Patrick aides hint at Tocco's removal

Governor Deval Patrick, determined to exert control over the University of Massachusetts system, is undaunted by his failed bid last month to remove UMass board chairman Stephen P. Tocco and is still planning his ouster, according to administration officials.

Patrick aides have been testing sentiment among UMass trustees and said they expect the governor to have sufficient support to remove Tocco in a matter of months.

Patrick was publicly stung when his allies on the board could not muster enough votes last month to force out the influential Tocco, who is an appointee of Governor Mitt Romney, a Republican, but has strong ties to Democratic leaders.

Despite that setback, the governor is not giving up, said aides who requested anonymity because of the political sensitivity of the issue. He is the first Democratic governor to appoint UMass board members since Michael Dukakis left office in 1991, and he wants to gain greater influence over the 19-member board by appointing his own chairman.

Tocco - who heads ML Strategies, a large lobbying and public relations firm - said he is not aware of any maneuvering by the governor's allies to force him to step down. He said that neither the governor nor anyone on his staff has ever asked him to resign and described his conversations with Patrick and his staff as very warm.

Some of Tocco's allies, including a member of the state's congressional delegation, have lobbied Patrick to keep him.

"The last time I talked with anybody they said, 'We consider you an ally, and the governor thinks you are an ally,' " Tocco said in a telephone interview. "If the governor wants this to happen, I think he would have a conversation with me."

The freshman governor's moves are unusual. New governors typically must wait until well into their first terms before they accumulate enough supporters on the UMass board to gain control. But Patrick is pushing a higher education agenda that includes a major life sciences initiative and his $1 billion capital spending plan, and he is not willing to wait, his aides said.

It is not clear if the next move to remove Tocco will take place at the full board meeting in December, early next year, or in a possible special session, which could be requested at any time by any five trustees.

At least on the surface, the relationship between Patrick and Tocco, a politically savvy figure who has crossed partisan lines for years to advise and work for major political figures, has been cordial and friendly since the new governor took office in January.

But Tocco's resistance to standing aside to allow Patrick to fill the job has irritated the governor's inner circle of advisers. The administration "tried to work out a resolution and allow him to have a graceful exit," said one of the sources.

Two senior aides to Patrick had asked Tocco to step down in September, an administration source confirmed, but he refused. Instead, he rounded up a slim majority of trustees to resist Patrick's attempt to remove him and win himself another term, which will last through next September unless he is ousted in another vote first.

Patrick's aggressive moves caught Tocco off guard. He and the governor do not appear to have major policy differences, with the possible exception of Tocco's past opposition to creating a UMass law school.

Tocco said he is comfortable with any decision to choose another chairman and that, even if he is removed, he will continue to serve out the five-year term on the UMass board. "I see myself serving at the pleasure of the board," he said.

Tocco also said that he and Patrick are in agreement on a UMass agenda. "My agenda is his agenda," he said.

With strong ties to Beacon Hill political figures, Tocco has played major roles in Republican administrations while also working with his Democratic allies in the Legislature. Since the early 1990s, he has been a Cabinet secretary, executive director of the Massachusetts Port Authority, and chairman of the Board of Higher Education.

Even Romney, a Republican who swept many of the Weld and Cellucci administration crowd out of power and fired them from boards and commissions, turned to Tocco last year to help him take control of the UMass board. He had been serving as chairman of the Board of Higher Education since 1999. Tocco's Democratic ties has prompted US Representative Edward J. Markey, a Malden Democrat, to lobby Patrick allies to keep him as board chairman. Tocco once served as Markey's executive assistant.

But his long history as a major player on the political scene has also made Tocco a lightning rod.

While he has built up strong allies, he has also gained enemies, ranging from the state's major labor unions to those in the state college and university system who felt slighted by his decisions at the Board of Higher Education.

Romney appointees still dominate the UMass board, but Patrick gained a strong foothold in September when he was able to appoint five trustees.

The group includes former chairman James Karam, a Fall River businessman who headed a recent $30,000 fund-raising drive for Patrick in Southeastern Massachusetts and Philip W. Johnston, the former head of the state Democratic Party. Both have been mentioned as possible successors to Tocco, but each has said that he is not interested because of the time commitment and other obligations.