First, I will opine but briefly on the presidential race and say: whew! Dodged a bullet on that one. Plus: it succeeded in cheesing off Donald Trump in a huge way, and anytime The Donald is unhappy is cause to smile.

Now, onto the major local races, two of which had the potential for upset victories: the race for State Senate of the Plymouth and Barnstable District, the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners. In both cases, the incumbents were returned to office by healthy margins.

Senate President Therese M. Murray (D – Plymouth) came within five percentage points of losing to Republican challenger Thomas F. Keyes in 2010, and this time around, despite some solid campaigning by her opponent, Sen. Murray won with 58 percent of the vote to Mr. Keyes’ 41 percent.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Keyes remarked after his concession speech that the reason he lost is because he was out-spent by Sen. Murray. Funny how the winning candidate always thanks his or her supporters, but the loser always blames outside forces for his/her loss, isn’t it? But I digress…

What really cost Mr. Keyes the race is the fact that all he offered was a lot of unremarkable ideas and negativity toward the incumbent. Any given e-mail from the Keyes campaign could be summed up thusly: “Therese Murray did something. Wow, is she corrupt and uncaring! I won’t be, though, so vote for me,” and you need more than knee-jerk gainsaying to win a race.

Then we have the three-way race for two seats on the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners between incumbents Mary L. (Pat) Flynn of Falmouth and Sheila R. Lyons of Wellfleet, and Eric L. Steinhilber of Barnstable.

The two incumbents deserved to win. They displayed a clearly superior grasp of a wide range of countywide issues, whereas Mr. Steinhilber ran a one-note race, and that note was very, very flat: he anchored his campaign in opposing a “Cape Cod wastewater authority,” a taxpayer-funded regional agency charged with administering a Cape-wide wastewater management plan, which was proposed earlier this year by the Special Commission on County Governance.

That would have been a fine tactic if it weren’t for the fact Mr. Steinhilber himself declared the wastewater authority proposal a dead issue back in August, weeks after Ms. Flynn and Ms. Lyons voiced their formal opposition to the idea. He later resurrected it as his primary campaign talking point, despite the fact no one was disagreeing with him (although he tried awfully hard to make it sound like they were).

I maintain that Mr. Steinhilber has potential as a candidate, and maybe next time around he’ll be more diligent about doing his homework on the issues and will offer a more well-rounded campaign platform (and will be better able to defend his positions when challenged on them).

Thanks for reading, folks, and I’ll see you again in 2014! In the meantime, you can keep up with my ramblings here on my blog.

By which I mean the end of the election cycle, and thank Cthulhu for that, because the onslaught of negative TV ads was honestly grating on my last nerve. Sad to say, I’m actually looking forward to the non-stop ads for Christmas shopping sales.

With Election Day tomorrow, I’m going to offer some thoughts on various races. I wouldn’t call them endorsements per se, since I think endorsements are worthless, but I will opine about who I think should win.

I’ll start at the top and say that I want Obama to get a second term. I say this as someone who voted for Obama and has often been disappointed in his performance over the past four years — but not so much as to give him the boot and put Romney in the Oval Office.

I find Romney to be as disingenuous and insincere a politician as you could get, but that’s not why I oppose him. Nor do I oppose him on his rather vague financial policies, which I believe are ultimately no better or worse than Obama’s (though I definitely do not subscribe to trickle-down/supply-side economics as a viable and sustainable economic model).

What is driving me away from Romney in a huge way: I believe he would champion a social agenda that sets back civil rights for women and homosexuals. If you’ve read the GOP’s official policy paper for the 2012 election (I have), you’ll see that it codifies repressing rights for same-sex couples and, specifically, women in the military. Our President is supposed to champion equal rights for all citizens, and anyone who would repress rights in the name of some ill-defined greater social good doesn’t deserve the nation’s top seat.

