropped.
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