Ordinarily, it wouldn't make headlines. But the fact that the town of Bridgewater is expanding the hours of operation for its library and senior center during a recession makes headlines for several reasons.

First of all, while many in the state Legislature are saying "taxes" is a forbidden word during this election year, Bridgewater residents voted for a $2.8 million Proposition 2 1/2 override last month.

Times are tough everywhere, with deep cuts to funding for schools, public safety and public services in this year's and next year's budgets. Bridgewater Town officials responded by holding school funding steady and cutting everything else.

Bridgewater residents responded by voting in favor of an override 57 percent to 43 percent. According to local political activist John Palmieri, Bridgewater residents wanted to preserve their quality of life in the town:

“I heard people who had historically voted against the override say, ‘I have to do this to save my town,’" Palmieri said. "I hadn’t heard that before, so it was a different sentiment and it really translated into the vote.”

The override vote followed nine straight years of budget cuts that saw city services slashed and library hours cut to 14 a week. The library is now open 26 hours a week.

Town Manager Troy Clarkson says the town is now beginning the process of rebuilding its infrastructure.

“This is the beginning of building a better Bridgewater,” Clarkson said. “The community came together and saw the importance of moving forward to rebuild this community.”

President Obama made a major speech on the need for immigration reform a couple of days before the 4th of July that got a pretty good review from called Immigration Returns from Paul Walman in the Pospect because it put us in the way back machine to 1921.

The American public was fed up with hordes of aliens pouring into the country, speaking foreign tongues and threatening to take jobs from native-born citizens. So Congress took decisive action, and passed the Emergency Quota Act.

It was 1921, and the new law, designed to solve the country's immigration problem, limited immigration from any one country to 3 percent of the population from that country counted in the 1910 census -- so if there were 100,000 immigrants from a particular nation already here, then only 3,000 more could be admitted per year.

But countries in the Western Hemisphere were exempt -- as many Canadians as wanted could immigrate, and the doors were wide open to Mexicans, Salvadorans, Brazilians, and everyone else from Latin America. At the time, the invaders that threatened to dilute the American character were thought to come from our east (especially southern Europe) and west (China) but not our north and south.

And then back to 1780 or so

 

It’s not easy being transparent and Bill Galvin, Secretary of State,  has pulled off a triumph in the state wide transparency challenge with his office’s web site that helps public policy advocates decide if and when they should register as lobbyists and how to report their activities and expenses.

One of the key ethics reforms passed last year contain big changes in the lobbying laws that specifically define “lobbying activities” and define exactly who must register as an executive or legislative lobbyist. All in response to a bunch of bad guys who disgraced the profession of lobbyists.

New Reforms Will Make Government More Transparent and Accountable

By Guest Writer, Deirdre Cummings,
Legislative Director, MASSPIRG

Transparency advocates praised last night’s vote by the Massachusetts Senate approving two reforms which will set a new standard for government transparency and accountability.

With unanimous votes during its budget debate, the Senate created a searchable new state budget website, making transparent much of state spending and revenue sources for all state agencies, including quasi publics. The website will allow the public, including local officials, businesses, lawmakers, citizens, and others to see where the state is investing our tax dollars.

Over the past year, in nearly every state across our country, newspapers have been filled with stories of state legislatures and town committees trying to work their budgets out of the red.

These times of fiscal crisis can be opportunities for us all to work together to rebuild healthy, safe, and appropriately-funded state and local communities, but we can only be effective in these efforts if all involved have access to the necessary budget and revenue information.

Brockton community members have demonstrated their agreement as evidenced by at least two school committee members refusing to meet secretly with their Superintendent, and by the recent opinion piece on in The Enterprise regarding secret school committee meetings surrounding a potential layoff of hundreds of staff:

"As we face a serious financial crisis, the superintendent needs to lead openly, strongly and decisively. He can dispel any questions about his abilities to steer Brockton's system to even higher academic achievements if parents and citizens are certain of his strength and clear thinking under pressure.

But no one can support what they can't see or hear... [more]

The Eastern Massachusetts water crisis of 2010 offers us a teachable moment about the importance of the public systems and structures we depend on in Massachusetts.

It goes without saying that we take for granted the clean water we depend on every day for all our needs. We turn on the tap and know that the water that comes out will be drinkable and will never be in short supply. But the public systems that ensure that this water is inspected and safe and the public structures that collect, convey and clean the water are invisible to us. Out of sight, out of mind.

