Our State Representatives
To those who question why I never criticize negatively Diana DiZoglio or Frank Moran, it’s just because they are doing what they were elected to do: Protect their communities, bring financial resources and make laws for the entire state. Please take the time to read what I write and reason things out.
Judging by the lists found on their respective pages at the State house, representatives DiZoglio and Moran have been busy representing their districts filing Bills to be discussed later at the House Committee levels in search of approvals.
Anyone can look up their records online by going to www.MaLegislature.com and then looking up any name in the House of Representatives or the Senate. The lists on page 17 show all of the Bills Rep. DiZoglio and Rep. Moran sponsored since January of 2015 when their new term began. They work hard for their districts and the records speak for them.
By contrast, Marcos Devers’ record shows that there are 7 Bills on his list. They were filed on January 15, 2015 but they were recycled from the previous year. When bills fail to pass, sponsors can present them again the following year. After that date, Rep. Devers has not sponsored any additional bills in one and a half years.
The problem is that DiZoglio and Moran don’t brag or have radio commercials promoting themselves, while Devers has radio commercials proclaiming all that he has done for this city by means of his vote when, in reality, all he has done is vote for bills sponsored by someone else. He is taking credit for what others have done.
It is not enough to broadcast lies because intelligent voters would go beyond to find the truth. A good example of that is what he has been saying about the 37 amendments he made to the state budget and were all approved. Well, his own Facebook page gave me the answer. He wrote in English and Spanish on April 27 that he placed 6 amendments to the state budget and were all approved. Upon checking if that was true, only 3 were approved. #251, #253, and #254 failed to pass. Who’s the liar now? And remember: on the radio he’s saying there were 37 amendments, not 6!
His Facebook page also mentions that 123 of 130 amendments that he cosponsored were approved. Cosponsoring a bill only means that he adds his name to what someone else wrote.
His attendance to the State House is pathetic. Records at the Treasurer’s Office show that in 2013 he attended only 70 days from January through December; in 2014, his record shows that from January through August he worked 42 days. There are no records from August to December. For 2015, from January through May there are 31 days. There is nothing from May through December 2015 and thus far, nothing that I could find for 2016.
You should remember that during the 2014 elections, Rep. Devers gave away $5 bills to elderly residents in front of the Senior Center. At that time he said it was money that he did not expect to receive so he gave it away. The records at the State Treasurer’s Office show that he requested the per diem amount given to legislators covering days worked from January through August 1, 2014 all at once. All 42 days were paid on September 26, 2014.
Now, on another election year, he might be saving those per diem funds from May 2015 through the present for another give away to the elderly.
There’s good reason for his meager showing at the State House. Mr. Devers has a thriving engineering business; according to building permits at City Hall. For 2013 he had contracts for over one million dollar in Lawrence alone. In 2014, the total contract were for two million dollars and in 2015, business increased tremendously. He also works in surrounding cities and he bragged to his colleagues a while back that he had to attend to a $100,000 project in Providence, RI.
There are two candidates vying for the position of State Representative for District 16. Rumbo has never endorsed any candidate for public office and we are not in this case, either. We do know for sure that Rep. Marcos Devers is a fraud and needs to be replaced!
Elections Department
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Back in 2012, Jose Alfonso Garcia applied for an emergency appointment to the Licensing Board and he was rejected for being a friend of the former mayor.
Now, the integrity of the Lawrence Elections Department has been seriously jeopardized with the appointment of Ruben Perez as bilingual elections coordinator. Being the closest ally to Marcos Devers (some people say he is his campaign manager), how can we trust that things are not going to be muddled up in such an important office.
That department is a mess anyway and rather than bringing competent people to straighten it out, the mayor keeps making political appointments but this one is a slap in the face to all of us.
