But I thought I'd try something different. Instead of telling you what was said, I'll tell you one person's opinion on who won this bout.
I liberally paraphrased the questions and can't give you a blow-by-blow account of the questions. But here's my take on last night's debate. I tried to award points for technical performance (the quality of the answer) but I'd be lying if I told you I didn't also reward style (in other words opinions that matched mine.)
In short, this was my gut feeling on the questions.
If you have your own scorecard supply it in the comments. If you think I'm a loser for taking the the time to write all this out, you're probably not alone but feel free to add that comment as well.
Most importantly, if you feel a position has been misrepresented let me know.
Round 1: If you met with Steve Karp, what would you tell him you'd like to see on his property.
Stiles: Focused largely on opening the process. Said the project should fit into the community.
Moak: Indicated in his answer that he has met Steve Karp three times. Suggested a mixed use.
Winner: Moak wins for actually having met Steve Karp. The benefit of being the incumbent.
Round 2: What would you do to fix Crow's Lane?
Moak: Largely--and justly--blamed New Ventures, the vendor, for fighting the town over every single aspect of the project.
Stiles: Opened up by saying the agreement that Moak inherited stinks. Credited local residents for taking on the fight. Also raised the recent news that toxic materials from Winning Farm in Woburn could be dumped in Newburyport. He requested a copy of those dumping plans from the DEP and plans to have a professional review them.
Winner: Stiles for bringing up the latest news and showing initiative.
Round 3: What can we do to fix the infrastructure and increase services?
Stiles: Not a lot the mayor can do. Budget is tight but city should seek alternative revenue.
Moak: Talked about the plan for improving infrastructure that he submitted to the City Council. Revealed that he meets with a group of five financial professional in Newburyport to identify new budgeting and money management techniques.
Winner: Moak, again the power of the incumbent.
Round 4: Does the city need a parking garage?
John Moak: No. The Waterside group must build the infrastructure to handle all the parking generated by their project. Talked about partnering with Waterside on a public private garage if necessary. Also identified Prince Place as a possible site of a parking garage if we did need one.
Jim Stiles: Not clear if we need a full blown garage, but people want to move spaces off the waterfront. That needs to go somewhere. He advocated having the NRA determine is plans for the waterfront, incorporating that into a parking management plan and then moving forward.
Winner: Draw. I like the idea of building some thing with Karp and the Prince Place lot. But I recognize Jim is eager to get cars off the waterfront.
Round 5: What could have been done to prevent the closing of the Kelley School?Stiles: Said the move made financial sense but didn't necessarily work for the students or parents. Blamed Chapter 70.
Moak: Acknowledged the closing caused some pain but said the high school also took severe cuts. However, he was very encouraged by the new Grades 1-3 school configuration at the Bresnahan.
Winner: Moak. He focused on the positive.
Round 6: Should we have a city manager?Moak: He'd favor a four-year mayoral term and fewer city councilors. Said he's open to anything but he admitted it's a low priority.
Stiles: Personally he likes the city manager idea. But as mayor he promised to get a Charter Review commission started to identify the best measure.
Winner: Stiles, sounds like he'd actually do something to answer this question.
Round 7: What did you think of the proposal presented at last week's NRA Meeting?
Stiles: Too much parking.
Moak: Seemed okay to me.
Winner: Stiles. I agree with him.
Round 8: This is where candidates go to ask questions of each other. Neither seemed to draw blood with their questions. In fact, I think they were better at answering than asking.
Winner: Draw
Round 9: Is the school budget transparent enough?
John Moak: Better than it was, might not be transparent to all, but interested people will understand it.
Stiles: He thinks the budget needs more metrics to provide context, such as per pupil expenditures in other towns.
Winner: Stiles, introduced some new ideas.
Round 10: Do you support ban on chain stores?
Moak: No. Chain stores can add a lot if they bring the right attitude to the community.
Stiles: Favors a ceiling on the number or percentage of chain stores permitted downtown. Says we should learn from Nantucket.
Winner: Stiles. I think we should be open to the idea.
Round 11: What would you do with the Kelley School?
Stiles: Senior center, community center, and sale should be explored.
Moak: Laid out the steps he took to study potential uses for the plan. Says the intention is to keep it and preserve it, but it would be opened up to an RFP soon.
Winner: Moak. Sounds like he's acted responsibly.
Round 12: What are the three best changes and the three worst changes in Newburyport over the past few years?
Moak: Three positive changes: improvements at Port Plaza, conversion of multi-families along High Street into single family structures, and the energies that went into protecting against landfill.
Stiles: Positives: Rail Trail development and preservation of open space. Negatives: School budget cuts, Crow's Lane Landfill.
Winner: Stiles, although its nearly a draw because Stiles had time to think of an answer.