If Obama is re-elected, my hope is that the GOP ceases its efforts to stop Obama’s major economic initiatives cold in the name of political gamesmanship and works with him to craft policies that are in everyone’s best interests — not just the uber-rich, not just the very poor, everyone.

US Senate

I’m one step away from flipping a coin at the voting booth, because I really don’t care for either Scott Brown or Elizabeth Warren. Neither of them has impressed me so much that I’m falling over myself to vote for them.

Congress

Let me first say that Dan Botelho is probably the best third-party/non-party candidate this area has seen in years. He’s not a righteously indignant one-issue ideologue, which is largely what has emerged to run against the party candidates,  but a thoughtful and well-informed candidate with some good ideas.

Christopher Sheldon, while a decent candidate, never struck me as a great candidate, and definitely not a superior choice to Congressman William Keating. His critics like to say “Keating hasn’t done anything for this district!” but that is a patently false statement. His record of achievement is fairly good for a first-term Congressman, and he has treated the Cape as well as his predecessor Bill Delahunt ever did.

State Senate

I think Cape voters would be nuts to let Senate President Therese Murray (D – Plymouth) go, in good part because of that title in front of her name; as Senate President, she has the mojo to get things done for her district in a big way. She’s also spearheaded some significant reform efforts over the past two or three terms, so she’s not sitting on her hands doing nothing.

Tom Keyes has run a much better campaign than in 2010, and I fully expect another close race between him and Sen. Murray, but so much of his campaign has been based in reactionary statements that try to paint Sen. Murray as a corrupt, ineffective do-nothing. If Murray were to state, “I like cats,” Keyes would issue a press release accusing her of being in the pocket of Big Dog. He hasn’t really distinguished himself as a superior alternative to the incumbent, and if he does come out on top, I would say Murray lost the race rather than Keyes won it.

Barnstable County Commissioners

Mary Pat Flynn and Sheila Lyons should be returned to the board, because Eric Steinhilber has not proven himself worthy of ousting either of the incumbents.

Mr. Steinhilber chose the wrong tentpole issue in the “MWRA on Cape Cod” to-do, stuck to his guns far longer than he should have once that topic’s shelf-life expired back in the summer, and has failed to show voters why his opposition to a taxpayer-funded wastewater authority is somehow better, more reliable, or just plain different than Ms. Flynn’s or Ms. Lyons’.

I directly asked Mr. Steinhilber why voters should believe him when he says “I oppose a wastewater authority” but doubt the incumbents when they say it, and he did not provide a good answer; his argument was, basically, he was dead-set against it and Flynn and Lyons were not — and he did not elaborate whether he thought they were lying or were simply easily manipulated dupes who could be bullied into changing their minds.

That, coupled with his lackluster ideas on other issues and failure to recognize OpenCape as a potential economic engine for the region, make him ill-suited for the job compared to Flynn and Lyons — and that’s a shame because I had high hopes for the guy. I maintain he would have made a better challenger for State Senator Dan Wolf (D – Harwich) in 2010 than Jim Crocker, but the man needs to be better about doing his homework and distinguishing good issues from bad (or non-) issues.

Question One

The Right to Repair question is a tricky one, but let’s be clear about one thing: voting “no” on Question One does NOT negate the Right to Repair Law passed earlier this year; a “no” vote is against the ballot question only.

What a “yes” vote would do is set the stage for a mess in the Legislature. By approving a RtR Law via the ballot, voters would be overriding the existing law, which lawmakers approved after several failed efforts in the face of staunch opposition by the auto industry. The existing law may have flaws, but it would be better to address those flaws through the legislative process than by forcing lawmakers to either entirely scrap the law they crafted — or create a compromise law, or ignore the will of the voters completely and keeping the current version.

A number of initiatives begun during Sheila R. Lyons’ first term on the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners are coming to fruition, and Ms. Lyons is looking for a second term so she can see them through to conclusion.

“We’ve been doing some great things, and we’re in the process of some of these initiatives being realized,” she said. “We’ve put wheels into motion and I would like to see these initiatives through. I do think that there is still a lot to be done.”

