What is Somerville

Plants grow out of a storm drain

Native pollinator garden?

Unofficial results in Somerville suggest mayor Katjana Ballantyne has been outvoted by her two challengers in a preliminary election – and the November race may well be among two councilors. #Somerville

Don’t look now but they took down the Nov 24 election results from the elections page

Today, September 16, is Primary Election Day. Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Vote-by-mail ballots must be placed in a dropbox before 6 p.m. or hand-delivered to Elections at City Hall (93 Highland Ave.) before 8 p.m.

Learn more and check your polling location at somervillema.gov/elections.

Yeah, I think it is. Also might be Union Square Main Streets but I don’t know.

Central Square has advertisements for a lot of their businesses on public infrastructure in Cambridge.

Councilor McLaughlin says that Somerville's new charter passed the Massachusetts Senate today, is before the governor for signature, and could well be on the ballot in five weeks.

He would like to not put that at risk with a last minute change to the rules.

16/?

screen grab of city council meeting from aug 28, 2025

Here is a brief history of why I am so frustrated with the lack of progress on a Highland Ave redesign.

(If you enjoy municipal rants, this post is for you.)

youtu.be/lP0zGdQSXIk?...

Like I said initially, still not a scandal and still something I think Democrats should do more (take credit).

But it's a tad obvious to ramp up the press releases and insert yourself into LITERALLY EVERYTHING like a month before your super-contested Mayoral primary.

🤷

Press release examples from 2023 and 2024 show annual events that have had reformatted titles in 2025. Now, Mayor Ballantyne is the subject of each press release.

Press release examples from 2024 show annual events that have had reformatted titles in 2025. Now, Mayor Ballantyne is the subject of each press release.

It's plain to see when looking back at prior years. Where the City used to announce things, "Mayor Ballantyne" now does.

The Ballantyne team is obviously trying to present activity and 'happenings' on their behalf.

I doubt we'll be hearing many updates from individual departments anytime soon.

Pretty safe to say that nobody is imagining this. The City is absolutely changing the way it issues press releases. Pretty transparently so, in fact.

Seems like @mayorkatjana.bsky.social has instructed City staff to basically spam press releases with her name.

FYI the residence boundary is MUCH bigger than you might think; I'm easily included and I live past Teele, and friends in medford and porter have also been eligible

Unrelated but am I to believe that Berlin is really the nominee for Connecticut

I'm not rooting for more corruption, per se, but perhaps less 'slothfulness' or incompetence in my politicians? This is such a bad look that I'd rather they not get caught altogether.

I don't even know. Gotta cut it here, this is going nowhere.

👋

22/22

But I don't think it's an unfairly high bar to suggest that the staffers and politicians running Somerville would know how to submit the right forms, put in the 6? 7? minutes of effort to substantively change language, and not get caught doing this.

21/?

I guess whatever hypothetical situation could describe this occurrence, I wish that there were people in place looking after my city's interests who could get away with doing this without getting caught.

Weird to say, I know.

20/?

Dah, perhaps I'm reading too much into things.

This *obviously* isn't Watergate - let alone any scandal whatsoever.

But it's nothing short of disheartening to have this peculiar glimpse into the machine that runs my city. That machine is run by people who appear... kinda slow?

19/?

I searched pretty damn hard to find public examples of language like this floating around on the internet. Perhaps from a committee or Somerville department?

Nope. At least not that I found. If I'm wrong about that, chalk it up to social media disinformation and don't tell me.

(Kidding)

18/?

I find that last hypothetical to perhaps be the least embarrassing, but even still, that would leave me believing that the Mayor and her team knowingly pulled from language for a City Council candidate questionnaire and actively chose to work from it.

You're the Mayor. Attention to detail?

17/?

The slight alterations in most of the answers indicate that the author(s) were aware that they should present this information differently. Never mind the identical question, of course.

Perhaps they pulled from a doc that prepared language for allied candidates, and they only worked on edits?

16/?

Did a consultant employed by each try to sneakily save time and effort without telling either candidate? If so, bad job!

I really hope this isn't the case, but did the candidates and their teams actually sit down and concoct this plan? I say I hope this isn't the case because... yikes if so 😬

15/?

If you weren't sold on that from the near-identical or verbatim identical language that they both submitted, I'll remind you, dear reader, that the MAYOR of Somerville submitted the CITY COUNCIL version of the questionnaire.

Lol

14/?

So many questions.

It's not exactly breaking news that candidates and politicians work together, sometimes even directly share language, but this? This is just weird, no?

It goes without saying that these two campaigns are working together.

13/?

Highlighted text reads: I would explore zoning changes to the inclusionary ordinance linking increases in height to replacement of units affordable at 110% AMI with units affordable at 50% AMI. I am not prepared to specify the percentage of 110% AMI units that need to be shifted to 50% AMI affordability with the addition of each 10-12 feet of building height; that calculation should be developed in cooperation with representatives from local affordable housing developers and other organizations with such missions/expertise.

