View from the Corner Office

MassINC is by any standard a unique organization.  We know of no other quite like it around the country.  I believe our strength is drawn from our commitment to impartiality, independence and balance. Our magazine of politics, ideas and civic life, CommonWealth, is unique in today’s rapidly changing world of journalism. Our research reports follow the facts where they lead us without prejudice as to the findings.  Frequently, our findings surprise us – and that is good for all of us. And, our public forums aim to illuminate the challenges and opportunities our state faces. We are proud to have the backing of labor and business, liberals and conservatives, Democrats, Republicans and Independents.  We value our nonpartisan approach to dealing with the issues of the day. The motivations for our work are both contemporary and historical. The primary contemporary challenge facing our state is cost of living – and its impact on our ability to attract and retain the most skilled workforce in the nation.  Massachusetts has always lived by its wits.  Brains, capital and innovation make this a special place in the world.  But today, it is becoming ever more difficult for individuals and families to live the American Dream in our Commonwealth.  Cost of living is pushing many families to leave our state.  This is undermining our ability to attract and retain the talent we need to compete.

The subject of population outmigration – and its risks – is rising to the top of our civic agenda in the city and the state.  MassINC has been ringing the alarm bell as loudly as we can – and we as a community need to do more to respond. For historical motivation, let me draw from the examples of two of our founding fathers that were native sons of Massachusetts. Ben Franklin, a notable son of Boston, – an early outmigrant perhaps best known for playing with lightning in Philadelphia – he felt that the foundation of our communities would be voluntary civic organizations and associations.  I think he would have been a great believer in the many nonprofits – ours included – that populate the landscape and agitate for a better future. So too John Adams, perhaps the first of many Bay State politicians who have sought the Presidency, chose the word “commonwealth” advisedly when he sat down to write the Constitution of Massachusetts.  He envisions a dedication to the common good as a guiding principle for us here in Massachusetts.

In this sense, MassINC is the latest example of an old idea: that democracy needs revitalization and that each individual citizen should play a role in this process.  This historic hall brings this point home for all of us. As we thought about an appropriate way to mark this important 10 year milestone, we considered several options.  Instead of yet another gala dinner, we decided to focus our energy on fostering a more substantive debate about the future of Massachusetts in this election year.  First, we launched a newly redesigned CommonWealth magazine – hereafter in full color. Second, we released important research on the cost of college education – another key part of the cost of living puzzle. Third, we partnered with the Eagle Tribune and the MetroWest Daily News to begin publishing a special set of issue papers in the run up to the election – and we expect to join forces with other leading regional papers on this project in the months ahead. And, fourth, we co-sponsored a gubernatorial debate on jobs, the economy and cost of living last Thursday with our friends at the New England Cable News, the Boston Globe, WBUR and Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.  This was the first live broadcast debate of the campaign season.  I’m pleased to report that the three Democratic candidates for Governor have accepted an invitation from NECN, MassINC, the Boston Globe and WBUR for another debate – on health care and education – later in June.  We will have more details on that in the coming days.

To fund this work – and to build our organization for the next decade – we set out to raise $1 million dollars for MassINC 10^th Anniversary Fund.   Many of you here today have helped us to get two-thirds of the way toward our goal.  For those of you who have already supported our Fund, we thank you very much – your investment makes our work possible.  To the rest of you, we hope you will get involved.  Those of you who know me, know that I would never use an event like this to raise funds. But, please don’t be shocked if my hard-working co-chair Gloria Larson asks you to consider becoming a supporter of our work at some point during the festivities today. In a moment, I will introduce Mayor Menino.  After that, our co-chair Gloria Larson will take over to introduce the governors and Robert Keough, editor of CommonWealth, and the moderator of this afternoon’s panel discussion.  But before I do that, I want say something about my two co-chairs, Peter Meade and Gloria Larson.  Peter Meade has brought tremendous leadership to the co-chairmanship of MassINC.  We thank him for all he does for us and for the community at large.  I am sorry to report that Peter could not be with us today due to a death in his family.  All of our thoughts and prayers are with Peter and Rosanne during this challenging time for their family. For her part, Gloria Larson has been a fundamental part of the success of MassINC.  She is a wonderfully optimistic and highly accomplished and effective civic leader.  Gloria – thank you for everything you do.

It is now my pleasure to introduce Mayor Thomas Menino for official greetings.  We have had the pleasure to work with the Mayor on several important issues over the years, including workforce development, the key role of immigrants in our economy, and – through our Real Talk series – the challenge of connecting more young Bostonians to civic life in the city.  Please welcome Mayor Thomas Menino.

BOSTON MAYOR THOMAS MENINO: Thank you Ian. It’s great to be here. I just wanted to make sure anybody didn’t hear Ian do fundraising in a public building. We’ll have the Ethics Commission here in ten minutes. You didn’t say that did you? I don’t care who you are pal. Some of us are still on the public dole. We’ve got to be careful of what we say and what we do. The guys in the private sector get away with murder. Let me just say I am really pleased to be here for the 10^th anniversary. Its publication does such a great job of bringing the issues forward. Some of the issues – the economy of our state – you have to have a plan to have a strong economy. We have no plan in Massachusetts deal with the economy that we need. That’s one of the issues we have to address as we move forward. I am honored to be here with the former governors who I have worked with. Their insight into where Massachusetts should be going and what the issues are will help us. Only MassINC could put together a group of such impressive leaders. I congratulate them on 10 years of innovation and generating ideas to enhance the vitality of our city and the region. They partnered to host a series of community forums called RealTalk to create dialogue for young adults who are interested in making Massachusetts a better place to work and raise a family. It’s that spirit of partnership that makes Boston a leader. From the founding of this nation to the first public school and library and union to our emergency as a hub of health care, life sciences, technology and finance. Boston’s future is being built today. With 12 million dollars of development in the pipeline and 46 million square feet of space ripe for development over the next 20 years, Boston is open for business. We have more office space leased in our downtown today than at any time in the city’s history. Our hotel occupancy rate has risen for the second year in a row. A recent study by Spaulding and Slye reveals that Boston’s economy is much stronger than the media would have us believe. According to the report, our population loss has been overstated and real estate trends adjust a healthy growth. The report points out that employment growth figures for last year are significantly better than originally reported. This new data is reflective of the response I am seeing from people across our country. Last weekend I was in Las Vegas trying to make up the city’s deficit (laughter). It didn’t work folks. I was there for the International Council of Shopping Centers’ annual conference that I have gone to for the last 11 years. I met a number of retailers and developers. I was really blown away by the enthusiasm for Boston. Companies want to be here. They are excited by the business opportunities that await them right here in Boston. What other city has an emerging neighborhood like the South Boston waterfront where business can build to suit? Our vision of a vibrant South Boston waterfront is now being realized and soon we will see a new district emerge, activating the waterfront to its fullest potential. New residential, office and retail and hotel uses are planned. The new state of the art convention center has a strong hold on the industry. The BCEC has just landed the biggest convention ever – 30,000 people. The opening of the Westin Boston Waterfront Hotel next month will only strengthen its competitive edge. At Fan Pier, plans are moving forward for 3 million square feet of office, residential, and retail space, a five-star hotel, world-class restaurants and a six-acre marina. The Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston’s newest icon, opens in September. If you haven’t seen it, you gotta to see it. It’s spectacular what they’ve done. It’s just a beautiful, beautiful building. That’ll be the icon for our city for many years to come. Boston is building for the future. I don’t need to tell you that. Everyone in this room is part of the wave of new ideas and fresh thinking that MassINC fosters and supports. I am proud the city can lead the way but we can’t do it alone. We need partners who will share our bold thinking and push Boston’s agenda forward. We need the state to see that investment in our city will pay off today and for the next generation. At City Hall, we are working proactively to grow jobs. Our proposed Infrastructure Investment Incentive Program offers incentives to developers in areas where infrastructure costs are prohibitive. This program would encourage projects to happen faster, meaning quicker contributions to city and state tax revenues, a win-win for everyone. Developers alone won’t sustain Boston’s success. MassINC has been active in advocating for improvements in education, the key to expanding economic opportunities for citizens. I couldn’t agree more. I am proud of the great strides we have made in education over the past ten years. Test scores are up, the dropout rate is down and more students are going on to college than ever before. We are starting earlier than ever by expanding full-day slots for four-year-olds and by converting more of our schools to K through 8’s to ensure that continuity in teaching and learning that parents value so much. We are restructuring our high schools into smaller learning communities that focus on the professional skills that are in demand. We are building stronger partnerships with higher education. Looking ahead, Boston’s future is bright. The work we are doing to strengthen the economy and the workforce is bringing us closer to our vision of a city that works for everyone. In my travels across the city, I see engaged citizens working to revitalize neighborhoods, businesses looking to locate and stay in our city, a public and private sector working in partnerships to build a stronger city. Forums like this play a key role in generating new ideas and new solutions to the challenges we face. Boston is fortunate to have concerned citizens and businesses who get involved. I say it everywhere I go – I ask you all, I need, need summer jobs. Everyone out there who has a business who wants to help us, step forward. Don’t be on the sidelines. I have 7,000 kids who need jobs. I’ve got money so far for 3,500. I am half way there. That’s part of our solution. Boys and Girls Clubs have stepped up big time to help us and keep clubhouses open ‘til midnight on weekends. So I’m just asking – I know it’s not part of our agenda, but I’ve got a good audience here. I need your help. I need your help. It’s a serious issue out there. I need everyone to help us. As a city we have got to come together and deal with the issue of youth. By doing that, by putting kids to work this summer, by what the Boys and Girls Clubs are doing, we’ll get there. Let’s just keep working together in making Boston a leader for the 21^st Century.