Ms. Lyons said that over the past four years, the commissioners have improved transparency by streaming their meetings online and creating a video archive of their meetings; have improved coordination between the Barnstable County Human Services Department, county officials, and individual human service providers across the region; and established the Regional Umbrella Services System (RUSS), which will explore regional applications for the OpenCape broadband network, which is scheduled to be fully active in January.

She added that the county has taken positive steps toward addressing what is shaping up to be the biggest issue in the coming decade: wastewater management.

“We’ve wasted 15 years just kicking this around,” she said, and the threat of a lawsuit by the Conservation Law Foundation and the Buzzards Bay Coalition is emphasizing the county’s need to have a comprehensive wastewater management plan. “Wastewater is indeed the biggest economic and environmental issue on the Cape, and if we don’t deal with it, we’re going to use everything.”

In February, the commissioners charged Andrew Gottlieb and Paul J. Niedzwiecki, respectively the executive directors of the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative and the Cape Cod Commission, with exploring a regional management plan, which is scheduled to be submitted by the end of the year.

She said she hopes to see a plan that “doesn’t penalize anyone who has done the work” at the local level and proposes solutions entailing “the least amount of infrastructure, with a savings to the taxpayer.”

Ms. Lyons stated that, despite claims from critics and one of her opponents, Eric R. Steinhilber, she was not in favor of a “wastewater authority” with taxation powers — one of the changes recommended earlier this year by the Special Commission on County Governance.

“Nobody has ever voted for it or called for a wastewater authority,” among the county commissioners or the assembly, she said, and the report itself called for the creation of a regional “wastewater district” and “fair, broad-based funding mechanisms” to support that entity.

Commission co-chairman Robert A. O’Leary suggested taxation on property owners as a way to generate revenue for the district, and Ms. Lyons interpreted that as his effort to “emphasize the seriousness of this” and a challenge to county officials to “have the political courage” to pursue the option if they determined it was necessary.

However, Ms. Lyons said the commissioners have heard significant opposition to a tax-funded regional authority from town officials across the Cape, and she considers the proposal dead.

If funding is necessary to support whatever approach the county adopts, that is all the more reason for the county to develop a comprehensive plan. She pointed to the OpenCape project as an example of how a strong plan can leverage federal funding, noting that the plan was unveiled in 2006, and between 2008 and 2010 received a total of $37 million in state and federal funding to make it a reality.

“That’s what you get when you have a plan,” she said. “That’s why you plan.”

New County Structure

“We need to have some structural changes within the county,” she said, and one of the changes she wants to pursue is “a strong administrator” with executive powers, another recommendation by the Special Commission on County Governance.

By creating a “county executive” position, Ms. Lyons said Cape Cod would gain someone who could truly champion county government and its mission to provide economic, efficient services to all 15 towns.

Creating such a post would require shifting certain executive powers from the county commissioners to the county executive, she said, and separating out peripheral duties currently handled by the county administrator and assistant administrator. The administrator also acts as the county’s finance director, and the assistant administrator serves as administrator for the Cape Light Compact.

“These are too many jobs for too few people,” she said, “and for anything to get done well, you need someone that’s much more pro-active in interacting with departments, out there looking for those grant opportunities.”

Ms. Lyons was also supportive of a new proposal from the assembly to create a county finance director who would be solely responsible for monitoring the county’s revenue and expenditures, and she proposed forming a joint county commissioners/assembly subcommittee to explore the idea.

Once the county executive issue is addressed, the commissioners could then better determine whether it was necessary to act on another of the special commission’s suggestions: combining the county commissioners and the Barnstable County Assembly of Delegates.

Under the special commission’s plan, the three-member board of county commissioners would be expanded to seven members, five of whom would represent specific districts, two of whom would be at-large members representing the entire region.

While open to the idea, Ms. Lyons said there are “constitutional questions” whether representation by geography rather than population is allowable, referring to criticism from the smaller Lower Cape towns that they do not have a strong voice in county government.

