From P-Town, Robert Cray in a ‘lodestar’ show; looking at the Portland Gale

DJ Braintree Jim has returned to the airwaves this month on Provincetown, Mass.-based radio station WOMR with special one-hour shows. He calls these shorts "lodestar" shows or offshoots of his full-fledged Chill & Dream program.

"Most vinyl records play between 40 and 45 minutes," Braintree Jim observes. "So, they fit nicely into a 60-minute show, along with some concise commentary and station announcements." He said he enjoys these shows as they let him showcase a single artist or a notable album that otherwise "wasn't given their due."

His next show, tonight (Jan. 11) from 8 p.m. to 9 p.m., will feature the work of singer, songwriter, blues guitarist and five-time Grammy award winner Robert Cray, commemorating the 40th anniversary release of his breakthrough album "Bad Influence." (Cray's next area appearance is on Feb. 28, at the Narrows Center for the Arts, Fall River, Mass.)

Braintree Jim surmises that "Robert Cray is such an ineffably engaging singer that it is easy to forget how protean and important a musician he is to the blues. He revitalized the idiom and modernized it, especially in the 1980s with the advent of music video. Nearly 70, he hasn't lost that unique voice nor his guitar chops. 'Bad Influence' is one of his earliest albums, and you can just hear the potential in it. The album was the spark that lit the fuse to greater success. Cray is also a study of endurance. The first Robert Cray Band started playing almost 50 years ago. I think for many people in my generation he made the blues fun and accessible. That's no easy feat!"

The DJ is also putting together special shows for 2023. One show he has planned for this spring is with local author Don Wilding. His new book Cape Cod and the Portland Gale of 1898 will be published in May. The Thanksgiving weekend storm is remembered as one of the deadliest weather events in New England maritime history. The story centers on the doomed steamer S.S. Portland, and also recounts the devastation wrought by the storm along the Massachusetts shore, particularly Provincetown Harbor.

As Braintree Jim says, "I am really excited to do a show with Don. He is such a font of local history and storytelling. I'm already thinking of ideas for the appropriate soundtrack."

Speaking of storms, the east end of Provincetown on Commercial Street, where the WOMR studios are located, is still recovering from the powerful winter storm that hit the area right before Christmas. Fifty decks were destroyed and Fanizzi's Restaurant by the Sea had to be closed for repairs after waves breached the waterfront dining room near high tide on Dec. 23. The full extent of the property damage is still to be determined, according to town officials.

You can live stream programming on womr.org and now on the new WOMR app. All music shows are archived on both platforms for two weeks from airdate for music shows, and in perpetuity for spoken word shows. The broadcast signal can be reached on 91.3 - FM Orleans, Mass., and 92.1 - FM Provincetown, Mass. And to learn more about Braintree Jim, go to chillanddreamradio.com

The doomed steamer The Portland

‘I’m not all gray’

Witch hazel can bloom in November.

— Photo by Keichwa

I come, a sad November day,
Gray clad from foot to head;
A few late leaves of yellow birch,
A few of maple red.

And, should you look, you might descry
Some wee ferns, hiding low,
Or late Fall dandelions shy,
Where cold winds cannot blow.

And then, you see, I'm not all gray;
A little golden light
Shines on a sad November day,
A promise for the night.

For though gray-clad, in soft gray mist,
Floating on gray-cloud wing,
I know that I the way prepare
For brightest days of Spring.

And though witch-hazel's golden flowers
Are all the blooms I know,
They promise—so do I—the hours
When sweetest Mayflowers grow.

— “November Day,’’ by Mary B.C. Slade (1826-1882), a poet and hymnist who was born in Somerset, Mass., and spent most of her life in Fall River.

Broad Cove, an inlet of the Taunton River, is at the northern end of Somerset.

John O. Harney: N.E.’s changing ethnic demographics; shrinking police forces; honorary degrees and culture wars

1. Northwest Vermont 2. Northeast Kingdom 3. Central Vermont 4. Southern Vermont 5. Great North Woods Region 6. White Mountains 7. Lakes Region 8. Dartmouth/Lake Sunapee Region 9. Seacoast Region 10. Merrimack River Valley 11. Monadnock Region 12. North Woods 13. Maine Highlands 14. Acadia/Down East 15. Mid-Coast/Penobscot Bay 16. South Coast 17. Mountain and Lakes Region 18. Kennebec Valley 19. North Shore 20. Metro Boston 21. South Shore 22. Cape Cod and Islands 23. South Coast 24. Southeastern Massachusetts 25. Blackstone River Valley 26. Metrowest/Greater Boston 27. Central Massachusetts 28. Pioneer Valley 29. The Berkshires 30. South Country 31. East Bay and Newport 32. Quiet Corner 33. Greater Hartford 34. Central Naugatuck Valley 35. Northwest Hills 36. Southeastern Connecticut/Greater New London 37. Western Connecticut 38. Connecticut Shoreline

BOSTON

From The New England Journal of Higher Education (NEJHE), a service of The New England Board of Higher Education (nebhe.org)

Population studies. The U.S. Census Bureau released new population counts to use in “redistricting” congressional and state legisla­tive districts. Delayed by the pandemic, the counts came close to the legal deadlines for redistricting in some states, raising concerns about whether there would be enough time for public input.

