The role of legislators

Very often, the public believes that a politician was placed in his or her position to vote according to our liking and get angry when the ‘wrong’ vote is taken. We vote them into office because during the campaign they have shown us that they are independent thinkers and people of principles and ethics. We place our confidence in them to watch for our interests, abiding by existing laws.

We support any politician that based on the information privileged to them makes a decision whether or not it is compatible with our own opinion. After all, they have access to documents, details, conversations, testimonies that we have not seen, allowing them to see ‘the big picture’. That’s where our confidence relies: in their honor in making a decision that is just – according to the law. Senator Ed Markey, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee has been in Congress for 37 years; he is not a newcomer on the political scene yet he voted “present” in the Syria decision to invade or not. That ambivalence is a sign of cowardice and it is unacceptable. He should have voted one way or the other demonstrating that he has an opinion of the subject.

At the local level, something happened during the recent City Council meeting while discussing the nominees to board and commissions in the city. We have always defended the right of our city councilors to vote their conscience for the same reasons explained above. When District D Councilor Kendrys Vasquez said that he will not vote for any city employee being nominated to a board or commission because that is a rule he set up for himself since he was elected to the council, we wondered why no other councilor jumped up to correct him. Councilors are not allowed to make their own rules when voting on anything. They are supposed to abide by the law. There is a Massachusetts law 930 CMR 6.02 that allows municipal employees to serve their communities in unpaid positions on boards and commissions. Is Councilor Vasquez now rebelling against the laws of the Commonwealth?

Several councilors expressed the same opinion regarding city employees rather than commend them for their extra effort to see the city function properly. We don’t have throngs of people applying for these boards and in the meantime, the work of some of those groups has become stagnant due to the lack of members. The residents of Lawrence deserve an apology for playing politics with the future of the city and get ready to approve the nominees if they really care for our progress.