Gregoire Continues to Deny a Need for Legislative Successes

Danielle Gregoire continues to make the focus of her campaign the mutual accomplishments of the Massachusetts Legislature, while denying any personal responsibility for their failures. In a recent Main Street Journal article, Ms. Gregoire stated, "pointing towards individual accomplishments is not my priority." This would have been a humble statement except she went on to justify her lack of accomplishments by adding the bills she cosponsored for issues that are not prime concerns of most of her constituents. Ms. Gregoire is out of touch with the residents of the district. The accomplishments she highlights and her goals for a future term do not correspond to expressed resident concerns. Her request for rewards for her hard work does not seem to be generating a positive voter response.

Perhaps Ms. Gregoire does not understand how these statements read to the people who also work hard in her district. This attitude may be a product of a society that hands out trophies for any effort at all. However, she should know that many people are only rewarded for working hard when they actually produce anticipated results. Voters respected effort in the first few months as she learned the job. However, after two years, her comment that "different members take the lead based on their strengths" indicates the district may need a representative that has a strong financial background if we expect results for our district. Using her theory, her work assignments demonstrate Ms. Gregoire has not been identified as having strengths in the legislative areas most residents are concerned about in this economy.

Further examples of Ms. Gregoire lacking a connection to her district came in her chance to ask questions of her opponent. One would have expected questions that would connect her not to her base of hard core Democrats, but with the battleground effort to win the Independent voters she will need for reelection. Selections of her questions to Mr. Levy were very revealing of how little she understands the economic concerns of her voters. The first question she asked in the article indicated no research on the topic. It was a question about the City Council failing to act on the required state's waste ban and what she deemed would be a "no cost" mandatory recycling plan. Mr. Levy's response demonstrated her lack of research on the question. Marlborough has complied with the ban of certain materials in the waste stream since 2008. He also explained there is no free method of creating mandatory recycling as Ms. Gregoire suggested and discussed the resistance in the community that needs to be addressed before moving forward with a plan. As the local State Representative, one would have hoped she would not only have been aware of the resistance, but also have been engaged with solving these problems. Why was she waiting for an election to become educated by the City Councilor running against her? To connect with voters, she needs more experience connecting with people outside her own party.

The second question was about another favorite topic of Ms. Gregoire's, raising taxes in tough economic times. She asked Councilor Levy about his position on the CPA Ballot Question 4. Once again, Mr. Levy had a researched answer on the issue that reflected an understanding not only of the issue, but its impact on local residents, something Ms. Gregoire seems unable to relate to despite tough economic times.

It continues to demonstrate how out of touch Ms. Gregoire is with the voters when she happily discusses raising taxes without understanding how this will hurt local families.

Jim Ash, "Candidates Make Their Case. Levy is Challenging Incumbent Gregoire." ,Main Street Journal