Creedon makes payments

FORMER SOMERVILLE ALDERMAN TELLS COURT OF EXTORTION; SCHEME FOR VOTES [THIRD Edition] Boston Globe (pre-1997 Fulltext) - Boston, Mass. Author: M.E. Malone, Globe Staff Date: Aug 13, 1986 Start Page: 53 Section: METRO Text Word Count: 514 Document Text Three current and two former aldermen in Somerville were given money in exchange for a favorable vote in connection with the Assembly Square Mall project, a former alderman testified yesterday in US District Court. According to Timothy J. Creedon, who was sentenced to a year in prison for his role in a scheme to extort money from a developer seeking liquor licenses, aldermen Vincent Ciampa, Joseph Macaluso and Michael McKenna accepted money from him in exchange for their votes approving a home rule petition in February 1983. Former aldermen Frank Bakey and Alan Kenney were also paid for their votes, Creedon testified. Creedon was the third prosecution witness to testify at the trial of McKenna and his father-in-law, former city assessor Robert Campo, who are charged with trying to extort money from East Bay Development Corp., the builder of the Assembly Square Mall in Somerville. Creedon testified that he told John J. Callahan, an undercover FBI agent posing as developer Jack Collins, that he would need $13,500 to secure enough votes to guarantee approval of a home rule petition authorizing two new liquor licenses for the mall -- $1,500 for each of eight aldermen and $1,500 forhimself. The petition was approved by a vote of 11-0. Instead, Creedon said he pocketed most of the payoff, giving only $500 to each of five other aldermen, including McKenna. When McKenna learned that Creedon had collected $1,500 per man from East Bay, he became irate, Creedon said. During a meeting at McKenna's house, Creedon testified that he told the young alderman, "I told him, 'My neck is out there.'. . . I told him the deal was $500 and that's it. . ." At a meeting several weeks later in Creedon's car outside a local junior high school, McKenna accepted an envelope with $500 in cash, Creedon testified. Alderman Joseph Macaluso said he was approached by Creedon several weeks before the board was to vote on the proposed home rule petition. "He said to me, 'Can I still count on you for support of the licenses at Assembly Square? . . . There's going to be money in it for you,' " Macaluso testified yesterday. Macaluso said he agreed to vote for the licenses because they were in Creedon's ward, but said he would not accept money for his vote. He testified that shortly after the vote, he refused an envelope from Creedon. Several months later, he said, he asked Creedon to sell some tickets for a campaign fundraiser. According to Macaluso, Creedon gave him $350, saying that $200 had come from Jack Collins and $150 had come from Creedon. Macaluso reported the contributions on his campaign disclosure forms filed at City Hall. During cross-examination, McKenna's attorney, Vincent Brognalia, painted Creedon as a liar. In addition to demanding more money than he planned to distribute from Callahan, Creedon admitted that he lied to Callahan at a meeting in February 1983, when he told the agent that he had already given McKenna a downpayment for his vote. McKenna wasn't given the money until several days later, Creedon testified. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) According to Timothy J. Creedon, who was sentenced to a year in prison for his role in a scheme to extort money from a developer seeking liquor licenses, aldermen Vincent Ciampa, [Alderman Joseph Macaluso] and Michael McKenna accepted money from him in exchange for their votes approving a home rule petition in February 1983. Former aldermen Frank Bakey and Alan Kenney were also paid for their votes, Creedon testified. Instead, Creedon said he pocketed most of the payoff, giving only $500 to each of five other aldermen, including McKenna. When McKenna learned that Creedon had collected $1,500 per man from East Bay, he became irate, Creedon said. Several months later, he said, he asked Creedon to sell some tickets for a campaign fundraiser. According to Macaluso, Creedon gave him $350, saying that $200 had come from [Jack Collins] and $150 had come from Creedon. Macaluso reported the contributions on his campaign disclosure forms filed at City Hall.

CORRUPTION CHARGES AGAIN BLOT SOMERVILLE IMAGE

CORRUPTION CHARGES AGAIN BLOT SOMERVILLE IMAGE Boston Globe (pre-1997 Fulltext) - Boston, Mass. Author: Paul Hirshson Globe Staff Date: Jun 21, 1984 Start Page: 1 Text Word Count: 611 Document Text Only 11 years ago, Somerville was honored as an All-American City. It was climbing out from under a cloud of corruption which had seen three of its former mayors and other city officials indicted and was moving forward under a reform-minded mayor. Before the end of the decade, the city would take the bold step of converting an old, disused auto plant and warehouse into one of the region's most successful malls, Assembly Square. It seemed to many that Somerville - an older, industrial city of 78,000 bordering Boston, suffering from the old-city ills of overcrowding, corruption and poor schools - was at last pulling itself up, shining up its image. But today, two men long associated with Somerville politics stand charged with soliciting bribes in connection with obtaining a liquor license for a restaurant at the new mall. Eugene C. Brune, who is serving his third term as mayor, expressed the frustration of many yesterday. "This whole investigation has been a disappointment to me. We've been trying since the day I took office to change the image of the city." He cited such projects as increased street cleaning, a tree- planting program, major urban renewal projects in Davis and Union squares and a new wing on the high school. "We had a plan to change the city around, change the image. We were doing a great job until one day last November, an FBI agent walked into my office" to tell him about the investigation. "It took me three years to change the image of this city, and it took three seconds on television to change it back the way it was," Brune said. It was in 1971 that a Globe Spotlight Team series indicated that a number of officials were involved in questionable bidding practices, assessing property inequitably and engaging in conflict of interest. After publication of the series, 19 persons were indicted, including the three former mayors, other city officials and private contractors. Although none of those indicted was convicted, the headlines generated by the chargesput a seemingly indelible stain on the city's image. S. Lester Ralph, who served as mayor from 1970-77, was generally viewed as a reformer from outside the established old order, trying to help the city recover and restore trust to its public officials. In an interview yesterday, he said that the effort was frustrating and left him "drained and burned out." "It was continual warfare," he said, between his administration and the old guard. "There were a lot of families and cliques, such as the McKenna clan, the Piro clan and the Howe clan." "They've got their tentacles in all levels of government. They can affect you, no matter what you try to do. It was very difficult trying to govern." Describing the level of confrontation that prevailed, he said: "They were vicious to me." (The McKennas include Denis, who is a state senator, and Michael, who is an alderman. Marie Howe is a state representative, as is Vincent Piro, Democratic majority whip. Piro and Timothy Creedon, a former alderman, are under federal indictment on charges of conspiracy and attempted extortion.) Both Brune and Ralph seemed saddened and disheartened by the apparent re- spotting of the city's image. But Brune said he was relieved, to some extent, that at last all the gossip and rumor have at least taken some official form. "I'm relieved because since November, it's been almost a daily routine, What's happening in Somerville?' "Now that it's coming to a head, the people will know who's indicted and the trials will take place," said Brune. "Then we can go back to the job of putting our image back together again." Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) After publication of the series, 19 persons were indicted, including the three former mayors, other city officials and private contractors. Although none of those indicted was convicted, the headlines generated by the chargesput a seemingly indelible stain on the city's image. (The McKennas include Denis, who is a state senator, and Michael, who is an alderman. Marie Howe is a state representative, as is Vincent Piro, Democratic majority whip. Piro and Timothy Creedon, a former alderman, are under federal indictment on charges of conspiracy and attempted extortion.) Both [Eugene C. Brune] and [S. Lester Ralph] seemed saddened and disheartened by the apparent re- spotting of the city's image. But Brune said he was relieved, to some extent, that at last all the gossip and rumor have at least taken some official form. "I'm relieved because since November, it's been almost a daily routine, What's happening in Somerville?'