The U.S. population grew 7.4% in 2010-2020, the slowest growth since the 1930s, according to the bureau. The national growth of about 23 million people occurred entirely of people who identified as Hispanic, Asian, Black or more than one race.

The Associated Press reported:

• The population under age 18 dropped from 74.2 million in 2010 to 73.1 million in 2020.

• The Asian population increased by one-third over the decade, to stand at 24 million, while the Hispanic population grew by almost a quarter, to top 62 million.

• White people made up their smallest-ever share of the U.S. population, dropping from 63.7% in 2010 to 57.8% in 2020. The number of non-Hispanic white people dropped to 191 million in 2020.

• The number of people identifying as “two or more races” soared from 9 million in 2010 to 33.8 million in 2020, accounting for about 10% of the U.S. population.

A few New England snippets

Maine remains the nation’s oldest and whitest state, even though it saw a 64% increase in the number of Blacks from 2010 to 2020, as well as large increases in the number of Asians and Pacific Islanders.

Connecticut’s population crawled up 0.9% over the decade from 2010 to 2020 to 3,605,944 residents. The number of residents who are Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) increased from 29% of the population in 2010 to 37% in 2020. Connecticut’s number of congressional seats won’t change, but district borders will.

The total population of the only city on Boston’s South Shore, Quincy, Mass., topped 100,000 (at 101,636), as its Asian population grew to represent nearly 31% of all residents. Further south, the city of Brockton’s population increased by nearly 13% as the white population dropped by 29%, and the Black population increased by 26%.

Amazon jungle. Amazon last week announced it will pay full college tuition for its 750,000 U.S. hourly employees, as well as the cost of earning high school diplomas, GEDs, English as a Second Language (ESL) and other certifications. While collecting praise for its educational goodwill, stories of dire conditions in the e-commerce giant’s workplace also triggered a new California law that would ban all warehouses from imposing penalties for “time off-task” (which reportedly discouraged workers from using the bathroom) and prohibit retaliation against workers who complain.

Police shrink. Police forces in New England have recently felt new recruitment and retention pressures. In August 2021, The Providence Journal ran a piece headlined “Promises made, promises delivered? A look at reforms to New England police departments.” GoLocal reported that month that Providence policing staff levels stood at 403, down from 500 or so in the 1980s under then-Mayor David Cicilline. The number of officers employed by Maine’s city and town police departments and county sheriffs’ offices shrank by nearly 6% between 2015 and 2020, according to the Maine Criminal Justice Academy. Reporter Lia Russell of the Bangor Daily News noted, “It’s also a challenge that police in Maine are far from alone in facing, especially following a year during which police practices across the nation were called into question following the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin.” The Burlington, Vt., City Council in August defeated efforts to reverse a steep cut in city police ranks. The police department currently has 75 sworn officers, down from 90 in June 2020. A survey by the police officers’ union found that roughly half of Burlington cops were actively seeking employment elsewhere.

Honor roll. Honorary degrees are becoming something of a frontline in the culture wars. Springfield College alum­nus Donald Brown, who recently coauthored a piece for NEJHE, tells of his alma mater revoking the honorary master of physical education degree it had bestowed on U.S. Olympic Committee Chair Avery Brundage in 1940. In 1968, Brundage pressured the U.S. to take action against two Olympic athletes who gave the Black Power salute after finishing first and second in the 200 meters. That event was only the tip of the iceberg. Brundage had a history of anti-semitism, sexism and racism. Springfield President Mary-Beth Cooper met with the trustees and others and decided to take back the honor. Meanwhile, the University of Rhode Island has been tying itself in knots over the honorary degree it bestowed on Michael Flynn in 2014, before he was appointed Trump’s national security adviser and accused of sedition.

Refugees. After the U.S. ended its longest war (so far) in Afghanistan and the capital of Kabul fell, the question arose of where Afghan refugees would resettle. New England cities, including Worcester, Providence and New Haven, are among those that have readied plans to welcome Afghan refugees. In higher education, Goddard College President Dan Hocoy said it was a “no-brainer” to offer to house Afghan refugees at its Plainfield, Vt., campus for at least two months this upcoming fall. Back in 2004, NEJHE (then Connection) featured an interview with Roger Williams University President Roy J. Nirschel, who died in 2018, and his former wife Paula Nirschel on the university’s role in its community as well as their pioneering initiative to educate Afghan women.

Sunshine state. Before Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took his most recent stand against fighting COVID, he displayed a narrow-mindedness that seems to always be in fashion. As Inside Higher Ed reported, after expressing concerns about faculty members “indoctrinating” students, DeSantis signed a law requiring that public institutions survey students­, faculty and staff members about their viewpoint diversity and sense of intellectual freedom. The Miami Herald reported that DeSantis and state Sen. Ray Rodrigues, the original bill’s Republican sponsor, suggested that the results could inform budget cuts at some institutions. Faculty members have opposed the bill, which also allows stude­­­­­­nts to record their professors teaching in order to file free speech complaints against them.

