Final Meeting for City Manager Donoghue
Tuesday night was City Manager Eileen Donoghue’s last city council meeting as city manager. Her contract ends on Monday, April 11, 2022, and the next council meeting is the following evening. The council voted to have City Clerk Michael Geary serve as acting city manager until Tom Golden takes office.
Donoghue has had an extraordinary career of public service in Lowell. She won a council seat on her first try in 1995 when she finished fourth which was especially impressive for someone still relatively new to the community (she grew up in Holyoke). She was reelected in 1997 and her colleagues unanimously chose her to be mayor. Reelected in 1999, she was again a unanimous selection for mayor. Donoghue was reelected in 2001, 2003 and 2005, however, in 2007 she instead ran in a special election to fill the Congressional seat left vacant when Marty Meehan resigned to become chancellor of UMass Lowell.
Donoghue finished second behind Niki Tsongas in the special Democratic primary that September. Tsongas received 19,821 to Donoghue’s 17,385. The third-place finisher, Jamie Eldridge, received 8.042 votes. (Barry Finegold and Jim Miceli were the other two candidates in that race).
After the Congressional race, Donoghue practiced law fulltime but when Steve Panagiotakos announced he would not run for reelection to the state senate, Donoghue got into that race and defeated Chris Doherty in the Democratic primary, 6,357 to 3,953. She was reelected to the state senate every two years after that until she was named city manager in 2018. (She was succeeded in the state senate by Ed Kennedy).
Is this it for Eileen Donoghue when it comes to public office? Perhaps, but in 1971, Charles Gallagher was elected to the city council the year after he resigned as city manager, so you never know.
As for Tuesday’s council meeting, Donoghue left councilors and her successor, Tom Golden, with a proposed FY2023 budget (FY23 begins on July 1, 2022, and end on June 30, 2023). The document’s introductory section, which is signed by Donoghue, contains a couple of paragraphs worth highlighting:
It is abundantly clear from the priorities set forth in the early months of this City Council’s term that a focus must be placed on “curb appeal” and that every day, pedestrian issues, must be addressed. The first step in making progress on these issues is funding the appropriate labor and materials in the Department of Public Works. The DPW suffered disproportionately to other city departments in the wake of the great recession and has not since regained its workforce since.
Then this:
This preliminary budget intends to address some of these shortages by investing in the DPW’s lands and buildings, as well as in the other divisions to build back up the staffing levels, as well as invest into the facilities. The investment in these priority areas is highlighted within this spending plan in the General Fund summary labeled as “Council Priorities.” This additional investment will require change in the city’s tax policy, but because the City of Lowell is well below the levy limit set forth by Proposition 2 ½, there is ample excess levy capacity to support the increased expense.
Finally, there’s this:
Fixed costs continue to rise including a $1.6 million increase in our pension assessment. State assessments, namely the increase to the charter tuition assessment increased by $4.8 million in FY2023. Personnel costs will increase in FY23 based on the most recently negotiated contracts with the city labor unions. These costs, combined with our financial commitment to our key focus areas, limited our ability to expand funding for the various city departments. In fact, many line items were not just level-funded but yet again reduced. These necessary cuts in expenses were spread evenly across the departments and were focused on limiting any disruption to service delivery. While I’m confident in my department heads’ ability to continue to do the great work they do each year with less, it is worth noting that these departments are as lean as they have ever been.
While this is respectful and neutral-sounding, if you read between the lines there’s a clear message that goes something like this: “I would set different priorities but you’re the council and you’re in charge. . . . Just remember that if you want to do all the stuff you’ve talked about in your first 100 days, you’ll have to find a way to pay for it.”
The council does benefit this year from the twin windfalls of millions in federal ARPA funds and the highest free cash amount in twenty years. But those won’t be around forever, and all the increased costs added when extra money is available will still be owed when the revenue declines in future years.
Niki Tsongas Bridge Dedication
One of Eileen Donoghue’s last public events as city manager was presiding over Friday’s dedication of the Niki Tsongas Bridge in the Hamilton Canal District. While praising Tsongas’s many accomplishments in Congress, Donoghue stressed the persistence and determination of Tsongas in getting the Department of the Interior to transfer the land used for the National Park Visitor Center parking lot to the city for future development as part of the Hamilton Canal District.
You might think, what’s the big deal about transferring ownership of a parking lot? But you must remember, this land was owned by the Department of the Interior which is adamantly opposed to giving up National Park Service property for development. If it was easy, there would be no more National Parks anywhere. But Tsongas stuck with it and was able to get the deal done before she left office. For that reason, naming this bridge for her was a fitting tribute.