GLORIA LARSON, MASSINC CO-CHAIR: Thank you so much for those terrific, inspirational remarks. We are so fortunate in Boston, already a great city, to have someone so dedicated in Boston to making this a better and better place. Thank you for letting us borrow your great hall this afternoon. I promise not to say one additional word about additional funds for MassINC. But there is a reception that follows and you’re all fair game then. On behalf of the board, I welcome all of you to this View from the Corner Office. We are celebrating MassINC’s and Commonwealth’s tenth anniversary by doing more of what we know we already do best – independent, non-partisan, ahead-of-the-curve research, unique, sometimes controversial but always informative journalism and wide ranging public events to encourage spirited debate and a richer more engaged civic life for everyone. We have been dedicating for ten years efforts to give everyone an opportunity to pursue the great American dream, achieving a secure middle class life. We work hard to affect the views of policy makers at all levels and to change the lives of everyone who lives here. Whether our focus is on the economy, education, public safety, growth and development, cost of living, health care, immigration or other compelling demographic issues, we try to bring urgency and energy to the public debate and to foster much needed change. We work equally hard, all of us, to banish partisan politics from our efforts so much so that we’ve gotten completely used to seeing our data used in one week to support tax cuts and greater public spending all in the name of the public good. This year we’ve redoubled our commitment to achieving our American Dream goal, putting extra effort in keeping issues that matter most to average families in front of the public and the candidates during this gubernatorial campaign. Today’s forum couldn’t be more timely. Who could we ask to do a better job of thinking about how we need to grow and prosper than our former governors? They know this office better than anyone else. We did invite Gov. King to be with us. We are so sorry he couldn’t attend. His son Tim King will read a statement from his dad.

TIM KING, SON OF FORMER GOV. EDWARD J. KING: For those concerned he has had a medical situation and is rehabilitating very nicely, a strong rehabilitation with good momentum, going in the right direction and probably a month or two from programs like this. We almost made it. (Applause) He wrote this for tonight. These are his words. I would like to thank my friends at MassINC for inviting me to be a member of this exclusive panel. It is my greatest honor to be a member of this panel and to my dismay I am unable to join them in person tonight. To Gov. Swift, who shouldered the burden of breaking several barriers in the governor’s office, I have sincere and eternal admiration. To Gov. Cellucci, whom I met as a sate rep in 1979, the instant we first spoke I took a liking to you. I am so very proud to be your colleague. To Gov. Weld, whose commitment, talent and success set the stage for a decade, the people of the state of New York are in for a real treat. Good luck. And Gov. Dukakis, with whom I shared a similar stage at Stonehill College recently and without whom I may not have ever been a governor – some may remember we did not always agree – I have come to admire your relentless dedication and belief in the duty of public service. You may want to talk with Gov. Romney when you see him at some point about that continued public service. The greatest time of my life was the four years as Massachusetts governor – absolutely and without question. If anyone in this listening audience is contemplating a run for public service, there is no more noble, respectable or rewarding duty. No matter how the media may portray a politician, what may happen publicly between you and your political opponents in the heat of a campaign, or the complete sacrifice of yourself to family and career, I say again that there is no more noble, and respectable or rewarding duty. I thank the host. I trust this assembly of the finest our state has recently offered will be a unique treat to those in attendance. My thoughts and my heart are with you all tonight. Thank you all. Gov. Ed King.

GLORIA LARSON, MASSINC CO-CHAIR: Thank you so much Tim. Please thank your dad. Tell him we wish him a very speedy recovery at Spaulding, a safe journey back to Florida, and that we will miss him very much today. We send him our collective best.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: We’re here to talk about the American Dream. James Truslow Adams coined that phrase in 1931, in his book The Epic of America, when he made reference to “that American dream of a better, richer, happier life for all our citizens of every rank.” Unlike most dreams, the American Dream is one that is supposed to come true. It’s a dream that ought to be within reach of every American. In concrete terms, it’s about achieving and maintaining a level of material comfort, security, and opportunity generally associated with the middle-class. It’s about having a job with a future, income sufficient to support a family, a home of your own in a community of your choice, schools you’re comfortable sending your children to, the wherewithal to give those children a college education and yourself a comfortable retirement. For some, pursuit of the American Dream means striving to attain a level of comfort and security they’ve never had before. For others, it’s protecting a hard-won status that’s in danger of slipping away. And for many of us, it is about the hopes we have for our children, as they pursue an American Dream of their own.

It’s not exactly written this way in the state Constitution, but the job of governor is, in many ways, chief steward of the American Dream in Massachusetts. For this forum, we asked all five living former governors to join us to talk about their years in the Corner Office, what the American Dream in Massachusetts looked like to them at that time, and what they tried to do to make Massachusetts a better place to pursue the American Dream. Unfortunately, not all five of them could join us today, at least not in person. Not all five could join use today. We appreciate the message from Gov. King, and thank Tim King for bringing it to us. Gov. King may be in rehab but he still hasn’t lost his fastball. It’s not health but politics that kept Bill Weld from joining us here today. Being governor of one state wasn’t enough for Bill. He is trying to add another to his resume. He is a week away from the Republican state convention in New York and this close to that event his campaign manager would not allow him to cross the state line. But we do have some greetings from him as well.

