Q&A with the Westminster Community Vine

1. Tell us a little about your background, and why you’ve chosen to run as a candidate for State Representative.

 I grew up in Worcester and I met a girl, Maura Mathews, from Holden shortly after I graduated from college, and we got married and moved to Holden to be closer to her Mom and Dad. We have two kids, Jon who is 14 and Patrick who is 12. I have been a residential roofing contractor for 23 years.  When I was young, it was all I wanted to do.  But I am 46 now and the roofing jobs are not getting any easier.  I got involved in town politics as selectman when my kids were in elementary school, and the principle at Dawson Elementary started explaining to the PTA that the schools were facing a massive cut, which threatened to radically inflate class sizes.  It was proposed to eliminate up to 120 teachers that year (2004).  I had been active in my kids elementary school PTA for a while, coordinating the Christmas tree sales, and I decided to run as a way of illuminating the fact that we could do things differently and minimize the reductions. I won by a wide margin and worked for the next few years to restore the funding cuts implemented that year by organizing parents and lobbying for more education aid at the State House.  I was the cofounder of the Stand For Children central mass branch.  In 2005 we turned out 7 busses to a rally at the Statehouse for schools! It was pretty fun.  I began toying with the idea of running then, but I seriously started thinking about it when I got involved in organizing the effort to pass the public safety building in our town in 2007.  The project had been twice soundly defeated. I knew the only way we could win was if we identified the voters to pass the project by either door to door or talking to them on the phone.  So I hosted 18 phone banks at my house.  The day of the election, we called every single one of the people we had identified as supporting the project, all 2000 of them, and the building passed by less than 200 votes.  That was when I began thinking that I could make a difference.  Last spring, I talked to my brother Joe about running for Mayor of Worcester.  I remember saying to him, these opportunities may never present themselves again.  He decided to run, and I worked like crazy all summer and fall, along with hundreds of other people, and he won by a wide margin.  He now serves as Mayor of Worcester.  So, I have had some pretty significant experiences that have led me to believe I can be successful doing this.  I believe politics is the “art of the possible”. I think what we need in government today is someone who has broad experiences, who is tough and practical, and thinks outside the box.  I think I fit that mold pretty well.  I think representing the district would be a great opportunity and I think I could be really effective at it.

2. What differentiates Westminster from other towns in the First Worcester District? What does it have in common?

The first time I came to Westminster as a candidate, I drove over Mountain Road from Holden and Princeton and began thinking this is literally “the other side of the mountain”! One thing that impressed me right away with your town was the public participation in town government.  It seems like your town has a really strong sense of community.  People are really engaged, they care about their town government and their public schools. It is really impressive.  It is very different from Holden.  Holden has a town manager form of government, and the manager is empowered to make many of the important decisions about town operations.  Your town has a weak administrator, and the residents really do play a much larger role in governance.  But the problems of your town are the same as the problems of most of the other towns.  Shortfalls in local aid and education aid have led to cuts, and the cuts that are deepest are in the schools.  In your town there is recognition of this and I think a real sense of concern, but in the Wachusett Regional School System, I think people take the schools much more for granted. I’m not sure why that is.  I think it is because they are so good.  We have great test scores.  Recently, in a statewide science contest, the top two finishers were from Wachusett.  It is really a remarkable accomplishment, but it goes largely unnoticed.  I was really impressed that during difficult financial times, your town still supported the education override earlier this year.  I don’t think there is the same commitment to schools anywhere else in the district and I think that is really great. Lastly, the issues your town faces are largely connected to North Worcester County, while the rest of the district, with the possible exception of Hubbardston and Oakham, are really much more tied to Worcester and Central Massachusetts.  That demands representation that will work cooperatively with the many different metropolitan area leaders.   

3. If you have one major goal in your public life, what is it that you feel most passionate about?

I really want to inspire others to participate in service.  I have read about the Kennedys, when John Kennedy said “ask not what your Country can do for you but what you can do for your country.”  I think back then, there was a feeling that government can work to solve the problems we faced as a nation, overcoming racism, wiping out poverty.  The very best and brightest aspired to serve in government.  I think a lot of that has been lost over the years.  It really saddens me.  I think we really have to work to restore peoples faith in government and it has kind of become my life work, it sustains me.  I took over this program in Holden a few years ago called YAHOO which stands for Young Adults Helping Out Others.  The high school and middle school kids go out and clean up elderly peoples lawns in the spring and fall.  I took over the program because it provided me with the opportunity to show young people that they could make a difference with really very small efforts.  We had some very powerful experiences in the aftermath of the ice storm.  One weekend, we had maybe 80 kids, and we cleaned up 4 yards in two hours.  The yards were literally destroyed, but the kids cleaned them up in a snap. To see the expression on the elderly peoples faces, some crying, was really a special thing for me and I know it inspired the kids.  It has changed me forever. I have found that in every town there are tremendous human resources. I have met so many wonderful people in my political life it is really amazing. I firmly believe the key to good government is to empower people, citizens.  The trick is how do you do that.  I think the way to start is to have open and inviting government.  When Mr. Flanagan spoke to the Lions a while back, he said that when he first got involved in government in your town, he thought there would be a lot of resistance to him but he found it just the opposite.  That says a lot about the culture of your town government and I think it sets your town apart from many others.

