Messages from the gallery
MILLIONS REPORTEDLY tuned in to President Joe Biden’s final State of the Union address of what he hopes will only be his first term, and millions witnessed what was essentially his formal general election campaign kickoff highlighted by incidents of heckling and a much more feisty and energetic Biden than we have come to expect.
Though naturally a lot of attention is being paid to the speech itself, each year there are interesting narratives that play out by virtue of who is invited by different members of Congress to watch the speech from the viewing gallery of the House of Representatives chamber. In the case of the two representatives in The Sun’s coverage area, their guests were intended to highlight two major issues playing out in American discourse in the most heated election year in living memory: reproductive rights, and U.S. support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia.
U.S. Rep. Lori Trahan of the 3rd Congressional District has recently been one of the leading voices in the issues of legal abortion and in vitro fertilization after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that all human embryos, most notably including those conceived as a batch during IVF, are considered to legally be living children. For those who somehow are not familiar with the procedure at this point, IVF can involve the disposal of embryos that do not end up being used by the parent, which according to the Alabama Supreme Court would apparently amount to murder, thus immediately halting IVF treatments for hopeful parents across the state.
As The Sun recently reported in the wake of that ruling, Trahan’s position on IVF is personal, as she conceived her two daughters through IVF treatment.
“In the wake of the GOP’S latest attack on our reproductive freedoms, I spoke up about how IVF gave my husband and me our two beautiful daughters, Grace and Caroline. The outpouring of love and support has reminded me just how salient this fight is to protect our reproductive freedoms. Of course, my story and my daughters were only possible because of Boston IVF, the practice that helped me through five long years of IVF treatment,” Trahan said in a statement ahead of the State of the Union.
Trahan invited Dr. Pietro Bortoletto to the speech to further bring that message home. Bortoletto is a reproductive endocrinologist and the director of reproductive surgery at Boston IVF, the same practice where Trahan underwent five years of IVF treatment.
“The state of our union is only as strong as our President’s willingness to stand up for the basic freedoms we hold dear as Americans. Tonight, we heard a message of strength from President Biden, who is all in in the fight to protect women’s freedom to make our own decisions about our health and our family,” Trahan said in a statement Thursday following Biden’s address. “As someone who turned to IVF as my last resort to start a family, I know his refusal to back down in the face of extreme Republican abortion bans hit home for every woman wondering if their state would be next to rip fertility treatments away from them like we’ve seen in Alabama. As the President promised, we will not stop until we fully restore Roe.”
“I am thankful to Rep. Trahan for the invitation to join her at the State of the Union to raise the importance of federal protection for IVF. Infertility affects 1 in every 8 couples in the US. Access to IVF treatment is essential medical treatment to help these couples build their families,” Bortoletto said in a statement Monday. “Beyond infertility, access to IVF is crucial for patients with cancer who want to preserve future fertility and those attempting to sidestep genetic disease in their offspring. Which state you live in should not determine your ability to access fertility treatment.”
The sudden brouhaha over IVF, to just about everyone who
has seen this movie before, is perhaps less sudden, and more like a brief glitch in the matrix showing just a little bit too early what the end game is for “anti-abortion” groups after the repealing of Roe v. Wade. The Alabama state legislature of course did codify protections for IVF into law in recent days in response to the high court’s ruling, but maybe this incident should be the catalyst for those in favor of legal abortion, and who knew this would not just stop at abortion, to look in a mirror and begin practicing your best “I told you so.”
Over in the 6th Congressional District, U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton’s guest was meant to highlight the stalling of American aid to Ukraine by a certain speaker of the House. Moulton invited Oleksandra Kovalchuk, a Ukrainian national living in Salem and a leader in the transatlantic effort to protect heritage sites and museums in Ukraine from Russian bombardment. Kovalchuk, her husband and her son were able to flee the Russian invasion by crossing into Moldova, Romania and Bulgaria before they were able to get on a flight to the U.S.
She has since gone back and forth between the U.S. and Ukraine to support cultural heritage sites and museums in her home country as Russia wages a war on their very culture and heritage.
Though reportedly the votes exist to get aid to Ukraine while ammunition on the frontline is apparently scarce and Russia is gaining momentum, it is now up to the man who sat behind Biden during the speech, Speaker Mike Johnson, to bring that measure to a vote, and conveniently for Russia he refuses to do so.