The water system is the perfect metaphor for the challenges we face in making the case for government. Most government systems that keep us safe and make life possible in our country are invisible to us: regulatory systems, air traffic controllers, environmental protection, social safety net services. We depend on these systems and thrive because of their existence. But when most of us think of government, we bring to mind the most visible forms of government, like elected officials and police. Our interactions with the public face of government and what we read about them in the media – good or bad – colors our opinion of government. The rest of government we think of as a vast, amorphous bureaucracy.

It’s an unfortunate characteristic of human nature that we often don’t appreciate what we have until we lose it. And we also often don’t notice our public systems and structures until they malfunction. A busted traffic signal gets more attention than a functioning one, in the same way we notice potholes more than smooth stretches of road, failing bridges more than safe ones, corrupt public servants more than those who do the job we elected them to do. While a broken water conduit is a rare occurrence, it grabs headlines in ways that the well-functioning water system we’ve depended on all our lives ever could.

This is why it’s much more likely that our friends and neighbors will have a negative view of government than a positive one.

We know that the public structures that make our state a great place to live can only be maintained and repaired with our shared support. That is why the nine votes in support of Rep. Matthew Patrick's amendment on dividends and interest are so important.

Those nine votes are a clear indication that representatives took to heart the calls our Greater Boston, Pioneer Valley, and South Coast and Cape members made, urging our legislators to support our communities with adequate revenues. Both rank-and-file reps and those in leadership positions backed the amendment in the face of stiff resistance from House Speaker DeLeo and Ways and Means Chairman Charles Murphy, both of whom have stated their opposition to any new revenues.

Speaking on the House floor, Rep. Patrick characterized his amendment as a call for the Legislature to look more closely at the tax system: "This is really the beginning of a conversation we need to have," he said. "We can't let talk radio dictate tax policy."

Our Leadership Team voted in favor of a campaign for new revenues in the 2011 state budget. ONE Massachusetts network members are calling on our legislators to close tax loopholes that cost the state money and close the budget gap, which is threatening our communities with drastic budget cuts.

We’re asking the Legislature to back to following revenue options:

• Restore of the tax on dividends and interest to 12 percent, with provisions to exempt moderate-income seniors (+/- $500 million)
• Cap of the Film Tax Credit for one year to save $75 million
• Limiting Life Sciences Tax Credits by $5 million
• Repeal of the Aircraft Sales Tax exemption ($4.5 million)
• Removing the sales tax exemption for cigars and smokeless tobacco ($15 million)
• Sales tax on candy and soda ($51 million)
• Support for transparency and accountability measures advance by Revenue Committee chairmen Ben Downing and Jay Kaufman and Gov. Patrick

CNN: Hudson River Plane Crash

As people across our state deal with flooding in our communities, I am reminded of the media response to the terrible Hudson River Airplane Crash just over a year ago.

Though the situation was clearly different - a very short-term, localized emergency event - the coverage seems familiar.

Nationwide coverage and popular response focused almost entirely on Chesley B.
"Sully" Sullenberger, the heroic pilot who landed the flight, but in large part, failed to fully-recognize  the carefully-coordinated efforts of private and public employees working together to make sure the safe landing stayed a positive story.

Ferry drivers, Coast Guard and Fire Department members, paramedics, nurses and doctors all followed plans from emergency coordinators with practiced contingency plans - built in advance so that tragic events can go as smoothly as possible.

CNN: Northeast Flooding 2010

Reading through flood coverage - and seeing it covered on both local and nationwide news footage - I see a lot of the same reaction. People on every channel and in every publication are shocked by the road-rivers flowing past homes and are worried about losing power to pumps working hard in their basements. People are shown being rescued from homes and vehicles by emergency workers and checking into their flood insurance policies.

And while all of these are very important stories, not enough people are speaking publicly about the historic causes and long-term planning we need to do to protect our communities for future natural disaster such as these floods. How are we going to repair and maintain the structures in our cities and towns that keep us safe?

It's time to take a long, hard look at what we value in our state - and how we want to support it. Last week, we discussed some potential revenue options.

Do you have ideas on how we should build a sound fiscal foundation for Massachusetts?

The ONE Massachusetts Leadership Team is meeting on April 2nd, and we're interested in using your suggestions to build our agenda for the upcoming budget season.

ONE Massachusetts network members are encouraging their legislative delegations to build new revenue options in next year's budget. Are you ready to encourage your legislators to take a close look at how they will support our communities - and avoid drastic cuts - with revenue options?

Here are a couple of sample talking points that could get you started...