Wow! Northland has donated $319,251 to the YES campaign. Some of these canvassers are being paid decent money. See here.
Big Corporate Money in Local Referendum Campaign
by Amy Sangiolo | Feb 24, 2020 | Newton | 27 comments
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Thank you, again, Amy, for #followingthemoney.
Look if you’re going to spend 4K on a poll, at least use a local polling company or someone with above a C rating on 538.
Yes, thank you Amy, for posting this. Since it is all corporate money, maybe the headline should be “Big Northland Money in Local Referendum Campaign.”
HO-LY COW!!! That’s frightening.
It’s hard to imagine that anyone is surprised by this. If you had invested many years and millions of dollars in purchasing land, designing a project, going through years of community review and redesign, incorporating feedback into your project to make it the best it could be and earn a super-majority approval by the City Council… wouldn’t you spend whatever it took to protect that investment?
You’re not wrong @Allison, I would do the same in their shoes. It also tells me this….
https://youtu.be/7RF-OLohSLI
Let’s also remember that the referendum is costing Newton taxpayers more than $33,ooo, according to the City Clerk. What’s more, RSN2020 and some City Councilors attempted to push back the vote to a date that would have cost taxpayers more than $145,ooo.
At least Northland is spending its own money. As Allison said, it shouldn’t be a big surprise to anyone that they are trying to protect their investment in the project. This simply isn’t comparable to other “big money in politics” issues, as RS2020 is trying to frame it in their Facebook ads tonight.
Everyone has their motivations that they feel are justified. Everyone, as far as I know, is acting within the law. But I could imagine a whole bunch of better civic uses for this money. If only.
I’m very impressed that the canvassers are being paid quite handsomely. Guess it’s not just not for the cause.
I guess we should be thankful they are single handedly keeping The Tab in business by purchasing nearly $24k in ads this past month (including the, “vote Yes or we’re going to put you in 40b hell”, ransom letter/full page ad.)
1) Opponents forced an approved real estate project worth hundreds of millions of dollars to a ballot question. Now they are clutching at their pearls because the developer spent a tiny fraction of that money to compete in the referendum? What did you expect?
2) Most of the canvassers appear to be Newton residents. I, for one, am glad that the Yes camp is hiring local. And good for them for paying their team well. Are we really going to bemoan the fact that a local campaign is hiring local workers and paying them well?
Huh? Based on a quick scan of the filing, it seems as though most of them made only a few hundred bucks.
There were a couple of exceptions: one gentleman from Newton and one lady from Roxbury made what, a little over $6k and $5k, respectively, during the five-week period? Plus some takeout from chitople? (note: misspelling is mine)
Assuming they could line up similar gigs each and every one of the other 47 weeks of the year, with no time off in between, those two might be able to take home $50k per year.
Again, this was all based on some quick math so feel free to correct me if I’m missing something.
Speaking of which, Charmin has introduced a new toilet paper called the Forever Roll, which can last someone up to one month. “We’ll see about that,’ ” said Chipotle.
This headline is a tad over the top. My headline would have been: “Local company defends efforts to undo years-in-the-making, City Council-approved, business plan.”
It’s actually important to understand that this is just another thing that becomes part of the cost of doing business in Newton. If we want to allow small property owners to build more modest apartment buildings, the process needs to be simplified. When you have to hold land for years and spend years worth of Money on lawyers, consultants, late night land Use presentations, then the lawsuits, and now a ballot campaign on top of it, the only developers you’re going to get are large-scale developers who can afford to get a large enough project with a big enough ROI through this ridiculous process.
It’s ironic with all of the talk about going green that we are getting 6-8 postcards every day telling us to “Vote Yes” on this green project.
Interesting. Thanks for posting. I’ve had the same experience as Newton Runner with multiple, multiple, multiple postcards, and received a robo-text at 8:45 Saturday night (claiming to be from “Brendan”, revealed to be robo when I responded). More than $270k total expenditures in this report, including top-flight political consultants Northwind Strategies.
Curious folks’ thoughts re: how concerned we should be about astro-turfing …
And interesting point to Bryan about smaller owners being pushed out of the process (are there other reasons for this, too?).
