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2
October 20, 2006
an): flawstahle Wot 2006 Voter: GIIIIIO
IIEMEI‘IIIIIS “WIS - D
uncuumn
Atsalis still has drive
and desire for position
By David sun I:
dstill@bamstablepatriot.com
Don’t expect to see much of four-term
incumbent state Rep. Demetrius Atsalis
on Gavel-to-Gavel, the public television'
coverage of House actions.
He said that he’s addressed the entire
body of the House . .
maybe half a dozen
times, explaining
that the work is done
among members be—
fore the day of a final
vote.
Those speeches
sometime make for
good theater, but he
said he cannot say they’ve ever changed
anyone’s minds.
It’s also because he agrees with the
counsel given by his father.
“He said, ‘Don’t get up until you can
contribute to the debate,” Atsalis said.
Rather than repeat what’s already been
said, Atsalis said he works with his col-
leagues to get things done.
A change in the House leadership two
years ago saw the departure of the man
whose ear Atsalis claimed even before
his first election, Speaker Tom Finneran,
raised questions about just who would be
listening to the representative in the new
era. That Atsalis supported the unsuccess-
ful candidate to replace Finneran added
to speculation that whatever juice that
relationship provided had evaporated.
Not so, said Atsalis, who one of four
members of Finneran’s leadership team to
retain a position in the new regime.
“Other people were stripped of their
positions,” Atsalis said. That he stayed
in the leadership circle, he said, speaks
volumes about the relationships he's been
able to forge.
And it’s not just with Democrats, Atsalis
said. He said that to be effective, a legisla-
tor needs to be able to work with colleagues
from both parties to build consensus.
More than party, he said, there’s a cul-
ture on Beacon Hill that depends on being
able to trust in the positions and statement
of your colleagues. He said that he’s been
able to maintain and build relationships
by holding to positions and commitments
once they’ve been made.
Atslais also said that he’s been success—
CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
Wlll CIIDCIIEII - II
Ready to go on record
and build one of his
own
By David Still II
dstill@barnsfablepatriot.com
The first time Will Crocker paid atten-
tion to anything political was at age 11
in 1968.
He doesn’t remem-
ber being taken neces-
sarily by the politics or
platforms, but by the
entire scene.
As a former news-
man of 25 years, he
knows enough to laugh
that it was the Repub--
lican convention, not
the news- and protest-filled Democratic
affair of that year, but he also knew that
it captured a moment.
Crocker left his job as a radio journalist
in March to run for this office, saying it
was time to stop covering the issues and
to start doing something about them. But
for someone trained to remain impartial,
there was an initial adjustment period.
As a first-time politician coming from a
career more attuned to covering elections
than running one, Crocker said that while
he knew the issues and where he stood
on them, talking about where he stood
seemed unnatural.
“It took me a while to weave myselfinto
the issues,” Crocker said in an interview
at his Centerville home this week.
“The biggest cure for that is knocking
doors,” he said.
And he’s done that more than 4,500
times. At doors of voters of all political
persuasions in Bamstable and Yarmouth,
he said, three main issues kept coming
up: home insurance, education funding
and rolling the income tax rate back to
50 percent.
Those are issues that Crocker kept
going back to during this week’s Patriot-
sponsored debate at the Cape Community
Media Center in Yarmouth.
On education funding, he believes he’s
come up with a proposal that will cost the
state no more money, but simply more
equitably redistribute the $3 billion or so
spent on public education. His bill would
raise the minimum support for education
to 25 percent for all communities and cap
it at 80 percent. Those receiving more than
CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
Mlle 8. ISIIIIIIIS SIEIIG SBIIflIIII'
IIIIB D'lEIIIIY — D
IINGIIMBEIITI
Health, education keys
for O’Leary
By Edward F. Maroney
emaroney@barnstablepatriot.com
It sounds almost Lincolnesque.
“There were little cabins in a circle,”
Rob O’Leary said of his first summer
“residence” on Cape Cod. “There were two
rooms and we all slept
in one room, six kids
and my parents.”
From the seasonal
encampment down by
the shore in Hyannis,
O’Leary’s father,
Dan, would head for
the Hyannis Normal
School, now town hall,
to teach. Today, his son
uses an office in the same building as state
senator for the Cape 8; Islands district.
Dan O’Leary went on to the presidency
of Lowell State College, which he molded
into the University of Lowell. He had a
hand also in the creation of Cape Cod
Community College.
Rob O’Leary stayed with the family
profession, teaching at Massachusetts
Maritime Academy and living in the village
of Barnstable. Then came the day that he
heard the Barnstable Civic Association
would be talking about a boat ramp, and
he attended and spoke. That same night,
several people asked him to become presi-
dent of the association.
“I’m an accident in a way,” O’Leary said
as he described a political career that has
held similar surprises, including becoming
the first Democratic county commissioner
and Cape Islands state senator (when
Henri Rauschenbach stepped down be-
fore the end of his term) elected in the
last century.
Now vying for his fourth term, O’Leary’s
priorities are changing. He’s become chair-
man of the Higher Education Committee,
and written legislation that increases the
state’s commitment to that function.
Massachusetts got away with being near
the bottom in funding its state college
system because the multitude of private
colleges was thought of as taking up the
slack. Now, he said, most of those are
“pricing themselves higher and higher”
and appealing to out-of—state and out-of—
country students.
With all the competing needs that
come before a senator, O’Leary said he’s
CONTINUED ON PAGE 4
Barros looks for oppor-
tunities to serve
By Edward F. Maroney
emaroney@barnstablepatriot.com
Service is important to Ric Barros.
The Centerville Republican was so eager
to serve in the military that he ran away
from high school and joined the Army at
16, putting in 19 days before he was sent
home.
At 17, following the
example of his uncles
and brothers, he be-
came a Marine.
As a young adult,
he joined the re-elec-
tion campaign of Ed
Brooke, the first black
man elected to the US.
Senate since Recon-
struction.
Barros topped off his UMass-Boston
diploma with a Boston College law degree.
He hoped to enter the Marine Corps’ Judge
Advocate General program, but resigned
his appointment when his father died. His
service was needed at home, where there
were seven siblings under 17.
Becoming a lawyer was another oppor-
tunity to serve. “In the ’60s and ’705,” Bar-
ros said, “it seemed they could do things,
fight for things, look for justice.” He knew
of only one other Cape Verdean American
who was an attorney.
Barros announced his aspirations in first
grade and his teacher said, “Why don’t you
be a cranberry picker like your dad?”
By his third year at BC Law, Barros
had jumped into politics as a candidate
himself, challenging Cape Congressman
Geny Studds.
“In 1984, Iwanted to he recalled. “In
’86, they (the party) wanted me to run. In
’88, they wanted me to run and I didn’t.”
Anti-Communism was a philosophy that
appealed to Barros grong up. In 1986, he
blasted Studds for “encouraging repressive
action” by Daniel Ortega and the Sandini-
sta government of Nicaragua.
“We were just fundamentally different
people,” Barros said.
In 2000, he was one of several Repub-
licans seeking the nomination for state
Senate after Henri Rauschenbach decided
not to run again. At the time, he called on
party colleagues to respond to “the great
center."
“That was not a liberal or conserva-
tive statement,” Barros said. “It puts the
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