Old Guard no more

IN SOMERVILLE, THE OLD GUARD RULES NO MORE [THIRD Edition] Boston Globe (pre-1997 Fulltext) - Boston, Mass. Author: Chris Chinlund, Globe Staff Date: Mar 24, 1985 Start Page: 1 Section: METRO Text Word Count: 1443 Document Text Larry Bretta is in jail. Denis McKenna retired. Vinnie Piro, although cleared of attempted extortion last Wednesday, is out of office. All are part of a Somerville old guard that rules no longer. After years of dominance, the city's traditional political establishment is on the wane. Some say the balance tipped in favor of a more progressive new guard last year. Some say the year before. Others say the transition is just now taking hold. "Mayor Brune and the new guard have taken over, and they have begun to entrench themselves," says Billy Joyce, a former alderman and part of the city's old establishment. "There are very few old guard on the ward and city committees. The old guard is slowly fading into the dust." Joyce is secure in his job as city messenger; his appointment runs until he is 70. Sen. Denis McKenna, as much a representative of Somerville's old guard as any, retired this year from 30 years in politics. "I was the type of politican able to do many favors for people, but things changed in the last eight or 10 years and you can't do things like you used to," he says. It's hard now to secure summer jobs for young people, he says, hard to arrange public housing for elderly people. "You can't do the bread and butter favors like you used to." In Somerville - a densely populated working-class city known for its 10hills and almost as many political factions - the terms old guard and new guard are common lingo. They refer more to political persuasion than tenure. Old guarders are seen as conservative Democrats, many from the politicalfamilies that have dominated for decades. The new guard is more progressive, reformist, less likely to have relatives in office and friendly with the Dukakis administration. Like most labels, these are not perfect, and in recent years the lines have blurred to some extent. But people here know what old guard and new guard mean. "I like to think of it as the more traditional Somerville politicians versus the progressives," says Alderman Cathleen O'Dea, who says she relates to both sides. "It's certainly become increasingly more difficult for traditional Somerville politicians to get elected." The change began in 1980 when Eugene Brune arrived in the mayor's office after beating incumbent Thomas August. That election showed Somerville politics - never genteel - at their most rambunctious. When the Somerville Journal called for August's defeat, for example, the edition mysteriously disappeared from the newsstands in the early morning hours. But it took a few years for Brune to establish his style of government, and to muster support on the Board of Aldermen. It was not until last year that the city's State House delegation was reconstituted. Rep. Marie E. Howe, a veteran conservative Democrat, remains but McKenna, also a conservative Democrat, retired and state Rep. Vincent J. Piro was defeated in his Senate bid. Their replacements were epitomes of the new political camp, Aldermen Salvatore R. Albano and Joseph Mackey, both of a progressive bent. "It's tough to fight the Vinnie Piros, the Marie Howes and the Larry Brettas (former mayor and political force)," says Albano. "They have the resources and the ability to raise money, but this year was the climax of what we have been working for for many years." Adds Mayor Brune, "I'm going into my fourth term, and there is no opposition from the old guard." The change in climate is expected to make it harder, although not impossible, for Piro to win office again in his city. Talk on the street is that he may run for alderman in Ward 4. But even some of his supporters are doubtful of his election chances. Asked if Piro could win election again in the city, Alderman Michael McKenna replies slowly, "I don't think so." His father, Denis McKenna, responds to the same question with a noncommittal "I don't know." Others say Piro still can pull the votes. S. Lester Ralph - the city's first reform mayor who, unlike Brune, was battling the old guard at every turn in the 1970s - remembers the lessons of the past. Never, he says, underestimate the opposition. "There's no question the old situation could return," he warns. "It's almost like the law of gravity." People of all persuasions seem to agree that the seeds of change began with community organization in the late 1960s, and that the Ralph administration laid much of the groundwork. Ralph endured hostile times. He remembers being spit at by an official from the opposing camp as he walked out of City Hall. He remembers how difficult it was even to get postage stamps from the auditor, another political foe. People who know Somerville best give many reasons for the decline of the old guard. A few ran afoul of the law. Bretta, the former mayor and General Services Administration official, is now serving four years for extortion. Alderman Timothy Creedon, a friend of Piro, was sentenced to a year and a day in jail for conspiring to extort money from a developer. Piro's political career also suffered because of his two trials on charges of conspiracy and attempted extortion. Albano used the "corruption factor" to engineer his defeat of Piro in the Senate race. One of Albano's leaflets quoted from FBI tapes of Piro allegedly arranging a payoff, planning to "grease a few guys." Other people associated with Somerville's old guard moved to the suburbs, as the city's population dropped 12.8 percent in the 1970s. Says a former activist who later headed the Metropolitan Area Planning Council: "There's been a fairly substantial population loss in Somerville . . . and a lot of the people who moved out were the old guard." They were people, she said, who had always wanted to trade Somerville's crowded triple-deckers for a suburban lawn and two-car garage. When they had the chance, they left. Many people who have moved into Somerville, on the other hand, have had new expectations of their government. They are often professionals who can afford the $150,000 homes around Davis Square, and they are often more liberal. Demographic surveys show 50 percent have at least a college education, compared to 16 percent citywide. But according to Brune, the newcomers don't have the numbers to be responsible for the ousting from office of the old establishment. James Bretta, a former priest who now runs an elderly services program and who has been active in city affairs for many years, says, "I don't think at this point the yuppie thing is consequential. The backbone of Somerville politics are the people who have been here for a while: the second- and third- generation Irish and Italians." The difference, they maintain, is simply that the Somerville electorate, old and new, now demands more of its officials. Perhaps the most important reason for Brune's success - he's widely considered a popular mayor - is the willingness of once- contentious aldermen to adopt his initiatives. Michael McKenna is one of them. "I have been able to change in the way the city has, although a lot of times in the past I have seen the new guard as a threat," says the alderman. "The population of the city has changed, and a lot of the old-guard politicians didn't grow with the population." And the effect of two federal probes - one in the 1970s and the second under way - has been to expose to residents some undesirable aspects of their elected officials. Those probes, say some, have helped convince voters that a change was needed. The current federal probe continues to cause nervousness in some city circles, especially among a few aldermen who privately fear they might be named in later indictments. The nature of possible indictments is unknown. Concern was lessened, but not erased, by Piro's acquittal. Sources say at least five current or former Somerville city officials may be named. Meanwhile, Brune - with the help of Albano and Mackey - is carrying out the recommendations of a third investigation, one done last year by the state Revenue Department. Auditors found the city's elected assessors had engaged in illegal assessing practices, giving breaks to a few at the expense of many. The issue reflects the city's new order. Three years ago, when Brune asked the Legislature for the power to remove the assessors, the effort was killed in the Senate by McKenna. This year, with Albano in McKenna's old seat, the measure is expected to sail through. The current assessors are expected to be ousted from office by mid-year. "The new guard," says one activist, "is now the establishment." Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) It took a few years for [Eugene Brune] to establish his style of government, and to muster support on the Board of Aldermen. It was not until last year that the city's State House delegation was reconstituted. Rep. Marie E. Howe, a veteran conservative Democrat, remains but McKenna, also a conservative Democrat, retired and state Rep. Vincent J. Piro was defeated in his Senate bid. Their replacements were epitomes of the new political camp, Aldermen Salvatore R. Albano and Joseph Mackey, both of a progressive bent. A few ran afoul of the law. Bretta, the former mayor and General Services Administration official, is now serving four years for extortion. Alderman Timothy Creedon, a friend of Piro, was sentenced to a year and a day in jail for conspiring to extort money from a developer. [Vinnie Piros] political career also suffered because of his two trials on charges of conspiracy and attempted extortion. Albano used the "corruption factor" to engineer his defeat of Piro in the Senate race. One of Albano's leaflets quoted from FBI tapes of Piro allegedly arranging a payoff, planning to "grease a few guys." according to Brune, the newcomers don't have the numbers to be responsible for the ousting from office of the old establishment. James Bretta, a former priest who now runs an elderly services program and who has been active in city affairs for many years, says, "I don't think at this point the yuppie thing is consequential. The backbone of Somerville politics are the people who have been here for a while: the second- and third- generation Irish and Italians."

Bretta and Callahan part 1

Following are excerpts from transcripts of FBI tape recordings filed in court yesterday in the Bretta case: The first $6000 payoff to Bretta was made by undercover FBI agent John J. Callahan in March of 1982. Callahan: I got the bucks here. Bretta: Make sure you don't mention that we've seen each other. Callahan: Oh no, no, no. This is between you and I. Callahan: It's for services renderded and I appreciate it. I don't know whether you want to count it or not, Larry. But when this time comes around next year, you give me a holler. The second payment was made in May 1983, and at a restaurant meeting Callahan and Bretta discussed how the money should be delivered. Callahan: Your package is in the trunk (of Callahan's Lincoln). If you just want to drive by, I can put it right in your hands. I don't want to bring it in here. Bretta: No, no, no, no. Callahan: I don't want to do it in a restaurant, Larry. Bretta: I tend to agree with you. Callahan: I'll drive up the alley there. Just drive by me and I'll pop the trunk and hand you your package. Bretta: OK. In another conversation, April 29, 1982, Bretta, according to the transcripts, discussed a $10,000 payment the prosecution claims he wanted forhelping locate a Jordan Marsh store at the Assembly Square mall. Callahan: When Jordan Marsh came in here. . . . Bretta: Yup. Callahan: You used your influences, whatever. Bretta: Whatever. Callahan: Whatever you call it. OK, and for that amount of dollars through your connections with Jordan Marsh, who's a fellow who is a vice president there . . . Bretta: Well, Dick Duca, I guess was the guy that finally . . . Callahan: OK, whatever... Anyway, X amount of dollars was owed to you. Bretta: Yeah. Callahan: All I know is that is $10,000 somewhere coming to you. Bretta: Correct. Callahan: Maybe the figure is wrong and maybe it's right. Bretta: No, that is correct, Actually it is owed to Dick, but that's OKbecause we get (unintelligible). In the FBI reports filed with the court there were several references, none of them incriminating, to House Speaker Thomas P. O'Neill Jr., who helped Bretta land his GSA job. Raymond Coots, the late president of East Bay Development Corp., which built Assembly Square Mall in Somerville, is quoted by a report as saying Bretta told him, "Somerville is O'Neill's territory, and Bretta thought he could possilbly help (in obtaining a federal UDAG grant for the area surrouding the mall.) Coots stated that he does not know if O'Neill helped or not." Coots said, according to the report, he had seen Bretta and O'Neill together at social events such as the annual Tip O'Neill Clambake held by the Somerville Chamber of Commerce. On a Sept. 24, 1982, tape Callahan asked Bretta about the possibility of meeting O'Neill. Callahan: Will I have an opportunity to talk with, ah . . . . Bretta: Of course. Callahan: Tip. Bretta: Sure, sure. There is only going to be about 20 guys. Callahan: Will I be able to bring up that UDAG thing (unintelligible) and that Somerville thing, and ask him about that? Bretta: Sure, positive, yah, yah, no problem, with that. OK. Callahan: Good, good. Bretta: It might be well if you and I just took a plane trip down. Callahan: Yah. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) The first $6000 payoff to [BRETTA] was made by undercover FBI agent John J. Callahan in March of 1982. Raymond Coots, the late president of East Bay Development Corp., which built Assembly Square Mall in Somerville, is quoted by a report as saying Bretta told him, "Somerville is [O'Neill Jr.]'s territory, and Bretta thought he could possilbly help (in obtaining a federal UDAG grant for the area surrouding the mall.) Coots stated that he does not know if O'Neill helped or not." On a Sept. 24, 1982, tape Callahan asked Bretta about the possibility of meeting O'Neill. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.

