Left In Lowell

Most Saturday’s as I am reading Kendall Wallace’s column, my reaction is WHAT? But not today. He is right on target.

Wallace endorses a pay raise for City Manager Bernie Lynch and he presents a series of arguments why the City Council should do the right thing not only for the City Manager but more importantly for the City.

Warren Shaw, on his Saturday morning radio show on WCAP, has been promoting giving Bernie a raise for two weeks now. Not only because it is the fair thing to do but he points out that it is damaging to the image of the City.

Last week’s the CC began the process of evaluating the City Manager. There is an ordinance that requires the CC to do that; an appropriate pay raise for the CEO of the City should be enthusiastically supported by this CC. As much as some of them talk about the “poor tax payer,” I did not hear any objections to the pay raises in all of the contracts they approve. I did not hear any objections to the pay raises they approved in the FY 2009 budget.

By the way, Wallace reminds us that Bernie has not received a raise since he arrived here two years ago; he makes substantially less than CM’s in cities’ comparable to Lowell; he makes substantially less than the School Superintendent who was given a $170,000/year salary and as a 5% increase written in her contract. If the Mayor thought that she was worth this much money, I wonder how much money he thinks Bernie should get.

If the CC members are really concerned about the “poor tax payers,” they will acknowledge that we are on the right track, that this guy works as hard as anyone who has ever sat in the CM chair and that he has brought a higher standard of government to City Hall.

I think it would be politically damaging to any City Council member to challenge a pay raise for Bernie. He is popular guy. The only ones who complain about him are those who believe that they should be members of a cabinet, and that they should be consulted on every issue; and of course, those who have lost their “access.” Too bad, this City has over 105,000 people living in it and he has been hired to administer the government of those people, not the selected few.

Not only should the CC give him an appropriate raise but they should give him a performance bonus.

Yesterday, the Lowell Sun reported that the Massachusetts Attorney General’s office has ruled that the University of Massachusetts Lowell ‘violated public bidding laws in awarding a $20 million student housing project to a local developer,” back in May.

These dorms were to be built with private funds, then leased back to the University. In his Sun article, Matt Murphy reports that “John Kendrick, president and CEO of Academic Village Foundation, filed a complaint after his bid was passed over, claiming the process was skewed to favor Brasi (the local developers) over other projects.”

The Brasi project calls for the U. Mass residential buildings to be constructed on Marginal Street; Kendrick’s plan has their dorms constructed on Pawtucket Street. I think they are referring to the old Burbeck Ice Cream site.

In today’s edition of the Sun, Murphy reports that Kendrick “is threatening to take the university to court if it doesn’t halt construction on the new dorm immediately.” Apparently, work continues on the dorm at Marginal Street while the University and the AG try to iron this out.

According to the Globe article on this subject, the University “argued that the project, which the developer would own and maintain, was private, giving them greater latitude in awarding the contract. But state officials office concluded that the public university created detailed specifications and design concepts for the building, and would in all likelihood assume ownership of the property eventually.” If that is the case, then the bidding process must follow state laws.

Increasing student housing is an essential part of Chancellor Marty Meehan’s plans for the University. Therefore, I am surprised that the University did not take every precaution to make sure that the process could not be challenged. It was not clear whether the AG’s office is asking to school to reopen the bidding process or award the bid to another entity. One thing is clear, either the new dorm will not be ready by August 2009, the University’s desired date, or it is going to be messy getting there.

The AG’s web page has not yet posted the ruling. When they do, I will link to it.