Highlighted text reads: I would explore zoning changes to the inclusionary ordinance linking increases in height to replacement of units affordable at 110% AMI with units affordable at 50% AMI. I am not prepared to specify the percentage of 110% AMI units that need to be shifted to 50% AMI affordability with the addition of each 10-12 feet of building height; that calculation should be developed in cooperation with representatives from local affordable housing developers and other organizations with such missions/expertise.

And, after all that (misplaced) effort to make these responses look distinct, someone just GAVE UP and submitted the exact same language on Question #11.

12/?

Highlighted text reads: Subject to the income eligibility and desire of each tenant in the redeveloped property, it would also make sense to explore affording the displaced tenant(s) the right of first refusal for a tenancy in one of the newly developed units.

Highlighted text reads: I would require the new property owner to offer those tenants the right of first refusal for a tenancy in one of the newly developed affordable units with the same number of bedrooms.

And continues...

11/?

Highlighted text reads: To remedy the situation, as long as the owner remains an occupant of the property, I would propose relaxing the requirement to select a tenant from the inclusionary waiting list, and would allow the owner to select any income-eligible tenant. If and when the owner no longer lives in one of the units on the property, the tenant selection process would revert to the requirement that the owner select a tenant from the inclusionary waiting list, subject to the outcome of their usual screening process.

Highlighted text reads: As long as the owner remains an occupant of the property, I would propose relaxing the requirement to select a tenant from the inclusionary waiting list, and would simplify the restriction, allowing the owner to select any income eligible tenant. If and when the owner no longer lives in one of the units on the property, the selection process would revert to the requirement that the owner select a tenant from the inclusionary waiting list, subject to the outcome of their usual screening process.

And continues...

(Love the use of dashes in Ballantyne's income-eligible tenant vs Sait's income eligible tenant)

10/?

Highlighted text reads: However, that zoning provision was interpreted to require the owner to lease the newly affordable unit to the next eligible person on the inclusionary waiting list (subject to the owner’s usual, but lawful, tenant screening process). Despite apparent interest in developing so-called accessory units and/or adding on a new unit to an existing property, the provision resulted in little if any new development, presumably because property owner-occupants were uncomfortable with the accompanying constraint on their tenant selection process.

Highlighted text reads: However, zoning has been interpreted to require the owner to lease the newly affordable unit to the next eligible person on the inclusionary waiting list (subject to the owner’s usual, but lawful, tenant screening process). It is likely that owner occupants have not taken advantage of this opportunity to add a unit to their property because they are uncomfortable with the accompanying constraint on their tenant selection process.

Elsewhere, the trend continues.

Clearly, whoever was working on this language had the thought to diversify the word choice a little so as to... paint a picture that these weren't the same responses?

This is mean, so apologies in advance, but they didn't do a very good job. At all.

9/?

Highlighted text reads: We might also want to consider increasing the percentage of units that are required to be affordable below the 50% AMI level, with perhaps some units offered at rents affordable to households with incomes of 30% AMI, even if this requires a somewhat higher percentage of units to be priced at market rate.

Highlighted text reads: I am also interested in cooperating with representatives from local affordable housing developers and other organizations with such missions/expertise to explore options for increasing the percentage of units that are required to be affordable below the 50% AMI level and 30% AMI level, even if this requires some percentage of units to be priced at market rate.

These are pretty different. But not really.

In the context of this thread, amidst all the near-identical and identical language, these are also obviously written by the same person.

8/?

To do a little plagiarism of my own here, "generally speaking" these are functionally identical. A modicum of effort to change small phrases, sure. But they're identical.

OK? Kinda interesting.

7/?

Highlighted text reads: Generally speaking, 50% AMI units constitute approximately 40% of the “affordable” units in buildings with more than 25 or 30 apartments. 80% AMI and 110% AMI units – which are hardly “affordable” to working class households constitute the remainder of the inclusionary units. In a 100-unit building, for example, 20 of the units would be discounted under the Inclusionary Zoning program, and of those, approximately 8 would be affordable at the 50% AMI level. A 50% AMI 2BR unit would rent for more than $2,000/month (including utilities), which is great by comparison to market rent levels, but barely affordable for 2- or 3-person household with a single-income earning $25/hour = $52,000/year = $4,333/mo.

Highlighted text reads: Generally speaking, 50% AMI units constitute approximately 40% of the “affordable” units in buildings with more than 25 or 30 apartments. 80% AMI and 110% AMI units – which are hardly “affordable” to working class households constitute the remainder of the inclusionary units. In a 100-unit building, for example, 20 of the units would be discounted under the Inclusionary Zoning program, and of those, only 8 would be affordable at the 50% AMI level. A 50% AMI 2BR unit would rent for more than $2,000/month (including utilities), which is great by comparison to market rent levels, but barely affordable for 2- or 3-person household with a single-income earning $25/hour = $52,000/year = $4,333/mo.

Didn't take long - we're still on Question #2 - before I came across another example.

As a reminder, you've got Ballantyne on the left and Sait on the right.

6/?