Gary Rosen

By Rosalie Tirella

… what Worcester School Committee girl (she is definitely no grown up!) Tracy Novick and Gary Rosen must be thinking re: race and WPS Superintendent Dr. Melinda Boone.

They certainly appear to be racist. Former city councilor Rosen writes that he guarantees – just absolutely guarantees! – that Dr. Melinda Boone (Worcester’s first female, black school school superintendent) is using Worcester as a stepping stone to … moving back South so she can put her legs up and relax with all her old friends and colleagues down home.

Pathetic.

Would Rosen have written that about any white Worcester mover-shaker guy who just landed one of the most demanding and high-paying city jobs Worcester has to offer?

Rosen, in his writing, intimates that Dr. Boone is lazy and not completely honest with the city (shuckin’ and jyvin’). He writes Dr. Boone is covering up, stone walling, fibbing, shutting out the city … . He makes her seem so nefarious … . All his comments are tinged with racism.

Then there’s Novick. She slaps a Freedom of Info request into Dr. Boone’s hand at a public meeting. When she writes about Dr. Boone, she always writes “Boone.”

There’s rudeness to Novick’s ways.

You would think these two folks would be proud of: Worcester’s first black school superintendent! Dr. Boone is a great role model for our minority majority Worcester Public School population. The kids love when she visits their schools!

You would think these two “educators” would be this agressive when it comes to: HIRING MORE MINORITY TEACHERS for our school system. Springfield, Hartford, Boston – these urban school systems have lots of minority teachers in all their schools. Worcester public schools look like the set of Leave it to Beaver.

Changes must be made. Change is already here in Dr. Boone.

Novick and Rosen are dragging the City of Worcester down.

The racists.

By Rosalie Tirella

Let’s take another look at the political subtext of the nasty/arrogant behavior of Worcester School Committeewomen Tracy Novick and Dianna Biancheria, re: The Goddard School MCAS brouhaha that they have managed to create, insulting WPS School Superintendent Dr,. Melinda Boone, the City of Worcester, Goddard School staff, students and families.

These two women are using the Goddard School to work out their issues re: The MCAS test in general (Novick, who loathes them and wants to do away with them – even though most educators and inner-city families want some kind of standardized test measuring the academic progress of students), the Mass Dept of Primary and Secondary Education (Novick has a vandetta against Mr. Chester and imtimated that he was corrupte), desire to oust Dr. Melinda Boone/racism (Novick and Biancheria resent this intelligent, caring and powerful African American woman), power/control (Novick and Biancheria do not know their boundaries and want to take it away from Dr. Boone – witness how the immature and shrill Novicik “slapped” her information request/letter in Dr. Boone’s hands at the last Worcester School Committee meeting. “unbelieveable” is how one political observer viewed Novick’s rudeness) and finally, both women’s disdain for then Mayor and now City Concilor Konnie Lukes who was instrumental in keeping the school superintendent search two years ago, fair, open, professional – and country-wide.

Good ol’ political Worcester boy Steve Mills did not get the job. The Worc. School Superintendent Search Committee, headed by WPI president and a lot of impressive/diverse Worcester business and educational and community leaders, chose Dr. Melinda Boone, who hails from Virginia – and is a beacon of professionalism and fairness. She is a role model for all our public school students – especially our kids of color. Novick – white, privileged, stay-at-home Mom who has never lived in the inner city and has never been poor/working class – has no idea how important a symbol Dr. Boone is for the WPSchools – a majority minority school district, where a majority of students are eligible for free or reduced-lunch (read poor) and whose parents know (to their very cores) that their kids’ school are neighborhood beacons of hope and caring, as well as education.

Konnie Lukes, John Monfredo, Joe O’Brien, Jack Foley and Mary Mullaney know this.

Novick has her head so far up her tight little asshole, she is incapable of seeing the truth. Biancheria is too dumb to have the kind of complex motives that Novick has – who will probably use the Goodard MCAS “scandal” to run for Worcester City Council soon (we hope she loses). Biancheria just feels left out, out of the loop, she says.

In other words, Dianna B.’s ass isn’t getting kissed often enough.

Dianna Biancheria worked at the Worcester public School Administration building on Irving Street. She was put into her high-paying position (a sinecure if ever there was one) by her ally and all around Worcester big-shot player, by former Worcester Mayor, Ray Mariano. Then she lost her job and all that money.

Dianna B. immediately ran for Worcester Public School Committee just to keep her fist in the money pie – and won, with the help of the Ray Mariano Political Machine. She – like all Worcester School Committee members – gets (around) a $15,000-a-year check for sitting on the Worcester School Committee.

Having watched the Goddard “showdown” a few weeks ago in which Dianna and Novick and strange political bed-fellow Brian O’Connell’s petition to see all the state records re: the Goddard MCAS test results (which classrooms was the “coaching” going on in, which tests were affected, which students were being inappropriately aided by which Goddard School teachers) get voted down 4 to 3 should have ended this creepy affair.

Nope. Novick and Biancheria are going to the state, filing freedom of information letters and the whole nine yards. Just to out to the community the Goddard students (how sad for the families!) and the teachers (whom everyone says are first-rate) to get what they need: their bizzarro egos fed, their misplaced need for control met and their (unconscious) racist, provincial desire to ruin the career (same motive of former Worcester city councilor Gary Rosen – the little dildo) of Dr. Melinda Boone, a woman way too classsy for these three.

