– Lack of Legislative transparency — Our Legislature seems to work extra hard to make things hard to understand. In some cases, it is turning around 300 page bills in less than 24 hours, meaning no one can read it with any level of care. In other cases, it’s the lack of available data about pending legislation, as detailed by State House News in a article yesterday (sub. req’d). I’d note that the Connecticut Legislature has a much more sophisticated site that allows you to track bills and sign up for email updates when anything happens related to your interests. – No 311 in Boston — Boston has an iPhone app for constituent complaints but you still have to “bumble […]

The Lowell School Superintendent tried to put out an RFP to determine if using a private vendor for school food services would save money. Other cities have done this and it is also standard practice at most colleges and universities (even the state-funded ones). So, what did this exploration of potential savings earn her? An expletive laced series of threats from school committee member Regina Faticanti. Read the whole thing here. Fun fact — Regina Faticanti is a member of the School Committee’s Discipline subcommitee.

The fluid nature of the budget process and the semantics around layoffs and hiring freezes has left me confused. The “final” BPS budget called for laying off 100+ teachers. Twenty-five teachers received “layoff notices” in May and a 105 provisional teachers were told they would not be invited to return. (I’m using quotes because it seems as if it is standard practice to give these notices to some number of school staff who are then rehired before the start of the school year.) Then, the BTU objected to the Teach for America program, believing it displaces “hundreds of good surplus” teachers. Yet, the BPS website has hundreds of open positions (not all teaching, to be sure) and BPS is actively […]

[CORRECTION ADDED BELOW] I attended another meeting of the Special Commission on Pension Reform this week and was entertained, as always. – The representative from the Auditor’s office had his delicate sensitivities hurt by the chair’s statement that if anyone wanted to defend termination pensions, they should be prepared to do so at the meeting. – PERAC Commissioner Joe Connarton crudely mocked the Vice Chair of the Commission Peter Diamond (a professor at MIT with some experience in the topic). The irony of the situation was that Diamond was trying to make room in the discussion for a proposal from one of the state’s labor unions. – The Chair of the Commission Alicia Munnell repeatedly referred to Kyle Cheney, a […]

The Mass Convention Center Authority appears to be the new piggy bank for state leaders. The Governor and Legislature put the touch on them for $65 million earlier this year to balance the FY09 budget. Next, the state and the city of Boston put the touch on the Convention Center Authority for $1 million for the upcoming Tall Ships event. The MCCA operated for years with a state budget subsidy (since eliminated) to fund its debt and a special series of dedicated tax and fee revenues. The intent was to tax area properties (that ostensibly benefited from the Center) and travelers (who might be using the center). The logic was that revenue from users would be ringfenced and used for […]

The Globe reports that the Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association has objected to the Police Commissioner’s directive to get rid of water coolers (which would save $50k). The BPPA notes that the coolers were originally instituted as a health measure. Given the recent findings that allegedly harmful chemical Bisphenol A (which is found in almost all water cooler bottles) leaches into the water after rather brief exposure, the BPPA may be better off listening to the Commissioner.