Tuesday’s city council meeting was (relatively) brief and uneventful. That’s the third in a row that I’ve described that way. It’s been the case ever since the council returned from its every-other-week summer schedule. You might infer that the summer schedule’s doubling up of content was the cause of the lengthier meetings that all seemed to end chaotically, but that was how meetings went even before the summer so something else has changed. As I wrote last week, this is an observation, not a critique.
One “big picture” thing that arose at the meeting was a petition by a resident to address the city council on “critical race theory.” This same person appeared before the council several months ago on another petition. Back then, it was purportedly about geese fouling the city-owned beach on the north bank of the Merrimack River, however, the petitioner quickly pivoted to comparing immigrants to the geese before she was cut off. With that as precedent, it was unsurprising that this week’s petition included equally vile comments about immigrants. Mayor Chau attempted to intervene, saying the petitioner was off topic, but she continued her remarks until the council abruptly declared a five-minute recess. When the council returned, the petitioner was gone.
The council has been fortunate that more of this kind of thing has not already happened. News reports from around the country indicate that local government has become the latest battleground in the nation’s culture war. Since it’s a “thing” elsewhere, it’s only a matter of time before it arises in Lowell in a bigger way, so it’s best to think about it now.
One of the first actions a city council takes at the start of a new term is to adopt the rules of the previous city council. Whatever those rules are, I can’t find a copy of them online so I don’t know if they address this. (If anyone can send a link, please do).
Regardless of what the council rules say, there is a strong tradition in this country of citizens petitioning the government. In fact, it’s much more than a tradition; it’s embedded in the Constitution. Specifically, the First Amendment states, in part, “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging . . . the right . . . to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” In the decades before the Civil War, abolitionists flooded Congress with petitions in opposition to slavery. Congress, controlled by pro-slavery southerners, not only ignored the petitions but imposed a “gag” rule that prevented anyone from discussing them. Nevertheless, the petitions helped build momentum and support for the cause.
The Massachusetts state Constitution contains a similar right to petition:
Article XIX. The people have a right, in an orderly and peaceable manner, to assemble to consult upon the common good; give instructions to their representatives, and to request of the legislative body, by the way of addresses, petitions, or remonstrances, redress of the wrongs done them, and of the grievances they suffer.
Regardless of whether the rules of the council address the right of citizens to petition, the state and federal constitutions both apply to the city of Lowell government so I don’t think banning citizen petitions entirely is an option.
The question remains, is there some rule of relevancy that controls the subject matter of citizen petitions? Based on past practice, that’s a tough question to answer. In recent memory, the council was asked on two occasions to declare racism a public health crisis. Whether the vehicle for bringing that before the council was a citizen petition or a council motion, it raises the same question of relevancy (although recognizing both racism and issues of public health are central to the functioning of local government and so would seem completely relevant). A few years prior to that, one very dynamic council meeting involved supporting (or not supporting) transgender individuals and another meeting took up the propriety of the city hosting an official visit by a high-ranking representative of the current Cambodian government. Twenty years ago, the council voted to oppose the USA Patriot Act. More than 50 years ago, a bitter council debate was held over a Paul Tsongas/Gail Dunfey motion to oppose the war in Vietnam.
Some take the position that the council should “keep its eye on the ball” and not become distracted by national issues, but as the saying goes, “all politics is local” so it’s difficult for elected officials to avoid taking a stand on the most pressing issues of the day. But the question remains, what is relevant for the city council to discuss? It’s a question the eludes a clear test or definition.
The trap for councilors is in allowing things they agree with, or that are broadly popular, to proceed while curtailing things that are unpopular or with which they disagree. The key to managing this from a legal perspective is not relevancy, but consistency. If the council is going to limit the remarks of someone whose remarks are disagreeable to three minutes, then everyone who speaks before the council must be held to the same limit. Similarly, if whenever a member of the public is present to speak on some item on the council agenda, that item is moved up on the agenda under a suspension of the rules, so must a speaker whose remarks are disagreeable be moved up.
During the ten months this council has been in office, they’ve made clear that a collective priority is to listen to constituents. A significant portion of the motions made by councilors are prefaced by “a constituent asked me about this.” On several occasions when councilors have taken up proposals from the city administration, a single resident questioning or objecting to the proposal has led councilors to delay or derail the initiative. While coming from a good place, this inability to say No, this unwillingness to put the best interests of the city as a whole before the desires of a single individual is detrimental to the efficient operation of a city of 120,000 people.
In the same way, this sincere but misguided tolerance of individuals appearing before the council risks turning every council meeting into open-mic night for people with extreme agendas that are harmful to many of the city’s residents. The better approach is to allow residents their right to speak but enforce the same limits consistently. If someone strays from the topic, interrupt and tell them to stick with the issue. Then when they’re done, councilors can either respond to the comments or ignore them.