New colleges in a time of contraction. The nonprofit Norwalk (Conn.) Conservatory of the Arts announced plans to open a new performing-arts college and welcome its first class in August 2022. It’s unusual news amid the stream of college mergers and closures only widened by the pandemic. Among the challenges, many of the faculty members don’t have master of fine arts degrees that accrediting agencies require and, without accreditation, the college’s students won’t be eligible for federal financial aid or Pell Grants.

The Conservatory says the college will consolidate a traditional four-year undergraduate program into two years of intense training and a two-year graduate program into one year. Meanwhile, up the coast, the (Fall River, Mass.) Herald News reports that Denmark-based Maersk Training and Bristol Community College will work together to turn an old seafood packaging plant in New Bedford, Mass., into a National Offshore Wind Institute training facility to train offshore wind workers, complete with classrooms and a deepwater pool to train and recertify workers. (NEJHE has reported on the need to train talent for the burgeoning industry and the coastal economy’s special role in New England.)

Other higher-ed institutions are shapeshifting. After months of discussions and lawsuits, Northeastern University and Mills College reached agreement to establish Mills College at Northeastern University. Founded in 1852, Mills is renowned for its pre-eminence in women’s leadership, access, equity and social justice. Also, billionaire investor Gerald Chan and his family’s Morningside Foundation gave $175 million to the University of Massachusetts Medical School, which will be renamed the University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School. That’s the largest-ever gift to the UMass system.

Land deals. I was recently struck by a report titled We Need to Focus on the Damn Land: Land Grant Universities and Indigenous Nations in the Northeast. The report was born of a partnership between Smith College students and the nonprofit Farm to Institution New England (FINE) to look at how land grant universities view their historic relationships with local Indigenous tribes and how food can play a role in repairing those relationships. It grabbed my attention, partly because NEJHE has published some interesting stories about Native Americans and New England higher education. (See Native Tribal Scholars: Building an Academic Community and A Different Path Forward, both by J. Cedric Woods and The Dark Ages of Education and a New Hope, by Donna Loring.) And partly because two NEBHE Faculty Diversity Fellows, professors Tatiana M.F. Cruz of Simmons University and Kamille Gentles-Peart of Roger Williams University, are spearheading a fascinating Reparative Justice initiative. Among other things, Cruz and Gentles-Peart have had the courage to remind us that land grant universities in New England occupy the land of Indigenous communities. The Smith-FINE work offered sensible recommendations: Financially support Native and Indigenous faculty, activists, programs on campuses and beyond; offer free tuition for Native American students; hire Indigenous people, and fund their research.

John O. Harney is executive editor of The New England Journal of Higher Education.

Grace Kelly: The bumpy road to R.I.’s East Bay Bike Path

Facing south near the East Bay Bike Path's southern terminus, in Bristol

From ecoRI News (ecori.org)

“These days it’s hard to find someone who thinks creating the East Bay Bike Path was a foolish idea.” So begins a Providence Journal article written in 1999 by Sam Nitz, which chronicled the bike path’s beginnings and eventual completion.

The same could be said in 2020, a year when a pandemic forced people to get creative with their time. They took to the outdoors when the weather turned warm, with many dragging a set of wheels to a Rhode Island bike path that runs from Providence to Bristol.

I cruised along this path myself, dodging hand-holding couples, bold squirrels, and the occasional toddling roller-skater.

A map of the East Bay Bike Path from a 1984 pamphlet. Construction of the trail took place from 1987-92.

While looking at the path today might give the impression that it was a beloved idea all along, as Nitz noted in his article, “the path’s beginnings in the early 1980s were fraught with controversy and rancorous political debate.”

The 14.5-mile stretch of asphalt was hardly a shoo-in. In fact, it was met with raucous opposition, German shepherds, and even a letter to a high-level staffer of President Reagan begging for federal intervention.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

The story of the East Bay Bike Path starts with an old stretch of railroad that connected Providence to Bristol, with stops in Riverside and Warren and a connecting line that went to Fall River, Mass. It was a handsome railway, with postcards and old photos depicting almost modern-looking platforms and stations — one particular image of the rail near the future Squantum Association, a private club in East Providence, could be from the 2000s.

But as automobiles began to capture the American spirit, the railway slowly faded into disuse and the passenger line ended in 1938. In 1976, the State of Rhode Island acquired the right of way for the old Penn Central line, the section that ran from East Providence to Bristol.

It would also be automobiles that would inspire Bristol state Rep. Thomas Byrnes Jr. in the late 1970s, to lead the charge to create a bike path on the old Penn Central line.

“When I started at the State House in ’78, the oil shortage was … tough,” said Byrnes in a 2002 interview with his daughter Judith. “People were driving bombers around and they were having a hard time keeping their cars filled with gas. So, they were talking about looking into alternative means of transportation to cut our use of oil.”

