In a close race, Somerville chooses two progressive candidates for mayor boston.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from boston.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Email
Somerville residents and elected officials are fed up: they’ve been fighting for safety improvements along McGrath Highway and Mystic Avenue for years, and after four pedestrian fatalities, they want immediate action from MassDOT.
On May 26, a couple hundred area residents rallied in 90-degree heat to draw attention to the state’s inaction regarding road safety and environmental justice along I-93. Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley joined many of Somerville’s state and local elected officials in calling out the state for not doing anything about these “preventable deaths.”
“The…reason this is so infuriating is that the lives of Kevin and Cheryl and Marshall that we were robbed of due to traffic violence a violence that has been perpetuated by indifference, a complicit passive tolerance so this was one hundred percent preventable,” said Pressley. “Like most inequities and disparities and injustices, they don’t just happen; they happen because of indifferen
Wicked Local
In reviewing three candidates for the police reserve list, to fill current vacancies in the Somerville Police Department, a City Council committee voted against confirming the first name on the list.
On Feb. 2, all five councilors on the Confirmation of Appointments and Personnel Matters committee voted against appointing Matthew Fairchild to the police reserve list. The other two candidates, Giovanna Lorenzet Marin and Jose DaCosta, were approved in a 3-2 vote.
While police reserve list appointments have been a simple process in the past, the meeting played out like a slow motion drama.
The committee began by interviewing candidates in open session, before breaking for executive session to address protected personnel matters.