November

By Rosalie Tirella

… one of Worcester’s loathesome ‘anonymous’ cyber bullies has dumped on everybody – even Jesus. Writing a few years back, under his name and not Internet moniker THE COUNT, Kush wrote to his readers, HAPPY ZOMBIE JESUS DAY. It was early April. We can assume Kush was wishing his cohorts a Happy Easter.

What does Worcester get if it chooses to make this nincompoop a city councilor? It gets a cyber bully. A coward. An immature and stupid kid, too connected to have to work hard and chart his own course. A kid who knows that because he is the son of a long-time reporter at the T and G that he will get the powder puff treatment as he makes his belly flop into politics. A guy who has lied about Worcester’s public and private folks, a guy who trumpeted his disdain for Worcester only to turn around and decide that he wants to represent her people as an elected official, a stupid kid who got a city job through his parents and then decided to trash the city, Worcester, in an anonymous blog, STUCK IN COW.

Who needs a twit like Kush deciding important issues like city pension reform or slot casino violence? Who needs a guy who for years was known in the Woo blogosphere as The Count, a persona from which spewed all sorts of hateful ideas, loathesome comments about all things Worcester. Kush, as cowardly and sick as local blogger Claude Dorman, who has been hauled into court several times for the libel/lies he upchucks, was never brave enough to use his real name when writing vile, hurtful lies. Like Dorman, who lives on 38 Sever St., and blogs as the ‘anonymous’ whack job Will WW on his Worcester Wonderland blog, Kush was ‘outed’ by local dude Paulie Collyer. Collyer, who can sniff out a creep as expertly as his sweet Beagle Ginny can track a weiner all the way to Coney Island Hot Dogs, was not up for Kush’s venom. Kush’s lies about him and his life sent Paulie on a journey: The quest to unmask THE COUNT, who by the way, left little photos of The Muppet character as a visual tag to go with his toxic tales, all of which were written while he was an employee of the City of Worcester.

It is pathetic when someone stupid manages to land a job with the city because he is somewhat connected – Kush’s mother Kathy Robertson worked as a community liason flak for Holy Cross college and his dad, Bronny Kush writes for the daily – but it is insulting when the connected loser is the author of an anti-Worcester blog, STUCK IN COW. COW being the acronym for City of Worcester.

Kush also took money from local political candidates as a political consultant – a bribe to get in good with Daddy-Reporter Kush? – only to trash his clients on his blog and Claude Dorman’s blog.

Idiots like Kush and Dorman act out, like all bullies, to feel better about themselves. Woo should send them both packing to … Afghanistan.

By Rosalie Tirella

… Or fib? Or bull-shit? Or pad her resume?

District 4 voters need to know.

Incumbent District 4 City Councilor Barbara Haller has so much integrity. She works tirelessly – at everything. Her relationship with the Main South CDC goes back years. She and director Steve Teasdale are friends who have worked on countless projects together through the years.

So why did her challenger, Sarai Rivera, attach a doctored Main South CDC logo to her campaign literature? Why did she bull shit the community and make it seem like the Main CDC was endorsing her candidacy, when, according to Teasdale, it was most clearly NOT. The CDC was shocked that Rivera would do such a thing.

Sarai gave a weak excuse.

This kind of bull shit must stop.

Another example of Sarai Rivera’s “stretching the truth”: during the recent debate between the two District 4 candidates a few nights ago, the daily reported that Sarai said something like to the crowd: I am already doing all the work of a city councilor and I will continue to … .

No, Sarai, you are not doing ALL the work – especially all the work that City Councilor Barbara Haller does for her district. Pretty much from the morning to night – all the time. For years …

Let’s stop stretching the truth, Sarai Rivera. Voters don’t want to elect liars.

Of course, creepy rabble rouser Keven Ksen is running Rivera’s campaign. The 40-soemthing Ksen does not even have a job – living off his parents bucks/trust fund, no doubt. And – of course – he is not getting paid by Sarai. More “volunteer” work for Kev! Keven was pretty much fired by the City of Worcester from his Common Ground CDC job after an incident with the Worcester police over his camera. Ksen, whose short fuse makes him scary-mean, saw the funds for his job at Common Ground magically disappear after that incident – years ago. He hasn’t made traction since – but he always makes it a point every election cycle to try to destroy Barbara Haller. Every election cycle Ksen throws his weight behind Haller’s challengers – any challenger really. Which is what a few biz owners/property developers on Chandler Street do, too. Cynical moves, really.