When the assembly was created in 1998, constitutional “one man, one vote” requirements led to the assembly’s weighted vote system, which gives larger towns such as Barnstable and Falmouth more influence on votes that the Lower Cape towns, some of which have less than two percent of the total vote.

She added she understood the concept of having county commissioners represent specific districts, but said that in running a county-wide campaign, “as difficult as it is, I had a much better understanding of Cape Cod because I ran a 15-town campaign. I spent time getting to know not only the elected officials in those towns but the individual voter, and I could start to see where each town has similarities and differences culturally, politically, philosophically.”

“If you’re going to govern over the entire land, you need to know the land you’re governing,” Ms. Lyons said.

New County Services?

Ms. Lyons identified two other brewing major projects for the county, the first of which is the proposed purchase of the Dennis-based Aquacultural Research Corporation (ARC), which has been pitched by its current owners as a possible county service.

The candidate said she first became aware of ARC’s interest in becoming a county service six years ago, while Ms. Lyons was still on the assembly, through local shellfisherman who were concerned at the prospect of losing the state’s only commercial shellfish hatchery, which provide the Cape’s 235 shellfish farms with 90 percent of their seed.

The commissioners have held two executive session meetings to discuss the $4 million proposed purchase so Ms. Lyons could not comment in-depth on the matter, but said the county “would be negligent if we did not look at it.”

However, she added that she would not support the idea if the commissioners’ research suggests the business would be “a money pit…I would like for it to be able to pay for itself.”

“We have to have the right plan, the right business plan,” she said. “It’s not like we’re going to be negligent about it just to go forward.”

Ms. Lyons said she planned to exercise similar caution when exploring the concept of establishing a regional emergency dispatch center. The Barnstable County Regional Emergency Planning Committee’s 911 Dispatch Study Steering Committee is currently working on that proposal, and one option on the table is utilizing existing infrastructure and personnel at the Barnstable County Sheriff’s Department’s regional dispatch center.

While she was open to that possibility, Ms. Lyons said she was hesitant to endorse that model due to past issues with the sheriff’s department and its administration of the region’s Centralized Emergency Medical Dispatch (CMED) system.

The Cape and Islands CMED system coordinates communications between four area hospitals and ambulances operating on the Cape and surrounding communities. It also coordinates MedFlight helicopter landings for the Cape.

Ms. Lyons noted that James M. Cummings, county sheriff, has in the past warned of a possible CMED shutdown if he could not obtain funding to support its $450,000 annual operating costs, and she worried that a similar lack of a funding mechanism for a full-fledged county dispatch service could lead to problems down the road.

Ms. Lyons’ official campaign website is www.sheilalyonscapecod.com.

I’ll be taking next week off for some much-needed time in a deep coma, so see you back here after the election for some final analysis, but for the nonce…

Eric R. Steinhilber has picked up a few endorsements from assorted Barnstable County officials (and, I’m sure not coincidentally, fellow Republicans), including Sheriff James M. Cummings, Special Sheriff (and former state rep) Jeffrey D. Perry, Cape & Islands DA Michael O’Keefe, Clerk of Courts Scott W. Nickerson, and Clerk of Probate Anastasia Welsh Perrino.

In other obvious political endorsements, State Representative David T. Vieira (R – Falmouth) has endorsed fellow Republican Christopher Sheldon of Plymouth for US Representative of the Ninth District.

Finally, Thomas F. Keyes, Republican candidate for State Senator of the Plymouth and Barnstable District, picked up an endorsement from New Jobs for Massachusetts, a “public policy advocate for rapid growth in private sector employment” in the state.

Political news and announcements may be e-mailed to Michael Bailey, senior political reporter, at bailey@capenews.net.

In 2010, Eric R. Steinhilber tried his hand at state politics, running for the open State Senator of the Cape and Islands seat. This year he’s focusing his efforts more locally as he runs for one of two spots on the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners.