And one idea that came up: bicycles.

In the ’70s, the United States experienced a bicycle boom, with some 64 million Americans using bicycles regularly. A 1971 article in Time magazine noted that America was having “the bicycles biggest wave of popularity in its 154-year history.”

So, at the time when Byrnes started thinking about alternative methods of transportation, bicycles were everywhere, and other states such as Maryland were starting to investigate turning old railways into bike trails.

In March 1980, Byrnes and Matthew Smith, who was the Rhode Island speaker of the House at the time, wrote a joint bill that called for a study of bicycling as an alternative form of transportation and as an energy saver. The idea of the East Bay Bike Path was born.

What happened next was years of pushing through heated resistance.

“There was a lot of opposition, a lot of opposition,” said Robert Weygand, who was the chairman of the East Providence Planning Board in the early ’80s, and who later went on to be a U.S. congressman and Rhode Island lieutenant governor. “In every community there were people that came out opposed to it.”

Weygand became involved in the project through his work on the East Providence Planning Board and later as part of a group called Friends of the Bike Path. He saw its creation as a way to help restore East Providence’s once-rich history of activities and attractions along the water.

“We heard about what Tom [Byrnes] had been proposing for a bicycle trail along the railroad tracks … and we were in East Providence, which had a long history of having amusement parks and various venues along the railroad tracks,” Weygand said. “So we were interested in trying to reinvigorate the idea of having activities along the waterfront, which had been abandoned for a very, very long time.”

The East Bay Bike Path had plenty of fierce opposition, but had the support of the Rhode Island Department of Transportation and its then-director Edward Wood.

The wheels were now set in motion, and in 1982, Gov. J. Joseph Garrahy and the Rhode Island Department of Transportation (DOT), which was then led by Edward Wood, who died this year, threw their support behind the project and hired an engineering firm to research feasibility and design.

“The biggest thing that really helped us along the way was governor Joe Garrahy … he really embraced it,” Weygand said. “And also, there was a fella that was the head of the Department of Transportation, Ed Wood.”

But though Wood and Garrahy supported the project, many in their own circles were firmly against it.

“Even Wood at DOT ran into opposition by his own staff,” Weygand said. “They wanted to preserve the East Bay railroad track system … potentially for freight traffic and rail traffic … so his own staff was fighting him because they thought, if we give up the railroad tracks, we'll never get them back.”

Meanwhile, Byrnes, Weygand, a man named George Redman — you’ll find his name and portrait on the section of the bike path that crosses Interstate 195’s Washington Bridge — and a group of others were busy fighting their own battle on the ground to win the people of the five municipalities over on the idea.

“We constantly met, talked about different opportunities, did public hearings and meetings … and we’d get together periodically to share war stories about what was going on,” said Weygand, with a chuckle. “There was some real opposition. We had a public hearing in 1983 at the Barrington YMCA, and people were yelling and screaming and swearing at us, saying that all the criminals from Providence would use this bike path to come down and steal things from their homes. It was terrible.”

One vivid memory Weygand has of the resistance was when he helped organize a walk of the proposed area to give people a feel for what it could be like.

“One of the things that happened that day that we had this walk was, we had about 50 or so people go along the path … and in notifying all of the abutting owners, one of the owners was Squantum Club,” Weygand recalled. “We had invited them to join us along the way, and when we got to the Squantum Club, the manager was there with German shepherds and cars to prevent us from passing anywhere near their property.”

James W. Nugent, who was a member of the Squantum Association at the time, even went as far as to write a letter to James A. Baker III, a friend of his who was the chief of staff of President Reagan.

“At a time when the nation is looking for ways to cut expenditures and increase income, I thought it appropriate to call to your attention an expenditure that to me, and to many residents of Rhode Island, seems almost frivolous,” Nugent’s letter reads. “When there is publicity about people going hungry and dangerous federal deficits, the logic of expanding over $1 million on a bicycle path escapes me — especially when so many people along the route of the path object strongly to it. They fear increased vandalism and housebreaks from the transient traffic when their properties become more easily accessible.”

Nugent goes on to ask Baker to sway the federal government to withhold funds for the project.

Though opposition was strong, there were supporters who should not be discounted. One of them was Barry Schiller, who was the on the transportation committee of the environmental group Ecology Action.

In a 1984 letter to Wood, Schiller wrote, “This should be an ideal bikeway, scenic, safe and relatively flat that will become the pride of the East Bay.”

Schiller’s words were prophetic in some ways. Instead of being a so-called crime highway, the East Bay Bike Path has become a place where friends and families gather and exercise. Instead of negatively affecting home values, living near the bike path is considered an asset. It’s also inspired other Rhode Island municipalities to build their own bike paths; there are eight today, according to DOT.

In the end, the proponents won out, and on May 22, 1986 ground was broken at Riverside Square, and the East Bay Bike Path became a reality.