So now it’s Sarai for Kev. Or Kev for Sarai!

But not for District 4 – we hope! Because they are playing the election game a little dirty.

Another question: Sarai claims she is a pastor and then claims she is a social worker. Which is it? What does she do?

Voters need to be respected. Not finessed.

By Dean Jacob Williamson

When I found out that I would need a community representative for my Eagle project, my father knew exactly who to call. He knew a city councilwoman who not only knew a lot about city government, but also cared about each and every one of her constituents. That councilwoman was Barbara Haller. She is known throughout the community not for being another politician who cared more about herself than anyone else, but for being a veritable person concerned for her fellow Worcesterites. Barbara Haller was a great help to me before, during, and after my Eagle project.

I contacted Barbara Haller early this spring about my Eagle project, and she was quick to respond. I have always had problems trying to get in touch with those in the government but not with Barbara Haller. She emailed me back with a few questions about my project and took the time to meet with me over lunch. I was impressed by how well she knew the city and those in the community. I needed to contact people about grants and permission to start my project, and she knew who to call. She helped jumpstart my project right then and there.

My project was to restore the planters of Pleasant Street. Many of the planters were not taken care of and filled with water and trash. My project was to raise support and volunteers to rid the pots of the trash and water and fill them with dirt and flowers. This required some money. Barbara Haller knew some people involved with the Greater Worcester Community Foundation and helped me write a grant application. Unfortunately, the grant did not go through, but Barbara Haller gave me the idea to go door to door down Pleasant Street raising support. The community was willing to help and we raised all the money needed.

While all of the planning and fundraising was going on, Barbara Haller kept in touch with me and offered me plenty of advice and help. I did not have to keep sending emails to her to get her to respond; she sent emails to me to see how things were progressing. This kept me focused and on task. I do not know how I would have completed my project if it was not for her. I do not believe that any other city councilperson would have helped me the way Barbara Haller did.

The most kind and humble thing Barbara Haller did for my Eagle project was to get her hands dirty and help. It rained the day of my project and the dirt turned to mud, yet Barbara Haller did not think it was beneath her to plant flowers in the rain. Barbara Haller used her hands as well as her brains and connections to help me with my project.

Barbara Haller was there every step of the way for my project. She did not just benefit me with her help; she benefited the entire community. If you want someone who cares deeply about the community and those who make it up, then vote for Barbara Haller. The Pleasant Street community would be sorely lacking without Barbara Haller representing it. I believe I will turn 18 just before elections this year; Barbara Haller will get my very first vote.

By Rosalie Tirella

… Or fib? Or bull-shit? Or pad her resume?

District 4 voters need to know.

Incumbent District 4 City Councilor Barbara Haller has so much integrity. She works tirelessly – at everything. Her relationship with the Main South CDC goes back years. She and director Steve Teasdale are friends who have worked on countless projects together through the years.

So why did her challenger, Sarai Rivera, attach a doctored Main South CDC logo to her campaign literature? Why did she bull shit the community and make it seem like the Main CDC was endorsing her candidacy, when, according to Teasdale, it was most clearly NOT. The CDC was shocked that Rivera would do such a thing.

Sarai gave a weak excuse.

This kind of bull shit must stop.

Another example of Sarai Rivera’s “stretching the truth”: during the recent debate between the two District 4 candidates a few nights ago, the daily reported that Sarai said something like to the crowd: I am already doing all the work of a city councilor and I will continue to … .

No, Sarai, you are not doing ALL the work – especially all the work that City Councilor Barbara Haller does for her district. Pretty much from the morning to night – all the time. For years …

Let’s stop stretching the truth, Sarai Rivera. Voters don’t want to elect liars.