“Ukraine is facing an existential crisis for survival. We need to help Ukraine end this war on its own terms. If the United States turns its back on Ukraine now, it will only embolden Putin — and it will show other autocrats, like Xi Jinping in China, that the U.S. doesn’t credibly stand up for democracies when they’re under threat. This is the right thing to do, and it’s an investment in our own national security,” Moulton said in a statement. “I’m honored to be accompanied to the State of the Union this year by Oleksandra, whose important work is not just a reminder of the vast toll that this war is taking on Ukraine’s invaluable cultural and historical institutions, but also a testament to the unflappable spirit and resilience of the Ukrainian people.”
How the sausage is made
IF YOU really want to see where the sausage is made in the city of Lowell,
tune into any one of the subcommittees, boards and commissions that are held throughout the year and are available for viewing on the Lowell Telemedia Center’s municipal channel.
These below-the-radar regulatory bodies oversee very distinct areas such as public health, parks, historic preservation, the Pollard Memorial Library, homelessness in the city, the land use boards of planning and zoning, the Lowell High rebuild project and much more.
In comparison to their marquee colleagues on the City Council and School Committee, these appointed — and sometimes, volunteer — citizens largely labor in obscurity, yet their administrative remit is vast and touches almost every aspect of the lives of Lowell’s residents.
And they get stuff done — a lot of stuff. Without these bodies, life in the city would grind to a halt.
Take, for instance, the License Commission, which meets twice a month at City Hall. its meetings are mostly attended by petitioners who run the business gamut. Watching a meeting is to receive an education in who’s who and what’s what in the city.
The License Commission describes its work as to “adopt rules and regulations for licenses and license activity that address matters of local interest in compliance with the laws of the Commonwealth.”
Sounds boring, until one reads what that work actually entails, which is regulating:
• Alcoholic beverage retail
• Common victualler (restaurant and prepared food service)
• Entertainment in an alcoholic beverage licensed establishment
• Lodging houses
• Pawnbroker, precious metals, secondhand articles
• Public amusements
• Secondhand motor vehicle dealer
• Sidewalk stands
Want to serve liquor at a reception at an art gallery? You must file an application with the License Commission.
February’s wildly successful Winterfest wouldn’t have been possible without the behindthe-scenes work of the commission.
Director of Cultural Events Peter Crewe appeared before the commission in early January for a “Special Events Permit for Amplified Outdoor Public Entertainment” (the public amusements regulation part) for Winterfest.
Interested in running a used car dealership? License Commission, again.
Want to be a sidewalk peddler? Yup, there’s a license for that, too. But don’t even think about selling from a sleigh, cart or wagon unless the commission gives its OK. And license or not, “hawkers and peddlers” may not interfere with “public travel.”
“No person shall sell or expose for sale from any stand, booth, stall, cart, wagon, sleigh or other vehicle, in any street, square or public place within the City, any goods, chattels or merchandise, unless licensed by the License Commission.
No person shall sell, solicit or offer for sale upon any street or sidewalk within the limits of the City any article of whatever nature, whether or not a license or permit is required therefor, under this section or under Chapter 125, Canvassers and Solicitors, and Chapter 167, Hawkers and Peddlers, in such a manner so as to interfere with public travel upon such street or sidewalk.”
The commission also reviews annual retail alcohol license renewal and it recently completed a comprehensive review of the Lowell Alcoholic Beverages Regulations.
Chair Martha Howe runs a tight ship, but Commissioners Cliff Krieger, Joseph Donahue, Dennis Mercier and Andrew Tang, along with Executive Secretary John Pyers, seem aligned with her efficient meeting management. Most meetings run between 12 to 45 minutes offering newcomers an easy on-ramp to the body’s work.
Speaking of ships, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, one of the definitions of the medieval word “victualler” means one that provisions an army, a navy or a ship with food. And the body that oversaw that provisioning was the victualling board.
If that doesn’t pique your interest, not to mention the regulation of hawkers and peddlers, consider this — the commission’s public hearing on March 21 will discuss pawnbroker interest rates for the city.
Be sure to tune in.
Casualties of deficits and 40B?
DRACUT HAS lost two of its strongest advocates for open space and community preservation. And its projected budget deficits, together with a proposed Chapter 40B development, played at least some role in their departure.
Bruce Cote, a longtime member and former chairman of the Open Space Committee, announced on Facebook this week that he and his wife, Janice Dudevoir, had just closed on the sale of their home in Dracut. And, as he put it in one post, they are “no longer townies.”