The plaque alongside the bridge reads as follows:
NIKI TSONGAS BRIDGE – Niki Tsongas (b. 1946) represented Lowell and her district in the U.S. House of Representatives (2007-2019) as a distinguished advocate for members of the armed services and veterans, environmental protection, economic growth, and fair and just treatment of all. She has been a vigorous community leader since moving to the city in 1969 with her husband, Paul E. Tsongas (1941-1997), who also served in Congress and campaigned to be U.S. President. They raised three daughters and were wholly dedicated to civic service. A champion of Lowell’s renaissance from the start, Niki played an essential role in making Lowell the vital and inspiring place it is today.
Also speaking at the ceremony were University of Massachusetts President Marty Meehan, Mayor Sokhary Chau, Councilor Vesna Nuon, who made the motion to dedicate the bridge to Tsongas, and State Representative Vanna Howard, who was a longtime staff member of Congresswoman Tsongas.
Filling Council and School Committee Vacancies
Best wishes to School Committee member Andy Descoteaux who resigned his seat for health reasons two weeks ago. His departure in the third month of a two-year term highlighted an issue left unaddressed by the city council when it adopted the new hybrid system of electing councilors and school committee members. That issue was how does a vacancy on the council or school committee get filled.
Because it had not already been addressed, when Descoteaux resigned the default choice was the procedure in place since 1959 which is the candidate in the last election who received the most votes among the losing candidates is offered the seat provided he or she still meets the qualifications of the office. Following this model, Susie Chhoun, who lost to Descoteaux in the 2021 District 3 school committee election, filled the seat vacated by Descoteaux.
I don’t live in District 3 so I didn’t have a vote in this race, but Chhoun ran a credible campaign and will undoubtedly be a solid member of the school committee. Plus, her replacing Descoteaux increases the female and minority membership of the seven person School Committee to five each, a new high for both.
Nevertheless, the council might want to reconsider using the “next in line” method of filling vacancies, at least for the district seats which are all “vote for one” elections with only two candidates to choose from in the general election. What happens if there is a vacancy and the runner up is unable to be appointed? As unlikely as that scenario may sound, it has happened before and it will happen again.
To me, it might be best to adopt the same method used to fill state representative or state senator vacancies. If the vacancy occurs within a certain time of the next election, then the seat stays vacant until that election. (To minimize the time without representation for a district, the winning candidate could take office immediately after the election rather than wait until January). But if the vacancy occurs before reaching that pre-election window, hold a special election in the district and fill the seat immediately with the winner.
Smith Baker Center
The First Congregational Church, now known as the Smith Baker Center, was constructed in 1884 and was used as a church until 1969. At that time, the church’s congregation merged with another and sold the building to the city of Lowell. The city used the building as its senior center with the upper floor used as a performance space. The building has not been used since the early 2000s when the senior center moved to its current location at Broadway and Fletcher.
Several times since then the city has issued requests for proposals for the reuse of the building. The Coalition for a Better Acre has submitted several proposals. The one that stood the greatest chance of success was in 2015 but, as DPD Director Christine McCall wrote in her April 5, 2022, motion response memo to the council, “The funding model provided by the CBA proved incompatible with restrictions placed in the original RFP.”
What does that mean? I don’t know for sure, but I have a theory based on a lot of circumstantial evidence:
In 2015, UMass Lowell was near the end of an amazing burst of new construction and development of its campus. Part of that burst included the University purchasing several privately owned properties in the Acre. That had several consequences. Converting private homes and buildings to university use tended to drive up rents in the remaining privately owned units which made housing more expensive for residents. And because the University is part of state government, it does not pay city property taxes on real estate that it owns.
I’ve always felt that UMass Lowell gives the city so many benefits that losing some property tax revenue is a small price to pay for having the school in the city. Several city councilors felt differently. By 2015, there was a frenzy of animosity towards the University emanating from the council chambers. The council’s line in the sand was no more properties to entities that were exempt from property taxes, especially the University.
The CBA proposal for the Smith Baker Center would fully pay all property taxes so that proposal, which had a community center and offices on the first floor and a performance space on the second floor, did not run afoul of the council’s no nonprofit mandate.
But what if CBA got the property and then, for whatever reason, transferred it to a nonprofit, or “even worse,” to UMass Lowell? In that case, the city would not get any property taxes from the building. To preclude that scenario (and to pacify certain city councilors), the city insisted that the proposed transfer to CBA include a prohibition on a subsequent transfer to any nonprofit that would not pay property taxes.
This caveat created an insurmountable obstacle to CBA’s ability to get funding. When a big financial institution loans money to renovate a historic structure, it obtains a mortgage on the property to protect its investment. If the borrower defaults, the lender will foreclose which involves auctioning the property to the highest bidder. But when the borrower owns the property with a restriction on who the property can subsequently be transferred to, it lessens the value of the collateral in the eyes of the lender to the extent that the loan ceases to make sense from a business perspective.
