Why Pat Maloney is a great choice to replace me on the Board of Selectmen
Many of you may not know much about Pat Maloney who is one of the candidates for Chelmsford Selectman. I have had the pleasure of working with Pat for many years, first on the Finance Committee and, for the past three years as a Selectman. Pat has been working behind the scenes on behalf of the Chelmsford taxpayers for the past 13 years on the Permanent Building Committee. As a successful businessman involved in the construction industry Pat volunteered his time and expertise to make certain that all of the major building projects approved by the voters and Town Meeting Reps were completed on time and within budget. He wanted to make sure your tax dollars were used wisely. Pat has been extremely successful and has gone the extra mile to save taxpayer funds. When the $31,000,000 school project was passed by the voters, there was no one who anticipated that Chelmsford could get state aid to help fund the project since the state had a moratorium on all such projects. Pat went down to Boston and advocated on our behalf and got Chelmsford over $16,000,000 of state aid which saved your hard earned tax dollars. That project is now considered a model for other communities with respect to school projects. Pat is not only concerned with your taxes but has a proven track record of performing for the town. His commonsense approach and knowledge of how our town works is unique among the candidates. More importantly, Pat is an honest and trustworthy person whose word is his bond.
I can think of no one who would better serve our town to replace me on
the Board of Selectmen and I hope that you will consider casting one of your
two votes for Pat Maloney on April 2.
Jon Kurland
ron johnson
2:00 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Jon,
I have no issue with you choosing to support the person, I have a problem with the choice of words. He is not replacing you. He is running for a position for which you have chosen not to run. I do not see it as a matter of replacing anyone.
Jon Kurland
2:04 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Fair comment, Ron. On the other hand, if there is an employee at work who then retires, is fired or resigns, and that person's position is filled by someone else, I would say that the new employee replaced the old one. I guess it is just a matter of perspective.
Anna Bucciarelli
7:31 am on Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Absolutely correct ... Jon's use of the word is a common interpretation, however, misused and misunderstood. A person can never be "replaced", an exiting individual's vacated position can be refilled. It is not a matter of replacing an individual but filling a position, either town elected or in business.
Carl
2:15 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Ayyyy anyone up for some bocce? I will not vote for Pat. He is not trustworthy.
Jon Kurland
2:19 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Carl - Instead of making a blanket statement, why don't you provide a specific example of how you arrive at your conclusion? I have always found that he is a man of his word, he listens to the concerns of others and he tries to build a consensus when there are conflicting interests on projects his committee has been tasked with developing.
John Doe
5:52 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
He is absolutely a man of his word...unless he tells you he'll do something, then forget it ;-)
Stefani Bush
5:57 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Seems to me that Pat has committed to doing a lot of things for this town over the years and has followed through - and the town has had great benefit from his efforts.
People who post anonymously with statements such as these are frustrating.
jim
7:20 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
People like Carl and John Doe have to be completely ignored. To make a statement such as "he is not trustworthy" while providing no specific examples is simply wrong. These statements speak to the lack of character of the person making the statement.
Jon Kurland
9:40 pm on Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Jim - I couldn't agree with you more! It is truly pathetic that there are some out there who just love to attack the reputation of people who are willing to step up and volunteer their time and talents for the greater good of our town. We have seen this so many times in the recent past that it is a wonder why people are willing to subject themselves to such cheap, baseless and juvenile attacks. You know that they have no facts so they simply resort to the most contemptable attempts at character assassination. Fortunately I have enough respect for the other readers of this forum to know that they will see those posts for exactly what they are. I have been around town for a long time and no one who has dealt with Pat has ever had a bad word to say about him. That speaks volumes to me and that is only one reason why am so supportive of his candidacy.
John Doe
10:15 am on Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Jon, I hate this ridiculous excuse that no one can be criticized simply because they are not being paid. Can no one who is a "volunteer" do any wrong?
Under the watch of Mr. Maloney, some of the most unwarranted and, most importantly, unwanted projects have happened here in Chelsmford. Under his watch, taxes (and yours) taxes have skyrocketed, and our schools are ranked lower than anytime in recent history. But hey, you guys volunteer, so I guess I should stick calling you out, right?