GOV. WILLIAM WELD (IN VIDEO PRESENTATION): I want to congratulate MassINC on ten great years. I am a devoted reader of Commonwealth. There is a lot of stuff there that I don’t find elsewhere. It’s under a supremely able leadership. It’s a very intelligent offering consistently. Congratulations on the tenth anniversary. I wish I could be with you.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Luckily, we were able to catch up with Bill Weld a couple of weeks ago, when he was in town for a fund-raiser. Besides taping that greeting, I put to him a couple of the questions I’ll be asking his fellow governors, so we will have him join in the discussion, on tape. Now, as much as we are counting on our former governors to give us some perspective on the present, as well as the past, we thought we could use a bit of perspective on the governors themselves, and their time in office, which spans a period of more than 25 years. For that, we asked John Carroll, of Boston University and “Beat the Press” on WGBH, to prepare a short video on the Dukakis-King-Weld-Cellucci-Swift years and the American Dream in Massachusetts.

JOHN CARROLL (IN VIDEO PRESENTATION): For ten years now MassINC has used research, journalism and public events to highlight the challenge and opportunity of achieving the American dream in Massachusetts. But when Gov. Dukakis took office in 1975, the American Dream was more like a nightmare. The Massachusetts economy was referred to in polite circles as mature. The home mortgage rate had gone through the roof and unemployment was high as Timothy Leary. Faced with a daunting budget deficit, Dukakis raised taxes and slashed benefits, raising the hackles of voters. Before you could say competence not ideology Massachusetts traded a Duke for a King. Gov. Edward King signed a social compact with the high tech industry, promised to lower the tax burden and saw property taxes capped by Proposition 2 ½. But in 1982 he was no match for an older and wiser Dukakis, who dethroned King in a campaign billed as The Rematch, although it wasn’t quite the thriller in Billerica. At that point home mortgage rates were higher than Timothy Leary. Enter the Massachusetts Miracle. The high tech, high-octane growth spurt in the Bay State economy was so miraculous it led the Duke to run for president in 1988. As it turned out, Gov. Dukakis remained available to serve out his term. Shortly thereafter the miracle went south and voters went for a couple of newcomers to the political arena. Not altogether surprisingly, BU president and Democratic gubernatorial candidate John Silber lost to former US attorney William Weld, who not altogether surprisingly made a splash in Massachusetts politics. Weld made tax cuts his holy grail and signed off on the landmark Education Reform Act of 1993. He also ushered in the biggest jobs program in the nation, the now legendary Big Dig, which would eventually cost taxpayers $15 billion. Altogether surprisingly, Weld then decided he wanted to be ambassador to Mexico, which got a big aye carumba from Sen. Jesse Helms, R – Jurassic Park. Regardless Lt. Gov. Paul Cellucci, come on down. Cellucci inherited America’s third most expensive state to live in, literally, based on housing costs, but tried to make it less so by promoting a ballot initiative to roll the state income tax back from 5.95 percent to 5 percent. Though the tax cut would later be frozen, Cellucci declared victory and moved to Canada, but not before handing the Corner Office keys over to Lt. Gov. Jane Swift. As acting governor, Swift tried to focus on adult literacy and workforce development but she got blindsided by the 9-11 terrorist attacks and a collapsing economy, then got stiff armed by venture capitalist Mitt Romney who jumped into the 2002 gubernatorial race and won what might be called The Big Love Campaign. With one term almost under his belt and a health care plan in his back pocket, Romney decided not to run for reelection but started acting like a Republican presidential wannabe. At this point, the real Massachusetts Miracle would be a two-term governor. Meanwhile, what’s happened to the American Dream in Massachusetts? Population is declining, job growth is sluggish and homes are more expensive than ever. For its next governor, Massachusetts could probably use a miracle worker.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Thanks to John Carroll and the crew at WGBH. We have with us, in one form or another, chief executives from most of the last quarter of the 20^th century and the very start of the 21^st and I would like to begin by covering that time period in chronological order. Let me ask each of you: At the time you were sworn into office, what did you see as the biggest challenges to pursuit of the American Dream in Massachusetts? And what did you and your administration try to do to address those challenges? Let’s begin with Mike Dukakis, who had two chances, in 1975 and 1983, to look out the windows of the Corner Office with fresh eyes.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: Well Bob you have to understand what kind of shape the state was in in the mid-1970s. We were in very very bad shape. We had a 12 percent unemployment rate. We had the biggest state deficit proportionately when I took over in 1975. Time magazine was calling us the new Appalachia. And it was pretty grim and I don’t know that I had an awful lot of time to think about the American Dream. We almost defaulted on our bonds. And I’d like to think by 1978 we had begun to dig ourselves out of that pit and then of course as Ed King pointed out I made it possible for him to become governor. Coming back in ’83, although we were coming out of another recession though nowhere near as deep as the mid-70s, for one thing I think I knew a lot more about being governor than I did in ’75, and I was a much better governor in my judgment. Secondly – the mayor made an interesting point when he said you’ve got to have a plan – there was no economic development plan in the mid-70s nor had there been under administrations of both parties. It wasn’t ‘til the mid-70s that people started to expect governors to do anything about the economy. The state was largely uninvolved in public education, except for the certification of teachers. Our infrastructure was falling apart. I mean we had no north-south highway through Worcester County. 495 stopped in Mansfield folks. You couldn’t go to the Cape on a modern highway system. And the T was a basket case – just frightful, full of political patronage, badly managed, no investment. By ’83, not only had we done some things – Ed King and I didn’t disagree on infrastructure and that process we had begun in the mid-70s continued – so when I came back in ’83 wiser though sadder but in a position to really pick up from the beginning and move, we really went to work. I think those years from ’83 to ’88 were six of the best years we ever had. I mean we had 2.5 percent unemployment in this state. We were able to do great things: welfare to work, the first comprehensive education reform bill we ever had, major investments in UMass which should be one of the great state research universities and is not today for a variety of reasons we may want to get into. And finally, my proudest achievement, which was the signing of the universal health care bill in 1988. Sadly, hate to say this I wish he was here. In fact, I got a call from a reporter in New York saying what do you think of this guy Weld running for governor in New York? I said if he was bored in Boston, what’s he going to do in Albany? And I am sorry to say and I wish he were here cause I’d tell him to his face that if he hadn’t screwed it up we today would have universal health care in Massachusetts under a bill that was a hell of a lot better than the one that was just approved and has multiple problems but I hope working together in a bipartisan fashion we can make it work. One other thing, that is that everybody benefited from our economic success in the 80s. All incomes rose, especially the incomes of middle class people. That is not happening in the Commonwealth today. The average Massachusetts family today is making less in real terms than it was five years ago and that trend continues. This tax cut, which I think is a mistake for obvious reasons. Talk about deficits, our infrastructure is falling apart, our state parks are a disgrace, our university needs major investment, we need to invest in new technologies, a whole series of things. Sixty percent of that tax cut is going to the wealthiest 20 percent of the population. Sound familiar? We’ve seen this story before. So I think one of the things we have to do and I hope the next governor will do is see if we can get back on track with a comprehensive vision to make sure that everybody in Massachusetts not just some benefit from the economic success we hope to enjoy.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Next in line is Bill Weld. We do have his remarks (for electronic delivery).