“Bottom line is, I just want to serve the community and be involved, do what I can to help and bring about better solutions,” Mr. Steinhilber said. “I just care a lot about the Cape. I’ve got two little kids now, and I want to make sure the Cape’s just as special for them as it was for me growing up.”

He added that he opted against running again for state senate because the incumbent, State Senator Daniel A. Wolf (D – Harwich), “is a millionaire. I got to work for a living, and sometimes you’re going to have a tough time raising more money than what a millionaire can put into a race.”

Mr. Steinhilber said he would be a proactive commissioner who would “see each side of the issue and come to a solution that I feel is grounded in the principle of doing the most good in the most effective manner with the smallest amount of governor.”

“I think that type of leadership is really needed at the county level right now. I think it’s lacking,” he said.

That lack of leadership is most evident in the county’s handling of the wastewater issue, Mr. Steinhilber said, and he has made that the focus of his campaign.

Although the sitting commissioners, including his two opponents Mary L. (Pat) Flynn and Sheila R. Lyons, have voiced their opposition to a proposed “wastewater authority” with taxation powers, Mr. Steinhilber insisted he was “the only candidate in the race that can be counted 100 percent to be opposed to a taxing authority being created and imposed on the people of Cape Cod.”

“I think the proposal is alive and well. I think it’s still being pushed by a number of individuals,” he said, “and I think it is more likely to come to pass if the incumbent county commissioners remain.”

He said evidence of the sitting commissioners’ openness to the concept can be found in their February vote to charge Andrew Gottlieb and Paul J. Niedzwiecki, respectively the executive directors of the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative and the Cape Cod Commission, with exploring the concept, which had been pitched to the commissioners by the Special Commission on County Governance.

“I would have voted not to move the ball even further toward a taxing authority,” Mr. Steinhilber said, adding that by voting on the topic before the special commission had formally filed its final report with the commissioners was proof that “the county commissioners, I felt, couldn’t wait to get their hands on it to vote on it…they were excited to vote for it.”

He said the commissioners, despite their prior opposition, would be likely to accept a new recommendation he expects to emerge from a new task force assembled by the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce — as task force that, like the special commission, is fronted by Robert A. O’Leary.

A task force memo obtained by Mr. Steinhilber noted that the group wants to emphasize “positive messaging during the county commissioners’ election,” and the candidate believed the task force “feels they have a much better chance of getting a taxing authority in place with the two incumbents remaining.”

“I’ve been told by others in county government that this group was formed in direct response to my campaign,” Mr. Steinhilber said, but he declined to name his sources.

Better Communication Needed

Mr. Steinhilber also objected to another proposal by the special commission, to combine the county commissioners and the Barnstable County Assembly of Delegates into a single seven-member board with legislative functions. Executive functions now possessed by the county commissioners would be transferred to an appointed county executive.

“You can’t get better government with less representation,” he said, and he expressed admiration for the assembly’s performance, but acknowledged that the delegates — as well as the county commissioners — are not as visible in the community as they should be.

“It’s a communication problem,” Mr. Steinhilber said, and if elected he planned to hold public office hours to create a stronger connection with individual towns.

The candidate did support, conditionally, a proposal by the assembly to create a finance director to keep better control of county finances. Mr. Steinhilber said such an entity was necessary for enhanced transparency, but he thought such a position could be established using existing county personnel and resources.

“I don’t think we should create a brand new position out of whole cloth,” he said. “You can’t keep adding to county government. You need to come up with solutions inside of county government.”

Opposes New County Dispatch

Mr. Steinhilber also wanted to tackle what he regarded as a financial time bomb, the county government’s growing unfunded pension liability. “No one seems to be talking about it,” he said, quoting figures stating that the county’s liability between 2002 and 2010 jumped from $190 million to $475 million.

A report prepared by the Segal Group showed that the unfunded liability was expected to grow by another $25 million between 2010 and 2012, but actually increased by $47 million.

