On Wednesday, February 19th, we had a visit from a group of officials from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston at the head of which was its president and CEO, Eric Rosengren. The purpose of the visit/meeting was to hear from Mayor Daniel Rivera, the Superintendent of Schools Jeff Riley, some business owners and other members of the community on how we planned to use the gift of $700,000 grant received by the City from Working Families Initiative, reported on this page.
Rosengren was satisfied with the new leadership of the city and the support and cooperation received from non-profit organizations. “We are convinced that cooperation and leadership is what makes a city successful.”
We totally agree and encourages us the idea that this gift is not political and we are hopeful that it will accomplish its mission, but we must demand results now that we have a transparent administration.
Since Rumbo came into circulation in 1996, we have been reporting visits by politicians and other dignitaries from various levels of government that have come to town to announce millions in handouts. Some where profiled in our pages showing huge checks with even more gigantic figures.
This space is not big enough to list all articles reporting all the money that has come to Lawrence. We only want to cite one published in our issue #139 of February 22, 2002, with a photo on the cover of John Evereteze from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, announcing that, ” Lawrence is one of 40 communities that have recently been designated by HUD to receive an estimated $17 billion in aid over the next seven years to build affordable housing, tax cuts and credits to new industries.
It is sad that after so many years we still believe that “our residents are poorer, less educated , are mostly unemployed and are in poorer health compared to the state’s average,” according to the press release from HUD, dated January 22, 2002.
We are not tax experts and we do not know if that help actually ever became effective, or if it fell into that bottomless pit called Lawrence, as Congressman Marty Meehan once told us: “I don’t know what happens to all the money we bring into Lawrence and the city does not change.”
To that we add, “our sidewalks could be gold plated.”
