Paul McMorrow – Snappy Title TK TK

(Cross-posted from Boston Daily)

Governor Deval Patrick found out what it feels like to be governor last week, as Sal DiMasi’s House finally – finally – got to work advancing the governor’s agenda. It’s only been, what, thirteen months since the inauguration?

Patrick got to see his beloved $1 billion biotech bill emerge from committee. Here’s hoping the cost of inaction isn’t more than a billion large.

More importantly, at least politically, this week saw the speaker reverse course and fall in line with the governor’s long-stalled plan to change the state’s corporate tax code.

For the past year, Patrick’s tax plan has been panned as a burden on business and a recipe for economic disaster. Now, suddenly, the speaker is not only acceding to the governor’s plan, but using the word “reform” to refer to the new taxes. What gives?

First, the state’s business community seems to have bought into DiMasi’s own newfound logic – that taxing big out of state businesses more isn’t such a bad idea, if it can be leveraged to slash corporate tax rates and freeze unemployment payments. DiMasi’s budget outline would lower taxes from 9.5 percent to 7; Patrick’s would only see them fall to 8.3 percent. That reduction, combined with the unemployment freeze, DiMasi argued Tuesday, would mean that the “actual contribution” from all the state’s businesses would be “only $54 million” more in the short term, and revenue neutral after three years.

Asked why, if neutrality was the guiding principle that finally swung him on board, the plan couldn’t be revenue neutral right away, DiMasi sounded a lot like his counterpart in the Corner Office. He said, simply, that the state needed the money.

Which is why, ultimately, the speaker signed on to the plan at all. Two weeks ago, State House News reported, “Aides to the governor say he’s positioned strategically, and are confident they’ve got House Speaker Salvatore DiMasi boxed into a set of unappetizing policy alternatives: come up with his own revenue ideas, relent to deep cuts in popular programs, draw heavily from the stabilization account, or hop aboard Patrick’s own plans to raise money.” Cigarette tax aside, we learned Tuesday that there are no new revenue ideas, and with a massive budget deficit, something had to give. So something did.

DiMasi, notably, brushed aside a question about why he’d changed his mind on the issue. “I wouldn’t say I’ve changed my position,” he reasoned. Had he not been against closing the loopholes? Is that just us misremembering? Pressed on the matter, DiMasi told a reporter, “You must’ve been reading too much of your own news reports!”

Massive bleeding continues to afflict the state senate. In the past week, “Boston Ed” Augustus announced that he won’t be seeking reelection, and the fevered rumors surrounding Marian Walsh’s imminent judgeship reached an even greater sense of inevitability. Last week, senators Pam Resor and Robert Antonioni announced their retirement; last year, of course, saw the departure of Jarrett Barrios, Robert Havern, and President Robert Travaglini. That’s a ton of turnover for a 40-person body.

Speculation about Augustus’s seat has thus far focused on Karyn Polito and John Fresolo, though it’s the fight for Walsh’s not-open-just-yet seat that will be the real fun. There are few inside the State House who believe Majority Leader John Rogers will wind up taking a run at the seat, leaving Mike Rush the presumptive frontrunner. City Councilors John Tobin and Rob Consalvo are said to be intrigued but highly noncommittal, and with good reason. There’s likely only room for one city councilor in the race, especially with close friendships involved. And the senate seat would come at a hefty price: It would cost the upwardly-mobile pol $20,000 in pay and a shot at the mayor’s race.

The single biggest topic of conversation at the State House this week wasn’t taxes, biotech, or reps lusting after seats in the upper chamber, though. It was the governor’s “aerodynamic” new haircut. It’s cropped more closely to his head, and this fact has inspired a remarkable stream of chatter. Some of it has been positive, some not, but we’ve heard that so many people remarked upon Patrick’s cut that he took to assuming every compliment was a veiled jab. Word of this sensitivity led sympathizers to offer yet more compliments, which couldn’t have been helpful, either. The last thing he probably wanted to hear when wrapping up a press availability was a reporter eagerly yelping, “I think it’s a good haircut! Really!”

But that is, of course, exactly what he heard.

These are strange times for the state’s coastal legislators. First, they were subjected to an energy bill sneak attack that, unbeknownst to them, opened up their coastlines to unfettered wind farm development. They balked, as did the Senate, which had been pushing Senator Robert O’Leary’s oceans management bill as a way to set up a framework for plopping turbines down in the water. The senate threatened to hold Sal DiMasi’s energy bill hostage if the House didn’t act on their oceans bill, and so, this week, House leadership pushed a gutted bizzaro version of the senate’s bill to the floor. Turns out, it wasn’t a whole lot more than a reworded version of amendment leadership tried to cram through in November.

“It’s not much of an oceans bill,” O’Leary told us. “It doesn’t set up a meaningful planning process that has any teeth, and without that, it’s just an exercise, something that ends up on a shelf. I’m disappointed.”

O’Leary did pronounce himself “optimistic” that he’ll be able to bring the House around in conference committee. But until he does, don’t expect to see too much action coming out of the energy conference committee; the Senate can’t be too happy about the stunt that was just pulled on them.