Elections Department
The recent Election Report by Attorney Lauren F. Goldberg was extensive and loaded with accusations leading to the firing of Rafael Tejeda within hours of being received by Mayor Dan Rivera. Upon reading it carefully and questioning several people involved in the election process, I came to the conclusion that this report was tailored to bring about that reaction.
There is a problem, in my judgment, with Attorney Goldberg was double-dipping by tying her report of the 2013 recount to this year’s State Election. She keeps going back to her observations during last year’s recount admitting that some of the same issues took place but they didn’t seem to matter and she is now recommending “enhanced and more effective training as well as streamlined procedures…”
Atty. Goldberg started her involvement with the November 4, 2014 State Election only the Thursday before the election. Based on her limited involvement, here are some on her recommendations and my own findings.
Poll Worker List/Positions
The list of poll workers and their positions was not available until 4:00 pm on the Friday before election and no listing of the 15 supplemental poll workers. The suggestion was that, “the Clerk and the Elections Department should have a schedule of workers and assignments established and confirmed several months prior to the election…” along with a plan to fill vacancies that may unexpectedly arise.
Attorney Goldberg attributes said in her report, “As the Clerk suggested, the week before the election is not the time to attempt to locate poll workers and make sure they are trained.” Mr. Maloney believes she is confused because it was Mayor Rivera who said it. “In fact, the Election Division is always replacing poll workers right through the election day because some call in sick, some have emergencies, and some [sadly enough] don’t show up,” said Mr. Maloney.
“Attorney Goldberg was well aware that all ‘back up’ poll workers were contacted and declined to work when contacted to fill in vacancies noticed about 10 days before the election. She was also well aware that a list of all workers who declined was provided to Mayor Rivera which he requested. The Mayor was informed that if he failed to approve 15 poll workers to fill vacancies occurring about five days prior to the election – it may result in the election being contested on the grounds that there were insufficient poll workers available to administer the election,” concluded Mr. Maloney. Once the approval for the 15 additional workers was signed, he proceeded to call them.
Poll worker assignments begin in April and are finalized no later than July of each year with a list of proposed assignments forwarded to the Mayor by mid-August of each year. These assignments cannot be finalized as the election approaches (some people decline, are sick, have other obligations), and other events affect the proposed assignment list.
The report also states that it was unclear whether the City Clerk and Elections Department require training as a prerequisite for persons to serve as poll workers on election day. In her opinion, more formal and step-by-step training materials should be prepared and explained for all poll workers.
It is a little known fact that training of poll workers is “not required” by any City Charter provision, City Ordinance, Massachusetts Code, or State Law – it simply doesn’t exist and there is nothing assigning this responsibility to the City Clerk. It was only a “suggestion” by the Secretary of State as a result of the 2006 Rule 60 Order concerning the Lawrence elections but provided no guidelines by which training is to be conducted, any method of implementation, or any measure to determine compliance. Furthermore, it was also “suggested” that the State provides training for Wardens and Clerks to allow them to train the workers. However, the State never offered to present the training when asked and never offered since. By the way, the Rule 60 is no longer is effect and was dismissed in 2010.
“Although training is a very helpful tool to assure that all poll workers are ‘up to date’ and provided with the most accurate and current election information, the use of this ‘tool’ as a ‘weapon’ ostensibly to measure performance of instruction without pre-existing ‘standards’ is a poor substitute for interposing ‘subjective’ requirements that do not exist. It is easy to defend against criticism based on a requirement that do not even exist,” responded the City Clerk Bill Maloney.
Attorney Goldberg’s report indicated that training must also address matters such as the 150 foot rule. Do you remember what happened last year when then mayoral candidate Rivera was chastised for greeting voters at the entrance of a polling place and was advised by the attorney from the Secretary of State’s office to move beyond the stipulated 150 feet?
He swore on that day that the City Clerk would be fired.
Machine breakdown
This is a reoccurring problem every time. When a machine broke down, ballots were given to a police officer for safe keeping until it was fixed. They should have been placed in the hand count bin and counted manually at the end of the night.
Interestingly, Attorney Goldberg made no mention of the machines in three different districts showing the same totals of 184 each for William Lantigua. That is really odd and I believe required closer scrutiny.
Absentee ballots
Atty. Goldberg states that, “the processing of the absentee ballots was an issue at the recount, in that absentee ballots were discovered after the election that appeared to have been received timely and not counted.” That was also the case again this year when several absentee ballots were “received timely, delivered to the wrong polling place, and never counted on election night.”
There were 11 absentee ballots that were received by the City Clerk but did not get delivered to the polls due to time constraints. On the advice of Attorney Goldberg all ballots were secured by the City Clerk and presented to the Board of Registrars at a public meeting held on 11-17-14. By vote of the Board of Registrars, 8 ballots were determined “valid” and counted. Three ballots were not counted by vote of the Board and retained for further action, if necessary.
Ballot boxes
There were several complaints about the boxes being used, from being overstuffed with materials and supplies that did not belong in them to the fact that they could not be completely closed allowing access to the content without removing the covers.
The City Clerk makes a concerted effort to make sure poll workers do not run out of basic supplies (ballots and pens) during the election. Attorney Goldberg points clearly that the transfer cases need to be “bigger”. However, given the materials that the Election Division is allowed to obtain with limitations on financial resources, there would be much more than “criticism” that the transfer cases were “too small” if the polls ran out of supplies – or worse – ran out of ballots. We have not forgotten when a councilor had to run and get pens for his district because they ran out.
Anyone involved with the City budget process knows that all purchases are subject to Mayoral recommendation and City Council approval. In FY 2015 the Election Division was directed to cut 5% from FY 2014 funding. This requires prioritizing available funds toward necessary items like Poll Rental Fees, Voting Lists, Voting Machines, Voting Booths, Poll Worker Staffing, Police Staffing, and Election Staffing and the cost of goods and services never goes down. This will be raised again when funds are sought in the 2016 Budget process.
