Romney-Healey Field Questions from Local Residents in Leominster

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Romney-Healey Field Questions from Local Residents in Leominster

Three Answers Will Trouble Conservatives

Romney Would Rather Be 'Axeman' Than 'Taxman'

Conservatives will be troubled by three answers that were given to residents of Leominster yesterday. They concern casino gambling, gay/straight alliances and the secret intrusion by DSS into the privacy of new mothers and their families at the maternity wards of all hospitals in the state.

On the question of casino gambling, Healey answered that it is not a question of principle because we already have gambling in the state. She said it is just a question of whether it makes sense and they will look at the economics.

Healey said that Governor Swift had a panel look at it and Eric Kriss has been putting together another group of people to look at their analysis to see if the pros outweigh the cons.

"This decision is going to be made simply on the merits and we certainly would never want to have a casino imposed on a community," she said.

One questioner pointed out how Romney often used the term "non-essential services" to describe where he will make most of his cuts. He then asked what portion of education funds fit the definition of non-essential.

Lt. Governor Kerry Healey on stage answering questions of Leominster residents

The Governor failed to mention the money that funds the gay/straight alliances in the schools, which is kept a secret but is at least $1.5 million/year. Observers indicated that this indicates that Romney is going to continue to pander to the homosexual activists.

Romney said it is virtually impossible to go through every line item in the budget and say this item is "core" and this one is not. Instead they ask what is the core mission of government and how can they do it more efficiently and effectively and fairly

Education is a core mission, said Romney, but that does not mean they will not look in education for places to economize and do a better job, and make cuts where money is not being well spent.

One person complained about cuts to home visitation of mothers with newborns and asked if the money would be restored later.

In the past, MassNews has exposed this home visitation program as a virtual spy network for DSS. It uses deceptive practices to inject the eyes of the state into the homes of new mothers. After each visit, the home visitor files detailed reports about the home, mother and child without the mother's knowledge, which is entered into a computer database and acted on by DSS if they so choose.

Lt. Gov. Healey, Romney's designated abuse expert, answered by extolling the great benefits of the program in fighting abuse and neglect and assured the person that the program was suspended, not eliminated, and when the money is available, it will be one of their highest priorities to restore it.

In response to a question about what specific regulations might be eased for cities and towns, Lt. Governor Healey, who introduced their proposals in a legislative relief package for municipalities earlier yesterday, said they are looking at raising the threshold for prevailing wage so towns don't have to pay three times as much to get fire alarms installed, a pothole repaired or a sidewalk fixed. They also want to streamline the bidding process and eliminate anything that slows down and complicates construction processes called the "final sub-bid process."

More interesting for people, said Healey, will be a second round of proposals in the future that will include getting rid of unfunded educational mandates and costly regulations concerning environmental protection.

In response to a question about money for roads, Romney said he anticipates when the Big Dig is complete over the next couple of years, they will be able to spend more on transportation infrastructure statewide. Romney said he announced about a week ago two major principles on how they will spend that money.

The first is, "Fix it first," which means as they get the money, they will use it to fix bridges and roads that are in disrepair, rather than spending it on new highways. Expansion projects are important, he said, but the priority is on fixing what we have, because the Big Dig has drained so much money from maintaining our infrastructure.

Second is "Community first," which will place a community ombudsman to ensure that state highway projects are consistent with the culture and surroundings of a community.

In response to a question about the rising cost of health care, Romney agreed that costs are rising at an alarming rate. But he said that closing down hospitals won't help nor will reducing reimbursement rates to doctors, who would then go elsewhere. He said one thing that can be done is to look seriously at malpractice reform. Every time a huge award is paid out, everyone's rates go up, he said.

The head of Health and Human Services, Ron Preston, is helping him to look at ways to reduce costs in health care, said Romney.

Healey said one of their proposals for municipal relief is to allow them to pay a limit of 75% of health care costs for employees rather than up to 90%.

Asked to elaborate on how he will streamline government and why it is necessary, Romney replied that in the private sector, you have to find ways to streamline and can't keep raising prices when times get tough. In government, you also can't keep raising taxes. You also have to streamline, he said. For instance, the Executive Branch is overstaffed with 800 lawyers and 60 press secretaries with all their benefits, salaries, space, computers and phone calls. SUV's are more expensive to drive than sedans, he said, and it turns out they have 238 of them. If those were all sedans the state could save over a million dollars a year in fuel, tire wear, etc.

"That's the sort of economizing we have to do because it is the taxpayers' money. It is your money we spend. We are to serve you, not the other way around," said Romney.
"We'll keep looking and looking. Most of these ideas come from you."

Romney said they have a website where people post their ideas to save the state money, but he neglected to give the URL.

One questioner said he heard that if civil service were abolished, it would not include police and fire departments. What qualifies police and fire to keep civil service, they asked.

Healey said there was division among municipal officials on this matter. Some wanted to completely do away with the civil service system, while others made cogent arguments that it provides a prohibition against patronage and corruption in the critical areas of police and fire where people have to be truly qualified for the job. Maybe in the future we could find an alternative system that provides that security, but for the short term, she said, it would be best to keep civil service for police and firefighters.

On the homeless, Romney said we have a responsibility to care for them and he does not anticipate reducing money to shelters unless the homeless numbers shrink. However, he does not see the sense in paying hotel bills for 500 homeless per night as we are doing now and said he wants to look at alternatives.

A Leominster resident said their city has been fiscally conservative and asked if they would be penalized for having a stabilization fund and not get their fair share from the state.

Romney explained that the legislature created guidelines on how local aid money is to be cut. One rule is that he could not cut more than one third, of what he cut overall, from cities and towns. That is why local aid cuts total $114 million. Secondly, cuts are to be made proportionally according to how much money was originally allocated to them, he said. So unequal treatment cannot occur by favoring one town over another according to how they voted, or if they saved a rainy day fund, etc.

One questioner asked how Romney can prevent the state's talent pool from leaving Massachusetts during tough times.

Romney said we need to keep this state a friendly environment where employers want to stay and grow. We need to keep the tax rate competitive and to have good schools. We have to also be aggressive in recruiting companies and encourage those that are here to stay.

Is state support of the Democratic convention necessary given the budget constraints, asked one questioner?

Romney said emphatically that he is not a believer of the state spending money to subsidize conventions or sporting events or anything of that nature. He said if anyone came to him to ask for help in building a new stadium or whatever, he would say he'd love to look at that as long as the state has a great return on the money like the other investors are getting. "We are not going to be the dumb money," said Romney.

Regarding conventions, they ought to pay for themselves, he said. An investment he can understand, but a subsidy for either political party is a lot tougher to understand when people are facing tough economic issues in this state.

Asked how the administration plans to prevent a repeat of budget cuts three years down the road, Healey said the answer is fundamental restructuring of our institutions. Shrinking state government is one thing they are going to do to prevent a repeat.

Another thing they will do is devote a great deal of resources to a regional approach to economic development.

A state retiree asked why Romney is increasing their share of health insurance costs.

Romney answered that with 66,000 state employees, he had to reduce employment costs. He said they looked at possible layoffs and furloughs to reduce employment costs, but decided it couldn't be done right or fairly in a short amount of time, so they looked instead at increasing the amount that state workers pay toward health insurance, from 15% to 25% of the total insurance premium. The same applied to retired state workers, with a cap for certain retirees over 65 living within a certain percentage of poverty.