A civil debate for rivals

Four candidates for governor -- three Democrats and an independent -- aired their differences last night on an array of issues ranging from economic growth, job creation, taxes, and education in the first live televised debate in this year's campaign.

The debate, an hourlong encounter at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government, allowed the Democrats -- Christopher Gabrieli, Deval L. Patrick, and Thomas F. Reilly -- to position themselves for their party faithful and the voters at large just over a week before the Democratic Party's convention meets to endorse a candidate.

Reilly moved to the conservative edges of the Democratic Party by supporting a tax rollback; Gabrieli boasted that he had created jobs as a venture capitalist; and Patrick made a pitch to liberals with his denunciation of Governor Mitt Romney's lack of funding for programs for poor people.

Independent Christy Mihos, who left the Republican Party to run, touted populist themes, often aimed at the middle class: he highlighted his anti-property-tax, anti-toll-road platform and his call to increase local aid to provide more funding for schools. ''Beacon Hill is burying the middle class," he said.

The debate was civil in tone, with the only barbs aimed at Romney and Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey, the GOP's endorsed candidate who declined an invitation to participate.

''It is absolutely remarkable that Kerry Healey is not here to defend the dreadful record of this administration over the last four years, lost jobs, lost population," Reilly said. ''We are going in the wrong direction."

On taxes, Reilly stood firm on his position to roll back the income tax to 5 percent, while Patrick insisted the state needed the funds and should keep the rate at 5.3 percent.

''I believe taxes are too high in Massachusetts," Reilly, said, citing the state's large surplus this year. ''I'm not talking just about property taxes but I am also talking about the income tax and all the other tax burdens on people. People are hurting here in Massachusetts right now."

Gabrieli supports a gradual rollback depending on the state's revenue needs. But Patrick was put on the defensive when he was asked about his position on new taxes and his opposition to the rollback of the income tax to 5 percent, a rate that voters demanded in a referendum in 2000 but was never fully implemented by the Democrat-dominated Legislature. Patrick had shown interest in a cigarette tax hike but only, he said, to fund a healthcare reform plan and also to allow local communities to impose meal taxes.

''My issue is how we get past gimmicks as a way to govern and how we get to the root causes of some of the challenges we are facing," Patrick said.

''I have no plan to raise taxes," Patrick said a few moments later. ''I have no plan to raise the income tax. I have no plan to raise the cigarette tax. I was interested in that proposal, when that was one of the features for funding the healthcare plan. That's off the table now."

When questions turned to the recent flooding in Massachusetts, Gabrieli offered a harsh critique of Romney's stewardship of the state's decrepit dams and linked the situation to the April 3 fatal scaffolding accident at Emerson College that killed three people.

''What happened to the dam inspectors? We saw scaffolding collapse. What happened to the scaffolding inspections? There is a long-term price that we see when these crises come around. You can't anticipate everything, but there's been a knowledge for a while that we've got a problem in Peabody," Gabrieli said.

The candidates were also asked about a recent uproar in New Bedford, where Mayor Scott Lang won School Committee approval to give students general diplomas if they meet the school system's graduation requirements but do not pass the MCAS test.

Reilly and Gabrieli agreed on the current requirement that all students pass MCAS tests to graduate. ''One test for everyone," Reilly said. ''We can't sweep it under the rug anymore. We should give them an education that means something."

Gabrieli, who has worked on education issues, said MCAS tests are critical, but the larger question is that school systems are not providing good enough education for the students to pass the tests. ''I support the MCAS, but I think it is crucial that we ask not 'MCAS or no MCAS' but why we aren't getting kids in our poorer communities up to proficiency," he said.

Gabrieli also linked a question about schools to the minimum wage, and the overall economy.

''Even if we raise the minimum wage, and I support that, that's not going to get them into the middle class," he said. ''That's just a step better from the bottom, so we've got to raise skills.

''That means we've got to reinvent schools so it works better for kids," Gabrieli said. ''That's why I've worked on changing the whole concept of the school day, so that kids finish high school."

Patrick argued that MCAS testing is not the overriding issue in education reform, saying that he advocates instead offering programs that will improve the school systems to a level that would allow students to pass such tests.

Mihos did not answer the question directly, saying the real issue is getting more funding to cities and towns to permit them to spend more on education and raise the standards.

Mihos used most of his time to hammer away at his themes of lifting economic burden on Massachusetts residents, blaming the exodus of population the state is experiencing on the high property taxes and fees that he said were a result of the policies imposed by Governor Mitt Romney and the Legislature.

''Any type of relief for the beleaguered Massachusetts motorists is something that I would certainly favor," said Mihos when asked if he would support Healey's proposal to waive the gas tax for the summer.

Mihos also defended his plan to freeze property taxes. The proposal would keep assessments at current levels until a house was sold.

Asked if that plan would create inequity in assessments, Mihos said: ''It is certainly fair to the elderly people in the middle class who are leaving the Commonwealth . . . because they can't afford these huge increases in property taxes."

The only hint of criticism of a fellow Democrat came from Patrick, who made a sharp reference to the state officials overseeing the cost recovery efforts from the $14.6 billion Big Dig project. As the attorney general, Reilly heads up the state's effort to seek refunds from contractors. Patrick has questioned Reilly's oversight.

''If you look at something like the Big Dig [which is] billions of dollars over the original costs and the breathtaking lack of curiosity among our elected officials about where that money went, then it is no wonder that people aren't interested in an appeal to raise taxes," Patrick said.

On the controversial plan to build the world's largest offshore windfarm in Nantucket Sound, Patrick reiterated his strong support for the plan and framed it in an overall policy to increase renewable energy.

But Reilly denounced it as a ''huge rip-off" for the developers that would give them access to 24 square miles of federally owned land under Nantucket sound for free and provide up to hundreds of millions of dollars in tax credits for the company.

But the attorney general, pressed to explain where he would site liquid natural gas terminals along the coast, conceded he had no plans as to where they should be placed, other than away from residential areas.

Reilly was also asked how, as a career public official, he could bring jobs to Massachusetts, as compared to the other candidates who have worked in the private sector.

''I'll be a cheerleader," Reilly said. ''I'll be fighting for Massachusetts every day. Other governors are fighting for their states and fighting for jobs. We haven't had that for the last four years."

Patrick praised Romney for leadership in welcoming Hurricane Katrina victims to Massachusetts, saying he showed great compassion. But he lambasted the governor for not showing the same compassion to those in need within the state.

''It is shocking that he has been unwilling and unable to find the compassion and the resources to shelter, clothe, and feed people who are flat on their backs right here in Massachusetts, day after day, year after year," Patrick said.

The debate was sponsored by the Globe, the Kennedy School, the Massachusetts Institute for a New Commonwealth, New England Cable News, and WBUR.