Dear Jean Mayer

DAVID WARSH Dear Jean Mayer: It's tough sledding on your veterinary school in Worcester, I know. But it is something else that is on my mind. I think you should consider changing Tufts University's address to Somerville. As you know, half the campus is in Somerville, half in Medford; the town line runs right through your house. The time was when Medford was a better address. Times change. Now let me quickly state that I've lived in Somerville for a dozen years. My knowledge is the local knowledge of an outsider, not deep, concentrated mostly around Davis Square: Sessa's Grocery, St. Clement's Parish, Rev. Ken Turner's remarkable evangelical, multicultural Church of the Nazarene. I know my neighbors. I know where to vote. What I don't know about Ward 1 would fill books. What I do know is something about is economic development. Something happened in the middle of the 1970s. Somerville began to be considered in the same breath as Cambridge as a place to put a restaurant, a studio, an apartment. This was the era in which Steve's Ice Cream and Bertucci's were founded in Somerville, side by side. About the same time, the long decline that had afflicted the once-proud city in the years after World War II slowed, then stopped. Mayor Lester Ralph's career as a reformer petered out; Tom August took over for a couple years and rent control was repealed, a crucial moment. The Davis Square Task Force insisted on a stop on the the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's Red Line extension. And then in 1979 Somerville elected Gene Brune. Brune was a hell of a leader, the only five-term mayor the city ever had. He rebuilt the high school and police station, re-did all the city parks, eliminated the crooked Board of Assessment, went out of his way to attract artists to the city's lofts. The decision to ban biotech was a bad one; the Woodbridge Hotel burned down; he didn't do either one. More to the point, he restored a certain confidence to the city, and the reform spirit born of the Massachusetts Miracle did the rest. Characters like police captain Gerald Clemente and former Mayor Larry Bretta went to jail; state Sen. Dennis McKenna and Rep. Marie Howe went down to defeat. (CORRECTION: Because of a reporting error, the status of former state Sen. Denis McKenna of Somerville was incorrectly described in David Warsh's column in yesterday's Business Extra. He did not run for re-election.) On the day Vinnie Piro was defeated by Sal Albano -- with the margin coming from Somerville -- a neighbors exclaimed, "I feel as though I live in Wellesley!" This was the period during which Herald columnist Howie Carr moved into town, then out again, after his house was rhetorically burgled -- a poignant reminder that Somerville still can play by some very tough rules. You can't get Howie to say a good word about Somerville even now. Indeed, for many people, time somehow froze in 1971: Somerville is the Winter Hill Mob and The Boston Globe Spotlight Team poring over sweetheart contracts. The Sunsetters glee club would go about town on summer evenings singing "Who do you think you ah, Howie Cah?" It was touching, but not much of a defense. The beauty of this evolution is that it was decidely not gentrification. Somerville simply reclaimed its own destiny. Brune worked well with outsiders. After five terms he departed for the more secure position of Middlesex Register of Deeds. Then Michael Capuano beat John Buonomo by a hair. Capuano is a bright guy, like Brune only more so: younger, something more of an edge, the perfect postmodern Somervillian. A Dartmouth graduate who went to Boston College Law School, Capuano made a living as a lobbyist and sends his kids to a private school. But his roots go deep in Somerville. So the real test of the Somerville reform tradition comes next week when he faces reelection. His opponent is a 28-year-old lawyer named Mary Curtatone, with little experience beyond her family business. There is a lot of anger around -- not the least of it from Gene Brune, who has never forgiven Capuano for his curt personal style. But Capuano is good on finance, on women, on the environment. Most important, he's good on meaning fairness -- not a trivial consideration now that Somerville's minority population -- Haitians, Brazilians, Central Americans -- is approaching 15,000 people, or something like 20 percent. To sum up, Somerville could have been Chelsea; instead it's a discount Cambridge, with all the Byzantine politics that this implies. Medford is a lovely city, but it's been a long time since that over-the-river-and-through-the-woods stuff. I know the post office is in Medford. But now Somerville is a better address. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) More to the point, he restored a certain confidence to the city, and the reform spirit born of the Massachusetts Miracle did the rest. Characters like police captain Gerald Clemente and former Mayor Larry Bretta went to jail; state Sen. Dennis McKenna and Rep. Marie Howe went down to defeat. (CORRECTION: Because of a reporting error, the status of former state Sen. Denis McKenna of Somerville was incorrectly described in [DAVID WARSH]'s column in yesterday's Business Extra. He did not run for re-election.) On the day Vinnie Piro was defeated by Sal Albano -- with the margin coming from Somerville -- a neighbors exclaimed, "I feel as though I live in Wellesley!" This was the period during which Herald columnist Howie Carr moved into town, then out again, after his house was rhetorically burgled -- a poignant reminder that Somerville still can play by some very tough rules. You can't get Howie to say a good word about Somerville even now. Indeed, for many people, time somehow froze in 1971: Somerville is the Winter Hill Mob and The Boston Globe Spotlight Team poring over sweetheart contracts. The Sunsetters glee club would go about town on summer evenings singing "Who do you think you ah, Howie Cah?" It was touching, but not much of a defense. To sum up, Somerville could have been Chelsea; instead it's a discount Cambridge, with all the Byzantine politics that this implies. Medford is a lovely city, but it's been a long time since that over-the-river-and-through-the-woods stuff. I know the post office is in Medford. But now Somerville is a better address.

Somerville Boy

Somerville Boy SOMERVILLE - This is about a Somerville Boy. His name is John Buonomo and he is running for mayor. He may be the first candidate to run openly on the dummy platform. Of course, John Buonomo wouldn't characterize his campaign that way. But what else are we to think? Pick up his campaign flyer. In big bold type at the top, it states: "This is about a Somerville boy. In the first grade, he couldn't keep his mouth shut or sit still, so he was kept back -- twice." Beneath the fold is a pitiful picture of a solemn-faced little boy that is straight out of Dickens. As one Somerville voter said: "Maybe he's going for the sympathy vote." Another, referring to the fact that Buonomo was on the three-year plan in the first grade, asked: "Is he bragging or complaining?" Well, I wanted to know, too. So I asked the Somerville Boy about his ad and repeating the first grade -- first grade -- three times. In Somerville. "Many people in this city had similar experiences, and I wanted to show how I could relate to them," Buonomo said. I can just hear the households in Somerville buzzing now. "Honey, let's vote for the dummy. He's stupid, like us." Of course, John Buonomo is really not stupid. Not at all. He was valedictorian of his class at Southeastern Massachusetts University in Dartmouth. (His opponent went to Dartmouth, too. Dartmouth College). "I went from being kept back twice to being chairman of the School Committee in 1982," Buonomo said. So, the basic message is, there's hope for us all? That's as good a platform as a kinder-and-gentler nation, and certainly more original. "I believe it's important to show how I have been able to overcome difficulties in my life," he said. "The other thing I think is missing from politics today is candor and honesty," said Buonomo, who is chief administrator for Middlesex County. "Even though I repeated the first grade three times, I have the skills. I'm a manager. I set tax rates. I hire people, I fire people." In between, he works on his phonetics and fingerpaints. Seriously, though, how has the Somerville Boy ad gone over in Somerville, which has produced the likes of Vinny (Walking Around Money) Piro, Dennis (Get Me a Drink) McKenna and his son, Michael, Robert Campo and Larry Bretta, to name just a few of the town's more notorious politicians? "It absolutely has been successful," Buonomo said, adding that a woman recently came up to him and said she, too, had been carrying around "a dark secret" she was ashamed of. And what was that? She had flunked the fourth grade. "She felt a personal sense of relief that she was finally able to talk about it," Buonomo said. And perhaps that someone was as dumb as she was. Of course, John Buonomo really isn't dumb. It's just that his Somerville Boy ad is. Delve deeper into the flyer and you will find "The story of Buonomo Cheese" in which Buonomo describes how, as director of Somerville's Office of Human Services, he oversaw the distribution of the federal surplus cheese. "And soon," the flyer states, "it wasn't known as federal surplus food, it was 'Buonomo Cheese."' Geez, I've heard of wanting a school or park or bridge named after you, but some slabs of old cheese? The leading candidates, John Buonomo and Michael Capuano, like to think of themselves as the "reform" guys. But as one observer of Somerville politics has noted, "reform" is synonymous with "unindicted." If they allowed absentee votes from the Federal Correctional Institution at Danbury, Conn. -- known in Somerville simply as "Danbury" -- the Somerville citizens who are now guests of the federal government could swing any election. I asked Capuano if he had any deep, dark secrets about his academic record. Well, he acknowledged, he was on academic probation for a while at Dartmouth. But then he straightened up, did right and went on to Boston College Law School. "My academic problems may have been the reverse of John's," Capuano said. "I didn't have enough academic challenges." Oh yes, this campaign is getting nasty, all right. Capuano pointed out that both he and Buonomo are 38 years old, but Buonomo graduated three years behind him at Somerville High. Capuano was delighted to see the Somerville Boy ad, but he decided not to seize it as an issue because "I don't want to look like I'm picking on the dumb kid." "The question is, did you flunk the first grade and then become a renowned surgeon or something like that?" asked Capuano. "The answer is, he grew up and became a politician." But Capuano grew up and became a lawyer and lobbyist. Now, if we can just scrape up a used car salesman . . . [Table] ENGLIS;09/22 NIGRO ;09/26,12:49 ENGLIS25 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission. Abstract (Document Summary) Seriously, though, how has the Somerville Boy ad gone over in Somerville, which has produced the likes of Vinny (Walking Around Money) Piro, Dennis (Get Me a Drink) McKenna and his son, Michael, Robert Campo and Larry Bretta, to name just a few of the town's more notorious politicians? Of course, [John Buonomo] really isn't dumb. It's just that his Somerville Boy ad is. Delve deeper into the flyer and you will find "The story of Buonomo Cheese" in which Buonomo describes how, as director of Somerville's Office of Human Services, he oversaw the distribution of the federal surplus cheese. "And soon," the flyer states, "it wasn't known as federal surplus food, it was 'Buonomo Cheese."' The leading candidates, John Buonomo and Michael Capuano, like to think of themselves as the "reform" guys. But as one observer of Somerville politics has noted, "reform" is synonymous with "unindicted." If they allowed absentee votes from the Federal Correctional Institution at Danbury, Conn. -- known in Somerville simply as "Danbury" -- the Somerville citizens who are now guests of the federal government could swing any election.

