It’s no secret that I’m still a pretty big supporter of Governor Deval Patrick. For one, most of the things cited by dissatisfied voters, even to this day, are the stupidest, trivial things that when looked at factually, actually aren’t scandals. I speak of the silly drapes/Caddy malarkey. More about how silly those are a at a later date. But as someone who follows policy making pretty carefully, I have to say, there is a great deal which has been accomplished with Patrick, far more than people realize.
A lot of this has been on the boring issue of actually governing. For instance, putting people in charge of departments who care about delivering the services of said department - like, the DEP has people in it now that want to protect the environment. And so on. But the other leg of governing policy is about reforming the system which creates such cynics in our voters every time they open the newspaper.
We need a lot of reform in MA. You can blame the all-Democrat legislature if you want, and they bear a large share of the blame, but we can also look at past Republican governors - many of whom were perfectly fine with allowing friends to feather their own nests in our current system. The legislature also, for better or worse, took a lot of power away from the executive in those years, creating a whole cadre of quasi-independent agencies and places where old pols and their friends go to pad their pensions.
This past year, Governor Patrick has had a harder time getting this session’s legislature on board with his agenda, what with the removal (for good reasons) of Speaker DiMasi, who was at least in large part a partner on many issues, and the electing of DeLeo as Speaker. Patrick took on three areas of reform last spring, and when it was evident that the legislature was dragging its feet or watering the changes down too far, Patrick dug in his heels on multiple occasions. While the resultant pension, transportation, and ethics reform were not perfect, they were much stronger than we had expected, given the legislature’s poor record of policing itself (and not wanting to give power back to the executive).
Oh, we got the usual squeaking from the lege about how the Governor was being unfair and not working with them, yadda yadda, but the Gov played hardball. (How I wish President Obama would take a page out of that book!) And the Commonwealth benefited.
The Governor is now looking to take on another nest of vipers, the Probation department.
Governor Deval Patrick, in his new budget this week, will seek to wrest control of one of the fastest-growing but most secretive state agencies, taking direct charge of the probation officers who supervise criminals when they serve their sentences outside a prison cell.
Patrick’s proposal would largely remove the Probation Department from the court system, where, critics say, it has become a backwater of patronage jobs and bloated budgets, operating mostly independent of other public safety agencies.
See a BMGer’s take here. Outraged Lib also talks about it here. (All links via BMG.)
I honestly don’t know much personally about the Probation Department and its foibles. But if we can save money, be more efficient, and cut out a lot of the patronage crap, I’m all for it. You could argue that Patrick is doing this because it’s an election year, but I don’t think that tells the whole story. This Gov has consistently tried, with a good deal of success, to reform the system during his tenure. All this while dealing with downward spiraling revenues of this recession, delivering pretty responsible budgets, saving our quasi-indies from their own bad debt situations, managing to keep Chapter 70 and local aid uncut, and promising to preserve said local funding next year.
Anyone who remembers the disaster Mitt Romney was after the smaller, shorter recession in 2002 should be able to appreciate what not cutting the school money means to our local communities.
This Governor, with the help of the previously friendly legislature, put green jobs, and other high-skill industries like biotech, on the front burner when we were in good times. He began the Growth Districts initiative, which has obvious impacts right here in Lowell. Not only is he reform-minded, governing well in terms of delivering services, and balancing our precarious budget, but he has also put a long term vision in place to see us through past the recession and into better days. It’s all the little things that add up - such as his proactive work on creating a priority list of physical infrastructure replacement and repair needs, which made Mass a shoe-in for a lot of that stimulus money.
There are a lot of reasons that we’d be a lot worse off with a different Governor, and very little proof that either of the Republicans running to replace Patrick in 2010 would do any better. They won’t work any better than Patrick with the sometimes-reticent legislature; Patrick has proven he can both work with them, and, when necessary, push them hard. The Republican Governors in this state have been irresponsible, delayed important decisions to the future (such as rebuilding bridges), and in many ways, worsened the patronage problem. Certainly, a couple decades of these Republicans didn’t fix the corruption problem; we only saw it get worse under them. Some of them had a foot halfway out the door before their first term was up.
Thanks, but I’ll stick to what works, to give this Governor a second term to continue to fix the problems we have, to ensure a fair and even budget, to reduce corruption and to continue some of his innovative ideas on how to make government work better. My worry in this 2010 election is that not enough people know the great work and impressive headway this Governor has made in his first term. Has he made mistakes? Who doesn’t? Certainly, anyone who reads this blog knows how I feel about legalizing casinos. They could have been out in front of stories on several occasions when the media decided to make hay in order to sell papers, creating some sort of perception of Patrick as an elitist who is just like the rest of ‘em, when in honest reality, that is completely false.
You might think I’m some doe-eyed supporter who overlooks all the flaws because it’s more comfortable, but that just means you don’t know me very well. I really, honestly, in my heart of hearts can still support Governor Patrick for reelection, because I like what I’ve seen for three years, and I want to see more. So count me in for 2010.
January 25th, 2010 at 3:44 pm
The Gov. took on many issues and did get some reforms through and he did try to get others through that the House/Senate ignored and fought him on them. He wanted to make more Ethic changes but the House wants to keep their $$ and most don’t care about real reform. They would not give up the $18,000,000.00 (MILLION) dollar PAC Fund they are sitting on and will not give up the Probation Dept. (that is one of their last outpost for political jobs along with the Sheriff departments).