4. What can we do to improve public education in our state, and how will we pay for improvements if there is a cost associated with them? If we spend more on education, what will be cut? Is there anything that the state can do?

I could write a book on this topic, but I will try and keep it brief. There is a lot that can be done.  We have to begin by thinking outside the box.  A couple of years ago, Holy Name High School proposed building a wind turbine.  A lot of people said it couldn’t be done, that it was a waste of time.  But they pushed ahead and built one anyways.  Today you drive through Worcester and you will see the big wind turbine towering over Rt. 290.  Holy Name has capped its utility cost for 20 years and is generating a revenue stream selling excess power back to the grid.  The project has exceeded their expectations. I initiated a similar proposal at Wachusett High School by going out and recruiting Places Site Consultants, an environmental engineering firm in Holden, to do a wind turbine feasibility study for the school district for free.  Places wanted to get into that business, and they couldn’t break into it because they did not have any references of projects they had completed.  By doing it pro bono, they got their reference, and the school district got the information it needed to take the next step in the process. While that project is progressing, the point is we have to think outside the box.  Establishing alternative energy sources at school sites promises savings and revenue, no matter if they are wind, solar, or energy efficiency improvements, they pay for themselves many times over. These types of approaches to capping costs and capturing revenue must be fully pursued to offset the increasing costs associated with delivering quality educational services.

Secondly, we have to recognize that to reverse the direction educational services are going in, we must get a handle on health care costs.  Every year, health care premiums continue to spiral upward.  This is a critical problem for both State and local governments.  As health care gets more expensive in the private sector, more and more people come to work for the public sector for this benefit, and we see more and more family enrollments occurring.  This is costing school systems huge money and cannot be allowed to continue.  The State has made access to health care to all residents of the Commonwealth a cornerstone of public policy.  We must continue down this road, but we have to contain costs.  Here is how I would proceed to do that. First, we must do more for primary care physicians in practice already, and we have to get more doctors to practice primary care.  If we do this, we will begin to realize the intent of state policy: Cut down on expensive procedures being done in expensive settings and concentrating on keeping people healthy, and in the process save money.  Secondly, the Attorney General completed a report recently on affordability and accessibility.  Her conclusions were clear.  She described the relationship between providers and insurers as “dysfunctional”.  Reimbursements from insurers are being driven by market share not by healthy outcomes or other reasons.  Those providers that dominate markets can demand reimbursement rates significantly higher then other providers.  So I think the State has to engage in setting reimbursement rate standards, similar to what they do in Europe.  I also believe that the state has to set up standard protocols for treatments.  One doctor recently explained to me that if a patient complains of headaches, he has to order a ct scan, so he can ensure he does not miss the one in one thousand brain tumors that might cause this.  That’s a lot of unnecessary ct scans and they are not cheap. So we must develop a set of standards for treatment to allow doctors to not have to practice defensive medicine.  Lastly, we need a large provider group, like the GIC, to provide a low cost public alternative to private insurers.  This type of mechanism is needed to keep the private sector honest.  If an insurer and the providers it has relationships with is seeing an erosion of business, they will have to cut costs, improve efficiencies, and do all they can to recover their customer base.  Having a vibrant health care sector in our state is important but significant action is needed to contain costs.  If we are successful with this, it will strengthen our state economy greatly and will free up desperately needed revenue to fund local aid and education aid.

Third, for improvements to be made, we have to strengthen our commitment to educators.  There is no better investment made then the ones that keep teachers sharp and that keep class sizes small.  That will cost money.  In Massachusetts we have the education reform act.  This was a tremendous piece of legislation.  It ensured that every child in the Commonwealth receives a basic level of education.  This has placed Massachusetts at the forefront of primary educational outcomes in the nation and we all should be proud of that.  But we have to be realistic about what we are up against today. A second step would be to establish stronger relationships with the unions that represent the vast majority of teachers and personnel that surround them.  If we build cooperative relationships, more flexibility can be expected in working together.  I believe that the best people to implement ideas that will improve in delivery of services are the people working in the settings we are trying to improve efficiencies in. These ideas rarely come to the fore in adversarial settings, so we have to build stronger relationships between unions and management. 