Assembly Square, the Back Story: Part 6, Two new players Assembly Square, the Back Story Part 6: Two New Players An editorial by William C. Shelton In the fall of 1999, Assembly Square Limited Partners (ASLP) faced two serious problems. They had bought the mall property with $300,000 in cash and a one-year, $18.5 million loan that was due in October. But they could not legally obtain as-of-right permits to build big box stores. Newly-elected, Mayor Dorothy Kelly Gay had told the Globe, “We can’t allow National Development to come in here and tell us what we’ll have at Assembly Square.” National was the ASLP partner managing the permit process. Mayor Gay’s development director, Steve Post, said, “It’s clear that big box retail stores on the scale of potential development ranks near the bottom because it creates few jobs and doesn’t bring much tax revenue. Large retail stores will have a negative impact in East Somerville by generating lots of traffic and pollution.” Mayor Gay called for an August 25 public meeting, at which ASLP presented a plan that closely resembled the big box strip mall ultimately built last year. Those attending the presentation, including Alderman Joe Curtatone, unanimously rejected the plan. The next week, IKEA announced that it had bought the 16.6 acres next to the mall site. Mayor Gay immediately met with both developers and persuaded them to accept a year-long development moratorium while the city prepared a master plan. A master plan is essential to an effective land transformation and would have avoided much of the subsequent acrimony. Sadly, it never happened. Meanwhile, ASLP solved its debt problem. Without telling the city, ASLP essentially sold the majority of the mall site property to Home Depot. To give Home Depot tax advantages, ASLP signed a 99-year ground lease with a $1 purchase option at its conclusion. Home Depot bought the $18.5 million note and executed a mortgage with ASLP. These contracts, contained some unusual provisions. Home Depot committed to pay half the property’s carrying costs and any litigation costs. ASLP’s partners had to obtain permission from Home Depot before purchasing property anywhere in the world. And Home Depot was the actual developer, while ASLP was the public face. Taurus New England, ASLP’s majority partner, never seriously considered building anything other than a big-box-dominated project. This was not just because of Home Depot’s contractual constraints. Taurus had had enjoyed great success by buying failed projects, repackaging them, and selling them for a quick and substantial profit. The last thing they wanted was to execute an office-based master plan. Also, principal Lorenz Reibling was and remains deeply pessemistic about the Boston-area economy’s future demand for office space. So Taurus faced the challenge of obtaining permits to build a project to which most Somervillians then objected. They determined to meet that challenge by replacing erstwhile partner National Development with a politically connected developer. Environmental activist and unsuccessful congressional candidate John O’Connor was married to Carolyn Mugar, who with her brother David, was heir to many Star Market properties. The Mugars were major contributors to the Massachusetts Democratic Party, and Carolyn sat on the Conservation Law Foundation Board of Directors. Mr. O’Connor had persuaded his wife to create a development company that, starting with the supermarket properties, would showcase “green” development. They called it “Gravestar.” One of its first projects was the Porter Square strip mall, which drew mixed reviews from neighbors. O’Connor had become close with a political operative named Natasha Perez, whom he installed in a cottage on his and Ms. Mugar’s residential property. During the Spring, 1999 special election to replace Mayor Michael Capuano, Ms. Perez had also become quite close with candidate Joe Curtatone, when she served as his campaign field officer. She subsequently went to work for Gravestar, and at the same time, as Deputy Executive Director of the Massachusetts Democratic Party. Taurus calculated that Gravestar had the political juice that they needed. They brought Gravestar into ASLP, gave them a small equity position, and charged them with managing public relations and delivering the permits. Gravestar, in turn, charged Natasha Perez with leading this effort. This was the biggest opportunity that Gravestar had thus far encountered. Unfortunately, John O’Connor, beloved in the environmental community, had the bad judgment to die at the age of 44, before he could fully appreciate the environmental disaster that ASLP’s plans would create. Joe Curtatone was deeply impressed with Lorenz Reibling when Natasha Perez introduced them. This is understandable; Mr. Reibling is brilliant, charming, highly successful, and has an avuncular manner. Curtatone sought a personal relationship, taking Reibling’s family to see the tall ships when he was out of the country, and attempting to persuade Reibling to purchase the Prospect Hill house across the street from Joe’s sister’s home. They dined together regularly at Henrietta’s Kitchen in Harvard Square, discussing a variety of topics, including Joe’s political ambitions.

Assembly Square, the Back Story Part 2: False hope and true corruption Assembly Square, the Back Story Part 2: False hope and true corruption A Commentary by William C. Shelton (Editor's note -- The views and opinions expressed in the commentaries of the Somerville News belong solely to the authors and do not neccessarily reflect the views and opinions of the Somerville News, its editors or publishers.) By 1976, Assembly Square was becoming a ghost town. First National Stores (FINAST), the B & M Railroad, and Ford Motor Company, who had each paid the city over $1 million in annual taxes, were gone. Two machine tool companies and a trucking concern were the only large employers remaining. In 1978, city officials began preparing an Assembly Square redevelopment plan that, in many ways, resembles the exercise that they recently went through. Then, as now, city officials declined to develop a master plan, but embraced a developer’s initiative and presented it as the city’s redevelopment plan. Then, as now, the developer had site control of the old Ford plant. Then, as now, the plan called for the city to take properties from existing owners and give them to the developer. Then, as now, Somervillians were told that turning the old auto plant into a retail center would subsequently bring high-value development across Assembly Square. East Bay Development Corporation promised to not only turn the Ford plant into a mall, but to revitalize the office building that had been FINAST’s headquarters, build a 200-400 room hotel, develop ten additional acres of commercial and office property, and all together, create 1,450 permanent jobs. The city approved the plan and got a $3.3 million grant from HUD to build the road improvements that the developer wanted. East Bay had built the Woburn mall and several others. In the process, the FBI caught them in a securities-fraud and tax-evasion scheme. East Bay’s principal, Ray Coots, told then U.S. Attorney Bill Weld that, in return for reducing or dropping charges, he could deliver corrupt Somerville politicians. Conducting the sting required an operative who would not be recognized in Somerville. Special Agent John Connolly, now serving time for colluding with Whitey Bulger, recommended Special Agent Jack Callahan, his former Boston College classmate. They introduced Jack Callahan to Somerville as Jackie Collins, East Bay’s public- and government-relations officer. Their intention was to catch a low-level politico, offer leniency in return for cooperation, and work their way up the food chain. The fictional hotel’s restaurant needed a liquor license, but Somerville had recently frozen the number of on-site licenses at 52. A new license would require legislation by the board of aldermen and a home-rule petition passed by the legislature. Callahan wined and dined Ward 1 Alderman Tim Creedon, who said that he could get the legislation passed, but it would cost East Bay. Callahan gave Creedon $13,500. Creedon gave $500 each to five other aldermen. The only one who he later named was Ward 3 Alderman Michael McKenna, who had complained that he should get at least $1,000. Vinny Piro was then riding high as Somerville and Medford’s powerful state Representative. Callahan asked Piro to shepherd the home rule petition through the statehouse. Piro said that it would cost $25,000, and as proof of his good intentions, told Callahan that he had taken two bribes for successfully rendering favors in the past. In March, 1983, the FBI recorded Piro telling Callahan that he “needed a little walking-around money” to “grease a few guys.” They gave him $5,000 in marked bills. At that time, city tax assessors were elected. Assessor Robert Campo knew a good thing when he saw it. He went to Callahan and told him that he “needed some help,” because his campaign costs had been high. In return for $5,000, he reduced the mall’s tax assessment. Over the next two years, he solicited two more bribes, and the FBI recorded 47 conversations with him, including three involving his son-in-law, Ward 3 Alderman McKenna. He later testified that he had shared the bribes with other assessors. Campo ended up pleading guilty and received a three-year sentence. Creedon got a one-year sentence in Danbury for cooperating, and was paroled six months later. Suffering from cancer, McKenna was given house arrest. Piro’s attorney argued that his client had been entrapped, and pointed out that he had returned the $5,000 three weeks after taking it. Prosecutor John Pappalardo said that Piro had been tipped off, and that the currency he returned was different from what he had been given. Piro’s first trial ended in a mistrial, and his second, in an acquittal. Somerville voters, however, convicted him at the polls. He had won the Democratic primary election for the state Senate and faced no Republican opponent. In the general election, outraged voters elected Alderman Sal Albano in an unprecedented write-in campaign. Shortly thereafter, the board of aldermen abolished the election of assessors. The mall did not stimulate a wave of new development. During the period of its greatest popularity, it had the highest incidence of car theft of any location in the Commonwealth. A decade after it opened, it began a decline that would end with its closing.