“It seems like a long time ago, but it really wasn’t,” Weygand said. “It was absolutely wonderful, breaking ground and seeing it constructed.”

Construction took place from 1987-92, and today when Rhode Islanders cruise by on its blacktop, many are likely unaware of all it took for it to get done. But those who were there, those who helped push it through, they remember.

“Every time I ride the East Bay Bike Path, it gives me the inspiration to keep going, because I knew it took persistence in the face of strong opposition to get it done,” Schiller said. “It’s a lesson for all of us to not give up.”

Grace Kelly is an ecoRI News reporter.

A loving meal

Emeril Lagasse

“Anything made with love, bam! It’s a beautiful meal.’’

—Emeril Lagasse (born 1959), internationally known chef, TV host and restaurant entrepreneur. Born and raised in Fall River, his first big job was as executive chef of Dunfey’s Hyannis (Mass.) Resort, on Cape Cod.

William Morgan: Big box bathos in Fall River

Closed BJ’s Wholesale Club in Fall River. Photos by William Morgan

As if the hard luck mill city of Fall River, Mass., did not suffer enough existential angst, the failure of a big box store, such as BJ’s Wholesale Club, off Quequechan Avenue and with its prominent “Store Closed” banner, serves as a constant reminder of struggle. The hunkered down sea gulls might as well be vultures. But turn your back on BJ’s carcass and there’s the largest box store of them all, Walmart.

The Bentonville, Ark.-based commercial behemoth, has sucked the life out of Main Streets all across America, and arguably spelled the doom of BJ’s. Bigger and cheaper (in both senses of the word) than a score of older Spindle City businesses that it supplanted, this particular box store is touted as a Walmart Super Center. Fall River has some of the largest and emptiest parking lots around, reminders of the vain hope that massive shopping centers would save this once heroic economic powerhouse. These asphalt deserts are infertile ground indeed.

Looking toward Walmart Super Center in Fall River

Providence-based architectural historian, book author, essayist and photographer William Morgan was for many years the chairman of the Kentucky Historic Preservation Review Board.

Editor’s Note: Ironically, perhaps, Amazon has a big distribution center in Fall River. Amazon, of course, has ravaged many brick-and-mortar stores.

New chances for Fall River

Kennedy Park in Fall River, with the famous towers of St. Anne’s Church in the background.

From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

It was good news indeed that Paul Coogan defeated the twice-indicted incumbent mayor, Jasiel Correia, and City Administrator Cathy Ann Viveiros, a Correia ally running as a write-in, and will be the new mayor of troubled Fall River. Mr. Coogan, a member of the city’s school committee, is well respected and holds promise to be an honest and steadying force for the city, which has faced far too much corruption, as well as socio-economic challenges.

Sleaze alert: The (Fall River) Herald News published a leaked video of a secret meeting where Mr. Correia told supporters that he couldn't beat Mr. Coogan, head to head, but that at least one person (presto -- Ms. Viveiros!) would launch a write-in campaign, helping him by dividing the vote. Luckily for the city, the scheme failed. Mr. Coogan won with 79 percent of the vote, with Mayor Correia, getting only 7 percent. Clearly the voters want a big change!

For the leaked-audio story, please hit this link.

Fall River has much poverty and plenty of drug problems, but also some great strengths, including notably hard-working residents, a spectacular hilly site at the head of Mount Hope Bay and some beautiful structures, especially (to me) those old stone mill buildings that look so beautiful as you drive on Route 195, particularly as the sun comes up and sets. Further, Massachusetts’s South Coast Rail project will restore commuter rail service between Boston and southeastern Massachusetts, with stations in Taunton, Fall River and New Bedford; service is expected to be restored by the end of 2023. These are currently the only major cities within 50 miles of Boston lacking commuter rail access to Boston. South Coast Rail will boost the region’s economy by connecting it much tighter with rich Greater Boston. This will include luring more refugees from the sky-high housing costs up there to seek affordable digs in Fall River.

For a long time, New Bedford, which has long been twinned in the public mind with Fall River, has had much better mayoral administration than the Spindle City. Let’s hope that Mr. Coogan’s victory evens that out.

Fall River's electorate: Corrupt or delusional?

St. Anne’s Church in Fall River. The church, whose membership had been declining for years, had recently been the topic of demolition talks but now seems safe. The hilltop church, once home to a large French Canadian parish, may be the best loved building in the city. The brutalist City Hall, below, may be the most hated.

From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

Massachusetts’s system of local control over marijuana businesses that apparently often gives a single municipal official, such as Fall River’s brazen, sleazoid and perhaps crazy mayor, Jasiel Correia II, power to authorize a pot business to open is of course a wide-open door for corruption. In the latest scandal involving the 27-year-old statesman, he’s been arrested on charges that he extorted cannabis companies for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Mr. Corriea has long displayed a love of a fancy, glitzy lifestyle; his wants seem to far exceed his needs.

So it was good to hear Gov. Charlie Baker tell The Boston Globe last week:

“Maybe the state needs to put something in place that says, ‘It needs to actually be a governing entity, not a single person’ because that’s a legit concern.” Yes, a “governing entity’’ acting with transparency.