“That’s all on the backs of Cape taxpayers,” Mr. Steinhilber said, and he vowed to take action on that.

He identified another brewing taxpayer expense in the effort to establish a regional 911 emergency dispatch center that served all of the Cape’s police and fire departments. Mr. Steinhilber strongly endorsed the basic concept, but said there was a better way to make the concept reality than creating an all-new regional dispatch center.

“My main concern is that the county doesn’t get into a position where they build a center from the ground up” rather than take advantage of the existing emergency dispatch center run by the Barnstable County Sheriff’s Department — where, notably, Mr. Steinhilber has worked as a reserve deputy.

“We already have a top-notch center that’s run by the county sheriff,” he said, and he noted the sheriff’s department is in the middle of a hardware upgrade and is exploring options for expanding the facility in order to serve more towns.

Local law enforcement department heads have expressed concern over this approach due to the fact the sheriff’s department, and by extension its dispatch center, are state agencies, and they fear losing any local control over the center.

Other Massachusetts counties have established governance boards to keep control of regional dispatch centers at the local level, Mr. Steinhilber said, and Cape Cod could emulate such models.

Mr. Steinhilber said he wanted to address the regulations that deter new businesses from setting up shop on Cape Cod. In speaking with business owners, he said he heard a great deal of frustration due to the sometimes convoluted and multi-layered process of establishing a new business, which included dealing with multiple town boards and, in some cases, the Cape Cod Commission.

“To a lot of them it feels like a constant maze to navigate…it’s tough to get quick decisions,” he said, and he wanted to constantly review regulations to make local and regional review processes more streamlined and business-friendly.

He doubted that the launch of the OpenCape regional fiber optic broadband network would prove a potential boon to businesses. “I don’t necessarily know if OpenCape going to be a big part of that. I don’t think people are not opening a business because they don’t have access to the Internet,” he said. “Call Comcast to get the Internet.”

Mr. Steinhilber said he was undecided whether to support the county’s possible purchase of the Dennis-based Aquacultural Research Corporation (ARC), which has been pitched by its current owners as a possible county service. While supportive of the local shellfishing industry, Mr. Steinhilber said he was wary of the $4 million suggested purchase price.

He proposed forming a county subcommittee to review the finances of the business and the proposal to determine if it would be a worthy return on the county’s investment.

For more information on the candidate, visit Mr. Steinhilber’s official campaign website at www.ericforcc.com.

The non-party candidate announced this week that there is no truth to the rumor he was suspending his campaign for the Ninth Congressional District race — a rumor, he said, is being spread by one of his two opponents, though he declined to specify whether he meant Congressman William R. Keating (D) or Christopher Sheldon of Plymouth.

***

In politics, context is everything — or, another way to put it: a lack of context is everything.

For example: Republican Thomas F. Keyes recently issued a statement chiding his opponent Senate President Therese M. Murray (D – Plymouth) for “snubbing” Falmouth by declining to participate in the October 24 candidates’ night sponsored by the fine ladies of the League of Women Voters of Falmouth.

Mr. Keyes opined that Sen. Murray is dodging Falmouth voters due to her past support (which she later withdrew) of a proposal to expedite onshore wind turbine siting. The town has had many well-reported problems with two town-owned turbines negatively impacting abutters, and Mr. Keyes believes Sen. Murray does not want to face them.

While he does acknowledge that Sen. Murray is hosting “a conference” in Boston that same day, he does not note that the two-day event at the State House is on the US-EU Memorandum of Understanding on eHealth. The conference is a huge networking opportunity for the Massachusetts health care industry and could have some serious economic development impacts for the state.

Is it a shame she is passing on the debate? Absolutely, especially since the biennial League forum is always an informative and well-run evening, but to accuse her of “snubbing” Falmouth voters so she can host a major conference that has been on her schedule since June is a bit of a cheap shot.