UNDERCOVER FBI ROLE REPORTED IN SOMERVILLE Author: By Michael K. Frisby, Globe Staff Also contributing to this story: William Doherty, Norman Lockman and Chris Chinlund of The Globe Staff. Date: 02/18/1984 Page: ????? Section: RUN OF PAPER A PUBLISHED CORRECTION HAS BEEN ADDED TO THIS STORY. John (Jackie) Collins drove a white Lincoln Continental and lived lavishly in an apartment at Charles River Park in Boston while he worked for nearly three years as an executive for the East Bay Development Corp. of Reading. But yesterday, sources said Collins is a fictitous name used by an undercover FBI agent who was a key to a federal investigation that has allegedly implicated Somerville public officials and politicians in bribery, racketeering and extortion. As the undercover agent, posing as the free-wheeling business executive, discussed deals with city, state and federal officials, a tape recorder was strapped to his waist, sources said. On some occasions, said sources, the encounters, which they said may have included bribe-paying, were videotaped by other agents monitoring the transactions. According to sources, the FBI began the investigation in late 1980 after East Bay executives, who were developing the Assembly Square Mall in Somerville, complained to federal officials that they were under pressure from "minor bureaucrats" to pay bribes for licenses that were required to begin the project. As the investigation spread, sources said, former alderman Timothy J. Creedon cooperated with the probe and was "wired" by the FBI to tape conversations with other officials. Special Agent Lawrence Gilligan, an FBI spokesman, refused yesterday to discuss the Somerville case, and US Atty. William Weld has also declined to comment on the pending investigation. For the past five years, the FBI has had a Criminal Undercover Operations Review Committee, which approves undercover operations. The committee is composed of FBI specialists, members of the FBI's Division of Legal Counsel and Justice Department officials. One source said that "Collins" fit the role of company executive perfectly and quickly made contacts with Somerville municipal officials and employees involved with the construction of the Assembly Square development. The agent, said sources, gathered evidence on the municipal level in Somerville and gradually developed relationships with other officials so that eventually the FBI investigation spread to the State House and the JFK Federal Building. It is believed that "Collins" also contributed funds to at least one state legislator running for re-election. According to the campaign report of state Rep. Vincent J. Piro (D- Somerville), a John J. Collins who lived at the Charles River Park apartments contributed $500 last year to Piro's campaign. Piro could not be reached for comment yesterday on the contribution. He previously acknowledged that he and other Somerville officials are being scrutinized by federal authorities. In recent weeks, said sources, "Collins" has not been seen in his usual activities, leading to reports that he has resumed his true identity and is helping prosecutors in Weld's office prepare the case for the grand jury. Thus far, the grand jury hearing evidence in the case has not issued any indictments, but numerous persons, including the present mayor and former mayors, aides to the city's state legislators and city officials have been subpoenaed to testify. Sources said investigators have gathered information regarding the development of the Assembly Square Mall and have asked questions about the Twin City Plaza in Somerville. In addition, sources said, the investigators have obtained records from the city Board of Assessors, some of which document tax abatements given to the malls and other businesses. In the midst of the probe, a lawyer for Lawrence F. Bretta, former mayor of Somerville, informed General Services Administration officials on Thursday that Bretta was resigning his $69,000-a-year position with the administration in Washington. Federal agents, said sources, have investigated a T-shirt shop at the Assembly Square Mall that was owned by Bretta until it was reportedly sold last fall. Wilder-Manley Associates, a Boston firm, was hired by East Bay to handle leases for most of the retail outlets at the mall, said sources, but Bretta's store was one of a few that were handled directly by East Bay. Federal authorities, said sources, are probing whether any special arrangements were involved with the lease agreement. Sources said the store was operated by Bretta's wife and that Creedon's wife also worked in the store. It has been privately speculated by public officials in Somerville that Creedon was used by the FBI to gather information during the investigation. A GSA spokeswoman said Creedon has worked in the agency's print shop at the JFK building since 1979. One source said Bretta, who had served as New England regional director, helped Creedon get the job at GSA. Creedon, who had been an alderman since the mid-1970s, did not run for re- election last year and has moved from the city. Neither Bretta or Creedon could be reached for comment yesterday. East Bay developed the Mystic Mall in Chelsea, the Billerica Mall, the Woburn Mall, Harborlight Mall in North Weymouth and K Mart Plaza in Portsmouth, N.H. The company went out of business in 1982 after its president, Raymond H. Coots, died of a heart attack. Several of the East Bay executives formed JDC Properties in Reading. Reached by telephone last night, David Wahr, the treasurer for JDC, declined to comment on the Somerville investigation. "I'm in no position to comment," said Wahr, "and I won't be for some period of time." At the grand jury yesterday, former state Senate majority leader Joseph J.C. DiCarlo of Revere was among those called to give testimony in the case. DiCarlo was accompanied by his lawyer, David Berman, who refused comment. CORRECTION: The Globe was apparently in error in stating that former state senator Joseph DiCarlo of Revere testified before a federal grand jury Friday regarding alleged corruption in Somerville, a Globe editor said yesterday. The report was carried in Saturday's editions and was denied later that day by DiCarlo. Matthew V. Storin, daily managing editor, said: "There was apparently a faulty communication between two reporters, one assuming the other had more solid information than in fact he had. We will offer Mr. DiCarlo our apologies." DiCarlo was sentenced to a year in prison after he was convicted in February 1977 of exorting $40,000 from a New York consulting firm doing work on the UMass Boston harbor campus. In another development, Robert D. Goodoak of Reading, an architect, moved to quash a subpoena he received. In a motion filed in US District Court, Goodoak's lawyer, Robert Ford, claimed the subpoena was overly broad, unreasonable and unconstitutional and "seeks to pierce the attorney-client privilege." Goodoak received a three-year prison sentence in US District Court 1980 for his role in a kickback scheme involving the Somerville Housing Authority. The sentence was in addition to a two-year sentence he received earlier in state court on similiar charges. At the time, Goodoak admitted defrauding the US Department of Housing and Urban Development of $648,778 on modernization projects at two Somerville Housing Authority developments. Meanwhile, Somerville Mayor Eugene Brune told a press conference yesterday that he has received a subpoena to appear before the grand jury on Tuesday. Brune, however, said he has been told that he is not a target of the probe. Brune said that last November the FBI asked him for his cooperation in the investigation. Brune said he did not know the target of the investigation, but he said Bretta's name had been mentioned by the FBI. "I am deeply disturbed over the shadow cast upon us," said Brune. "I tell people of the city . . . I hope the shadow cast upon us will soon be removed. . . . I don't think it (the probe) has hurt my administation because it is not a part of it, but it certainly has hurt the city." FRISBY;02/17,17:08 BEVERI;02/19,15 B07699612

kevin crowely

Somerville — You can count me out as a citizen who refers to our fair city as the “ville” or the “Paris of New England.” You can count me in as a supporter of our city’s application for the All American City Award. I hope the mayor brings the award back home to Somerville.

This is not the first time Somerville is a finalist for the All American City Award. In 1973, the city received the accolade as a community that demonstrated excellence arising from broad-based community involvement and leadership, resulting in outstanding community development.

In January 1970, S. Lester Ralph, a minister and attorney, was inaugurated as mayor of Somerville. Six months prior, he was an unknown citizen who announced his candidacy for mayor. Two months earlier, he was elected mayor. He won 36 out of 38 precincts in the election.

A mere 30 months later, the city received the All American City Award. Specifically, it was bestowed upon the city for three areas of government and community participation: services to the elderly; development of and initiation of a master plan for building community schools, rebuilding old schools and remodeling all schools; and the efforts of citizens to install a reform government that exposed mismanagement of tax dollars, citing Mayor Ralph’s efforts to lead the government to be more responsive to community input.

Ralph’s election capped a six-year effort by civic groups dissatisfied with their municipal government. Between 1965 and 1970, Somerville citizens formed a host of civic organizations to change, upgrade and create a new atmosphere of citizen and government cooperation.
Some of these reform groups included ESCA, East Somerville Citizens for Action; CSS, Citizens to Support Schools; ESNIC, East Somerville Neighborhood Improvement Committee; EMOC, Eastern Middlesex Opportunities Council; SRUC, Somerville Racial Understanding Committee; SWRO, Somerville Welfare Rights Organization; WTCA, Ward Two Civic Association; MHTA, Mystic Housing Tenants’ Association; SCAT, Somerville Citizens for Adequate Transportation; CPP, Citizens for Participation in Politics (local branch); and INTERCOM, a group formed to foster communications between all these citizen groups.

This was a turbulent time in the country and in the city. These civic organizations received little or no assistance from the municipal government. It was a scandalous indifference.

They say “wisdom cries out in the streets.” Ward 1 streets were aroused by plans to destroy the character of their community with a plan for urban renewal. Community action stopped that plan. Ward 1 residents also led the city to renounce a state plan to encircle Somerville with multilane highways.