Education is expensive, so we will need to make stronger investments.  This will take clear and strong advocacy first and foremost.  Where will the money come from?  I have a number of ideas of how to generate revenue.  Bankers will complain that credit unions don’t pay the same amount of taxes they pay.  Close this loophole and level the playing field for all financial institutions. Second, we must revisit the big dig debt.  While some of the debt was placed on the T system, and another portion of it attached to the Mass Pike(which drove it to the verge of financial collapse), none of the other main beneficiaries of the big dig share in this burden. Tolls should be set up on Rt. 93 north and south, Rt. 3, Rt.1, and Rt. 24.  Everyone who benefits from the big dig must bear the cost of its construction.  That alone could generate many hundreds of millions of dollars.  Right now, 1 cent of the sales tax goes to support the MBTA.  If all users were paying for the big dig, we could shift that money to local aid or education aid.  That is fair and just.  If legislators are enriching themselves working full time when they hold legislative office, their full time pay should be reduced incrementally.  This will encourage legislators to invest themselves full time working in the job they are being paid full time to perform. If they choose to moonlight, like representative Evangelidis or many others, they should forgo portions of their salary. Revenue generation is a tough thing in a down economy.  I am all for proposals to generate revenue, but we have to approach any new taxes and fees very carefully.

Lastly, as private colleges become more and more out of reach for middle class families, we must continue the investments begun by the Patrick administration in rebuilding our state college system.  This will produce jobs and will ensure that the Massachusetts middle class continues to have a good alternative to private schools.  The State must also continue to move forward with early childhood learning when it is fiscally possible to do so.  These initiatives have proven highly effective in helping children learn in later stages of development, and are worthy of investments.. If I had my way, I would shift the monies dedicated from the sales tax supporting the T, put it into a capitol fund for secondary school improvements or for local aid and education aid.

5. If elected, what would you do to resolve the school funding crisis in our district so that we can restore educational programs that are children are missing?

First and foremost, I would be out in front in the effort to lobby residents to support schools.  I have done that in the past, and I will continue to do it in the future.  I think that educators and the parents of kids in school must take ownership of the situation as well.  When advocating for schools, this often leads to conflicts with local services.  This creates real dissention in communities.  But it is a matter of priorities. If parents and education supporters are not vocal and visible in the budget development process, who can blame finance committees, advisory committees and selectmen for dividing resources in ways that might reflect a different set of priorities. When discussing the division of resources, this always runs headlong into the issue of raising taxes.  Your advisory board is very conservative.  But you have a good balance of leadership with the selectmen.  There is no question, addressing education revenue shortfalls and the impact it is has on taxes is contentious.  While considering overrides for services, I was always an advocate for joint overrides for both municipal services and educational services if we had the people who were willing to go to bat for schools because that involves all the stake holders and the delivery of all the services is important. But this was often unpalatable in setting dominated by people with stronger municipal priorities than I and I was often kind of a lone wolf in supporting education.  At this point, I think the boards in your town lean more on the side of prioritizing municipal services then supporting schools.  The good news is that in Westminster you have some really strong select board members. They are fair and there is a balance of viewpoints.  This is the ideal environment to start to build community consensus about how to address supporting quality educational services. Unfortunately, I don’t think anyone you elect to the representatives seat will be able to deliver much help from the State given the state of the economy nationally and fiscal projections as they are. It is going to take local leadership and the state representative can assist local leaders in developing consensus around these issues and deliver fiscal resources when they can.

6. Give us your take on the new bullying law and the ‘idling vehicle at schools’ law—how do we reconcile lofty goals with no funding?

These are unfunded mandates.  No matter how well intentioned they are, if you provide no funding for implementation, you might as well not even propose them.  Look around, is there any spare money in the schools to set up bullying programs?  The signs for idling vehicles will inevitably come out of local budgets already hard pressed. Maybe if the police go to the schools and write fat tickets to bus drivers who are not following the guidelines, this deterrent will encourage compliance.  But it always drives me nuts when the legislature passes feel good initiatives but provides no money for them.  It was proper for your superintendant to push back on installing signs to enforce the idling ordinance. I say, show me the money, and we can then provide the service.

7.  In many ways Massachusetts is a great state, but its legislature is not well thought of, not least because the last three Speakers of the House have been indicted. What can be done to curb the corruption that seems rampant in our legislature?