GOV. WILLIAM WELD: The year I ran in 1990 Massachusetts was kind of in the cheap seats. There were a lot of for sale signs on homes near the border. Unemployment was rocketing towards 10 percent. So if the American dream was in jeopardy in Massachusetts it was at about that time. The recession hit Massachusetts and New Hampshire more deeply than any other state. Our course was pretty clear – cut spending, cut taxes and cut the cost of doing business. That’s what we set out to do in both my terms. I’d gone around to the employer community saying what are your biggest problems, why can’t you expand, why are you thinking about moving? They gave specific answers. Workers compensation was number one. Number two was unemployment insurance. Number three was the cost of electricity. Number four was health care – that would probably be number one or tied for one today. Corporate taxes was number five. We set about knocking those costs down one by one after we got in. Workers comp and UI we did very quickly and the business community responded and the jobs came back from small business. Seventy percent of the jobs come from companies with 50 or fewer employees and 90 percent from companies with 500 or fewer employees. So you’ve got to concentrate on small business and in two years we went from the highest unemployment rate of the 12 industrialized states to the lowest.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: When I took office in July ‘97 Bill Weld had led Massachusetts back. The economy was strong. For me it was about opportunity. That was what the American dream is all about. We want all of our citizens, particularly our young people, to have opportunity in this state. I agree with the mayor who talked about how well things are going in Boston. Despite some challenges, the quality of life in Boston and the Commonwealth is pretty good. We have to keep our competitiveness so that all citizens continue to have opportunity. That’s why one of the first things I did was say we’ve got to cut the state income tax. We had the highest effective income tax in the country. That put us at a competitive disadvantage. I led the ballot initiative to cut that tax. I am sorry the legislature stopped it at 5.3 percent. The people voted overwhelmingly for it because they understood it was important for our economic future. I also held the line on the MCAS standards. Tommy Finneran is here and Tom Birmingham. They stood at my side because we had a compact. We were going to put a lot more state money into schools, urban schools, to bring class sizes down and to provide opportunity in inner cities. Once we provide the money, we said we wanted accountability. Once the money got out, many in the education community said we don’t like the standards, but we held the line on the standards. And the courts upheld it. Young people for the most part are achieving those standards. They have the basic math skills and English language skills they need to go to college and to be part of a competitive workforce that Massachusetts has to have. The other big thing is an economy can’t grow without the economic and transportation infrastructure in place. Gov. Dukakis proposed the Big Dig. Bill Weld and I and Jane Swift built it. It cost a lot of money. But people are getting to the airport quicker. The traffic is flowing through this city a lot better. It wasn’t just the Big Dig. We did Rte. 146 out in Worcester and projects throughout the state. Those are really the three legs of having a competitive economy: a skilled workforce, the infrastructure in place and your cost of doing business has to be competitive. The other thing we always want to work on is quality of life. We have a good quality of life and safer streets and neighborhoods. People want to take a walk after dinner and not be afraid. They want open spaces and beaches to go to. We have those things. We need to preserve them and set our priorities as we move forward. But that’s how I felt coming in – that we had to make sure there is opportunity for all our citizens.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: I was extremely fortunate in my public service career to work on the issue I felt more compelling and most important. It’s the reason I had the unlikely opportunity to be governor, and it’s because of the strength of our public education system that still has to meet ever-increasing demands. It was critical that we implement key provisions of our education initiatives and we see the results of that. What you find in a position of leadership is there are things under your control and things not under your control. No one could have predicted 9-11 and the record shortfalls in revenue and real fear among the citizenry about their personal safety. What is important is whether you lead in good or bad times that you stay focused on priorities. For me, that meant responding to public safety imperatives and reacting responsibly to multi-billion dollar shortfalls in receipts to also stay focused on education and to make sure we did enforce standards when increases in education aid just couldn’t be as generous. The imperative today – Massachusetts compared to other states is doing extremely well if you look at public education. This is the time to look at what we need to do better. The competition for my daughters isn’t going to come from somebody in a public school system in New York or California or Alabama, but from students all over the world and is going to be dependent on their ability to be aggressively and well educated on science, engineering and math and the so-called STEM careers. Candidly, that has not been the area of greatest focus during this first and important and successful focus on education reform. Now, at a time of strength, after proving investment and accountability can work, it’s time to focus on the next horizon and that’s how to make sure every eighth grader is being instructed in algebra because that’s where we need to be. It sounds to teachers like impossibility from where they sit today. But it probably is the necessity if those children are going to compete economically and have a shot at the American Dream.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: What strikes me is what has changed dramatically are the changes in the economy, not just business cycle changes but fundamental changes. In the late 70s people were calling it a mature economy and not meaning it in a complimentary sense. The concern was that the whole Northeast was seen as being eclipsed, perhaps permanently, by the Sun Belt. We were joining the Rust Belt, which was just getting that name. Instead, we have had a much more vibrant and creative and innovative economy and a much more volatile one. We have had tremendous booms, serious crashes at the end of the 80s, another boom and serious concerns about labor shortages and then another serious recession. We still have not gotten to the boom we had gotten used to. What does it mean for the American Dream in Massachusetts that as our economy has become more dynamic it’s also become more volatile?