By Rosalie Tirella

I got a chance to catch last week’s Worcester City Council meeting. Appalling! To see all our city councilors get up to kiss Police Chief Gary Gemme’s ass – after he throws out his “you- should-thank-God-for-the-WPD crime” report. For without us, Police Chief Gemme was telling the council (not so blatantly, of course) this place would be Dodge City!! This place would be overrun with crime and criminals!” (truth: Worcester has a lower crime rate than Hartford, Springield, etc because Woercester has more upper income folks/families living in our city limits than cities like Hartford or Springfield do. And rich people don’t commit the kinds of crimes poor/desperate people do. Springfiled, Hartford – even Providence – have many more poor people – poor neighborhoods – than we do. In fact, Hartford is one of the poorest cities in New England and one of the poorest in the USA!). Click to continue »

Rosalie,

Although I decided not to go through the rigors of a political campaign this fall, the election for State Representative in the 13th Worcester District is one year away (the fall of 2010). I shall use the next few weeks and months to assemble a strong campaign committee, recruit volunteers, raise money, and plan the strategies we’ll need for a successful result next fall.

And this man that you have labeled as old is going to use that foolish statement as encouragement and motivation. As a former teacher at Wachusett Regional High School, many families still remember and respect me for the fine education I gave their children. And soon I’ll be getting some needed exercise this fall into the early winter by leisurely walking the town of Paxton, knocking on doors and talking to registered voters.

But don’t worry, Rosalie, I have the intellect, ability, energy and character to serve the people of the 13th Worcester District quite well.

Best Regards,

Gary Rosen

By Rosalie Tirella

Yup! That was my first, true, gut – “visceral,” if you want to get fancy – reaction when I heard that these three guys are most likely going to run for State Rep. Bob Spellane’s seat when he vacates it next year to become a grown up.

While I have always liked City Counilor at Large Gary Rosen, at 64 years old, he’s simply too old to run for this seat. It’s like he’s embarking on a political career when he should be … gardening. It’s strange: Gary dropped out of the Worcester mayoral race last month because he said he wasn’t up to campaigning. Too energy-sapping. Too much work. But he would have done pretty well (won reelection to his city councilor at large seat) if he had just kept his name on the ballot and spent the rest of the fall sorting his sock drawer. But yeesh, Gary, a run for state rep slot? How many people in Paxton know you? How are you gonna reach all these voters? Think of all the Gary-Rosen-for-State-Rep combs you’ll have to pass out!

It just goes to show you: some people are 9 parts ego and 1 part human being. Click to continue »

By Rosalie Tirella

What a surprise! WPI, following the lead of the great Charles Monahan and his downtown college, has volunteered to make PILOT payments to the City of Worcester. $9.1 million! The money will be used to (re)open our flagship library on Salem Square. So now kids can go to their libray on Sundays or Mondays or Wednesday mornings (the times the library is now closed). InCity Times has been asking for this kind of commitment from Worcester’s private colleges for YEARS! And now, deep in the midst of a national, state and city financial meltdown, WPI has decided to do the right thing!

Thank you, WPI! Thank you, City Manager Mike O’Brien for brokering this ground breaking agreement! Thank you (and we never thought we’d be writing this) District City Councilor Phil Palmieri for hammering away at the colleges/nonprofits council meeting after council meeting. City Councilor at Large Gary Rosen has also been wonderful, even suggesting that the colleges support our library system. And also thanks to District Four City Councilor Barbara Haller who was pro-PILOT (Payment in Lieu for Taxes) from the get-go, years back.

But I also want to take time out to give special thanks to two people who pretty much got passed over last night when the Worcester City Council gave itself MOST of the credit. Special thanks to InCity Times supporter and hero Anthony Hmura of Leader Signs on Canterbury Street. I remember when I started my newspaper almost 8 years ago – and got a call from a ballsy ol’ man named Tony, who saw the first copy of ICT and wanted to be part of the mayhem!

“Let’s get the college’s to pay us money – the leeches!” he screamed. It was a bit over the top, but after listening to Tony, I was on his side. The private colleges in Worcester are truly multi-million dollar corporations and it was wrong for them not to pay the City of Worcester any taxes. Yes, they were tax exempt because they expanded people’s minds, trained them for careers and all that good stuff … but really! Pay something for all the city services you use: fire trucks, police, clean water, snow plowing, street cleaning/sweeping, etc.  What’s more Tony, a sign maker for more than 50 years, brought a class-consciousness to  the table; the college kids came to Worcester from places like suburban New Jersey and Connecticut and took one look at Worcester and decided to make her their personal garbage can/urinal!

So the anti-college/pro-PILOT Tony Hmura ads ran in InCity Times – many of them a tad … primative. Like the time we got a clip art photo of a fat cat smoking a cigar and wrote HOLY CROSS COLLEGE over it. Or the time we told Father McFarland, president of Holy Cross, to put up or shut the hell up! We told him to do the Christian thing and help the poor people in the South Worcester neighborhood that Holy Cross was nestled in. We ran photos of crushed beer cans, stories of South Worcester folks who shared apartment buildings with Holy Cross students who fornicated in the hall ways! And we got a reaction from folks! Thay were pissed off too!

Then the other papers followed Tony Hmura’s lead with shall we say more measured pieces. And so the rumblings for PILOT grew and grew and grew. Soon East Side activist Gary Vecchio jumped into the fray and demanded the colleges pay PILOT. Gary was relentless! He was all over the airwaves, TV, newspapers!

And finally, after all the work and fulminating …. WPI gives us $9.1 million! Hurrah!

Thanks to all!