Of course, creepy rabble rouser Keven Ksen is running Rivera’s campaign. The 40-soemthing Ksen does not even have a job – living off his parents bucks/trust fund, no doubt. And – of course – he is not getting paid by Sarai. More “volunteer” work for Kev! Keven was pretty much fired by the City of Worcester from his Common Ground CDC job after an incident with the Worcester police over his camera. Ksen, whose short fuse makes him scary-mean, saw the funds for his job at Common Ground magically disappear after that incident – years ago. He hasn’t made traction since – but he always makes it a point every election cycle to try to destroy Barbara Haller. Every election cycle Ksen throws his weight behind Haller’s challengers – any challenger really. Which is what a few biz owners/property developers on Chandler Street do, too. Cynical moves, really.

So now it’s Sarai for Kev. Or Kev for Sarai!

But not for District 4 – we hope! Because they are playing the election game a little dirty.

Another question: Sarai claims she is a pastor and then claims she is a social worker. Which is it? What does she do?

Voters need to be respected. Not finessed.

By Lorraine Laurie, Green Island neighborhood activist

As a Green Island Neighborhood activist since 1981, I have seen Worcester City government move from 9 At- Large Councilors to 6 At- Large and 5 District Councilors. This was definitely a change for the better, at the neighborhood level and Citywide. The first District 4 City Councilor elected was Janice Nadeau. I had gotten to know Janice through Worcester Fair Share and her efforts to improve the quality of life in her own South Worcester neighborhood.

Janice brought her dedication and no nonsense way of handling neighborhood issues to her job serving the densely populated district. I remember Janice’s many trips and letters to the License Commission when residents felt that there were just too many bars on Millbury Street.

Then there were the years and years of Rt. 146 meetings and Janice was always there advocating for the area. She wouldn’t let the officials and engineers forget that the flooding issues in Green Island and under the Cambridge Street Bridge had to be addressed. Illness, however, forced Janice Nadeau to decide to retire and not seek re-election. The District 4 seat was now up for grabs.

Barbara Haller’s name had been mentioned as a possible successor to Janice. I had first heard of Barbara in articles about the Beacon/ Brightly Initiative. I then started seeing her at meetings involving crime prevention and neighborhood services and funding. Barbara Haller’s name appeared on the ballot at the next election and she was the successful winner of the District 4 seat. Click to continue »

By Rosalie Tirella

I called Worcester city council/mayor candidate Bill Coleman last night. He writes for us and is also a friend who has helped me in so many ways, both personally and professionally (i. e. building shelves to hold ICT issues, doing small carpentry/handy man projects around the house; listening to me when I need a sounding board, etc.).

So yesterday I said: “Hey, Bill, I just read Nick K.’s column on you. I thought it sucked. You finished 8′th in the preliminary election (for an at large city council seat – you need to place 6th or better) and he showed you no respect. Minimized your very strong showing by poking fun at you.”

Bill, ever the optimist, didn’t see it that way. “It was OK!”

I guess Bill believes crappy press is better than no press at all.

Wrong.

Nick and the T & G have been making fun of Bill Coleman for years. And in a way, Nick’s latest column on Bill smacked of a more subtle kind of racism. If another of the city council candidates – white and well heeled – had won the spot Bill did this past preliminary election, Nick would have written an entirely different piece. He would have been impressed! He would have written: Look out incumbents! But no. It was just Bill who won. So Nick poked fun and make jokes. In Nick’s column, Bill didn’t get any credit for the job he did so well (8th place!) – only back-handed compliments. Crumby compliments that pissed me off – and lots of Bill’s supporters, of which there are many.

Nick, when was the last time we had an African American city councilor? When was the last time we have had a person of color speak for people of color – or just regular folks – on the Worcester City Council?

Maybe like twice in the City of Worcester’s history.

Bill Coleman has made a name for himself in Worcester doing many good deeds, meeting a ton of people, listening to their concerns, touting the folks and establishments he loves. He is as high energy as they come – certainly more energetic than you, Nick, a fat, gray-haired, old columnist who has overstayed his visit, when it comes to covering politics in this town. You have been around for so long (more than 25 years!!) you can’t even tell that the city you have been writing about so drippily for eons is changing.