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: I don’t think we should be surprised by that. The great asset Massachusetts has, does and will continue to have are our colleges and universities. People said to me when I was governor that we don’t have as many headquarters as we used to have. I would say I am not so sure that is as important in this information age. Harvard, Boston College, MIT are not going anywhere. They bring young people to this state every year, keep us at the forefront of technology advance – that’s why we see the life sciences and health – we have these colleges that are kind of driving this. We need to take advantage of that. If we keep costs of doing business competitive and young people have the skills to go to these universities and we have the transportation in place and the quality of life, Massachusetts is always going to come back. You may have ups and downs but we have a powerful asset we should be proud of and work with on training programs and in the public schools to stay at the forefront of technology advancement.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: I agree with Paul. On the other hand we have got to be very concerned about public higher education. Seventy or 75 percent of our kids are going to our state college system and it’s been absolutely savaged Paul over the last few years. UMass ought to be a premier research university. I teach, difficult though it is during the winter, at UCLA. University of California is having its problems Paul because California is still spending $6 billion more than it’s taking in. But that UC system has everything to do with Silicon Valley and the economic strength of that state. I don’t see why UMass ought to be a second cousin to these private institutions and that’s what’s going on. There are two other issues, especially for the business community. The first is the cost of health care. Health costs are 40 percent higher in Massachusetts than the national average, and the national average in the US is double per capita what all the other advanced industrialized nations in the world are spending on health care and they cover everybody and have better health outcomes than we do. The new bill, a noble effort, doesn’t do a blessed thing about health costs. In fact, sorry to say, you guys deregulated health costs in the early 90s and we all know what happened. When I talk to business folks these days, it’s the cost of health care – $12,000 per employee per year to ensure a Massachusetts employee and his or her family. The second thing is housing costs. Presumably they are leveling off at $420,000 per house in metro Boston. When I was governor we were doing 6,000 to 7,000 units of affordable housing per year. If we’re doing 20 percent of that today, I’m surprised. The market is not going to solve that problem. We didn’t do it building traditional public housing. That was a disaster and I understand that. But this state pioneered in building mixed income housing. Go to Lowell, Brockton and see what’s happening. But you can’t produce affordable housing without some public support. The reason we are losing population and young people – this is a great place to live – is they can’t afford it. Unless we get serious – this is going to cost $250 million new dollars per year to get back to that 6,000. By the way this was a bipartisan commitment coming right out of World War II. It wasn’t til the 90s that we walked away from that commitment. If we don’t do something about housing and health care costs and infrastructure – if we don’t do these things folks – then I am concerned. One other thing. Our work on education has paid off. There is only one problem – no one knows it. The US DOE gives its national assessment, its own validated test to a representative sample of students in every state. Who was number one? Does anyone know Massachusetts was? I don’t think so. Now I don’t know where the governor is. He’s in Iraq or someplace. If I were governor or these two folks were and we came out number one, we’d be out in every school in the state putting out a we’re number one flag and thanking principals, teachers, parents and taxpayers. One of the things we ought to do is celebrate our success. This is a huge success folks. The people from whom we’re extracting millions of dollars ought to know about it.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: One reason I would love to hear about the success of education is it is easier to approve things headed in the right direction than it is to turn around things headed in the wrong direction. As wonderful as our current system is, there is a boatload that still needs to be done to make sure our kids are competitive with folks around the world and that is going to require leadership from the top down, which we’ve seen can work. Unlike turning around the Massachusetts fortunes if the global economy heads in a different direction, which I would say is impossible to do – you’re job is really to respond, to leverage your strength – on education we truly can drive in a particular direction. It requires focus from the top down. We don’t systematically integrate and leverage our strength in technology, which is happening in every other workforce and setting in the country and the world. That calls for leadership at the state level and regional level. The other thing is I think our system of improving education works best with vision, focus, accountability from the top down and empowerment from the bottom up – parents engaged, who care and have input in school and drive improvements for their own children and other children. One thing I think we need to celebrate is to continue to empower parents and teachers to do more to drive toward an even higher level of success. There are experiments and wonderful things going on in individual school districts. What we need to do is to figure out the biggest challenge, which is replicability. We never can seem to take when one principal does a great job to transplant that into other schools. I would leverage resources in higher education more to help us solve replicability and next level learning challenges we face in our public schools.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: A point about health care. I lived in Canada for four years. They have universal coverage and are proud of it. But people who live in Ottawa drive to New York got get an MRI. Under the Canadian health system they sometimes have to wait three or four or five months for an MRI. So universal coverage sounds great, but don’t think there are not significant problems with the Canadian system and some of these other systems. We have the best health care in the world and need to do a better job of making sure more people have adequate access to it. One of the dangers of trying to do it all by yourself as a state is you run the danger of putting businesses in an uncompetitive position. We put programs in place for every child in the Commonwealth to make sure they had health care coverage. We were in the schools recruiting parents. It’s complicated and we don’t want to lose what we have – high quality health care.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: We also at our peril see health care as only a service and a cost. It is along with colleges one of the greatest job creators and revenue engines for continued economic growth. It is the core of the sciences. You wouldn’t have biotech here in the same numbers without the universities and the research facilities, the hospitals and institutions and brainpower. So the challenge for a state is to figure out how to leverage economic opportunities a superior health care system provides while dealing with the fact of holding more of the burden of the cost because of the superiority of the service you have.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: I don’t know what’s going on in Canada, but for 46 million Americans there is no MRI because they don’t have health insurance. Maybe they’ll get it in the emergency room under very poor circumstances. That includes half a million people in this state. Our emergency rooms have become the primary doctor for millions of Americans. That bill I signed wouldn’t have put the state at a competitive disadvantage. Seventy percent of employers that do insure are paying for 30 percent who don’t. The business community finally got that. It took a while. That’s one of the reasons they went along with this new plan. I have to tell you, to say to a business you can get out from under for $295 while the guy down the street is paying $12,000 isn’t going to cut it. There’s nothing more anti-business than the current health care system because it’s putting the burden on responsible employers to pay for those who don’t insure. When I went to Worcester in ’82 and said we are going to turn Worcester into a biotech center, people said I was crazy. I never forget standing in the high grass with Gerry D’Amico on a hot August afternoon saying we’re going to put a biotech center. There are now 3,000 biotech jobs in Worcester. The Commonwealth had invested in a first class state medical school, which we are proud of, and the other three medical schools. Those medical centers and schools and hospitals are terrific assets but somehow it ought to be possible to take advantage of those benefits without spending 40 percent more than the national average. I hope now that we’ve don’t this access piece – I hope it’s going to work – I hope the next step for the same broad coalition of people and groups is to take a serious look at health costs and work collaboratively and effectively. This bill isn’t going to work folks with double-digit increases in health care inflation year after year. It’s simply not sustainable.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: I’d like to turn to a couple of cost-of-living issues that have been persistent through all your administrations. One is housing. Mike – you oversaw the most ambitious state housing production and subsidy program in the country. The Weld administration didn’t have the same enthusiasm for that approach, but by the mid 1990s, housing had started to become a more middle class issue as housing got out of reach. Under Paul and Jane, the attention turned to impediments to producing housing and how that was restraining supply and how that was feeding out of control housing costs. Has housing become our Achilles’ heel?

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: You can look at it a couple of ways. The price of housing has certainly gone up here in Boston. To some extent that means you have a good quality of life because it’s about demand. People would not pay these prices if they weren’t going to have a nice house in a good neighborhood. So that’s a good thing that the quality of life is so good in Boston and our Commonwealth. It also means there are a lot of people who are middle income and higher income that can afford these prices. We’ve got a lot of people whose quality of life has improved. That’s part of the American Dream to try to improve yourself. We should encourage that. We should not worry about that. The solution is not subsidized housing. We have tried that in the past. It hasn’t worked. We have to get back to market forces. You have to do something that is very controversial. I was a selectman and an advocate of home rule but you have to go after zoning and building regulations. Then private sector money can build affordable housing. That’s how you solve the housing problem and that’s a big battle. We need to take a regional or statewide approach to zoning and building so we get private sector money in there to build affordable housing so young people and others can afford to live in this state.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: I come from a city that still has relatively affordable housing prices, North Adams. I now live in a community that doesn’t have such affordable housing prices, Williamstown. The two are next door to each other. We have to focus on regional areas to help in ways government should to improve the quality of life so people will effect an economic renaissance. That’s public safety. People can’t live the American Dream if they don’t feel safe. Mothers and fathers are not going to be excited about raising their children in areas that aren’t safe. You can’t ignore the safety consideration. In many of those communities, it’s the most important place to improve public education because you want to live somewhere where you can afford your house and you’re happy to send your child to the public education sector. I give public and high credit to Gov. Dukakis, where you have areas where some communities are doing well and not others, planning does matter. Under Gov. Dukakis, the Northern Berkshire Industrial Park and Development Commission and the Northern Berkshire economic plan was put together. They looked at why one aging industrial city was not doing well while communities around it were. And that’s where the idea for Mass Moca, a cultural renaissance, was born. Paul Cellucci delivered the money to make sure there was a public private investment. Guess what? There are restaurants today in North Adams. I lost three Brownies from the Williamstown Elementary School because their parents bought a house in North Adams. I was sad to lose the girls, although we had 18 and 15 was better. But I was thrilled that families were able to buy an affordable house in the community I grew up in and had enough confidence in the public education system. That is part of planning. I don’t think it’s so simple as saying this block needs to have housing priced as X, Y and Z. Families make much different considerations. They want safety and quality education and vibrant communities in which to live and there are some ways in which we have done very well by that.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: Paul and I fundamentally disagree about this. You are not going to build affordable housing in metropolitan Boston without some kind of public support and it’s not true that it’s been a failure. The kind of affordable mixed income housing – go to Harbor Point. It was a public housing disaster. Today it is a terrific successful mixed income community where people paying $2,000 a month are living next door to people on welfare. And it works. But if the mayor were here – he has done a noble job under difficult circumstances using proceeds from surplus city property to subsidize mixed income housing in the city – but he can’t do it by himself. This state has got to commit itself to affordable housing. If we don’t, our kids will vote with their feet right down to Charlotte, North Carolina which is what is happening every single day. You knew I would get to trains. Give a retired politician a platform and we won’t shut up. We went through a tough period with the Big Dig. If (former Transportation Secretary) Salvucci were running the show it would have been done in half the time for half the costs. But the next decade of transportation investment ought to be in a first class regional rail system that connects every older urban community in this state, including Springfield, with the capital city. That means Fall River, New Bedford, frequencies Worcester and getting out to Fitchburg in less than an hour and forty minutes, which is what it takes now. It means rail connection to Springfield and connecting North and South Station so we don’t turn trains around at either end of this city. What does this got to do with housing? If you can get people from Brockton to Boston in 30 minutes, which we are doing thanks to you guys and the extension of commuter rail, all of a sudden a huge supply of affordable housing – people suddenly discover you can buy a ranch house in Brockton for $90,000. Not it’s not 90 anymore, it’s about 160, but it’s not 420. The same will happen in Fall River, New Bedford. The same is happening to Worcester. That rail connection is critical. Investing in our infrastructure has huge benefits, including opening up affordable housing. Some day we are going to get back to North Adams with passenger service. Meantime, go to MassMOCA. It is your money, your investment and it has transformed that community in Northern Berkshire County.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: We did bring the Old Colony line back. We did bring commuter rail back to Worcester. I supported bringing commuter rail to Fall River, New Bedford. There was a lot of opposition along the route, which gets back to the concept of regional or statewide planning which can overrule local objections sometimes. That’s a tough one but I think it’s one we have to confront in this state. I am not opposed to all subsidies for housing. I just think that building these projects like we used to do is not the way to go. We’re not going to do it with just subsidies. We have got to get the private market forces involved. You have to address zoning and building regulations so they can invest that money and get a return and build that affordable housing.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: We do that now. There is a state housing appeals board that can override local zoning. We used that more than once. We didn’t have a 40B problem when I was governor. But we put money on the table and there were very few communities that did not want to do some affordable housing. Why? They all have cops, firefighters and teachers and want to provide housing for them.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: If that’s true then why do we have a problem? There’s a problem. The problem is zoning and building codes.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: The problem’s in Iraq. That’s the problem.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Let’s talk about taxes. Massachusetts has been trying to live down the nickname “Taxachusetts” since Mike first took office, and has done a number of things: Prop. 2½, passed in 1980, restrained property tax increases. There were over 40 tax cuts during the Weld-Cellucci years. In 2000, went to the ballot box to get income tax rate rolled back to 5 percent, but that’s still stuck part way. And there’s renewed concern about property taxes as the run-up in residential real estate prices has shifted more of the tax burden to homeowners. Are we ever going to get rid of this label of Taxachusetts or are we digging ourselves back into it?

