DiDomenico lands leadership role
State Sen. Sal DiDomenico scored a coveted role as an assistant majority leader — with a $20,000 raise to boot — amid a leadership shuffle yesterday, a move that elevates the Everett lawmaker while he’s emerging as a potential Senate President candidate in 2019.
Harriette Chandler, the chamber’s current leader, tapped DiDomenico to round out her leadership team, which now includes Sen. Cynthia Creem, a Newton Democrat, as the new majority leader and Chandler’s top deputy, and Sen. Jason Lewis as the new assistant majority whip.
Creem is filling the role Chandler held before she was installed as Senate President to replace Stanley C. Rosenberg. Rosenberg stepped down late last year amid a still-ongoing Ethics Committee investigation sparked by allegations that his husband, Bryon Hefner, sexually assaulted or harassed four men while boasting of his influence over Senate business.
Chandler also reshuffled several committee chairs, shifting Salem Sen. Joan Lovely from assistant majority whip into the roles once held by DiDomenico, which include the No. 2 position in the powerful Senate budget committee.
But it was DiDomenico’s new roles that raised the most eyebrows around the State House. Also installed as the chair of Bills in Third Reading, DiDomenico moves into the upper echelon of Senate leadership, all while taking home $65,000 in stipends on top of his normal pay — or $20,000 more than he previously made.
It comes as he — and as many as four others — have eyed the presidency for next year, including Sen. Karen Spilka, the Senate budget chief DiDomenico once served under as vice chair in Ways and Means.
Chandler sought to downplay the decision to tap DiDomenico, telling reporters she viewed it as a “lateral” or “horizontal” move.
DiDomenico called it “moving to a different place in leadership.”
“He had a great deal of power in his former position, and we want to make sure that he continues to have that kind of authority and power,” she said. “I’m not sure this is elevation. It’s more a moving-over.”
But beyond the increase in stipends — a barometer of the Senate hierarchy — the change is a technical promotion by the Senate’s own accounting.
Chandler aides yesterday gave reporters a three-page list of the new assignments, including a box at the top reserved for “majority leadership.” The assistant majority leaders, naturally, were included. The vice chairmanship of Ways and Means, DiDomenico’s old position, was not.