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Tuesday’s meeting also featured the city’s energy manager, Katherine Moses, sharing some important information on electricity costs during the “motion response” period. Moses was at the podium to answer questions about the administrations reply to a Councilor Erik Gitschier motion on utility rates and cost saving measures. The written response dealt with steps the city has taken to curtail its own energy usage and costs, but Moses’s comments extended to how residents benefit financially in their household energy expenditures due to the city’s electrical aggregation strategy.
Massachusetts state law allows municipalities to “aggregate” or combine private electrical users to maximize the purchasing power of the bigger group. A number of years ago, the city embraced this program and enlisted a “competitive supplier” for the electricity needs of all city residents. Lowell people are automatically placed in this pool, but they have the option to “opt-out” and choose their own supplier. For those of us who have not opted out, it sounds as if the city’s official supplier will charge prices much lower than the market average this winter which is great news.
As the cost of energy continues to rise, the city has done its residents an important service by providing electricity at below market rates. Ms. Moses indicated that additional information on this will be forthcoming, so I’ll watch for that and include it in a future newsletter.
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In last week’s newsletter, I mentioned that the council would vote on an amendment to the TIF agreement with Lupoli Companies for the new Jackson Street parking garage. That was on Tuesday’s agenda but when it was reached, City Manager Golden asked that it be withdrawn. There was no explanation for why that was done. Presumably it will be back at a future meeting.
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Thursday’s Boston Globe had a story on the high cost of housing in Greater Boston (Six things we learned about Greater Boston’s housing crisis from the new Boston Foundation report card). As the headline announced, the story emphasized six findings:
Home prices have reached unprecedented heights, and not just at the high end.
Boston has some of the highest rents in the nation.
Housing inequality has deepened significantly
Housing production is up, but still well below where we need to be.
The wealthy suburbs lag behind on housing affordability efforts.
Greater Boston’s rental and homeowner vacancy rates have remained well below the national average.
Need a place? Good luck finding one at any price.
Although the story and the report are about Greater Boston, the findings could apply equally to Greater Lowell. I’m still shocked at the way real estate prices shot up during the pandemic. With the economy shutting down, you would have thought the real estate market would slow as well, but the opposite occurred. In retrospect, several factors contributed to the boom:
As always is the case in this region, there are fewer homes than there are people who want homes, so demand was higher than supply.
Despite so many businesses shutting down, the Federal government stepped in with massive amounts of assistance that kept paychecks arriving so most people did not have to cut their spending.
At the same time, opportunities to spend on vacations, travel and entertainment were curtailed by the pandemic. With little of the household budget being spend on those things, more money was available to spend on housing.
Interest rates were near zero so the long term cost of borrowing large amounts of money was minimal.
Today, housing is still in short supply and employment numbers (and wages) are strong. Both exert upwards pressure on real estate prices. But that pressure will be offset by the rise of interest rates which will have a severe impact on the ability of people to obtain housing.
For most who seek to buy a home, the purchase price is an abstraction. The relevant number is the amount of the monthly mortgage payment. The affordability of a new house is dictated by the would-be buyer’s ability to make the monthly mortgage payments for the amount borrowed. Let’s assume a person can afford to pay $2,000 per month in principal and interest. On a 30 year fixed rate mortgage, if the interest rate was 2.5 percent (as it was a year ago), that person could borrow $505,000. But if the interest rate rose to 7.5 percent (as is the case now), that same $2,000 per month payment would only support a mortgage of $286,000. With less ability to borrow, the potential home buyer will have to settle for a cheaper house.
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If you are voting by mail in this election, the Secretary of State’s office has a convenient application called Track My Ballot. The webpage prompts you to enter your name and address and then shows you the status of your ballot. In my case, the response states that the Lowell Election Office mailed me my ballot on October 16, 2022. That happens to be a Sunday but in any case, the post office delivered the ballot to my home on Friday, October 21, 2022. I voted over the weekend and placed the completed ballot in a U.S.P.S. mailbox on Monday, October 24, 2022. Back to the Track My Ballot app: it states that my ballot was received by the Lowell Election Office the next day, Tuesday, October 25, 2022, and it has been “Accepted” which the site defines as “Submitted to be Counted.”
Thanks to Track My Ballot, I don’t have to worry about whether my vote will be counted.
Another brilliant column, Dick. We are so grateful for your insights.
Wise advice on heading off the movement to high jack our democracy. We must not allow zealots and demagogues to succeed in their efforts of purposely throwing the sands of hate and fear in the gears of local government in order to make it unmanageable unless it caters to the demands of their bullying. What's next, a petition to approve lynch mobs? If enough people sign one, is that supposed to intimidate local officials from ignoring the law and handing over those the mob wants to terrorize so that they won't be attacked by the mob themselves. You are correct, we need to ANTICIPATE this coming "storm" and prepare our barricades now so that we can withstand it when it comes. Democracy, not mob rule.