Insist on full time work for full time pay.  Lawyers who go out and make $100,000 while they legislate should be stripped of their pay or at least a large portion of it.  The ethics laws should also empower the secretary of state to have more investigatory power and power to issue subpoenas and levy significant infractions, including fines and the stripping of benefits and privileges.  Also, when I am elected, I will file these ethics reforms, and I will also work on campaign finance reform.  I think caps have to be placed on candidate spending.  Put a cap at $30,000 in a house seat and $50,000 for a senate seat.  Make the public access forums the place to discuss the issues of the day, and require local access cable stations to play that so people can be informed about the positions and priorities of legislators.  I think this will create a much more responsive legislative body.  Think about it, if a legislator is limited to spending $30,000 to run for reelection, and he promotes some boneheaded legislation, the residents of his district can oust him easily it they want.  The will of the people should drive politics in almost every situation, except where civil rights are being called into question. Why would a middle class person run for public office when some entrenched incumbents have literally $350,000-500,000 in the bank to start.   Realistically, if someone can outspend you 6 to 1 before they even begin, it becomes very difficult to oust incumbents. Most people will run if they don’t have to break the bank to try and win.  Me personally, it was a big decision to run for this office, because it takes significant time away from my business, my ability to make money and I don’t have much money to begin with.  So this is a legislative priority for me to make better, more responsive politics.

8. How will you insure you represent the needs of your constituents, particularly Westminster, and not focus on just Holden?

This can be accomplished by coming up to town all the time and listening to the concerns of the residents and elected officials.  All the communities are important and you have to be out and about all the time.  Recently, I donated a small roof on the old town hall and installed it while working with a group of volunteers.  I have attended the Rt. 140 task force meeting, and attended the town wide yard sale to name a few.  Most importantly, I am going door to door and intend to speak with every resident of town before I am through.  When I am elected, I will either open a district office in town, or host regular office hours at the town hall to be accessible to residents at all times.  The key, I think, is to listen and to learn.  Going door to door, I have learned a lot about Westminster in a very short period of time. 

 9. Lew maintained a great presence in the town, rarely missing an event, to the extent we really wondered how he had a family life. Would you continue in his footsteps in this regard?

 I think the thing that made Lew effective was that he always had his ear to the ground and was visible and accessible.  I would be the same kind of representative, but with the added bonus of being a democrat, who will have a lot more opportunity in the legislative arena.

10. How do you stand on the state’s affordable housing law, 40B?

Because it is the only tool to develop affordable housing in the Commonwealth, a place that has some of the highest housing costs in the nation, we must continue to pursue a course to encourage communities to develop more housing for working families and seniors, who are the most negatively impacted by the high cost of housing.  All of the major candidates support continuing this program also.  So I think there is a recognition that we need to continue to address the high cost of housing.   Unfortunately, this can be contentious.  The 40B law gives developers the ability to avoid local controls on development.  The 40B law is called “The Anti-Snob Zoning Ordinance” for a reason and it is the Commonwealths only tool to build housing for seniors and working families that has worked, imperfectly at times, but is has worked.  I would like to see it revised to allow for policy to be developed that gives local communities more local control if they are making good faith efforts to meet the 10% affordable threshold set by the State. The 10% threshold is hard to achieve.  That is the point where developers are denied the right to impose the projects on towns.  What I would like to see is a program developed that would allow towns to deflect projects if they are making progress towards the 10% number.  A town would have to do a housing inventory, would have to have an affordable housing committee, and would have to undertake projects on a regular basis.  In Westminster, the housing proposed around the proposed senior center would be a great project to incorporate towards this approach. Many seniors are priced out of their towns when the cost of maintaining their homes becomes too much for them.  Sadly, they move out of the town they have lived in for their entire lives because they don’t have an affordable alternative.  In Holden, we have two senior housing complexes and each of them have long waiting lists to get in.  In Holden, we had a situation where we took land in my neighborhood by tax title.  The affordable housing committee worked with Habitat for Humanity to develop 3 houses, two which would be earmarked for town employees.  The town meeting rejected giving the land to Habitat though and the land was sold to private developers who built single family homes on the sites anyways.  So it is hard to build senior and working family housing in our towns because developers are more interested in building larger single family homes and this continues to drive the high costs.  There is a recognition of this by the candidates for governor.  So it is a problem that will continue and we must deal with it head on by giving communities tools to build housing for their residents that meets the diverse needs of the community. I  fully support increasing 41c property tax credits, senior work off  programs and the like to empower seniors to keep their homes longer. My opponents take a very different position on housing issues.