Yesterday, I received two YES mailers from the developer and two from Mike Bloomberg’s Presidential campaign. You can argue either way if the YES side is engaged in overkill with all the mailings and other outreach to Newton voters, but it actually seems to be turning off some of my neighbors. It’s abundantly clear that they are vastly outspending the NO side’s spirited, low budget but highly motivated campaign effort.
The NO side held a community forum in Upper Falls this past Sunday to present its case to the public and there were complaints that they should have allowed the YES side to present its case, as well. Perhaps that’s true, but I’m already hearing the YES side virtually every day when the mail is delivered to my front door. I’ve received only a single mailing from the NO side and it was half the size and far less slick or colorful than the daily missives from the YES side. In fairness, I think the NO side is entitled to some breathing room to present its case in the same unvarnished manner.
Sure they’re entitled to having their own events but my neighbors tell me they would have liked to attend an event with both perspectives presented.
And Right Size declined to do that.
Northland has a right to advocate for their project. I don’t have any problem with them spending their own money to promote a Yes vote. I personally believe that Newton is now best served by a Yes vote. But this six figure expenditure by Northland clearly demonstrates that city “leaders” left a tremendous amount of value on the table when they negotiated the Special Permit deal.
I’ve been very critical of the lack of affordable housing associated with the Northland project, and the lack of school impact mitigation funds. If this project had included two dozen more affordable housing units and some onsite educational space it would be a much more popular proposal and the Special Permit would not be in jeopardy.
Do I love the fact that so much money is being spent for a special election? Nope.
Do I love the fact that we are having a special election for a referendum on an issue that passed the city counsel with a supermajority? Nope.
Do I think it is the right of RSN to organize the referendum? Yep.
Do I think it is the right of Northland to advocate for their project using the monetary means they choose? Yep.
I don’t have to love anything about how this played out. But this is the system we’ve chosen. It’s ten pounds of stupid in a five pound bag.
@Mike Striar: I agree with you completely except I will be voting NO on the referendum.
Hopefully, Newton will have leaders who will negotiate and push for more community benefits!
LOL Amy. Who could you be referring to I wonder?
1. I voted for Amy before and will do it again…without hesitation!
2. Fig’s, “10 lbs of stupid in a 5 lb bag” is a perfect analogy. Kinda like trying to fit 800 apartment in the most overwhelmed part of the city. #classic
Like Bloomberg, Northland is buying an election.
Its all about $$$,$$$,$$$.
Hi @Greg you fail to mention that RSN didn’t attend the Newton League of Women Voters event because the initial moderator was a strong, public supporter off Northland.
When RSN requested an impartial moderator, the League publicly said they were unwilling change. (NOTE: I’ve heard the League ultimately did propose an alternate late in the game. Too bad, they could’t arrive at that decision sooner.)
At this weekend’s RSN 2020 conversation in Upper Falls some of the City’s strongest Vote YES supporters were able to address the crowd right after speakers invited by RSN discussed critical issues like the 40B threat, traffic and the fiscal impact.
The League of Women Voters Northland event held in Newton Corner format initially wasn’t going to allow direct questions or comments from attendees. Not sure if that changed without RSN there.
I applaud RSN for giving Councilors Crossley, Auchincloss and Leary and V14’s Jerry Reilly an opportunity to address the crowd without interruption at their community education event even though they’re being vastly outspent by Northland who stands earn more than $1 Billion in rent over the next 20 years from the project (more than 2x the development cost) while residents and the City Government will face bigger traffic problems on Needham street, a missed opportunity to do more to address our affordable housing crisis AND the very real risk of seeing a negative fiscal impact unlike Mark Development’s Riverside project which is projected to deliver the City a $50-$60 million net positive tax impact over the first 20 years.
@Pat is right #followingthemoney
Just think what the money could have been used for? Obviously as Mike said, there’s spending money still left on the table that could have been used for other purposes.
Remember this post: https://village14.com/2019/04/23/auchincloss-citizens-united-comes-to-newton/#axzz6F715r0Aq