As disturbing as Mayor Correia is, much blame also goes to those citizens of Fall River who voted for him despite impressive intimations of his greed, immaturity and megalomania and to those who didn’t vote at all in the elections that put him in and kept him in office. Not voting has the effect of a vote – usually for someone you don’t like. Corrupt politicians often reflect a corrupt and/or lazy electorate. Or maybe just depressed….

Old churches should diversify functions

From Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

The closing of St. Anne’s Church in Fall River, whose twin towers are a much loved feature of the Spindle City’s skyline, as well as the closing of many other Catholic and mainline Protestant churches across America, make me wonder if many could have remained open if their leaderships had been more able and willing to repurpose parts of their churches for regular non-religious functions to bring in revenue before closings became unavoidable.

Probably most of these old churches will never again have the big congregations they once had in more religious times. But many more of the spacious rooms within old churches could be used for small businesses, exercise studios, co-working spaces, artists’ studios and so on, if churches would market those uses much more – and faster -- than they have. The naves would continue to be dedicated to religious services.

Now how to save beautiful St. Anne’s from being torn down? It sure would be a prettier City Hall than the Brutalist beast that now serves as that function! See below.

Democrats' takeover of House might presage greener light for Mass. rail-service expansion

The now-derelict place where the proposed Fall River MBTA station would go.

Adapted from Robert Whitcomb’s “Digital Diary,’’ in GoLocal24.com

Readers notice and maybe complain that I put a lot of public-transportation stuff in these columns. That’s because of its centrality in the prosperity of southern New England.

It’s good news for passenger-train expansion that the Democrats took the House in in mid-terms. Such pro-mass transit Massachusetts congressmen as Richard Neal and James McGovern will be in a position as committee chairmen to push for federal aid to boost such projects as rail service between Boston and Springfield and Boston and Fall River and New Bedford. Those would ease highway traffic and wear and tear on our roads, saving taxpayers time and money, and lift our region’s economy.

Purple lines show routes of proposed new MBTA lines to Fall River and New Bedford.

It will be tough to get anything helping New England through the GOP-controlled Senate, but a foundation (or rail bed) can be laid for when the political environment changes, perhaps after the 2020 elections.

Would Trump and the narrowly GOP Senate cooperate with the Democratic-run House in enacting a bill that would include the aforementioned projects? In his campaign, Trump talked up a huge infrastructure program but once in office pretty much dropped the subject and concentrated on giving himself and his pals a big tax cut and trying to kill the Affordable Care Act. But then the current version of the GOP sees tax cuts, particularly favoring the rich, as virtually their only domestic policy.

Still, a swelling federal deficit, an aging population, crumbling infrastructure and increased military spending pose huge challenges. My guess is that in the next few years, the top marginal federal income tax rate will have to be raised to around 50 percent to pay for the services the public wants (if not needs) and to address the rapidly swelling national debt and associated higher interest rates. The bond and stock markets are without mercy. We can’t live in financial Fantasyland forever.

Readers may email rwhitcomb4@cox.net to make comments.

Amazonian ambiguities

From Robert Whitcomb's "Digital Diary,'' in GoLocal24.com

Here’s yet another observation on Amazon, which has been hiring thousands of people across America and a few hundred at its new distribution center in Fall River:

Those warehouse jobs are being taken by many people who might otherwise have been working in the thousands of stores being put out of business by Amazon. Those are people who would have been customers of nearby stores and restaurants and, because they were working in local stores (which paid local taxes) -- people much more likely to be civically engaged than those working for a gigantic global corporation most of whose buildings are gigantic warehouses far from town or city centers. Thus Amazon’s relentless expansion will accelerate the decline of local economies and local government.

But, as I’ve said, people love the convenience of dealing with Amazon, which will trump the attractions of local retailing in most places.  High-end stores, with intense personal service, in very affluent neighborhoods will be partial exceptions. As for the good PR Amazon gets from its hiring binge, that will fade as the geniuses in Seattle figure out more ways to automate its warehouses.

Hope on Mount Hope Bay

The Border City Mill in Fall River.

Adapted from an item in Robert Whitcomb's "Digital Diary,'' in GoLocal24.com

Amazon is already employing about 1,800 people in its new and gigantic fulfillment center in Fall River, Mass.

That’s a big boost to the long economically ailing ‘’Spindle City,’’ which was once the world's leading cotton-textile producer.

But folks should remember that simultaneously Amazon is killing many thousands of jobs at brick-and-mortar stores, many of which are closing because of Amazon, thus depriving their communities and states of much tax revenue and jobs and eroding their sense of community.

By the way, hilly Fall River’s setting on Mount Hope Bay is one of the most beautiful on the East Coast. And some gorgeous old granite and brick mills have survived the arsonists' efforts to enjoy the sexual pleasures of pyromania and/or the comforting piles of cash from insurance settlements.

 Yes, romantic Fall River.