Oh, and certainly everyone volunteers for the good of the town, right? Certainly there is no personal benefit, right? Cause it's not like you get free health insurance for life, or get the town (by town I mean you and pat Maloney) to allow them tons of special treatment to build an office building, right?
John Gault
8:31 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
John,
Could you specify the unwanted projects that happened under the candidate? I am undecided but if you could be specific on the projects, it could sway my vote. Thanks.
Sue Carter
10:25 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
John Doe- In the past health benefits were available to those collecting stipends if they had been in a paid position (stipends or actual employee) for 10 years. Town Meeting voted to elminate stipends because of this unpredictable cost to the town. I think it was 4-5 years ago.
As far as building "under his watch" - nothing is done without voter involvement either through overrides, debt exemptions or if a project is done within the budget or with CPC funding with the vote of elected Town Meeting representatives. Unfortunately, voter turnout in local elections is traditionally much lower than those with national significance like a presidential election.
Mr. G
3:31 pm on Thursday, March 21, 2013
Mr. Doe: What special treatment did Mr. Maloney receive and what office building did he build with that special treatment? Mr. Maloney has done an exceptional job for this town. All these recent projects were necessary and prudent capital management. While I think our taxes too high, especially when compared to neighboring communities, it is in no way the fault of Mr. Maloney.
John Doe
10:19 am on Wednesday, March 20, 2013
Also, you guys love to forget that 40% of the voting public thought you guys were doing such a terrible job that they voted to throw ALL OF YOU OUT WITH NO REPLACEMENT. But you guys have clearly still not gotten the message.
Stefani Bush
5:11 pm on Friday, March 22, 2013
John,
You also seem to LOVE to forget that many of those people voted based on inaccuracies by the proponent of the recall.
The campaign against the Selectman was run on paid signature gatherers who LIED and motivated by $2.00 per signature incentives.
Your post tries to lump Pat Maloney into the recall - he was NOT on the ballot and he was NOT on the Board during this time.
Honestly, it sounds like John Doe is Roland Van Liew - and someone said last night that he admitted to being John Doe on the Patch (hearsay - not 100% sure as I did not confront Roland myself).
That being said - Roland, if it is you - just have the guts to post under your own name and stand by your accusations.
THIS is NOT an example of OPEN AND HONEST GOVERNMENT!
If John Doe isn't RVL - just come out and prove it by posting who you are. Have the guts. Enough with the veiled attacks and slander of other candidates.
Andrew Sylvia
9:29 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
It looks like there was a duplicate comment, I removed it. Sorry about that, probably a technical error.
Tyler Jozefowicz
10:17 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
Was over a friend's house last night in Chelmsford. Chelmsford Telemedia was playing " Meet the Candidate: Janet Askenberg for Selectman". There was a shill there feeding her softballs to promote her candidacy. It gave the appearance that there was an unbiased moderator on a regular show merely interviewing a prospective candidate. There are however no other interviews of other candidates by that moderator planned, nor an show with that title.
Got luck, everyone campaigning , including Askenberg, don't know that much about the candidates , but looks like free campaign advertising.
Is that permissible on Public Access TV?
Can all the candidates insist and gain equal access/fairness doctrine, or is this candidate just more sophisticated than the rest?
Just wondering.
Vivian Merrill
11:40 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
Tyler, anyone can go on Telemedia and say whatever they want (within reason). All the candidates could do this if they wished. All they have to do is talk to the programming people at telemedia to work it out.
Pete Pedulla
11:46 am on Thursday, March 21, 2013
Chelmsford TeleMedia (the Public Access TV in Chelmsford) offers all candidates in contested elections an equal opportunity to create this type of program. This policy was in place during last year's election season, and 2 candidates took advantage of it. All 2013 candidates were notified by the studio of this opportunity on February 18, 2013. We have strict limits on what technical support we will provide. After that, the candidate must do the rest of the work. As with all public access programming, we do not take responsibility for the content of the programming.
Thanks for your concern, and we encourage you to use your local Public Access Center, Chelmsford TeleMedia. Come by anytime and take a tour!