Both Cote and Dudevoir grew up in Dracut, but they are now officially residents of Stratham, N.H.
In a Facebook message sent to this reporter, Cote wrote, “We have moved to Stratham N.H. (There were) Many reasons for leaving Dracut, but ultimately it was just time. The $3M deficit and the Murphy’s Farm development didn’t hurt the cause either.”
That $3 million deficit in the fiscal 2025 is now $3.6 million, and deficits of more than $5 million and $7 million are forecast in the succeeding two years.
The application for a Chapter 40B comprehensive permit for Murphy’s Farm, a proposal for 300 four-bedroom apartments in East Dracut, grinds on in front of the Zoning Board of Appeals. The development has widespread opposition in town, as lawn signs demonstrate. But state law places more weight on perceived regional housing needs than impact on the city or town affected.
Only 15 months ago, Cote and Dudevoir met with this reporter, sitting in a sunny corner of a local Dunkin’. After months of hard work and frustration, Dudevoir was smiling and talking about the future of the seed shed at Beaver Brook Farm.
Her work to save the seed shed had earned her a place on the Beaver Brook Farm Ad Hoc Committee. She spoke at Town Meeting in November 2022 asking voters to spend $250,000 to stabilize and mothball the seed shed while the ad hoc committee developed recommendations for its future use.
Between the June 2021 and November 2022 Town Meetings, Dudevoir attended and spoke at 18 of 27 Board of Selectmen’s meetings (as a retired project manager, she kept track). “And at 14 of those meetings, at least some portion of what I said, was related to Beaver Brook Farm and the out buildings,’’ she said.
Her goal, she said, was to allow the town’s voters to decide on the building’s fate. “The only thing that would satisfy me was to get it before the voters.” She was convinced the town would vote to preserve the building. In fact, she received a strong round of applause when she spoke in November about its preservation.
The town acquired Beaver Brook Farm, its outbuildings and about 20 acres for $2.8 million in 2015 with Community Preservation Act funds. The town sold the farmhouse and one acre in 2021 for $100,000. For many years, Cote was a member and a former chair of the Community Preservation Committee in addition to the Open Space Committee.
Dudevoir frequently challenged the way the town — the selectmen, the town manager and the ad hoc committee — handled Beaver Brook Farm. At times, she seemed to try their patience. However, when Board of Selectmen Chair Alison Genest was asked, through an email query, for response to the couple’s departure, she answered, “I wish them well in this next chapter.” Similar good wishes were posted on Facebook by state Rep. Colleen Garry, Selectman Tony Archinski and former Selectman Warren Shaw.
Cote and Dudevoir are avid cyclists and take long road trips throughout the country, so it might be a while before they are fully settled in Stratham. But when they are settled that community will surely benefit.
New additions to GOP lineup in Dracut
AS A result of the March 5 presidential primary, the cast of “What’s Happening Dracut” will join the ensemble that makes up the Republican Town Committee. “What’s Happening Dracut” is one of several news and talk shows on Dracut Access Television.
While the state’s presidential primary has voters pick their preferred party standard bearer, it also gives them an opportunity to select party organizers at the local level. Both the Republican and Democratic town committees have up to 35 members. Neither party fielded 35 candidates.
So on the morning of the primary, a post appeared on the “What’s Happening Dracut” page urging Republican voters to write in three names: John Zimini, Phil Thibault and Richard Silvio.
Zimini posted the write-in request and signed his name to it. He’d been criticized recently for an unsigned post.
Zimini received 20 votes, Thibault 20 votes, and Silvio, 13.
The top vote-getter was Brian Genest with 2,023 votes. Alison Genest was second with 1,907. But, because there were far fewer than 35 names on the ballot, the “What’s Happening Dracut” trio will be on the committee, too.
Brian Genest is also a DATV talk show personality with “Eye on Dracut.”
In addition to their DATV shows, Genest, Zimini and Thibault are all DATV directors. Some recent events related to Thibault and the Board of Selectmen, which Alison Genest chairs, must already make for some tension at DATV meetings.
Town residents may well wonder if the acrimony on display at some selectmen’s meetings will also spill over into meetings of the town’s GOP.
This week’s Column was prepared by reporters Peter Currier on the State of the Union, Melanie Gilbert in Lowell, and Prudence Brighton in Dracut.