 11. Do you have any ideas for bringing more business into Massachusetts, and Central Massachusetts in particular?

Yes, I am interested in incentivizing construction and manufacturing jobs in the clean energy sector.  As energy costs continue to rise, the state must continue to mold policy to invest in alternative energy sources.  Wind Turbines and solar systems built and installed by Massachusetts companies.  Also, we must modify state policy in certain areas to invest in cutting edge science.  By driving investments that will keep leading scientists and researchers in Massachusetts, we will always have opportunities to spin off companies to bring new products to market.  Take for example the states investing in a stem cell bank at UMass in Worcester.  Here we have made the investment in the facility, now we must make the investment in the science that will utilize the stem cell bank.  It is very easy to ship stem cells to New York or North Carolina.  It is the best policy to say to Craig Mellow(he is a man who just won the Nobel prize who works at UMass) or people like him, we value your cutting edge research.  We want you to do it right here and we are willing to give you the resources to do it.  Other states and countries are luring away these people as we speak.  Our high tech economy demands we maintain our edge and we can do that if we invest in the people resources needed to maintain our edge in the development of life sciences, health care, alternative energy, and the like.  Also, we have available high tech jobs in Massachusetts, but we have high unemployment as well. So we have to continue to invest in programs that retrain workers to work in growing sectors of the economy. This will take a renewed commitment to invest in the Commonwealths secondary education system.  By reinvesting in State College system infrastructure, we can create construction jobs, and we can reinvest in our residents by giving them greater access to the tools they need to find jobs in our local economies.  Our largest employers want to partner in this effort as well.

12. What can be done to address unfunded public pension and benefit issues here in MA?

What most people don’t know is that there is a huge unfunded liability here.  The Governor last year extended local communities window to deal with this, but we can’t put this off forever.  It will be one of the big challenges State and Local governments face in the future.  Also, it is easy to take aim at people like William Bulger who makes a huge retirement salary, but the vast majority of people in the pension system have very modest retirements.  I think some reasonable reforms are needed.  If you “retire” at 42 and begin working full time in the private sector, we have to put controls on this.  Maybe institute a guideline that payments cannot begin until age 60 or something like that if you earn significant money in the private sector prior to reaching “retirement” age.    Also, we have to cap benefits to retirement packages to the top pension earners like the William Bulgers of the world.  They are poster children for abuse of the system and it denigrates those who work their entire career for the state and earn a subsistence living in their decline. 

13. Anything else we didn’t ask that you want voters to know about you?

I want the voters of Westminster to know that I am running because I feel I am uniquely qualified to serve. I have served in Holden for 6 years as a selectman, and prior to that I served as a member of the Historic District Commission, the last year as chairman.  I served as a member of the economic development committee, and as a member of the water and sewer  advisory committee.  My brother is Mayor of the City of Worcester, and in his past roles as district director for Congressman McGovern and campaign manager for Lt. Governor Murray, I have been fortunate to develop strong relationships with these men. I worked closely with Congressman McGovern to obtain grants for our fire and police departments totaling almost $900,000.  I also have great relationships with powerful representatives and senators.  I have received campaign contributions from Representatives Pedone and O’Day and Senator Eldridge.  Representative Pedone serves as the Chairman of the House committee Bills in 3^rd Reading.  This committee controls which legislation will be considered by the full house. He is arguably one of the most powerful members of the house and I have known him for many years.  I volunteered for Representative O’Day for about 4 months last winter collecting ice storm damage costs.  Representative O’Day played a key role in insuring that local communities adversely affected by the ice storm received proper reimbursements for them, a fight that continues to this day.  Senator Eldridge is the only legislator who was elected under the clean elections law.  My brother Joe was a key proponent in a ballot question that passed to publically fund elections and Senator Eldridge is the only person ever to sue the legislature and win to ensure they funded the law.  Speaker Finneran, who was consequently convicted of perjury, circumvented this legislation shortly after Mr. Eldridges election.  Senator Eldridge is a leader in developing effective policy in the Senate and I am honored to have great relationships with all of these men and I am grateful for their support and encouragement.. These relationships will enable me to step into this job from day one to be an effective advocate for our communities.  I have also received the endorsements of many other organizations at this point.  They include: The Massachusetts Nurses Association, the Massachusetts Teachers Association, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 2325, Teamsters Local 170, the Structural and Bridge Ironworkers Local 7 and I have received a financial contribution from the Worcester-Fitchburg Building Trades Council. I have been self employed for my entire adult life.  I have run my own small roofing company since I graduated from College.  I am well versed in public policy and I am fiercely independent.

14. What is the best way for voters to contact you with specific concerns or questions?

I can be contacted in any number of ways.  First, you can visit my web site at www.kenobrien2010.com, you can email me at voteforkenin2010@gmail.com, or you can call me at either 508-373-4653 or at 508-829-9675.