But given the rate of unemployment and the anger shown by the people last week in the election of Scott Brown and “the stupidest, trivial things that when looked at factually, actually aren’t scandals (Like Marion Walsh or cars plus insurance and AAA for Welfare participants) he faces a tough road.
The voters are not pleased no matter how you spin it and even though he tried to make changes as once was said “ It’s the Economy Stupid”…and people are angry.
The Gov. has to somehow hope he can get Tim Cahill to draw only a small piece of the unhappy Democrats and that Charlie Baker gets the Republicans and the three somehow split the un-enrolled so he ends up with 34% of the vote.
In a three man race that is all he needs, so like him or not if he does stay in the race Thanks to Tim Cahill he has in my opinion an above average chance. If he was one on one he would lose like Coakley did.
If he can once again get the grass root element that he used in his first victory engaged again (Given the times we live in I don’t see that being an easy accomplishment)it is one that could be achieved.
If he has a core of die-hards like yourself willing to work hard, emailing, posting and talking his points (while getting beat up for it) the fight will be an interesting one.
Good Luck
January 25th, 2010 at 5:34 pm
To be fair, many of the reforms Patrick got passed were also introduced by Romney but the legislature refused to do anything about them
January 25th, 2010 at 9:08 pm
The Gov just threw the Legislature under the bus, and they will not react well to that.
He proposed that local aid and chapter 70 not be cut.. yet there are billions that need to be cut from the state budget. Lets see where he plans on cutting.
He’s trying to play hero and make them the bad guys. I don’t think they’ll like that very much.
January 25th, 2010 at 9:52 pm
In addition, there is this “little” matter that the legislature will have to vote on shortly http://www.mass.gov/legis/bills/house/186/ht04pdf/ht04421.pdf
A big bailout for the City of Lawrence with NO receiver attached.
I would implore our legislature to NOT pass this bill (the taxpayers bill) unless there is a receiver team attached.
While every other community in the Commonwealth is held to a standard of accountability AND on the receiving end of the cuts, Lawrence should not be held to a lesser standard and let off the hook. Hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars have gone into this city and very little has changed.
January 26th, 2010 at 9:33 am
Does he even run again in Nov.? I think looking at his low poll numbers and that the general chatter is 2010 is going to be a tough year for incumbents sees him fleeing to DC to “help his friend” the President. His track record in the private sector shows that when he comes up against a stiff headwind he moves on. Why should now be any different?
January 26th, 2010 at 11:23 am
Does he even run again in Nov.? I think looking at his low poll numbers and that the general chatter is 2010 is going to be a tough year for incumbents sees him fleeing to DC to “help his friend” the President. His track record in the private sector shows that when he comes up against a stiff headwind he moves on. Why should now be any different?
Because he’s said he will.
January 26th, 2010 at 12:06 pm
Forgive me for not taking a politician at his word. Things change and he may be rethinking his stance. Plus this is the same guy who endorsed Marcos Devers for office and then later that same week showed up at a Willie Lantigua fundraiser and endorsed him for the same office. Since then Tommy Duggan has repeatedly asked our esteemed Governor to clarify which candidate he endorsed back then and Deval Patrick has fleed the scene each and every time. (It’s on tape.) Keep swilling the kool-aid Tim. I wasn’t saying he was going to DC- I was asking the age old question.
January 26th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
Shawn:
Are you sure that you do not have the subject and the direct object of your sentence reversed?
January 26th, 2010 at 2:37 pm
Shawn
They are the BAD GUYS…NOT Voting to cut their 18 Million Slush Fund..Not voting for tougher ethics and conflict of interest laws..Not voting to dis-allow State funded Colleges and Universities from using our Tax dollars hiring lobbyist to get the State School more State money…Not voting to allow charging Inmates $5.00 a day Room.Board..Not voting on restrictions for Elderly drivers..Not voting on the Budget line by line just yay or nay for the whole thing so they can state (as TG does, he was opposed to the Sales Tax) yet he voted for the budget only Nangle did not locally. Constantly electing Speakers who are corrupt and spending over $600,000 to defend them.
I’m not a Deval fan but the Gov. did force through some changes and deserves to be noted for them. To bad if they don’t like it. Finally someone is calling attention to the fact THEY are responsible for a lot of the issues in this state.
January 26th, 2010 at 5:25 pm
Yeah, I don’t have a lot of sympathy for the hack wing of the state legislature, nor their hack Speaker.
They sound like a bunch of whiny babies, sometimes. “He’s picking on us!” Yeesh. My 5 year old niece is more mature it would seem.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:53 am
Thanks for laying it out there, Lynne. I am shocked by the number of friends I had considered “good Democrats” who are Baker supporters because “Patrick has done nothing”. I don’t get it. But I have posted a link to this discussion on my facebook account (as well as one to today’s Globe editorial on the same topic) in hopes of educating a few about this administration’s accomplishments.
January 28th, 2010 at 11:32 am
The Mark,
There can absolutely be no doubt at this point the Governor is seeking re-election. State convention caucuses are next month and delegate slates for other candidates would have had to be well on their way to forming by now. His senior campaign staff is in place and many volunteers are already active. He had a conference call with many of them on the night of the State of the Commonwealth and he is ready to run and win.