Ira Sharkansky: The wandering Jews of Portugal and Fall River

JERUSALEM A number of individuals from my home town of Fall River, Mass., have traveled to Ponta Delgada, in the Azores , to commemorate the refurbishing of a synagogue that they had financed. They also met with the one Jew still living in the islands.

The story is long and interesting, and ironic from both sides.

Jews had once been a major element in Portugal, but no more.

They also were a major element in Fall River, but no more.

Jewish history in Portugal resembled Jewish history in Spain. A sizable population developed in the early Middle Ages, by some reports a larger percentage of the total population than in Spain. In both countries the Jews were mostly eliminated by forced expulsion or conversion. Some remained, passing themselves off as Christians, and some returned when the anti-Jewish policy was relaxed.

The Portuguese first came to southeastern Massachusetts as crew members on whaling ships. The work was hard and risky enough to dissuade Americans, so the ships would sail from New Bedford and Nantucket with skeleton crews to the Azores, pick up men willing to serve, at least partly for the opportunity to remain in the  U.S. when the ships reached home port with the results of several years' hunting.  When the cotton industry began to develop in Fall River, mill owners sent labor recruiters to the Azores.

Jews came to the city from the latter part of the 19th Century, and served a growing industrial population as peddlers and small merchants. Their children, more than others, stayed in school and moved up the economic ladder to larger businesses and the professions. As the cotton mills closed in the face of competition from the South, another wave of Jews came, mostly from New York, to produce clothing, taking advantage of empty buildings and unemployed workers.

Then competition from China, India, Indonesia, Vietnam and elsewhere did to their small factories what Southern cotton mills had done earlier.

At its height, the Jewish community amounted to several thousand individuals, with a number of small Orthodox synagogues and one grand Conservative temple.

If there is more than one Jew remaining in Fall River, there is not not enough for a daily minyan. For some years now, the Conservative temple has rented space that once served as classrooms to municipal social service agencies.

My first assignment as a student of political science led me to the city's problems. According to official statistics, 30 percent of Fall River teenagers did not finish high school, and the average adult had not gone beyond ninth grade.

The city stimulated my interest in ethnicity, and the topic for my Senior Thesis was "The Portuguese of Fall River." Demographic and political research was made easier by the few family names among the Portuguese. One of them was Franco.

There are Francos in our family. The grandparents of the Franco who married a niece came from Turkey, and earlier ones most likely went there from Spain or Portugal..

There are Portuguese in Fall River who say they are Jews, or that their family had been Jewish.

Gentile friends lament the absence of Jews. They say that the public high school has become an "inner-city school," and that few graduates apply to prestigious colleges.

The ambitious Jews of my generation had to apply to several places, insofar as the most desirable limited the number of Jews they would accept. Virtually none of us returned to the city after college.

Fall River's total population has dropped from more than 115,000 to less than 90,000. Tenements are empty and cheap. Boston relocated some of its homeless to the city.

The city's education profile hasn't changed in 60 years. Still close to 30 percent of teenagers fail to finish high school. Now the average adult has reached 10 grade, but has not finished it.

There are Jews who live outside of Fall River, while continuing to practice their professions in the city.

It's not only the Azores and Fall River where there are empty synagogues. There are about as many Jews in each of Yemen, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Iraq, Algeria, and Afghanistan, all of which had been home to thousands..

Jews remain a significant population in the area of the former Soviet Union, despite about half of them--more than a million--having left since the late 1980s.

Estimates of Jews in Iran have declined from 100,000-150,000 in 1948 to about 80,000 prior to the revolution, and 17,000-25,000 currently.

Assessments of Jews' lives in Iran vary as widely as the population estimates.

Jews not only move. They also look for Jews in what for them are exotic places. The support of what had been Fall River's community for the Azorean synagogue is part of a wider tradition. Israelis do "roots" trips to their own, their parents', or their grandparents' former homes in Europe.

My wife, Varda, and I have seen where her parents grew up in Dusseldorf and Berlin, and visited the graves of her grandfather and a young cousin who died before the Holocaust. We have passed by the synagogues in a number of other European cities, walked the streets of Judeiria in Spain, and saw indentations in the stone alongside doorways in Gerona that most likely remain from when there was a mezuzah. .

After a professional conference in Moscow during 1979 I visited Jews in Samarkand, Bukhara and Tashkent. When I told one old man that I came from Jerusalem, he began to weep.

Neither of us has a desire to visit the ashes in Eastern Europe where family members perished.

Jewish movement has something to do with Jews' historic association with commerce. There are Biblical mandates about charging interest, and extensive Talmudic disputes about what constitutes interest, fair dealing, and the financial relations appropriate with Jews and others. Communities have invited Jews on account of their economic skills, and then turned against Jews for the same reason. Concerns for bookkeeping and commercial agreements may have contributed to the early development of literacy throughout the community, or at least among most of its males, and subsequent contributions in every field of science and culture..

Commerce is part of what we are, for the good and the bad associated with it. Including our capacity to move elsewhere when things turn sour.