But, to end on a positive note, the League’s candidates’ night an excellent time, politically speaking, and I highly recommend it to voters who would like to learn more about the folks running for office. It will be held at the Morse Pond School in Falmouth beginning at 7 PM.

***

Pizza party! Wooooo!

State Representative Randy Hunt (R – Sandwich) is throwing a pizza party fundraiser on Monday at Two Brothers Pizza in Sandwich. The open event runs from 5 to 7 PM and campaign donations are optional but appreciated.

***

Finally, Eric R. Steinhilber, candidate for the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners, this week picked up an endorsement from Mary LeClair, a 13-year veteran of the board.

“Cape Cod will be best served with Eric Steinhilber as a County Commissioner,” Ms. LeClair said in a press release. “Eric will listen and be a thoughtful, well-rounded leader on the issues facing our community.”

Well, he’ll be well-rounded if he can effectively address issues other than the “MWRA on Cape Cod” spiel he’s been throwing out lately, but we’ll all find that out next week when I’ll have my profile of the candidate.

Political news and announcements may be e-mailed to Michael Bailey, senior political reporter, at bailey@capenews.net.

Is there a conspiracy afoot to push through a Cape Cod Wastewater Authority?

Eric R. Steinhilber, Republican candidate for the Barnstable County Board of County Commissioners, suggests there is, and that the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce is, through a special task force, pushing for a regional wastewater management entity with taxation powers.

He also claimed that as part of this goal, the chamber is trying to push through to re-election two incumbent commissioners who are sympathetic to such an entity.

In a press release issued to the media last week, Mr. Steinhilber claimed county commissioners Mary L. (Pat) Flynn of Falmouth and Sheila R. Lyons of Wellfleet — both of whom are running for re-election this November — voted earlier this year to “move forward with a recommendation to create an MWRA- (Metropolitan Water Resources Authority) type Authority for Cape Cod.”

Mr. Steinhilber called the authority “the preferred plan by those who stand to gain from a big pipe solution with a big government agency solution,” he said. “If allowed to enact their plan, these proponents will re-elect Mary Pat Flynn and Sheila Lyons, who will continue the pursuit of a taxing Authority for Cape Cod after their re-election.”

County officials countered that Mr. Steinhilber is trying to manufacture an issue to prop up his campaign, and that the concept of an MWRA-type agency on Cape Cod is dead.

“It’s apparent to me he doesn’t understand the job he’s applying for or the issue,” Ms. Lyons said, calling his press release “a fiction based on snippets of reality.”

“I can only speculate but it appears the issue has more resonance with him as a perceived opportunity to provide visibility for his campaign than other ones like traffic congestion, economic development, housing, planning, and public safety regional dispatch,” Commissioner William Doherty said, “all more immediate and likely to require attention in the short term.”

The Timeline

Mr. Steinhilber said the main champion of wastewater authority idea is Robert A. O’Leary, a former county commissioner and current chairman of the Wastewater Task Force, a new working group created by the chamber of commerce.

In 2002 Mr. O’Leary, then State Senator of the Cape and Islands District, filed a bill to create a regional wastewater management entity. The bill would have made participation by individual towns optional, and Mr. O’Leary identified a portion of the meals and rooms taxes already charged on the Cape, and/or a tax on short-term accommodation rentals, as potential revenue streams.

By 2004 an assessment on homeowners had been added as a funding option. That possibility emerged from work conducted by the Blue Ribbon Committee on Regional Wastewater, a county-appointed working group that included Mr. Doherty.

Mr. Steinhilber quoted a passage in a blue ribbon committee memo regarding how the concept should be sold to residents, stating the outreach campaign should be “run like a political campaign” that identified those in the media friendly to the concept and “neutralized” any hostile media outlets.

That same memo stressed the need to present to the public “a strong defensible financial model to provide adequate funding” and emphasize the proposed entity’s independence “that allows for accountable action, but it is here that we must be careful not to suggest or imply that it can or will become an MWRA, quasi-independent from direct accountability for the management and control of their costs to the voters that established them.”

