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Opportunity
April 26, 2007

Wacky Pension Hijinks, Pt. 2?

This morning’s Globe raises some interesting questions about the recent dismissal of a legislative aide. The individual in question was fired 11 days after she had reached her twentieth year of service. The key verb is ‘fired’ (as opposed to ‘quit’). By...
Opportunity
April 24, 2007

Wacky Pension-Related Hijinks

Or maybe not so wacky. The estimable adamg over at Universal Hub points out this interesting nugget in today’s Herald: A veteran Boston police officer is expected to resign from the force after pleading guilty yesterday to charges he shot a fellow...
Opportunity
April 24, 2007

Psst... the Speaker may be trying to tell you something.

First, Speaker DiMasi went to a Greater Boston Chamber breakfast and poured cold water on Governor Patrick’s ‘loophole closure/business tax hike‘, choosing the very venue where Patrick made one of the initial announcements about the plan. Next, the House budget amendments came...
Opportunity
April 22, 2007

Build it and they will come?

I think we have heard that one before. So now we are going to build a $1.4 billion commuter line to New Bedford, even though the T can’t afford it, even though that will add to the ongoing costs of the T...
Opportunity
April 22, 2007

A Plea For Slightly Less Integrated Transportation Planning

The Herald’s has done a fine job pointing out one of the dumb things we do as a state — provide massive subsidies for little-used local airports that have no relevance to the transportation needs of the state.  Check out pg. 17...
Opportunity
April 21, 2007

More Drapes? Enough with the drapes!

Sometimes smart people cannot learn. We are smart people in Massachusetts. We all know that. Jim Rooney, executive director of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority, is a smart and also capable guy. And he’s done a great job with the bad hand...
Opportunity
April 20, 2007

What a Difference 100 Days Makes......

Remember the early days: “We strongly believe that good governance means taking the best ideas from the best people, no matter what their Party.” Ehh, maybe not so much anymore: [The Governor’s informal group of advisors] agreed on a major priority: to...
April 19, 2007

The Winter Moth

As winter turns to spring, or the day of it, anyway, we can expect before summer arrives, I would like to turn my attention to nature. The winter moth was introduced to North America from Europe and has now spread over much...
Education, Opportunity
April 19, 2007

School Choice in Boston

A brilliant author has crafted a masterwork on school choice, entitled School Choice That Works For Boston in this week’s Dorchester Reporter. Oh, that was me, wasn’t it? I’ve been interested in this issue from a policy and a personal perspective for...
April 18, 2007

Earmarks and Elections

As a young man I always marvelled that the day for filing my taxes was as far as can be on a calendar from election day. Whatever politician dreamt that up is a genius. But taxes aren’t the only things located around...