DiMasi bends House to left
Power shake-up hands minorities leadership posts
Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi dramatically shook up the House leadership yesterday, elevating several minority lawmakers to key positions and resuscitating the careers of liberal dissident members who had been banished under his predecessor, Thomas M. Finneran.
While many viewed the speaker's appointments as a shift to the left from Finneran's conservative reign, DiMasi insisted his selections would bring ethnic, geographic, and ideological diversity to the leadership ranks. DiMasi also swept out of power House members who had supported his rival for the speakership last year, Representative John H. Rogers.
''It's a major shake-up," said Representative Michael E. Festa, a Melrose Democrat and leading Finneran critic whom DiMasi appointed vice chairman of the State Administration Committee. ''It is an absolute, whole new reconfiguration."
For his most important appointment, DiMasi chose Representative Robert A. DeLeo, a Democrat from Winthrop, to head the powerful House Ways and Means Committee. DeLeo, a little-known State House insider popular with colleagues, will be thrust into a major public role on Beacon Hill, setting fiscal policy and controlling much of the House agenda. DeLeo will add to the Boston-area grip on policy-making in the Legislature.
A self-described lunch-bucket Democrat, DeLeo receives poor ratings from antitax advocates, but wins praise from environmental and education advocates. He opposed the sweeping campaign finance Clean Elections Law and gay marriage. Advocates for the poor and elderly said yesterday he is a strong supporter of human services.
DeLeo said he wanted to use his new position to make progress on issues he has focused on in recent years -- healthcare, education, local aid, drug enforcement, and problems created by drug addiction.
''The most important role we have in government is to help those people who can't take care of themselves," DeLeo said yesterday. ''We've heard that is our primary role. I think that's so true."
DeLeo's vice chairwoman will be Marie St. Fleur, a Democrat from Dorchester and the first Haitian-American to serve in the Legislature. She is the first minority to serve at such a high level on the Ways and Means Committee. St. Fleur will receive a $15,000 stipend on top of her salary of nearly $55,000, while DeLeo gets $25,000 above his legislative pay.
DiMasi also appointed Byron Rushing, a South End Democrat as the second assistant majority leader, a position that puts him fourth after DiMasi in the House leadership. Rushing, a consistent Finneran critic, tried four years ago to oust the then-speaker.
Of the Rushing appointment, DiMasi said: ''That was very historic." The speaker also appointed two other minority members to chair committees: Representative Cheryl A. Rivera, a Springfield Democrat and Hispanic, will chair the Public Safety and Homeland Security Committee. Representative Shirley Owens-Hicks of Boston, who had been dumped as a committee chair by Finneran, will head the Committee on Children and Families.
Most of the committee chairmanships come with extra stipends of $7,500 or $15,000. And unlike Finneran, who was viewed as a micromanager of legislation and members, DiMasi has promised to give those who head committees real power to shape and shepherd legislation.
Besides Festa, DiMasi also gave leadership posts to a number of Democrats who had been banished to the back benches by Finneran. They include Ruth Balser of Newton, who will chair the Mental Health and Substance Abuse Committee; Jay R. Kaufman of Lexington, who will chair the Public Service Committee; Eric Turkington of Falmouth, who will chair the Tourism, Arts, and Cultural Development Committee; and Frank I. Smizik of Brookline, who will become chairman of the Environment, Natural Resources and Agriculture Committee.
Other lawmakers who had been frozen out during Finneran's eight-year reign have been given vice chair positions on committees, some of which pay extra stipends. For example, state Representative James Marzilli, a Democrat from Arlington, is vice chairman of the Health Care Financing Committee, a post that gives him an extra $7,500 a year. ''I would say the Senate probably as a whole is still the more liberal branch, but the House has made a herculean effort to catch up," said House Republican leader Bradley Jones, Republican of North Reading. ''There's definitely a shift to the left. But after Finneran, almost anything is a shift to the left."
In a controversial move, DiMasi also promoted his close ally, Representative Thomas M. Petrolati, a Ludlow Democrat, to a newly created position, speaker pro tempore, a $15,000 post from which Petrolati will help him shape policy and run the House.
The move set off rumblings around the House because it appears to be a way for DiMasi to further curtail the influence of his onetime rival Rogers, who had agreed to accept the position of House majority leader when it became apparent that DiMasi would become speaker.
Yesterday, though, DiMasi insisted Rogers was the second in command in the House, not Petrolati. He noted that Rogers will get an extra $22,500, which is more than Petrolati will receive.
Petrolati has been at the center of the ongoing federal investigation into the House redistricting process four years ago. At issue is whether Finneran committed perjury when he testified in a civil case challenging the redistricting plan that he was not involved in developing the plan. Petrolati was House chairman of the Redistricting Committee.
Material from State House News Service was used in this report. 