Author Archive

City Council Review: 2018

Mimi Parseghian, who regularly contributes her weekly preview of Lowell City Council meetings As Dick mentioned in his Lowell Year in Review , the “nine victors in the bruising 2017 Lowell City Council race” gathered on January 2, 2018 to begin the municipal meeting year. In spite of the single-issue…

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Bobby Tugbiyele on LPS HR Director search

Lowell resident Bobby Tugbiyele shared the following letter he sent to Mayor Samaras and others: Dear Mayor Samaras, Members of the LPS Personnel Subcommittee, and Acting Superintendent Durkin: I and many community members, especially those who attended the early April School Committee session, ( Read-  http://www.lowellsun.com/breakingnews/ci_31782843/lowell-school-board-hears-calls-hiring-diversity ) respectfully and earnestly…

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Lowell Week in Review: December 23, 2018

“A Cataclysm for our District” Towards the end of Wednesday night’s review of the fiscal audit of the Lowell School Department, Connie Martin, the longest-serving current member of the Lowell School Committee said about the Lowell School Department’s fiscal mess, “This has been a cataclysm for our district.” Cataclysm is…

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Lowell School Committee Meeting: Dec 19, 2018

I usually don’t report on Lowell School Committee meetings, but given the financial crisis that has engulfed the school department, I thought it important to pay closer attention to how the school committee is responding. Here are my notes from tonight’s meeting. I covered the entire discussion on the recently…

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Lowell City Council Meeting: December 18, 2018

ROLL CALL – all present CITY COUNCIL – MOTION (taken out of order) Samaras – Req. City Mgr. provide a report to the city council and school committee/administration regarding school department reimbursement for the Digital Connections Partnership School Grant Program totaling $553,217.46 that was sent to the Lowell Treasurer/Collector’s Office…

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City Council Preview: December 18, 2018

Mimi Parseghian previews tonight’s Lowell City Council meeting: Tonight’s City Council meeting is the last for this year.  It is short on Council motions, just one; but very long on Motion Responses; thirteen of them. At the conclusion of the open meeting, the Council will meet again in Executive Session…

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Lowell Week in Review: December 16, 2018

The long-awaited outside audit by the firm of Clifton Larson Allen of the Lowell Public Schools was released late Friday night and according to an Elizabeth Dobbins story in the Lowell Sun (“Audit confirms Lowell schools’ fiscal quagmire”) it is a devastating indictment of fiscal mismanagement by the past school…

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