My RTK journey began almost 2 years ago when the City of Nashua was appraised for new property values (Laurie Ortolano has a wealth of examples to supplement mine). Shocked by my personal copy of their report, I sought to know specific methods in which specific types of properties were appraised, compared to one another, and the assessor’s office, with Attorney Bolton (here and here, if unfamiliar with him) as an accomplice, repeatedly refused or delayed me. I ultimately sued the City in superior court and Attorney Bolton slammed my email inbox with a 900 page pdf the night before my court date. It was the USPAP report that the City had been crying “draft exemption” in refusing to share it in addition to misleading me to thinking the report actually had the information I was looking for. It didn’t, but lots of time, money and effort was wasted over several months and the blame is squarely on the City. But enough of that. What about Bob Burns?
Transparency?
Nurse Terese, who is in a primary with Burns and 4 other candidates for the retiring Ted Gatsas’s executive council seat, is a busy person and does not have a hired paid professional campaign staff like Burns does. Because she’s an ordinary person and a political newcomer compared to many of her opponents, she often asks people for help with little tasks here and there. One example was today when she said she didn’t see Burns’ required financial data in the SoS website and asked me to look into it.
At this point, I will put in a kind word on Scanlan by pointing out that he usually answers my emails to him within a few hours and today was no exception. Scanlan replied with a link, which I encourage interested readers to click on right now because I want people to see for themselves what I’m about to point out. He also copied a member of his staff, instructing me to contact him with any site navigation-related questions because It was clear that the site was not the most user-friendly, and he didn’t want to be like that thoughtless cabbie who dropped off a passenger outside a dark and locked destination at midnight and skedaddles without making sure that person gets safely inside.
I started with the fields and clicks that were a matter of logic just like a customer looking for something in a grocery store that prefers to just find the item without bothering an employee first. Unfortunately, I was not successful, so I emailed the SoS staffer and he kindly replied. Rinse, lather, repeat. Each new instruction I followed did not turn up the desired results, which was the campaign financial data required to be submitted by June 18. I even took screen shots of the results of following this staffer’s directions to help him help me better.
Finally, I was beginning to think Scanlan’s office was willfully diverting me, but I was committed to staying polite, so I said, “it says ‘no data available,’ and it’s late on a Friday afternoon, so I’ll just ask when the information is available to come in and inspect in person next week.” Interestingly, the next reply from this staffer was a custom link that brought me straight to the page I was looking for, but I will only share it upon request because I want people to first experience the hamster wheel of doing the search.
Like Bolton
Keep in mind that being the opportunist that he is, Burns has switched around which offices he has sought over the years, and each election cycle is not necessarily the same office as the previous one. He has also filed using different accounts. What I mean by that is that candidates can file under their own names or as “Committee to elect…” and perhaps other variations. This loophole sends truth seekers on a wild goose chase. Not only does Burns use multiple addresses, but multiple account identities. It reminds me of Laurie Ortolano’s RTK saga with the Nashua Arts Center, which is riddled with LLCs and shell corporations to hide money and shelter records from 91A.
District 4 constituents deserve an executive councilor that practices rigorous honesty 100% of the time without any of the “burying in discovery” or “lying by omission” shenanigans. There’s a reason why the words in an oath administration are “do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth,(“so help me God,” or “under the penalty of perjury”)? Nurse Terese will never wrongfully keep secrets or willfully deceive people. In fact, she even tweeted about such things recently.
Truth matters.