Round 13: Something about the historic commission having more control over the appearance of buildings in the city. I was contemplating Mike Lowell's contract situation.
Winner: Draw.
Round 14: What would you do to foster regionalization?
Moak: Big proponent of sharing services and equipment with other towns. Working toward that goal right now, cited example of Newbury police being able to respond to calls on the Newburyport side of Plum Island.
Stiles: Agreed with Moak. In that spirit he called Newbury's planning office when he heard the plans to build a senior center at the Little River complex. He asked about the potential of partnering with Newburyport on the effort, something that would help both towns. He said there was no interest(and they want our water and sewer for this project?).
Winner: Draw, both had great ideas. Teaming with Newbury on a senior center seems like a no-brainer to me.
Round 15: How would you improve relations with City Council?
Stiles: Would take a page from Mary Ann Clancy and call--or have a representative call--councilors each week. Keeps small fights from getting big.
Moak: Says the relationship can be rocky at times but it's working.
Winner: Draw
Final Score Card
John Moak: Four rounds
Jim Stiles: Six rounds
Draw: Five rounds
Stiles wins on the issues in a decision. But he may have needed a knockout.
10 comments:
You're a loser.
-- J. Scott
Why would Newburyport consider a city manager when they have a mayor.
Generally speaking, a city manager is one of two options for concentrating the management of city services.
Does Newburyport have the city departments reporting to the Mayor? If it does, then I can't see the benefit of the additional layer of management.
For the sake of full disclosure, J. Scott is an old friend of mine so he knows better than most.
Admittedly, I have a vested interest in the answer, but with regard to the transparency of the School budget, it has been tweaked every year in response to feedback from the community. Several weeks ago, when Dave Tobin, who had been a school Superintendent for 35 years came to Newburyport to explain why the newly adopted changes in the Chapter 70 funding formula actually screw Nbpt even more than the old formula did, he picked up our annual budget and told the audience it was the most transparent budget he had ever seen in 40 years he'd been in education.
It can still improve, and it will.
As for using comps from other communities, we often do look at them, but the problem is that at the DOR website, the numbers breakdown isn't sufficiently detailed to tell you which, if any costs are carried on the City/Town side of the budget; like health benefits here in Newburyport. To complicate things even more, rural districts have higher transportation costs, and regional school districts get reimbursed for transportation- so you end up with apples and oranges.
I think that it is fair to say, as I did the night of the Chapter 70 presentation, that it seems that no stone was left unturned by the state in finding ways to screw Newburyport out of state dollars. It will take a long time to do that; what we need is a real municipal dialogue that stops seeing the problem with education as a problems with the schools- what happened last year in Nbpt happened in hundreds of communities across the Commonwealth; this year, hundreds more are facing the identical crisis.
We don't have a school crisis- we have a municipal crisis; we need to find the answers first within our entire City budget through efficiencies and difficult decisions and redirecting that income to where it is most needed; we need to identify new streams of revenue; and we need to continue to strategically lobby the state to have the Chapter 70 formula tweaked to our benefit.
I am not concerned any more about making the School budget transparent- let's open up the City side of the process and bring a little sunlight on that side of the room. Then we can really get down and solve our problems as a City.
I now return this blog to the estimable Mr. Salemi.
Way to go, Tom.
Thanks for the recap. It's very helpful for those that could not attend!
Bruce, perhaps a simple link your blog would have sufficed?
Tom,
Two comments:
On the Kelley school - I want to consider selling Kelley School as a last resort. I would prefer holding on to it for municipal or public use. Failing that, a simple sale may be prudent.
On incumbency - it seems to be the one telling advantage that John has in this election. Given that your results were close only because you place significant value on John having been elected two years ago, you have effectively promoted this issue to the key issue in this race. Of course John himself placed no apparent value on incumbency two years ago when he decided to run against an incumbent - John places value on incumbency only when it is in his favor. It seems excessive to give him three wins for something as ephemeral as this.
Jim
Dear Anonymous:
http://newburyportschools.blogspot.com
you have a better idea.
Bruce
So what did you decide about Mike Lowell's contract? Or, what about A-Rod coming to the Sox?
Good question Anon (if I may call you that)
I wondered this. Say the Sox offered Lowell three years at $12m per and the Yanks offered four years at $12m per and Lowell took the Yanks deal, how would Sox fandom react? Would they boo like they boo Damon? Personally, I don't think I could. Lowell is too classy. He's never made a "I'd never join the Yanks pledge." And, frankly, the Yanks aren't nearly the baseball boogeymen they once were.
All that being said, I hope the Sox put their effort into Lowell first. I'd give him 4 years at a reasonable contract. If that doesn't work out, move Youk to third and try finding a 1b out there.
In short, pass on A-rod (although work hard to drive up the price.)
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