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: Well I thought the 40 tax cuts pretty much put a stake through that label. In 1998, with the support of Tom Finneran and Tom Birmingham, I signed into law the largest tax cut in the state’s history, about a billion dollars. When I went back to the House and Senate to take that anti-competitive high state income tax back to 5 percent, they said no. So I led the effort and took it to the people. I debated Tommy Finneran, Tom Birmingham, Shannon O’Brien and there was one other one – I forget who he was – he was a candidate for governor I think. Let’s not forget that on the same ballot that the people of Massachusetts voted for Al Gore over George Bush by 31 percent, they approved that tax cut 59 percent to 41 percent. I was down at then-Gov. Bush’s ranch, the president-elect had all the Republican governors in before he was headed to the White House, and he was telling us how he was going to cut the taxes because he thought it was important to the economy of the country, so I told him this story about how the people of Massachusetts had overwhelmingly voted for this tax cut. He looked at me and said, well why didn’t I do better there? I said I really don’t have an explanation for that. But think about it. Even the people of Massachusetts knew their taxes were too high. I think we have come a long way. It will be incumbent on future governors and Legislatures to hold the line. It doesn’t mean you can’t invest in education and infrastructure. You have to set priorities. While Bill Weld and I were cutting those taxes we effectively doubled the amount of state aid that went into local school districts. It you set your priorities you can do it.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: Far too often this debate gets to be about whether or not to make investments. What I learned dramatically when I first took office in 1990 during the first budget crisis and then as governor after 9-11 is finding the way to stimulate the economy to the degree governors have the power to do it – the economy is what drives revenue collection. Overwhelmingly, if the economy is going well and your taking advantage of that, then revenue collections and the ability to invest in your priorities take care of it. If people think it’s too expensive to live here, and they don’t live here like that disturbing article we saw in the Globe not too long ago, it doesn’t matter what your tax rate is if they’re not here to pay it, then you’re not going to collect that to invest in other services. It’s extremely important that we remain competitive – people have choices, choice is a good thing – and having a low competitive tax rate is one of the keys to making sure you can invest in transportation, infrastructure and education.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: One of the things you have to try to do and I’m not sure I did it very well – I cut taxes ten times in five years from 1983 to 1988 and in retrospect it was probably a mistake because there are these gyrations which are not new. Just as sure as God made little apples, we’re going to have another recession. In fact I hope it isn’t beginning but there’s been a sign softening here and nationally in the real estate industry and others. Lets hope it’s not a forecast of things to come. When you’re trying to do the right thing fiscally and in other areas, you have to be very conservative. You have to be conservative in terms of spending because if baseline spending gets out of control, you’re going to be in trouble. But you have to be very conservative in maintaining your revenue base. With all due respect folks, if it hadn’t been for that guy over there who stopped these tax cuts, we would have been in even worse trouble than we got into in the early years of the Romney administration and I am not blaming Romney. It was just the result of this kind of thing. You’ve got to make sure you put a lot of money into that rainy day fund. If it hadn’t been for that rainy day fund Tom (Finneran), God know what would have happened. And you were the guy who insisted that we invest in this rainy day fund.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: And we did.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: And you did, yeah. But had that thing gone down to 5 percent, nobody would have pulled out of it. It would have been a disaster. So we’ve got to be very careful. When you have the investment gap we have today in infrastructure and higher education – I mean look, there’s a shell game going on here. The median property tax is up 42 percent in the last five years. Now they’re telling us they are going to jack our T fares for the second time in three years. Absolutely insane – insane at a time when we have $3 gas. Raising T fares is just as much a tax as any other kind of tax, at least for those of us who ride the system and there are a million, one hundred thousand of us who do every day. The answer to that is for the state to assume capital costs of the T, which we did prior to 2000, but that takes money. The first thing we better do is start sharing a fixed percentage of our revenue base with our cities and towns, which is what I thought we were supposed to do in the 80s and get them their cherry sheets before the first of March so they can function. Be very careful on the down side as well as the upside. I do spend those three months in California. And I know what happened there. And it was Gray Davis in that case who decided, hey Christmas has arrived, all those capital gains taxes pouring in the door. Now they are $6 billion short and Schwarzenegger is claiming credit for solving the deficit problem. We’ve got to be very careful. We’ve got chunks of the Longfellow Bridge falling into the Charles River. We have bridges on Storrow Drive that haven’t been painted since I left office. I think you invest in those kinds of things first before you start telling people you are going to give them a tax cut. Sixty percent of the tax cut will go to the wealthiest 20 percent of the population. To the average taxpayer it’s going to be half a pizza a week. I think most Massachusetts citizens, if confronted with that set of choices, would elect to invest in the future of this state and skip the half a pizza. But I may be wrong.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: That’s not what they said in 2000.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Massachusetts, indeed America, is a different place today than when you were in office. What is the single biggest challenge to living the American Dream in Massachusetts today?

