Frustration and anger I get, but what good is it? Mayor Gitschier posted on his Erik Gitschier for Lowell City Council Facebook page that the Senior Center lease should be audited going back to 2001. He wrote:

“The initial contract outlined payments of $257,666.28 a year for 20 years or $21,472 a month (i feal like im dealing with a bad carsales person), again which would mean the agreement was until April of 2023.

The only three payments during this contract that were of that amount were the first three. In the 18 years of the contract, the City paid over 1.6 million dollars or on average over 94 thousand per year? Why?”

He also included the page from the lease that shows what he was referring to (attached at end of column). What he didn’t include was Exhibit B (also published at end of column), which shows the rest of the story.

That exhibit shows that monthly payments because of land credit and others that were added. So it was increased to be $27,266.27 monthly and $327,195.24 annually, which equals $6,543,904.80 or $1,390,579.74 more than what is on the original lease page.

It’s just another example of the many many things wrong with this entire lease.

There is a section that allows the city to deduct cost for work they perform, but it would not shock me if nothing was ever charged back.

I understand the anger and frustration of the Mayor, Councilor Rita Mercier (on fire Tuesday night) and other Councilors, but here’s my 2 cents;

Mayor Gitschier was upset with Dick Howe, Jr. (and probably me, but that’s a weekly occurrence) when past city attorneys Sweeney and Fenton were brought up. What good is it going to do now, when previous Auditor’s or CFO’s like Jim Kennedy, Barbara Haag, Sheryl Wright, Attorney Chris O’Connor and others get dragged into this?

No one can be charged, Sarris would kick-ass in court, and aside from the chest thumpers who want to spat about the “Old Boy Network” or the “Good Old Boys,” what is going to get accomplished by continuously looking backwards?

This is a complete Clusterluck (self-edited) from the beginning through today, and unfortunately Doc isn’t showing up in the DeLorean so we can go back in time and fix it.

Lowell needs to move on.

There were motions on the council agenda to seek an RFP for a new Senior Center. Until we find one, we have only limited choices. Reach a short term deal to be paid out of the city budget with the current landlord and keep the existing center open while we try to find a place and figure out how to afford it.

This Council has to do this while facing layoffs , lack of summer recreation jobs and tightened state and federal funding.

The road behind us with this lease was a disaster.

The road ahead isn’t looking promising, but before we drag people through the mud in the name of transparency, my question is what does it accomplish?

The guy you’re dealing with fought with a church for $410,000. Do you think if people keep saying he’s a bad man, he’ll honor a deal he probably never wanted to make, but his partner at the time was honorable?

He’s dug in. The Council has to either direct the Manager to spend as much money as it takes to fight in court and get a temporary restraining order to allow the Center to stay open , try to negotiate a new lease, or shut down the Senior Center and eliminate the Council on Aging and staff until we find a new location.

What will continuing a trip down memory lane into the past and throwing mud on people at the risk of making Lowell reimburse the Feds for CDGB money, or  what most of us are pretty sure will find Lowell on the losing end of a court fight, accomplish? Trashing people, even those we liked and thought were “good guys,” accomplishes what???

This council needs to figure out what to do that will allow them continue serving the seniors and not end up costing the taxpayers over past actions.

Social Media use a tricky issue for Elected Officials. In 2026, we have the wonderful world of social media.

Elected Officials and political candidates use all different platforms to reach the public. They have their own campaign social media pages where they post on topics that will help their campaigns or inform their supporters of their latest activities or views on an issue. Some also have their personal Facebook, Instagram or TicTok pages.

Today some members use BOTH their personal and political pages, and it’s sometimes confusing when a member post on their political page but then tries to say it is a personal page, especially when the post then becomes a motion.

I don’t believe you lose your right to comment and give your opinion as a private citizen just because you’re an elected official, but I see that it is a very blurry line when you do it on a political page.

The case in point again is Erik Gitschier (the gift that keeps on giving). On his Erik Gitschier for Lowell City Council Facebook page Wednesday, he posted about the proposed Trash Enterprise Fund and trash enforcement against the Lowell Housing Authority.

Apparently someone disagreed with him or took exception to the “Mayors” posting. He responded as follows:

“I want to make it very clear again, this page is not the Mayor’s page (there is a seperate page on facebook) it is my personal page and has been for five years. This is not an official account, it is my personal account and no one posts under my name but me.”

On its face, this appears to be a political page, not a personal one.

