Dear CDCC Members and Friends:
Both houses of the state legislature have now passed maps for new Congressional districts, and Cambridge remains split into two seats. With the support of our city's entire legislative delegation, we mounted an amendment to unite Cambridge, and fought tooth-and-nail for it in both chambers. We generated more than a hundred comments to the committee, far more than any other community affected by the redistricting process. I would like especially to thank Rep. Alice Wolf and Sens. Sal DiDomenico and Patricia Jehlen, along with their staff, Kathleen Hornby, Wally DeGuglielmo, and Bob Fitzpatrick, and my predecessor as chair, Avi Green of MassVOTE, for all their dedication and perseverance on Cambridge's behalf.
Because we wanted to protect the new 7th CD as a majority-minority district, the proposed amendment swapped Cambridge for most of Allston-Brighton; the trade would not have affected racial/ethnic balance, and would have opened up opportunities for white support of minority candidates. However, Mike Moran, chair of the House redistricting committee, lives in Brighton. He did not accede to the swap, and it failed on voice votes.
We now welcome Ed Markey to Cambridge, and look forward to working with him and his staff, alongside Team Capuano, here and on the Hill. We hope to bring him to talk with the city committee, and his new constituents, as soon as possible. Markey is a senior member of the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee, long active on environmental and technology policy. Thanks to his work as Chair of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, the House passed a comprehensive cap-and-trade bill in 2009. We hope and expect that Democratic majorities will soon, with Ed Markey in the lead, push climate-change legislation into law. Although we take seriously our fealty to progressive principles, we salute his extraordinary efforts on behalf of the Coordinated Campaign and the Democratic Party, and are excited about our partnership in the coming years.
The redistricting saga is over and, with the denouement of the Select Committee on Deficit Reduction ("supercommittee') next week, far larger issues loom. Please take a moment to contact John Kerry (http://kerry.senate.gov/contact/), who sits on the supercommittee. Tell him to protect vital means-tested programs -- including Medicaid, the federal food programs, and the Earned Income Tax Credit -- and to raise revenue beyond current-law baseline. For more talking points, see the excellent briefing and letter from the Mass. Law Reform Institute.
Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours--