Imagine Somerville surrounded on three sides by highways. The state plan was to have I-93 divide the city to the north, extend Route 2 through Cambridge and Somerville to the south, and connect I-93 with an “Inner Belt” connecting Somerville to the Mass. Pike to the east. The Inner Belt was to pass through Somerville and Cambridge. Sound crazy? Surprisingly, most city officials were in favor of this plan.

These citizens’ groups were the catalysts that aroused other residents to oppose this strangulation of the city. Through strong activism over a period of five years, they were able to stop the extension of Route 2 and the four-lane Inner Belt. Unfortunately, the state went ahead with construction of I-93 without depressing the highway through Somerville, causing, as predicted, a split city, pollution and noise. The protest of the activist groups was the first crowbar to disturb the loud and blowsy attitude of many city officials.

On the other hand, however, more community groups formed to rehabilitate or re-create our school system. They sought to institute a school lunch program to ensure adequate nutrition for all children and to free women from the necessity of remaining home all day, unable to work, since they needed to be home at lunchtime. Even after Carla Johnston, the ace of community organizers, testified before the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and the program was endorsed by Sen. Edward Kennedy, the majority of the School Committee voted against the school lunch program. Most students in low-income Somerville were entitled to this program under law. It was a federally funded program.

Ideas to initiate a community school system were defeated. Once, parents, though invited by the superintendent of schools to visit and inspect the schools during National Education Week, were turned away from many schools when they arrived with checklists to record the physical conditions of schools, the majority of which were built between the Civil War and the early 20th century. These parents were called “outside agitators,” “socialists” and “hippies.” Privately, the shibboleth “commies” was a common slander.

Even high school girls were under attack for wearing pants to school. A gathering of female students dressed in pants was told to “go home and change your clothes if you want to go to school.”

Community schools? Well, they were simply too new-fangled for consideration. The prevailing official attitude was that most schools were to be open only during the school day. After-school programs, drug education, community meeting access, teen programs and preschool programs were not in the cards for parents. These parents were working mothers and wives of working-class workers. They were seen as agitators and troublemakers




Meanwhile, down at the Housing Authority, residents, beset with structural and heating problems, organized themselves into a tenants’ association. One night, they had a fundraiser that was raided by the Somerville Police. An innocent game, similar to bingo, was a vehicle used by churches, veterans’ groups and nonprofit agencies to raise money for their expenses. This game, though illegal, was universal in Massachusetts ($20 scratch ticket, anyone?). The chief of police, when contacted, ordered the fundraiser stopped. Akin to the police chief in the movie, “Casablanca,” he was “shocked” to discover gambling in his city. Now, this was a time when every barroom in the city had its own bookie and the third-largest organized crime outfit in New England was headquartered a mere 1,000 yards up the street from the fundraiser.

The new community groups were a creative lot. Where programs did not exist, they, with the help of nonprofit public agencies, started their own. The first area nursery school was established by volunteers in Winter Hill. A “well baby” clinic was successfully launched. Three teen centers were opened in the “housing projects.” A Community Ambassador Program provided “scholarships” for Somerville students to spend summers abroad. The first mental health clinic was founded. A health clinic was opened. A summer day camp was sponsored by the Somerville Racial Understanding Committee. Miniature community schools were organized on weekends in churches. Food programs were opened. Groups formed to clean up playgrounds and parks. A community housing and development agency was formed. Gene Brune was busy gathering support to build a Boys & Girls Club complex.

Money was raised from donations from civic leaders, federal funding and community gatherings. People from various groups met at potluck dinners to raise revenues and share the spirit of their many endeavors. This was democracy in action.

It all seems so long ago. A pervasive pattern of inside politics, hidden from its citizens, was surfacing in Somerville. A compliant populace was rising to challenge the established order. Even though the ideas of citizens’ groups were constantly shot down, the mere act of getting under officials’ skin revealed a cabal of politicians who did not know enough to stay out of their own way. As the late columnist for the Boston Globe, George Frazier, wrote of all entrenched politicians, “If you let your guard down for a single moment, you were suckered by their stealthyness.”

Some political leaders were in agreement with the new civic spirit in Somerville. There was Alderman Lee Figgins, who fought endlessly for change at Board of Aldermen meetings. Somerville politics was raw and acrimonious. Lee Figgins was in the foxhole, and there was none better than he. There was School Committeeman John Holmes. He carried the banner, alone, in the School Committee for revamping the school system. There was Alderman Leonard Scott, who shared many ideas of community activists and tried to advance their goals.
Sadly, space considerations deny me the opportunity to tell more of the story or to name the hundreds of heroic citizens involved



Political change did come to this city. Armed with confidence gained from years of community organizing, many of these citizens banned together to support and elect S. Lester Ralph mayor. His administrations instituted many of the programs conceived by the community groups of the late 1960s.

The All American City Award is not given to a community because it has attained perfection. It seeks to find a point in time where one can measure where it was then and how far it has traveled since that time.

Successive Ralph administrations brought change and new ideas to Somerville. There was fervor in the city for change, and change it did. Ralph initiated many of the successful agencies, transportation policies, affordable housing issues, arts awareness programs, financial steadfastness guidelines, tenants’ programs, development concerns, community health awareness, tree plantings, elderly programs, beautification policies, and park reconstructions that exist and flourish today.

Under the category of “victory has a thousand fathers,” file the “Red Line.” In 1972, the proposed extension of the Red Line was to travel only through Cambridge from Harvard Square to Alewife Brook. After the scuttling of the Route 2 extension, the Ralph administration received a commitment from then-Gov. Francis Sargent to alter the planned route to include the stop in Davis Square. And hasn’t that made all the difference?

The schools: it was always the schools. The Ralph administration built five schools, rebuilt four schools and remodeled every school. They embedded within the new community schools preschool programs, community access programs, nutrition programs, an alternative high school and the school lunch program.

As Mayor Ralph said at the time of the award, “No one person, group or agency can claim this award as their own; but together, Somerville can certainly be proud.”

This story is incomplete without mentioning Shelley Cohen, the former crusading editor of the Somerville Journal and present editorial page editor of the Boston Herald. She expanded the Journal, through the letters section, to open a community forum for floods of varying opinions. If something was happening in Somerville, you knew about it through her persistent reporting. If you had an opinion, she printed it.

Contacted recently, she noted what an “astonishing time” it was, and the terrific opportunity she had to report on the “bubbling up from underneath of a citizens’ reform movement.” Speaking of Mayor Ralph, she said, “He was the most unlikely of politicians … He did what needed to be done under very difficult circumstances.”



So, though some may think Somerville is today the “Paris of New England,” I say there was once a “moveable feast” that many of us still carry with us. It is in this spirit, with an understanding of our past, that I look forward to the mayor returning from Florida with the All American City Award, not for the “ville,” but for the people of Somerville. We are indeed an All American City, and of this we can be proud.

Kevin T. Crowley is a lawyer in private practice in Somerville. He was an administrative assistant to Lester Ralph, and former assistant city solicitor under then-Mayor Gene Brune.

howe family

A six-week investigation by The Crimson has revealed a consistent pattern of conflict-of-interest, nepotism and misuse of public office by one of Somerville's most powerful political families. First of a two-part series.

Democratic State Rep. Marie E. Howe of Somerville and her younger brother John J. Howe, a Somerville property tax assessor, may have systematically used tax assessments to reward personal friends and punish political opponents, an examination of the city's tax records shows.

Although the Howes deny using assessment powers as a political weapon, Somerville tax records reveal a persistent pattern of questionable tax reductions awarded to political friends, and tax increases levied on political opponents.

In one specific instance of conflict-of-interest, the Howes used their assessment powers to give themselves a tax break on their own property.

On June 2, 1976, 35-year-old John Howe lowered the yearly assessment on a piece of property on Charnwood Road in Somerville, a block from his home, by nearly 25 per cent--from $8400 to $6400. This was one of the largest proportionate reductions in residential property taxes awarded that year in Somerville.

Nearly a year later, Somerville Alderman Andrew Puglia discovered that the property on Charnwood Road was owned by John's older sister Marie, and that the property's beneficiaries were listed on the property deed as "John J. Howe and Kristen Howe." Thus assessor Howe lowered the taxes on a piece of property owned by his own family.

John Howe admits that he lowered the assessment so the previous owners could more easily sell the property to his sister, even though the law requires assessment at full property value. But Howe maintains that his actions were not a direct conflict-of-interest, because his family members did not own the property prior to his action. Nevertheless, those who benefited from Howe's decision to lower the assessment were clearly the Howes themselves, who bought the Charnwood Road property at the lower price.

"When have you ever heard of an assessor lowering the assessment so the owners could sell the house?" Puglia, a political opponent of the Howes, asks. "That's unheard of. You're supposed to lower the assessment only if the property has gone down in value. And then, all of a sudden, a few months later, lo and behold, Howe's sister buys the property."

Howe justifies his decision to lower his family's taxes by saying that the property had been over-assessed previously--something Somerville insiders doubt, in light of the city's usually-lenient assessment practices, and the unusual timing of Howe's sudden tax decrease. Only the state's Department of Corporation and Taxation can rule definitively whether Howe's self-help tax break was legitimate, but the department has so far taken no steps to handle the politically sensitive issue.