GOV. JANE SWIFT: The single biggest challenge is to be able to secure the best jobs that allow you to afford to live a lifestyle that many people would categorize as the American Dream. The single solution is to continue to strive for excellence even when we are at a terrific point in our public education system.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: I am a little disturbed about this immigration debate at the national level. One of the great things about our state is we have always welcomed immigrants – the Irish, the Italians, the Portuguese, the Brazilians, the Vietnamese, the Jamaicans . . . I could go on and on . . . the Greeks. It gives us diversity, it’s a great thing. I think we should have this guest worker program. I think we should go even further. NAFTA is a free trade agreement between Mexico, the United States and Canada. What it is is a free trade agreement for businesses. We do $500 billion a year in trade with Canada, and $250 billion with Mexico. These are huge economic engines that employ millions of people in all three countries. It’s helped to strengthen the Mexican democracy and lift millions of Mexicans out of poverty. It’s been a great thing for our three countries. I think we should have free trade for individuals. If you go up to Toronto and go on a shopping spree when you go through the clearance center at the airport and file your customs form with US Customs, if you bought over a certain amounts of goods, you have to pay a duty. So you don’t have free trade as an individual. And we should seriously look at labor mobility. They do it in the European Union. If you live in Mexico, Canada and the United States, you would be able to live and work in any one of those three countries. And the market would determine where the jobs would go. Think of the money we are spending trying to defend the southern border. Billions of dollars. It doesn’t make any sense to me. We could significantly solve this problem by expanding NAFTA to include labor mobility and Massachusetts could continue to welcome immigrants as many other states would do as well. It would be a great thing for our state and for our country.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: Doesn’t sound like a Republican to me. It’s been great fun exchanging ideas here. This state needs an investment strategy in infrastructure, housing, education, K-12 and higher, and that takes public money and partnerships and the involvement of the private sector. I want to live in a Commonwealth where everybody shares in our economic good fortune. It bothers me that the average family income in this state is lower today than it was five years ago. That’s not the kind of American Dream that I grew up with and brought my parents here and made it possible for them to do as well as they did and for me to do what I have been able to do. This notion that we are all in this together and this is a Commonwealth, we’ve got to ensure that everybody shares in this good fortune, I think is fundamental to our future and I think it’s an idea that most Massachusetts people believe in very strongly.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: For Bill Weld, I had to ask him what was the biggest challenge to living the American Dream in New York.

GOV. WILLIAM WELD (BY VIDEO): I find in New York today the same problems, the loss of jobs and inability to retain the 20 to 34-year-old generation. These kids in Schenectady and Utica going to college and learning all about computer science and IT and they are not going to stick around and live in commuting distance of mom and dad for a job that pays $24,500. They’re just not going to do it. I propose middle class tax relief there to encourage the creation of jobs paying in the fifty to $75,000 range. The other thing since the 80s the rise of education as the crucial ingredient in being able to compete in a more globalized economy in the information age has just become more and more apparent and now jobs and education are two issues that are just completely handmaidens.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: We have 15 minutes for questions from the floor.

AUDIENCE QUESTION: Hello. I was wondering if you ever thought about a young student’s perspective on the school systems since after all we are the ones taking the tests and spending the majority of our time in these schools.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: I spend a lot of time thinking about it. I am the room parent for my daughter’s first grade class and try to be there so I get the parent perspective and I heard, although I am sure I will hear more in middle school, her perspective. The hard thing to do as a leader is the same as the hardest thing to do as a parent, which is to set what we know is good for you and figure out how we can convince you to put the effort into something that is good for you that you might not feel as strongly about. One of the things that is really important is that leaders start talking more to middle school girls about their capabilities and future in math and science careers. That is something that I am passionate about and think we need to do more of.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: I agree with Jane. My oldest daughter Kate is a seventh grade science teacher and I am very proud of her. It’s very important that we encourage not just the young boys but the young girls to focus on math and science. We have to set standards and we have to help our young people achieve those standards. Only then will they have opportunity in this information age we all live in. That’s what I try to focus on.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: I have six grandkids ranging in age from 17 to 15 months. We have kind of a built-in survey research system. Here is an idea that may not please you but I want you to take it back and discuss it with your pals. I have wondered for many years why we send you to school at 8, 8:15, 8:30 and send you home at 2, except these days we then scramble around looking for after-school from 2 to 5. It doesn’t make any sense to me. Why don’t we have a full school day, so we can do all the testing and the test preparation but at the same time have a richer, better, fuller and more valuable school day. It can include the extracurriculars and field trips. Two schools in Boston do this – the Timilty and the Murphy – look at their test scores Jane, they’re off the charts. So I am a big fan of the extended school day, which may or may not go over big with you guys and I am happy to say the Legislature last year appropriated half a million dollars for planning grants for 16 school systems. About 14 have come back with plans. We now have to provide some additional funds for those schools so they can extend the school day and pay their teachers somewhat more. But Boston is spending $60 million on after-school and if you took that and funded an extended school day, where kids started at 8 and went home at about 5, which is about when their parents are coming home, most of whom are working, it seems to me it would be better for everybody. Take a poll at the Day Middle School and report back to me.

AUDIENCE RESPONSE: If I can say something about that. I am kind of a little bit apprehensive about that idea because with the amount of homework we are getting now in most schools, our after school time would be eaten up. Also, more extracurricular activities during the day, I would love to see that. But if the whole day gets eaten up by complete working then, you know, nobody really likes to work for eight hours straight.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: I know I don’t.

AUDIENCE QUESTION: Governor Dukakis knows I have heard about education reform over my dining room table since he and my uncle, who was one of his education advisors, were discussing it way back when. I moved to Newton for the schools. I have listened to you discuss standards and testing standards and how Massachusetts is great. How do you address the concerns of parents in places where it was working like Newton and Wellesley and Boston Latin and other schools that are watching our curriculum be watered down to meet a lower standard rather than watching other schools raised up to ours?

GOV. JANE SWIFT: One of things that was the hardest to do but we tried to do was create incentives for schools performing well to do better. There are many schools that were doing well that actually are doing better. It is a function in many cases of figuring out and doing the hard work that we don’t do well anywhere in the public school system of professional development, of helping teachers figure out how you integrate standards into a dynamic curriculum. That’s number one. Number two, a conundrum we face in public life – there was not the political will to hold seniors in high school for passing more than English and math standards. In many cases that resulted in – it’s not the decision I would have made but some made the difficult decision to de-emphasize science and foreign languages. One of the things we need to figure out is how we shift and measure and focus on those, and I think that focus on other school time, whether we extend the school day or we make sure we have more vibrant activities in many communities for out-of-school learning is one of the real challenges because that’s where a lot of the supplemental learning – if you are not getting science education today in your elementary school to the degree that you think is appropriate, many parents who can are supplementing it. Then there are many good quality programs who do the supplemental programs for students whose parents don’t have the economic ability to provide that. I think that fundamentally setting standards works. But there are pieces that driving for excellence, particular professional development, that would hasten our pace toward an even higher level of excellence that we haven’t achieved yet.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: The extended school day could help in this regard. But let’s not forget the fundamental problem we face. It was unacceptable to me that we were graduating thousands and thousands of young people, particularly in urban schools, that did not have basic math skills and basic English language schools. We immediately diminished their opportunity in our society and that was unacceptable. A lot of people complain that we have to teach to the test but if teaching to the test means that young people graduating from high school have those basic math skills, have those basic English language skills, that’s a good thing because we were graduating too many kids who did not have them. So that was a fundamental problem that we had to address. There are ways to address what you’re talking about but we couldn’t leave all these kids behind. It was not right.