In other words, “The funding model provided by the CBA proved incompatible with restrictions placed in the original RFP.”
So, whenever someone says that CBA failed to follow through, ask what the restrictions were that the city placed in the original RFP that caused that to happen.
Diversity Officer Departure
The Lowell Sun reported that Ferdousi Faruque, the city’s first Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Officer, resigned effective April 15, 2022 (“Faruque cites roadblocks to ‘building an inclusive and equitable workplace’”, April 5, 2022). Two paragraphs of the story caught my attention:
“However, Faruque felt that the City Council’s Auditor and Clerk Oversight and Personnel Subcommittee had ‘little regard’ for her recommendations and input.”
“Asked for where the subcommittee had disregarded her recommendations and input, Faruque declined to elaborate and said the relevant details cold be found in Lowell Telemedia Center local TV recordings and previous Sun reporting.”
I checked out LTC. Specifically, the February 22, 2022, meeting of the City Council Auditor/Clerk Oversight and Personnel Subcommittee. The purpose of that meeting was to “establish procedure and timeline for search and appointment of a new city manager.” The subcommittee was chaired by Councilor Erik Gitschier with Councilors Dan Rourke and Corey Robinson as members. The three of them sat in the seats normally occupied by the city manager, the assistant city manager, and the CFO during council meetings. Seated at the council desks on either side of the aisle were City Solicitor Christine O’Connor and Human Resources department head Mary Callery. To Callery’s left sat Ferdousi Faruque. The other eight councilors were in attendance. They sat at the remaining council desks.
The full video of the meeting is available on the LTC website. The portion where Faruque speaks is right at the 35-minute mark. Here is what was said:
Erik Gitschier: When you look at it [the job description of the city manager] it is the most vague job description I’ve ever seen in the city. Qualifications. You can have a bachelor's degree. We would prefer a master’s degree but a bachelor’s degree is OK. If you went up to work at the Water Department as a filter operator, that has more qualifications than this does. You have to have state licensure. You have to have a lot of things that go along with that position. So a police officer has more qualifications than this. I just think some of the qualifications, education stuff, should be dialed in better and it takes a little bit of time. If anyone else has anything more they want to add, feel free to. I think this committee has a lot of work ahead of it in the next few hours to try to get this dialed in to where we want to get this back to the council for the next council meeting if that’s what we’re looking at. [Recognizes Ms. Faruque].
Ferdousi Faruque: I do want to add that from a DEI [diversity, equity and inclusion] best practices point of view, you do have standardized questions that you can compare from each candidate to candidate. It’s not to say that if they prepare their questions ahead of time there won’t be follow up questions like other people have mentioned in addition to that. It’s important from an equity perspective to really open it up and have applicants that want to apply, to have that fair chance. There are several different consulting firms and headhunters that can aid in a national search. I have a couple here that I can share with you after. And I think community listening sessions are really important because we want to get community buy in. We want to make sure they have our confidence. So I think those are some of the things that I think are imperative going forward and this job description when it was given to me this morning said 2014 on it. It says 2018 on it now but I’m not sure how old it is but it definitely needs to be revamped and looked at. I agree with everything you said.
Gitschier: I think you have a lot of work ahead of you if you haven’t seen all the job descriptions in the city. This is not the only one, I promise you that. And it’s a standard HR practice. It has nothing to do with DEI. It’s standard HR practices. Everyone has the standard questions going across. It’s not a DEI issue. It’s across all of HR throughout the state, throughout the country. People ask the same standard questions with any HR department that’s qualified and functioning. I don’t want to put labels on things. I just want to say that when you are looking at policies and procedures, it’s a policy that says standardized questions across the board. And we don’t have that in any other job interview process that we’ve had in the city.
Faruque: I would also say that if we’re looking for longevity, I don’t think this process should be rushed. It should not be something that is posted on the 25th [of February] and then given back in three weeks. I think, if we’re looking for someone who’s going to be here for quite some time, then we should really take the time to nurture this whole process.
Gitschier: That would come down to the will of the council. I would suggest that the council is the one who sets the time frame and sets anything that comes forth to your office. This comes down to the will of this council to try to get someone in this position of higher authority. Does anyone else on the council have anything? Councilor Drinkwater?
Councilor John Drinkwater then asked a question of HR head Mary Callery about the method councilors would use to rank applicants. The meeting continued for another 30 minutes but no one ever returned to Faruque’s recommendations beyond the “will of the council” comment by Subcommittee Chair Gitschier.
Thanks for this insightful recap of the what was a fairly momentous week. I wonder how the CC will deal with the outgoing Manager’s observations about budget, and ramping up DPW services. While I agree with Councilor Gitschier that developing standard questions is a general HR practice, certainly the CC set aside Ms Faruque’s recommendations for a slower, more deliberative process that considered longevity in hiring the next CM.