Howe maintains that at the time he lowered the assessment on the Charnwood Road property, he did not know his sister was planning to buy it. "We were shocked when we heard about it," he stated last year. "What she [Marie] does in her office is one thing, and what I do in mine is another. We don't butt into each other's business." But as one Somerville politician noted skeptically, "Who the hell are they kidding? Marie Howe controls John like a puppet. If my brother owned a house and the assessment was lowered, I'd sure as hell know about it."

Even if Howe knew his sister was planning to purchase the property, he says that it was still legal because it did not involve a direct conflict-of-interest. Howe claims that the "John J. Howe" who is listed as the property's beneficiary is not himself, but his eight-year-old son, John Joseph Howe. (The "Kristen Howe" also listed on the deed is Howe's daughter..) Legally, there is no way to tell which John J. Howe is the true beneficiary.

However, even if it is his son who is the actual beneficiary, Howe would still seem to be involved in conflict-of-interest, because he is the beneficiary's legal custodian. Howe denies this, saying his wife could be the custodian instead. But according to several legal sources, including one in the state Attorney General's office, if the state Taxation Department finds that Howe's family tax break was unjustified, the assessor could be fired by the Department for violating the state's conflict-of-interest statute.

Marie Howe says she bought the Charnwood Road property after her brother lowered the assessment by $2000 as an act of charity toward the previous owners, whom she says were "in deep financial trouble." She denies asking her brother to change the property's assessment, and says that those who charge the family with conflict-of-interest are "sick."

Several months after Marie Howe bought the Charnwood Road property, her brother raised the assessment by $900. He says he did this because the property had increased in value after his earlier assessment because it was no longer vacant. But Alderman Puglia charges that Howe raised the assessment only when he found out he was being investigated for conflict-of-interest. "After they became aware that I was snooping around, they took a pencil and tried to cover their tracks by changing the assessment," Puglia charges.

The Enemies List

The Charnwood Road property is not the only time the Howes have used tax assessments in Somerville for personal and political purposes. The record shows that the Howes may have consistently used the assessing process to reward their personal friends and punish their political enemies.

On June 5, 1976, Howe raised the assessment on the business property of Cosmo Capobianco by $1000. Howe says he increased Capobianco's taxes because of building improvements on the property. But Capobianco says it's been more than four years since he made any building improvements on his property, and that his taxes were raised at that time. Capobianco is a friend and campaign contributor to former Somerville Mayor Lester Ralph, a long-time foe of the Howes who defeated Marie in the 1971 mayoral race. Marie Howe, in an interview with The Crimson, called Capobianco a Ralph "crony ... who has done nothing but steal from the city of Somerville on payroll jobs in the county." The man who personally raised Capobianco's taxes, John Howe, has publicly labeled Capobianco a "political parasite"--prompting Capobianco to sue for libel. The suit is still pending. "There's no question Howe has used assessments as a political tool," Capobianco says.

Three days earlier, Howe had raised by $800 the assessment on property owned by Paul and Doris Griffin. Howe says he raised the assessment because he thought the Griffins' house was a three-family dwelling. Doris Griffin was also a friend of Ralph, Marie Howe's persistent opponent: she had worked as a door-to-door canvasser in his mayoral campaigns, and later was appointed by Ralph to the Somerville Board of Appeals. "Howe said that the reason he raised our assessment [from a two-family dwelling to a three-family dwelling] was because he ... saw some curtains in the attic where my daughter slept, and just assumed there was a third family there," Doris Griffin says. But there were only two families in the Griffin house. As proof that the Griffins were a three-family household, Howe presented to the assessors photographs he had taken showing curtains in the attic of the Griffin house. Doris Griffin says Howe told her he "always" takes photos of the many hundreds of properties he assesses.

The Griffins appealed Howe's decision, and the rest of the assessors decided to grant the family an abatement. "I'm sure he [Howe] doesn't go around this city taking pictures of all several thousand of the houses in Somerville

Both Howes deny that Marie asked John to raise the Griffins' assessment; both deny that the increased assessment was politically motivated.

Former Somerville mayor and current City Clerk William J. Donovan, a political antagonist of Marie Howe and who admits having "no great love" for the Howes, had his property assessment raised by Howe from $10,600 to $14,000 in 1976. Howe says the property was previously under-valued, and that the 40-per-cent assessment increase was long overdue. But the property itself had no buildings that could have increased in value. "The land was vacant," Donovan remembers. "He couldn't justify the assessment." Donovan, too, received an abatement from the rest of the city's assessors.

Marie Howe denies playing any role in Donovan's increased property taxes. Her brother says the assessment was warranted, adding that Donovan's property was full of debris, and is a "disgrace."

The Somerville Journal Affair

One of Howe's largest assessment increases was for the Somerville Press, Inc., which publishes the weekly Somerville Journal. For years, the Howe family has been at political odds with the Journal. In 1974, the newspaper angered the Howes by its coverage of Marie Howe's conviction for trespassing. The conviction stemmed from an incident in which Marie Howe's friend, Walter Silva, forcibly removed the door of one of Howe's tenants from its hinges, while Marie participated in the break-in. Two years later, the Journal gave front-page coverage to Marie's arrest for disorderly conduct during Queen Elizabeth's bicentennial visit to Boston; the paper reported that Marie bit the hand of her arresting officer, requiring him to go to the hospital to get a tetanus shot, and that she then gave the police an alias so they wouldn't know she was a state representative. "She was infuriated after we did the 'Howe Bites Cop' story," says Journal co-editor Barbara Powers. "She said we've always been against her, and she came down [to the newspaper office] and started screaming and yelling and threatening to take us to court." No such suit ever came to trial.

On June 2, 1976, John Howe raised the Journal's tax assessment from $13,000 to $24,4000--an increase of nearly 100 per cent. The Journal had remodeled its building in the past year, but the changes were minor compared with the nearly two-fold property tax increase. "He singled us out, there's no question about it," says one Journal staffer. "He didn't do the same to other businesses." The newspaper appealed Howe's decision, and received a full tax abatement.

Howe maintains his attempted tax increase was long overdue, and "should be higher."

A Little Help for Their Friends

At the same time John Howe was allegedly using his assessment powers to punish his family's political enemies, he was also lowering the taxes of the family's political and personal friends.

In 1976, John Howe lowered the assessments of Robert and Selma Kopelman by nearly $15,000--from $44,900 to $30,000. The Kopelmans were long-time neighbors of the Howes. Though assessments are generally consistent in a given neighborhood, other property assessments in the area were raised by Howe.

On May 4, of that year, Howe also lowered--from $7000 to $6600--the assessment on the home of Leonard Scott, his wife and children. Scott served with Marie Howe on the Somerville School Board, and is reported to be a very close personal friend and companion of Marie Howe. She denies, however, using her influence to lower Scott's assessment, and says "I don't really know Leonard Scott that well."

Because of John Howe's caprius use of his assessment powers and the great influence of the Howe family in Somerville, many of those whose assessment were raised by Howe were afraid to talk to The Crimson.

Paul M. Haley, one-time Somerville alderman who admits that he "never had anything in common" with the Howes, says publicly that the increased assessment of his property was justified: "[In my neighborhood] I think it was just my house and a couple of others at the time (that had an increased assessment), but I can't quarrel with anyone, you know?"

Robert Nunziato, a supporter of Howe opponent Mayor Ralph and a one-time candidate for alderman, did not want to talk about Howe's increase of the assessment of property owned by his father and uncle. "We've been here too long in the city," he said. "What they do, they do. I'd rather forget about it."

Crackdown on Leftists

John Howe may have used his office especially to crack down on political activists. He raised from $7000 to $7900 the assessment of Chris Burns and the "cooperative family" Burns was living with. Burns had contributed money to Howe opponent Lester Ralph, and has been active in Citizens for Participation in Political Action and other liberal groups in Somerville. Marie Howe personally lobbied against Burns in 1972, when the Democratic City Committee in Somerville met to debate his resolution condemning the Vietnam War. Four years later, John Howe's rationale for raising Burns's assessment was that he saw many names on the cooperative family houses. Burns appealed the decision, and the rest of the city's assessors granted an abatement.

Both Howes deny that the assessment was raised for political reasons.

Around the corner from Burns lives another "cooperative family" of unrelated adults, including leftist political activist Frank Ackerman. In October 1976 at a packed meeting of the city's Board of Assessors, Ackerman denounced the board for using tax assessments as a political weapon. During Ackerman's speech, Howe interrupted opened, opened the tax books for Ackerman's neighborhood, and asked threateningly: "Mr. Ackerman, where did you say you lived?"

The next day, at Howe's direction, two city inspectors showed up at the Ackerman house. Two days later, Ackerman received a letter from the Board of Health at Howe's debut citing him for a rarely-enforced city ordinance against five or more unrelated adults living together without a "boarding house" license. Only when Ackerman hired a lawyer to challenge Howe's actions did the city rule in his favor.

Howe still maintains that Ackerman was operating a boarding house, despite a ruling to the contrary by the city solicitor's office.

