Norwood Bulletin: "Primary Appeal"
Rogers, O’Leary answer some Primary questions, by Mason Neely
September 7, 2006, Page 1
(With the September [19th] State Democratic Primary only weeks away, the Bulletin asked the two candidates vying for the 12th Norfolk District Seat – incumbent House Majority Leader Rep. John Rogers and challenger Leah O’Leary – about the region’s most pressing political issues and how they plan to address them on Beacon Hill….)
1. What do you feel are the most important issues impacting the voters of Norwood and Walpole?
Rogers: I have brought back the largest state education financial aid package to Norwood and Walpole in the history of the two towns because quality education is an issue of major importance to these communities. Affordable health care is also very important to Norwood and Walpole citizens. In the big picture, I helped to enact the new landmark first-in-the-nation Heal Care Law of 2006, which provides universal health care coverage for virtually everyone in the state and for several thousand in our community. In the smaller picture, I have secured for three years in a row a sum of $1.9 million to help maintain Caritas Norwood Hospital as an essential community provider, helping to keep its doors open and accessible to our families.
One of the largest issues affecting Norwood and Walpole families is the very high cost of living. Virtually every household in our community struggles to balance seemingly limited incomes with ever increasing bills. This is why I have spent so much time trying to bring back relief programs and laws that help people deal with their household financial burdens. In July, I successfully led the override of Governor Romney’s veto of $25 million that thankfully cut Norwood’s MWRA water and sewer ratepayers’ bills by more than $280,000 this year alone. I fought for two years to deliver $1.1 million in state funding for Norwood’s Senior Center, a cost which otherwise would have been borne by Norwood’s property taxpayers. And this year, I brought home a record amount of school aid and local aid to pay for local services for Norwood’s citizens, money that helps keep property taxes lower.
O’Leary: I think the foremost issues at play in Norwood and Walpole are the issues that affect working families on a day to day basis: educating our children, making sure our families have access to high quality, affordable health care, and ensuring that our towns get the financial support to be able to provide the services we all need.
Talking to people in the district, the pressures on our community and our families keep coming up. In Norwood, the issue of replacing or fixing the High School is of great concern; in Walpole there were just 19 layoffs in the school system. The rising cost of healthcare is really hitting home, too: some of our senior citizens are literally cutting their pills in half to keep their bills down. This race is not about having or not having enough resources in this state, it's about setting the right priorities for our families and fighting for those priorities. I got into this race because the most important thing to me is making sure the priorities on Beacon Hill match the priorities of our families and our communities.
2. Do you feel your views reflect those of the voters in the 12th district more so than your opponent?
Rogers: Yes. For 14 years, I have distributed my annual Voter Opinion Poll and [sic] the Annual Ton Elections asking my constituents how they feel on various state issues affecting them and their families. Most recently, I wrote back to these voters with the results of the poll.
Staying in touch in this way helps guide me in the decision-making process on their behalf. Also, I am on the phone with Norwood residents from all ages and backgrounds every day of the year. I hold office hours to listen to the concerns and thoughts of ordinary citizens and have worked on more than 20,000 constituent cases in my career. More than this however, my life-long experience here in Norwood keeps me grounded in the views of the community. I was born and raised in this Town by two good parents and I live here with my wife and my three young daughters. We share similar struggles, hopes and dreams for our daughters and their future as our fellow citizens have for their families. As I move about this great community daily, I am each day made aware of what’s on the minds of the people I am privileged to represent.
O’Leary: My family goes back over a hundred years in this community. I know this community and the people who live in it; I am running for State Representative because I do not see the priorities and values of this community reflected in the leadership provided by our local State Representative. My opponent has spent a lot of time on an agenda with a different set of priorities. While he has been focused on other issues, funding for our schools has slipped, local aid has been cut, and the burdens on working families have increased. Norwood has always been a community that cares about other people, and I think that my focus on the day to day issues in this community and on meeting the needs of its residents is much more in line with the voters.
3. How would you describe the state of the area’s schools and how would you work to change/improve that status?
Rogers: Many of our schools are old and sound maintenance can only buy so much time before costlier renovation or repair is required. The question that inevitably arises is how to finance those improvements.
That’s why I’m proud to be chief author of the 2004 law that created the Massachusetts School Building Authority, a vital reform that enables the state to partner with towns like Norwood to match up a portion of the state’s sales tax revenues with local costs for renovation or repair. This new reform pays for improvements up front with cash so that towns don’t have to bear costly financing costs.
Finding ways to help towns pay for schools is one of the reasons I am proud to be endorsed this election by the Massachusetts Teachers Association.
O’Leary: Norwood and Walpole have education systems that we can be proud of, but they are not as good as they could be. The main problem? Not a lack of talent, but a lack of support. We have built a system that provides more focus on accountability without the resources and supports necessary to achieve its goals, and this has really hit home in communities like ours. As recently as 2004, Massachusetts was ranked 41st out of 50 states, based on share of the total public elementary and secondary education funds coming from state government.
This is simply not acceptable: we owe it to the young people in this community to reverse this trend and to give them the best education possible. The opportunities open to our young people in the future will be directly proportional to how well they are prepared to take advantage of them.
4. What are the most pressing environmental issues facing the area and what steps should be taken to protect the region’s natural resources?
Rogers: Open space preservation is a pressing environmental issue. I successfully secured $350,000 from the state to help pay for the acquisition of Adams Farm in North Walpole, an historic 300-acre tract of agricultural and forest land, home to hundreds of species of wildlife and well-known for year-round human recreation activities for our area’s families. Also, I secured $750,000 for the repair of the Ellis Pond Dam and pedestrian nature trail, $150,000 to build the Willett baseball field for our youth, and wrote a law that grants 100 percent state match with local money for the acquisition of open space.
O’Leary: In these towns, where many people commute to work, we’re feeling the pressure from high gas and energy prices. I think we need to find a way to transition to forms of energy that are both cleaner and more sustainable – hybrid cars are a step in the right direction, as are wind farms and other forms of clean energy. Of course, we can help at the local level by taking small steps like carpooling or using the commuter rail. I think environmental issues are ones on which the legislature and communities are going to have to work closely in the future. I am going to be a strong advocate in the legislature for the preservation of our resources, here and across the state, as well as an advocate for long-term, sustainable solutions.
5. In Norwood, there has been an ongoing debate over the Town’s request for Massachusetts School Building Authority funding for the construction of a new high school. Do you support that effort to secure funding and as a legislator, how would you facilitate Norwood receiving such appropriations?
Rogers: You can foretell what elected officials will do for you in the future not so much by what they promise to do, but by what they have done for you already. When the MSBA announced that it would reimburse Norwood $3.3 million for the renovation costs for six of our schools, that was good news. The bad news came when the authority said it would pay the Town in small increments over 16 years rather than in one lump sum, resulting in a fiscal crisis for Norwood, several layoffs, and a reduction of Town services. Immediately, I held a conference with officials at the authority and made the case for Norwood that we should be paid the entire amount up front in a lump sum with no waiting. Later that day, the authority reversed its position and Norwood got the full $3.3 million. If the Town in its wisdom decides to build a new high school, then I stand ready and confident in the effort to make the state share the cost dollar for dollar.
O’Leary: My children and I all love the Norwood High School, but I have been convinced that we need a new facility to accommodate the growing needs of our school system. I will fight for the funding necessary to bring our system up to standards. We cannot risk the accreditation of our high school: we need to increase the level of funding available at the state level to repair and replace schools and other municipal structures, and we need to ensure that Norwood receives its fair share.
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