AUDIENCE RESPONSE: I agree. You can’t leave those kids behind. However, in a place like Newton where kids were well exceeding the basic standards are now being forced down to the basic standards, how do you address those? How do you balance that? Address that.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: I don’t see any inconsistency here. What’s the matter with Newton? I mean if you can’t help kids to meet certain basic standards plus, then there’s something wrong with the system. Nothing against Newton. Not a bad town, but something’s missing. I don’t think that’s happening in my town. I don’t think it’s happening in a lot of towns. I do think an extended school day in many of these communities will help. Look at the charters. There is almost no charter that does not have a 9 to 5, an 8 to 5 day. Must be something about that. The so-called exclusive private schools for decades have had a full school day. So I think you can get both. There should be no inconsistency between the two.

AUDIENCE QUESTION: I am Mike Grunko. I am president of SEIU Local 509. We represent human service workers and organize them in Massachusetts. I am a big fan of Gov. Swift and Gov. Dukakis and the work together we have done over the years. Right now, we have organized about 3,000 private sector mental health and mental retardation workers. They are certainly the underside of the Massachusetts economy now, needing two or three jobs to live in Massachusetts, not just in Boston but in Lowell and Springfield and all over the state. The wages are poor and the jobs are bad, and it’s a tax-funded function. One thing I hope we can address is giving these human beings the American Dream because it’s a long way off from where they are now. I’d like you to comment on that.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: I think for my grandparents worked jobs that most or all of us in this room would find to have absolutely no intellectual stimulation but were necessary, the ability to achieve the American Dream was rooted in their daughter’s opportunity to get an education that allowed her to be a teacher and then she had the opportunity to send her kids to a public education system that allowed them to be engineers and nurse midwives and a governor and computer IT specialists. It’s not all not public education but I also do think that one of the things, mostly because of the design of this, that we haven’t talked about a lot and one of the great aspects of being governor is you get to work on so many different issues and how we take care of those least fortunate among us and make sure we also take care of the people who do that very, very difficult work is I think one of the basic responsibilities of government that I know that in the administration I worked in with Gov. Cellucci that we thought about a lot. And those are some of the vexing issues that as governor you get a chance to try to make an impact on.

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: It’s a problem in society. I mean we don’t pay people what they are worth in a lot of – teachers should be paid more. A lot of that education money that we made a priority for urban schools went into raising teacher salaries. That was a good thing. We pay pro athletes millions and millions of dollars and who has a more important job? The school teacher, the human service worker, obviously. I’ve never had a problem with adequate pay for people doing difficult jobs. Sometimes the collective bargaining process is a difficult one. Sometimes balancing the budget has to be something that you do. But it’s all about setting priorities and making sure people are adequately compensated.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: One of those priorities ought to be to pay the folks we ask to do some of the most difficult work there is a decent wage. And we’re not doing it. The current administration has vetoed cost of living increases how many times? Repeatedly. I don’t understand it. This is tough work folks. You are working with people that have multiple problems. And you pay your human services workers a decent wage before you talk about cutting taxes. That’s my view. And I think most folks in the state would agree with that.

AUDIENCE QUESTION: I am a resident native of Massachusetts and have lived here a long time and my family grew up with Dukakis’ family in Brookline. My concern is that there is a lack of embrace for diversity in the state. If you go outside Massachusetts and you talk to people of color about living in Massachusetts, they are worried. They don’t want to come here. We have a negative image. What do you think from your position on the Corner Office that one can do to stimulate diversity and promote a sense that everyone is welcome here? I see over time that the color of our state has changed and is changing more rapidly and there is still this thinking that people aren’t welcome here. What can you do in leadership positions to change that image?

GOV. PAUL CELLUCCI: A lot of this goes back unfortunately to the busing crisis in the city of Boston. That was an unfortunate time in our history. James Michael Curley was a famous mayor of Boston, infamous some would say. He was selected four separate times and had one two-year term as governor and it was a disaster. But one of his proposals was to really amalgamate the city of Boston, to bring in the suburbs and put it under one city, something like what I talked about happening in Canada in the big cities. Interestingly, if they had followed the lead of Gov. Curley back then, we probably would not have had that busing crisis that I think hurt our image. From my years at lieutenant governor and governor, I traveled all across the state and I think for the most part we celebrate diversity in Massachusetts. We need to do more to promote that. I remember the celebrations when the Brazilians won the World Cup, over in the Brighton area. Everyone was having a great time. Those were immigrants. Those were diversity in our state. I don’t think the reality is what some have as an image. We have to do a better job of promoting and explaining that this is a diverse state and we welcome everyone.

GOV. JANE SWIFT: I’d agree with Gov. Cellucci. It’s a case where a bad taste lingers well beyond the reality. That doesn’t mean there aren’t still challenges we have to face. But I do think one thing governors can do is both symbolic but real, which is to make sure they populate leadership positions with people with a variety of different backgrounds. Sometimes we talk about making appointments of people with a variety of different backgrounds, we think that that’s the end of the work, to just put people in positions who have a variety of different backgrounds. It’s much more difficult and the work that needs to be done is to support their the ability to do those jobs well. Whether you are a person of color of a parent of young children or someone who has struggled with English as a second language, it’s important to both put people in positions who represent the diversity, which is a strength of our society, but to also give them the support network to be successful because I think that sends a powerful message.

GOV. MICHAEL DUKAKIS: This must be my week. I met your mother on the Red Line yesterday. We have made significant progress. We have a long way to go. When Kitty and I were in high school, the same high school you went to, this state folks was racist. It was anti-Semitic. If you were a person of color, you didn’t live in Brookline, unless you lived in the basement, because your father was a janitor, with one exception, Roland Hayes, the great black tenor who somehow, I don’t know how, was able to buy a house on Pill Hill. I mean you didn’t live on this side of the railroad tracks in Boston. You were over there in the South End. You didn’t live in the Back Bay. When I was a kid, there was no person of color behind a department store counter anywhere in downtown Boston. It’s taken an awful lot of work and a lot of effort and some legislation. We do have a state commission against discrimination, which is supposed to do this. But we still have a long way to go. I agree with Paul and Jane. Some of it, if you are in a position of political leadership, is demonstrating that you care, that you celebrate diversity. Saying the kinds of things that Paul said, these very gutsy things. I don’t think there is anybody in Washington of either party that has said what Paul Cellucci said this afternoon. But we still have miles to go. One other thing, if I may say, that a governor can do is demonstrate his commitment to expanding opportunity for people of color in their neighborhoods. Paul Cellucci announced in 1997 that he was going to move the state Department of Public Health from downtown to Dudley, and more power to him. It’s been nine years and the Commonwealth can’t take the state Department of Public Health and get them out of expensive downtown office space and get them to Dudley. I went to Romney personally and asked him to do it. Can’t do it. Won’t do it. Melnea Cass Boulevard ought to be an inner-city 128, with jobs to the people of that community. Train by Northeastern, RCC, Wentworth, Madison Park – it’s not happening. Some of this is saying the right things but a good deal of it has to do with stepping up and doing them. And we’ve got to do that.

ROBERT KEOUGH, COMMONWEALTH MAGAZINE: Thanks very much. That’s our program.