— Eye on Everett —

He doesn’t believe anyone can beat him.
“No one can beat me,” he says over and over.

– The Mayor’s Blue Suit talking with Josh Resnek

By JOSH RESNEK

A few days back, I picked up the Blue Suit at the end of Abbott Avenue where it meets Elm Street in the early morning. It was snowing. The Blue Suit opened the passenger door. He stepped into my car. He sank into the seat. He let out a huge sigh.

“You OK?” I asked him.

“I’m good,” he answered. “Thank god the mayor went out early. He gives out free time to me the way he likes to throw c-notes around, which is to say, he tosses around c-notes like manhole covers.

“Drive into Woodlawn Cemetery,” the Blue Suit ordered me to do.

He directed me to drive toward the area of the cemetery that borders the back side of Abbott Avenue.

“I can keep an eye on the mayor’s mansion from here,” he said to me.

“What stories I can tell you about what’s gone on inside the mansion,” the Blue Suit added.

“Forget it,” I replied. “I don’t need to hear that stuff. I mean, don’t you think the mayor deserves a bit of privacy from you?”

“Yeah. I guess you’re right,” the Blue said.

We were chatting about this and that, more this than that, when he perked up.

“You know that last trip the mayor took to Aruba?” the Blue Suit asked.

Continue reading “— Eye on Everett —” →

Everett out of the red, virus numbers down

FEBRUARY 20: The vaccine clinic at Pope John was up and running over the weekend. (Photo by Jim Mahoney)

By JOSH RESNEK

It is a time when we watch on television as the president does a candle lighting for the 500,000 dead from COVID-19 and memorializes the nation’s dismal, third- world country response to it.

Another 100,000 Americans from all walks of life are expected to die in the next three months – so it is obvious the virus remains deadly as our response to it finally ramps up.

Many millions more will come down with the virus but will likely survive.

Here in Everett, infections are dramatically down. Hospitalizations have dropped. The use of masks and social distancing efforts have worked – and now comes the advantages that begin to be felt with mass vaccinations.

Everett’s designation as a hot red zone for the virus has been changed to yellow this week by the Department of Public Health – a sure sign the virus trend is apparently heading in the right direction.

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Jet setters

US Senataor Ted Cruz. (Courtesy Cruz.senate.gov)
Mayor Carlo DeMaria (File photo)

When the going gets tough, the tough get going, traveling pols are cut from the same cloth

By JOSH RESNEK

The recent winter storm catastrophe in Texas sent Senator Ted Cruz traveling to Cancun, Mexico with his family to get away from the freezing cold and ice storm that paralyzed the state.

Millions went without electricity, heat and drinking water as Cruz relaxed under the warm sun on the beach at the Ritz in Cancun.

Sound familiar?

When the state shut down last March – in the days before it shut down – the mayor went on a trip to Aruba, to the Ritz, knowing full well the city of Everett was shutting down. No emergency, not even a pandemic, was big enough to stop the mayor from going away.

Cruz never should have gone on a vacation to Cancun.

The mayor never should have gone on a vacation to Aruba at that time.

Cruz has apologized for making a mistake – not the mayor.

In fact, the mayor took another vacation to the Ritz in Aruba at the end of December.

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Mayor looks to pack school committee

Move seen to unseat Supt. Tahiliani

By JOSH RESNEK

Superintendent Priya Tahiliani’s leadership of the School Department does not include the mayor’s imprimatur and his voice, as the mayor sees it.

As a result, the mayor is apparently putting together a slate of candidates who will run for the School Committee in November with the hope of ridding himself of the superintendent’s audacity, according to a variety of people inside and outside of the School Department and the School Committee.

The plan is to pack the School Committee in the November Election, to be followed by a vote to force the superintendent out of her position.

All the present members of the School Committee are apparently aware of the mayor’s effort now underway to pack the School Committee with political allies, instead of independent education-minded voices, according to a wide variety of sources familiar with the effort.

“The public will make its own decisions (about packing the School Committee). The mayor hasn’t had a good track record of getting others elected. As for the superintendent, I voted for her. She was my pick. I’m going to make sure she succeeds,” said School Committeeman Frank Parker.

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Adrien battles for respect

By JOSH RESNEK

In a recent Boston Globe Op-Ed and during a radio appearance on the Jim Braude and Margery Egan news show on National Public Radio, Adrien addressed how she is being treated by her colleagues and the mayor since she was elected.

She was invited to appear on the radio show based on the revelations she made in the Globe Op-Ed.

Her appearance last week on NPR caused the mayor to demand equal time on the Braude and Egan Show, a request they granted to him late last week.

During his radio appearance, the mayor said Adrien was “rude and ignorant.”

Adrien had detailed her poor treatment by her council colleagues and the mayor since her election during her earlier appearance on the Braude, Egan Show.

She described being taunted, being threatened, and being asked to resign by several of her colleagues.

She also gave substance and detail to her belief that the mayor is out to get her and isn’t exactly trying to hide the animus he holds for her.

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