WORCESTER NEEDS NEW COLUMNISTS for NEW TIMES!

By Rosalie Tirella

City Councilor at Large Mike (Michael) Germain has never, ever, EVER taken the 84% pay raise the Worcester City Council so sneakily awarded itself four or so years ago – right after the November election, of course! Right in the middle of a recession, of course!

Mike Germain stood tall. He told his colleagues that it didn’t seem right to take city/taxpayer money (almost another $15,000 per city councilor) – especially at a time like this. Hooray! We applauded such behavior then and we applaud it now, seeing Mike continues to refuse the money – a good chunk of change. Germain’s decision smacks of integrity – something sorely lacking in many of our Worcester political “leaders” these days!

We remember our old pal, former city coucnilor Dennis Irish, doing the same – he refused the pay hike, too. Dennis had/has a ton of integrity, too!

Germian’s good choice, something he hasn’t played up this election cycle, should be noted by the voters. Germain, who is up for reelection, could have taken the dough – raising his stipend from almost $15,000 to almost $30,000 a year. HE DID NOT. He believes in Worcester, loves Worcester and felt during these tough economic times, the City Council doesn’t need to wring blood out of a turnip.

Everyone else on the Worcester City Council is taking the money. Add it up! That’s a minority teacher recruiter pay check – or maybe a jumpstart for the Worcester Public Library Book Mobile program!

This says a lot for Mike Germain (and Dennis Irish). If re-elected, Mike Germain will still forgo the pay raise, unlike his colleagues who, we think are being a bit greedy, since as a city councilor, you get tons of perks like getting city health insurance at the cheapo premium rate (25%), getting a city pension and a free lap top.

Again, voters should remember this come November.

By Rosalie Tirella

Why did just 9% of registered voters in Worcester go to the polls in the recent city preliminary election? Moves like this one: After Mayor Joe O’Brien announced he would not seek re-election, Worcester At Large City Councilor Joe Petty, one of the boys in the Murray/Rushton boys club – the boys club that has been running this town for years, decided – just hours later – to run for Mayor of Worcester.

Petty made his announcement in less than 24 hours!

Just like that! Amazing! Spectacular!

I bet Petty wasn’t planning on running for mayor of New England’s second largest city, had no pressing issues he wanted to champion, had no special vision of the Worcester that he wanted to realize. He simply got a phone call from the boys club and they said: Run, Joe, run! Run for mayor! KILL KONNIE LUKES! RUN AGAINST HER SO SHE WON’T BE WORCESTER MAYOR AGAIN! (Lukes was mayor prior to O’Brien) And Petty, the good soldier, said OK. No biggie.

What a cynical move – on Petty’s part and the Boys’ Club. What a cynical way to run your politics. What a crumby way to run a city or present yourself to the voters.

This is why no one votes in Worcester! What’s the point? voters ask themselves. It’s all pre-planned, pre-ordained.

Hell, Petty is a good egg, but he has zero charisma and has never displayed any kind of leadership on any city issue – and I have been watching our city council for years. Yes, he wants Verizon’s tax loopholes closed; yes, he wants our cable contract with Charter looked at very carefully. But that is all I remember Petty getting passionate – well, not exactly passionate about – but at least leading a discussion about at city council meetings. Click to continue »

By Rosalie Tirella

In a way, we didn’t deserve him. In a way, Joseph – “Joe” – O’Brien, Worcester’s first true progressive mayor, was too darned forward-thinking for the dunderheads in this city – most of whom took to calling him “commie,” “socialist,” and other such perjoratives when O’Brien did enlightened things like advocate for immigrants in Arizona and district representation on the Worcester School Committee. etc. – ideas and proclamations that we at InCity Times CHEERED! Absolutely cheered! But the morons of Worcester – of which there are scads – couldn’t see the light that Joe O’Brien shone for all the heat they were generating. I couldn’t believe, as I read cop-ed columns, people’s/community leaders’ quotes in local papers, etc how positively cuckoo for cocoa puffs the nuts in this town would go when confronted with new, good ideas – ideas that O’Brien put out in a clear, thoughtful and sensitive way.