Closing Procedures
The report also mentions “copious amounts of supplies were maintained in ballot boxes, including, in some cases, multiple vests, and large numbers of Information for Voters booklets.”
Boxes were over stuffed and as a result, if a recount of the election had been requested, no one would have been able to access the voted ballots. Also, the Goldberg report notes that the City Clerk was not present when ballot boxes began to arrive at City Hall. There is no requirement for the City Clerk to receive the boxes, particularly when there is so much police presence there that night.
Among other observations, she cited that a voter was sent to City Hall from her polling place to review her eligibility to vote. Once it was confirmed, she was asked to go back to the polling place.
Another attorney for the Secretary of State, Paul Lazour complained directly to City Clerk Maloney that a poll worker at the Leahy School was placing overflow ballots from the ballot box in the open air and were exposed to the public who could easily access the ballots. Also, that there was no police officer at this location to assure their safety. When City Clerk Maloney investigated, he found that, “the ballots were placed in the transfer box, as required, near the police officer at this location, and away from any public access.” He also confirmed that the poll location was never without police coverage. The results were reported to both Attorney Lazour and Attorney Goldberg immediately upon conclusion of this matter.
There was a question as to who may serve as an observer at the polls as a result of a complaint by Abel Vargas, a Devers campaign worker now employed by the Planning Department. He said that poll workers were individually helping voters in the process when the law states that once a voter requests assistance, two poll workers, one from each political party (one Democrat and one Republican) must assist. This has been an issue through the years because there are not enough Republican in the city. The rationale here is that it is best to assist the voter instead of having them wait around and be inconvenienced.
Now, for my take on this
This report seems to have been tailor made as the excuse to fire Rafael Tejeda. Since firing the City Clerk is more difficult because it has to go through the City Council, this discovery of wrongdoings will justify the mayor’s actions. The proof of that is that there was no discussion and the dismissal was instantaneous. It was all made up to seem important when no one tried to correct them in previous years.
Rivera was very careful that the report was dated one day after the results from all Cities and Towns was certified to the State. More importantly, nothing in the report amounts to much – certainly not enough to “fire” anyone.
Now, usurping once again the City Council’s authority, Mayor Rivera has hired the North Andover City Clerk to straighten out the Elections Department.
Would anyone please tell him he might call himself CEO but Lawrence is not his personal property?
Lawrence is Open For Business
As part of my daily routine, this week I was checking some local websites, and what a surprise when I entered the City of Lawrence website and clicked on “About the City’s Best Places to Live” section! http://www.cityoflawrence.com/best-places-to-live
Just in case the content was changed or removed, I decided to save that portion of the site. When I read the red sign “Lawrence is Open for Business”, I got excited and was expecting tax breaks and incentives to attract new businesses and investors, easy access from major highways, plenty of storage facilities; access to plenty of water sources, updated data about our workforce, our state-of-the art High School and our students recent academic progress, our college graduates, and the richness of our diverse population. But, sadly, none of that happened here. But my disappointment was greater when I saw a young professional’s name at the bottom of the page as the city official who potential investors would contact.
It seems that Abel Vargas, Director of Business & Economic Development or the City of Lawrence, is lacking ideas on how to promote city resources and opportunities for investors to come to Lawrence. Instead of playing the role of a “marketing agent” for certain private companies involved in the real estate business, Vargas’ position requires him to be a strategic thinker; able to have productive interaction with senior level business professionals and CEOs, forward-thinking discussions and become a key member of Mayor Dan Rivera’s team to help impact the City’s economic growth and development of its business community and its residents.
Before becoming the person responsible for bringing businesses and economic development to Lawrence, Vargas was and still may be a licensed Real Estate Agent who used to work for a well-known real estate firm representing sellers and buyers of both residential and commercial properties in Lawrence. As to be expected in this type of business, Vargas created a large network of friends and a close relationship with other realtors and financial institutions.
He also served as a marketing analyst for Harvard Pilgrim Health Care. So it seems that marketing is in Abel’s blood. And that’s an excellent tool that can be incorporated into his position. The problem here is that the first impression people who know Abel get is that he is using his position and the city resources to benefit his colleagues in the local/private real estate industry by placing their links in the City website. But, to increase my suspicion, many of the names attached to the links are well known local real estate agents who also supported Rivera’s campaign for Mayor.
To reinforce my concern about a possible conflict of interest, please read this insert from the State Ethics Commission’s website at www.mass.gov:
“The conflict of interest law, Massachusetts General Laws chapter 268A, seeks to prevent conflicts between private interests and public duties, foster integrity in public service, and promote the public’s trust and confidence in that service by placing restrictions on what municipal employees may do on the job, after hours, and after leaving public service, as described below. When the Commission determines that the conflict of interest law has been violated, it can impose a civil penalty of up to $10,000 ($25,000 for bribery cases) for each violation. In addition, the Commission can order the violator to repay any economic advantage he gained by the violation, and to make restitution to injured third parties. Violations of the conflict of interest law can also be prosecuted criminally.”
I have no doubt that the City of Lawrence has plenty of good character/well trained people at different levels, attractive economic incentives, lot of physical structures, natural resources, local hospitals, banks, and more to attract investors who want to contribute to the economic development of our city with the hope that it will provide better wages, benefits, and opportunities for advancement.
Another concern on all of this is that the Administration is basically promoting the occupancy of certain high profile properties in order to meet Mayor Rivera’s promise to build a “new educated middle class” in Lawrence as stated in his inauguration ceremony speech in January 2014. I am still wondering what he really meant to say.
