By José A. Ayala
There was no escape: Mayor Rivera and his staff “grabbed them” as they entered or while leaving.
With a welcome sign, bottles of cold water and a warm hug by the management, Mayor Dan Rivera spent part of his working day on Thursday, assisted by employees from his office talking with customers coming and going at Market Basket supermarket of Essex Street in Lawrence.
Mayor Rivera said his goal was to have face-to-face contact with residents to express their concerns, complaints or suggestions on matters affecting them such as fixing the streets, safety, parks and other matters.
“It is not always easy for them to go to City Hall during working hours to talk to me so I decided to set aside this time for those people,” Rivera said.
This comes a day after a group of citizens, led by attorney Louis Farrah and police officer William Green, members of the “Foundation for Transparency in Government” group began a recall petition against Mayor Rivera. During the 45 minutes I was there, and later Rumbo, we could not see fans or high-profile political allies accompanying Rivera, except for his newly appointed Chief of Staff and former District E Councilor, Eileen O’Connor Bernal. Also watching the activity were Pastor Victor Jarvis, Father Joel Almonó and the Director of the theater group Renovación, Juan Carlos Mañón.
During an interview on Friday morning on Benny Espaillat’s program, Rivera came to the defense of his administration by highlighting some of your achievements, as more security and a decrease in crime and delinquency. He described attempts to remove him as a distraction and reaction of people with special interests affected by his actions, but did not mention anyone specifically.
One item that caught the attention of other colleagues in the press was that the tent, all materials brought to distribute and his staff, including Rivera, were located on the yellow fire lane that clearly have messages prohibiting standing or parking on that site, although we did not see any vehicle parked on the line.