Marie Howe denies playing any role in the Ackerman incident, but told The Crimson that "Mr. Ackerman's house was loaded with German swastikas.... They were in adoration of Adolf Hitler," Ackerman's wife, Kathy Moore says that there are no swastikas in her house and never have been: "That's just the craziest thing I ever heard. ... The poor woman apparently doesn't know the difference between the (political) right and the left." Indeed, most of the members of their household are Jewish. (Marie Howe adds that even if the Ackermans are Nazis, "that's not why it [the assessment] went up ... I'm not saying anything against Ackerman.")CrimsonAnthea LetsouFor years, the Howe family has feuded with the weekly Somerville Journal. The newspaper's front page coverage of Marie Howe's arrest for disorderly conduct when she bit a police officer especially angered the Howes. After her brother was elected a city tax assessor, he increased the Journal's assessment by more than $10,000. "He singled us out, there's no question about it," says one newspaper staffer. "He didn't do the same to other businesses

carla johnston and vinnie lopresti

The city’s first Italian-American alderman-at-large was the guest at the Aug. 17 contributors meeting for The Somerville News. Vinny LoPresti was an alderman from 1971 until 1975 and garnered the most votes of any at-large candidate in the city’s history, he said.

“Back then you had more people running for office and more people involved,” he said. “These days, I hear, there aren’t even primaries.”

LoPresti was one of 29 candidates in 1971, he said.

LoPresti said he is proud of the time he spent as an elected official and said his greatest accomplishments were getting a string of new schools built and spearheading the city’s first anti-drug program. He helped lead the effort to build schools in Wards 1, 2, 4 and 7, he said.

“When I first became alderman, the schools were deplorable. The roofs leaked. They just had to go,” he said.

A problem community leaders were less likely to address straight on was drug abuse, he said.

“People didn’t want to talk about it. The police thought if we brought it up, it would reflect badly on them, but that is not what it was about. It was a reflection of our entire society not just Somerville,” he said.

Eventually, LoPresti organized the first publicly funded anti-drug program in the city. It consisted of seminars to educate kids on the dangers of drugs and a drop-in center for people struggling with addiction.

To illustrate his point that drugs had reached the city’s youth, LoPresti brought a marijuana cigarette that had been confiscated from a student to a Board of Aldermen meeting.

“I held it up at the meeting to show people that we were dealing with drugs in the community,” he said. “When I was finished, I just left it in there though. I didn’t want to bring it out in the hallway. I could have been arrested myself.”

LoPresti said constituents would sometimes call him with unexpected problems. “There was a woman who asked for my help who said her husband had been beating her up. She said she was too scared to go to the police and needed help from somebody. I wasn’t sure what I could really do but I told her I would help her. So one day I called the guy up and I lied. I told him I was the deputy chief of police and if he kept giving his wife problems he was going to get arrested,” he said.

The unconventional solution worked, he said.

“I saw the woman a few months later and she was thanking me and said I had scared her husband and he had stopped hurting her,” he said.

LoPresti said he has seen the city change dramatically in the three decades since he was an alderman.

“There’s a more professional crowd in the city now, fewer families, fewer children. The silence can be deafening these days,” he said.

And, he said, many people who called the city home for decades have moved to the surrounding suburbs.

“I see more Somerville people in Woburn and Stoneham than in Somerville itself these days,” he said.

Posted at 06:00 AM in George P. Hassett | Permalink



e dedication in a recently published book states: “To Carla Brooks Johnston, Who Turns Words Into Deeds For Better Communities.” And that is exactly what she did some four decades ago in Somerville and Cambridge and for the last decade of her life in southwest Florida.
Carla Brooks Johnston
1940 - 2011

Carla Johnston died of cancer on April 28 at her home in Sanibel, Florida.

In the 1970s she played a key role in the election of reform Mayor Lester Ralph in Somerville, ousting a corrupt government. The Boston Globe won a Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of the corruption and what Carla Johnston and her colleagues were doing to end it. As funding coordinator for the city in Ralph’s administration, she brought education, social welfare, and environmental funds to the city and was instrumental in getting it designated an “All-American City” in 1972. She was executive director of northeast Massachusetts’ 101-city planning council and chief budget analyst for the areas’s 78-city transportation consortium. She served as Deputy Director of the Union of Concerned Scientists, headquartered in Cambridge, and was twice chair of the city’s Democratic Committee. She was CEO of her Cambridge-based New Century Policies. She was a professor at U.Mass-Boston and also taught at Boston University and Emerson College. At Harvard she was a Loeb Fellow, was a fellow at the Kennedy School and was awarded first Bunting Peace fellowship. She lectured on public policy and media throughout the United States and in countries on six continents.

Read More:

■Activist's Life of Hope Reminds Us We Can Make a Difference
Commentary following the Celebration of the Life of the late Carla B. Johnston at Somerville City Hall on September 10th, 2011 (also published in the Somerville Journal on Sept. 22, 2011).
■Remembering Carla Brooks Johnston
A place to share your memories of Carla
■Obituary
■Carla's letter to friends
■In Lieu of Flowers
Please consider helping us to establish a seed funding grant program for Change Makers by contributing to Carla's non-profit organization: New Century Policies Educational Programs, Inc.

Memoirs

Somerville — A person will accumulate a lot of stories over four decades in local office, and now longtime Somerville politician Gene Brune is putting them down on paper.

“I started jotting down things… and I realized I had some stories to tell,” said Brune.

Brune hasn’t found a title yet for his memoirs, and hasn’t worked out how they will be published, but said he expects to finish the manuscript this spring.

Without getting into the all the specifics, Brune said the book would chronicle some of the scandals that have shook the city over the years but it won’t be a tell-all that names the names of all the players.

Brune grew up in Somerville, traveled with the U.S. Army to Japan, married, divorced, and then started a life in public office. Brune was Ward 6 alderman from 1972 to 1980, when he unseated Mayor Tom August in a four-way race against a young Mike Capuano and Paul Haley.

During his time as mayor, the police chief at the time was indicted for cheating on a Civil Service exam, the FBI busted officials for taking bribes and Brune re-configured the often-corrupt Board of Assessors. He is credited by many as being the first “reform mayor,” while others credit Lester Ralph with that distinction. Brune is an ally of Mayor Joe Curtatone.

Brune became the register of deeds in 1988 and his old rival Capuano won the mayorship. Twenty years later, the man Brune backed in that mayoral race, John Buonomo, was arrested and charged with stealing cash out of the copier machines at the Registry of Deeds. Buonomo had been elected register of probate after another failed mayoral run in 1999.

Most Somerville histories fall into two categories, according to Brune: the architectural retrospective and the gangster confessional. Brune wants to add political memoir to the Somerville library.



Read more: Former Somerville mayor Gene Brune writes memoir - Somerville, Massachusetts 02144 - Somerville Journal http://www.wickedlocal.com/somerville/news/x1354948976/Former-Somerville-mayor-Gene-Brune-writes-memoir#ixzz1jXtkG0Gv

Gene Brune on Tufts

Brune to News: Can we set the story straight?
On November 14, 2006, in Uncategorized, by The News Staff ....
Brune to News: Can we set the story straight?

To the editor,

For a long time now I have had to listen to and read the many varied and wild stories in reference to the sale of the former Western Jr. High School site, now known as the tab building. The article would always mention that when serving as mayor I gave away the building to tufts for $1.00.


I always thought that newspapers did everything possible to check the facts before putting something in print. In the Nov. 8 “News Talk” column, your newspaper failed to do so.
The facts, as I remember them, are during my tenure as mayor, when it was decided that the former Western Jr. High School was no longer needed by the School Department and in very serious disrepair, it was turned over to the city.
Because it was not needed by the city and too expensive to repair, I thought it would be in the best interest of the city to sell the building and invest the proceeds in education and the remodeling of the Teele Square fire station. Both of which I did.
Certainly we wanted the school building to be used for something that would benefit the city and not be a hardship on the neighborhood, or negatively affect the children attending the adjacent Powderhouse Community School. After going out for bid the city ended up with two bidders, Flamingo Construction Co., who wanted to renovate the building and rent space to an assortment of companies, and Tufts University, which was willing to move their administrative offices into that location. Both were willing to lease back space to the city for 25 years to be used for our senior center, SCALE and other non-profit activities.

Tufts University came up with the highest offer of one million, six hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and was willing to rent space to the city starting at $8.90 a sq. ft., including utilities. They proposed to give us a ten year lease, with the option of three additional five year terms.
Flamingo construction offered the city much less and, in fact, went bankrupt six months later. As I remember, seven aldermen agreed that tufts would be our best choice. Four aldermen wanted Flamingo Construction Co. Even though they offered a lesser price.
Also, I personally called then Tufts president Jean Mayer, and asked him for an additional three hundred thousand dollars to be placed in an interest bearing account to be used after the first ten years of the lease to pay for any increase in cost for space rented by the city for our senior center and SCALE.
In retrospect, I was asking tufts to finance any future rent increases by them. President Mayer said that he would honor my request. When the city had to renew their lease the three hundred thousand, with interest, was almost six hundred thousand dollars. One could say that Tufts University paid almost two million three hundred thousand dollars for the Western Jr. High School site. That is a far cry from the $1.00 figure that is always used by those who may by chance dislike me or Tufts.
Any one who observed me during my ten years as mayor in the eighties, saw me work through perhaps the worst financial times in years, having the most dangerous chemical spill in the history of the state, taking on proposition 2 ½, having been stuck with several appellate tax cases requiring millions of dollars to be paid back, and having the cities health insurance bill double. Despite all that I brought the red line into Davis Sq., built a new comprehensive high school, planted over 4000 trees, refurbished every city park and square, rebuilt over two hundred streets and much more, yet in my ten years I never once used any part of the 2 ½ percent that I could by law use to raise taxes. All of this is a matter of public record and fact. This doesn’t sound like a mayor that would give a building away for a $1.00.

Eugene c. Brune
152 curtis street
Somerville
Former mayor
Present register of deeds