While the Azores, Fall River, and many other places have empty synagogues, there are four within 100 meters of these fingers. All have daily minyans, even without my attendance.

Ira Sharkansky  is  an emeritus professor of political science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Pressing on with South Coast Rail

  By JOYCE ROWLEY, for ecoRI News

NEW BEDFORD

“We're forging ahead,” Jean Fox, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority's project manager, told the South Coast Rail Task Force at its Feb. 25 meeting, when questioned whether the change in administration would affect the South Coast Rail. “We’ve got our marching orders and we’ve not been told otherwise.”

The 20-year-old South Coast Rail (SCR), now in its preliminary design stage, has chugged along despite a protracted planning and environmental review. Last summer, the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (#mbta) awarded a $12 million preliminary design contract to the engineering firm Vanasse Hangen Brustlin, with an option for a $210 million 10-year final design and construction contract.

“It’s pretty exciting. The goal was to get approximately 15 percent design completed by June 30, 2015,” Fox said. “We’re on target for #most tasks.”

In January 2014, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued a final environmental impact statement for an electric train line that will extend the existing MBTA Stoughton commuter rail line. Passing through the 2,000-acre Hockomock Swamp on an abandoned rail bed to #taunton, the new branch will split in Berkley. The main line will connect to New Bedford on existing freight tracks, and a branch will continue to Fall River.

But record snowfall beginning with the first storm on Jan. 26-27 left the T demobilized throughout Greater Boston, leaving some at the meeting questioning the viability of the project.

“Is the state thinking of spending $3 billion on a new line when the T hasn’t worked well for a month?” asked Kyla Bennett, director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility.

Fox said that $2.3 billion was allocated in the state transportation bond last year to build the SCR. Fox said they would be meeting with Gov. Charlie Baker’s administration about the project soon.

“Our goal is to sit down with them and see where we fit in," Fox said. “It’s a transportation priority and has been for several years. We can show a cost-benefit analysis of the transportation, environmental and economic development potential for the project.”

Blame for the T’s winter problems has been laid at the 9 feet of snow that incapacitated commuter lines to Worcester, Springfield, Lakeville and Stoughton; at the use of T parking lots by residents who had to stay off the streets during parking bans which then left T commuters with no place to park; on outdated equipment on some lines that couldn’t make it through deep snow.

Now, over a month later, all commuter rail lines are still on revised schedules. It remains to be seen whether promises to get the entire system in order by March 30 can be met.

In a interview with ecoRI News later, Bennett questioned the allocated amount of funding, as well as the wisdom of spending billions of dollars on a rail line that may not be used.

“I think the $2.3 billion is a vast underestimate,” she said. “Public records requests to get the most recent cost estimate were denied.”

Her group won on appeal to the state, but then only received the estimate with minor modifications. The estimate hasn’t changed much since the 2011 draft, Bennett said.

“I don’t know how much it will cost to fix the T, let alone what it will cost to do both,” she said. “The reason this matters is because if it is more, then that’s even more that we won’t put into fixing existing infrastructure.”

Transportation justice SCR Task Force Chairwoman Susan Teal disagrees. The Rochester resident said both maintenance of the existing lines and development of the new branch are needed.

“There's plenty of money for both,” Teal said at the recent meeting.

All other major cities in Massachusetts tie into Boston via rail, except Taunton, New Bedford and Fall River. All three are “Gateway Cities” and all three have consistently pushed for the connection.

Most proponents of the rail expect it will make a connection to Boston and jobs, but will also help draw businesses to the region. In fact, regional planning agencies the Southeast Regional Planning and Economic Development District, Metropolitan Area Planning Council and the Old Colony Regional Planning Council show anticipated growth in surrounding communities.

“Just look north to Lowell to see what rail does for a community,” Fox said. “It brings in higher-paying high-skilled jobs and builds new housing stock.”

Nearly $2 million in technical assistance grants to 31 communities over the past seven years has promoted the SCR’s “Smart Growth” planning efforts to mitigate potential impacts in advance. In fiscal 2015, the MBTA spent $353,830 on technical assistance to communities under SCR’s program.

Smart growth is a buzz-phrase for planning to minimize sprawl and reduce vehicle trips, and resulting greenhouse-gas emissions. It includes building transit-oriented development that reduces the need for additional highway infrastructure.

“Smart growth has been impactful and productive,” Fox said.

Bennett questioned the anticipated greenhouse gas-reduction benefits that the SCR may create. Instead, she said the money would be better spent creating jobs in the three targeted cities so people could work where they live.

“People are going to pay $500 to $600 per month to travel four hours on a train for what jobs in Boston?” Bennett said later. “Taking cars off the highway even if there is ridership won’t necessarily make a difference. Cars backfill in the highway when people realize there’s more room.”

Next month, the MBTA will begin construction of independent utilities, including grade crossings and a rail bridge at Wamsutta Street that will serve active freight. These components of the project need to be built even if the SCR isn't completed, according to Fox.