He is also 100% correct when he states, “this page is not the Mayor’s page.” He also filed this motion for this week’s council meeting;

M. Gitschier – Req. City Mgr. provide the City Council with a report on how many fines have been issued to the Lowell Housing Authority for trash violations, the amounts, and dates of the fines.

It’s very difficult for the public to separate the person from the position. Clearly, it’s his political page, but according to the state, as long as he doesn’t use his official Mayor title, that would be okay. But since he IS a City Councilor, it clearly isn’t his personal page, but it is HIS political page.

The state hasn’t yet addressed the issue clearly (big surprise) and I could only find this “Draft” Mass.Gov Search from 2020!

Councilors Gitschier and Corey Robinson use social media often. Councilor Sean McDonough speaks at Council and School Committee meetings as Citizen McDonough. The days of City Councilors being fulltime goodwill ambassadors for the city are over.

Councilors (some) now see the position as being caretakers /managers who sometime express “tough love” to make their point, but also have to navigate between the political and personal world.

The times they are indeed changing!

Budget Cuts? Who cares, let’s add more jobs/work to City Staff! Does Councilor Nuon understand the time it takes to add items to a website?

In another of my many hobbies, I was a blogger and let me assure you, it takes time.

In the spirit of everyone’s favorite saying, “IN THE NAME OF TRANSPARENCY,” let’s create one or two new full-time jobs. Councilor Nuon has the following motion on this week’s agenda:

1. Nuon – Req. City Mgr. in recognition of the importance of transparency and the Massachusetts Open Meeting Law, ensure all supporting backup materials associated with each item that appears on the agendas of the more than dozen city boards, commissions, and advisory committees are available online for public viewing; said backup materials, along with the meeting agenda, should be submitted to the City Clerk’s Office for posting prior to the date of the aforementioned board, commission, or advisory committee meeting to ensure no individual needs to submit a public records request to the city to gain access to said backup materials

WASTEFUL use of employees.

Does the Average citizen care about the Animal Advisory Committee – Civic Stadium Commission – Lowell Historic Board – Lowell Water Board – The Taxicab and Livery Commission?

Sure, there are small special interest groups, but the MAJORITY of citizens don’t even know about these boards, let alone the need to post every single item and back-up about them on-line.

In fact, FOIA requests were created for those who do.

Lowell is Upset! Let’s change our position! For over the past few years, many city and town officials, Vocational School Committees and the trade unions have opposed proposed legislation that changed the way students were admitted to vocational schools, without any success. These people all contribute to the vocational education system and fought hard, to no avail.

Now all of a sudden, Councilor McDonough filed this motion:

C. McDonough – Req. City Council send a letter to our state delegation, the state Secretary of Education, the commissioner of the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, and the governor expressing our strong opposition to the mandated change to lottery admissions for our vocational and technical high schools.

Maybe he needs to start spending more time with the other Gitschier, Lee, the Greater Lowell Tech School Committee member, who can tell him about how long and hard this fight has been.

A sternly worded letter from the Lowell City Council is like tossing a pebble into the ocean. Don’t waste time, no one is going to change it because you and Councilor John Descoteaux and the other councilors now want to take a stand.

My question is, where have you been?

Lee, Ray Boutin and others were talking about this back when I was doing the weekday radio show.

HR Demographic Report! The City’s Human Resources department has answered some questions about the city employees asked by Councilor Sidney Liang.

The workforce is predominantly male (68%) and Caucasian (72.7%). • Nearly half of employees reside in Lowell (47%), while a slight majority live outside the city (53%). • Ethnic diversity is present but limited, with Hispanic (7.8%) and Asian (4.4%) representing the largest minority groups. • Approximately 9.3% of employees opted not to disclose ethnicity.

Beginning of the Tension Season, aka budget time! The school department has posted their budget and it will be presented at the School Committee meeting this week. (FY27 Proposed Budget.pdf)

Included in the CFO was an item that caught my attention. It looks like the school department is once again being charged $100,000 a year for Parking.

I had pointed out to Kevin Murphy that the School Dept. is the only department charged for parking, and he said he would drop that. So why is it back?

A city council wanted the school department downtown, then stuck them with the ridicules rent.

If the answer is it’s in the existing MOE agreement, then why are they charging for items NOT in the current agreement, Like Public Service calls?

Early College Program: Congratulations to some of my favorite LHS students who spent time at the State House this week, advocating for the continued funding of the early College Program.

It was great to see State Representative Tara Hong invite the students into his office and talk with them.

Rep. Hong is a good role model for the students and is all over the city attending many events.