The bashing was something we at InCity Times thought only happened to us! Not to (basically) a Worcester insider like Joe O’Brien. I mean, he had the Irish name, Congressman’s Jim McGovern’s support, the Tim Murray impramateur tattooed on his butt, for Cripes sake – and yet – yet – the morons of Worcester went at O’Brien like the Roman gladiators went after the first Christians in the Colesseum!

But Mayor Joe O’Brien continued to bravely follow his head and his heart – put out one great idea after another. Even when people like fellow city councilor Paul Clancy – the so called “dean of the Worceser City Council – slagged him in the press. Even when the T & G treated him like some martian who had just disembarked from his shiny flying sacuer. It was heartbreaking – and yet inspiring. No matter what the powers that be said – Joe O’Brien stayed true to his ideas – ideas/plans that we have applauded on these pages, plans that have included: a Latino student task force, the banning of exotic animal acts in Worcester, the cheerleading and creation of community gardens in Worcestwer’s inner-city neighbrohoods, his total support of the MCAS-weary Goddard School staff/teachers, families and students. Also: O’Brien’s support of raising chickens in city limits (very cool!), his belief that all kids – no matter what their color or socio-ecomomic backgrounds must succeed in our Worcester Public Schools, his support for improving/repairing the buildings/grounds of Worceser’s inner-city schools, his desire to make our public schools the best in the state – so the city can continue to draw middle- and upper-middle-class families.

And the list goes on: such as O’Brien’s PURPOSELY living in Worcester’s inner-city, suporting the good work of the Main South CDC, WALKING to work so that he can get a true taste of what is going on in our city and talk with folks who may not otherwise feel comfortable accessing him in City Hall, creating longer mayor office hours so working people can meet with him in city hall to discuss their concerns. And, let’s not forget, O’Brien’s pushing the City of Worcester to hire local contractractors/companies for local city construction work and other jobs.

My list goes on and on. We have become one of O’Brien’s biggest cheerleaders! We regret the not so great past in which we defended Grace Ross to Joe’s detriment (BUT GRACE would support Joe on all his issues – we know it!)

But I digress! Everything that Mayor Joseph O’Brien proposed for this city was the right thing to do – the Catholic thing to do.

Many of O’Brien’s detractors – the morons – couldn’t wait to kick O’Brien out of the mayor’s chair this election cycle because they were afraid of the vision of the city Joe was presenting to us all – a picture, I think, that is the true snapshot of where Worcester is in the early part of the 21′st century and where it is going. Immigrants, the rising Latino population, an underclass that has not been helped enough, good, safe housing for our poor families (to stabilize our schools!), the environment … . These are all truths that will continue to bloom as the years pass, years after we all bite the Wormtown dust.

My guess? O’Brien would have won the mayoral seat again. He is too well liked and respected by lots of good people, he had the support of the unions (even though he pushed them to pay a teeny bit more on their health insurance premiums), and the business community likes what he was/is doing for them (for example, the business round table he set up).

This would be a truly sad time if O’Brien had decided to pull out of the Worcester city council all together.

We, however, are lucky. Joseph O’Brien is still running for an At Large City Council seat. We are ecstatic!

We say YES to Joe O’Brien – yes! to his vision of Worcester and his continuing the fab work he is doing for all of us – especially the Worcester of tomorrow.

By Michael Moore

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Friends,

This letter contains (almost) no criticisms of how the Democrats have brought this day of reckoning upon themselves.

Today, we have one job and one job only: Stop the return of the bigger criminal class, the Party of War, the people who (with a few Democratic enablers) manufactured the very mess we are in.

There is good news this morning: The final ABC/Washington Post poll shows that, among registered voters, people still say they prefer the Democrats over the Republicans by 5 percentage points. It’s only when the pollsters ask “likely voters” who they want that the Republicans come out ahead by a few points.

So it’s clear the majority of voters want the Dems, but the prediction is the Republicans will win because Dem voters are going to stay home.

So, our mission is simple: MAKE SURE NO ONE WE KNOW STAYS HOME TODAY. Click to continue »