Amidst considerable public pushback, the committee abandoned the authority model and instead filed a proposal that led to the creation of the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative.

Mr. Steinhilber said wastewater authorities then decided to bide their time and wait “for an opportunity to bring their failed proposal back again, and in the meantime, [allow] the wastewater problem to get worse.”

In an interview with the Enterprise, he accused “many of the primary public faces here” of being “more interested in creating a taxing authority than in solving the problems. If they were not, they would not have sat on the sidelines for years doing little to solve the wastewater problem.”

Mr. Steinhilber cited a report from the Conservation Law Foundation (CLF) indicating there was “effectively no improvement” in water quality between 2009 and 2010, and said prior to that the county made “minimal efforts to address many of these issues…my conclusion is that they were more interested in the Authority than in solving the water issue.”

He claimed the new impetus to revive the wastewater authority concept was the threat of a lawsuit by the CLF and the Coalition for Buzzards Bay. In late 2010 the two organizations filed a “letter of intent,” the first step toward filing a lawsuit, claiming the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Cape Cod failed to meet their obligations under the federal Clean Water Act to control nitrogen loading in coastal embayments.

The county commissioners and the Cape Cod Commission were also named in that letter.

In 2011 the county commissioners formed the Special Commission on County Governance, a body charged with examining the structure of county government. Mr. O’Leary was a co-chairman on that commission.

One of the commissions’ recommendations was the creation of a taxpayer-funded regional wastewater authority — although the commission later chose to avoid the word “authority” specifically to avoid any comparisons to the MWRA and instead refer to it as a wastewater “district.”

Conspiracy Or Political Ploy?

The special commission finalized its report in February and submitted it to the county commissioners in March. The commissioners formally accepted the report that same month. A review of the video from the March meeting showed that none of the commissioners explicitly endorsed any of the commission’s recommendations — including the wastewater authority proposal.

Mr. Steinhilber’s said the commissioners voted in February to “move forward with a recommendation to create an MWRA-type Authority for Cape Cod.”

“The impetus of the entire vote is advancing a special commission recommendation” to create an MWRA-style body, even though materials in his own press kit indicate the commissioners in fact did not vote to support the proposal.

What the commissioners did was charge Paul J. Niedzwiecki, executive director of the Cape Cod Commission, and Andrew Gottlieb, executive director of the Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative, with exploring the ramifications of creating a regional wastewater management plan.

“Having a regional plan is very important, and I think all of us, the three [county commissioners] recognize that we must move forward on that,” Ms. Flynn said at that meeting, adding, “to make a decision to move forward, without any public discussion or without any public input on voting to recommend a regional plan that includes a taxing authority, at this time, would not be very wise and I don’t think would show good leadership on our part.”

Mr. Gottlieb met with the commissioners again in July after meeting with town officials across the Cape, and his opinion was that that option was not desirable.

The commissioners concurred that a regional approach of some kind was desirable, but an authority was not. “It would be ridiculous to have an MWRA here,” Ms. Lyons said. “I do think there was a misunderstanding. People latched onto [the word ‘authority’] and never let it go and never allowed themselves to have a clear understanding of it.”

Ms. Flynn reiterated that position on September 5 during a meeting with Sandwich town officials, telling them the county wanted to be responsive to town needs and supportive of current town-level projects. She said the county’s contribution to the efforts is “certainly not a taxing authority, and certainly not taking over the planning and implementation of wastewater planning on Cape Cod. That’s not our intent and it’s not our job.”

Mr. Steinhilber himself joined the chorus and declared the wastewater authority dead — and in fact claimed direct credit for defeating it. On August 9 he issued a press release with the header: “Steinhilber: 1, MWRA on Cape Cod: 0 — The MWRA solution is ‘off the table.’ Steinhilber declares victory.”

“After months of consideration, it took until July 18th for the Commissioners to officially kill it,” Mr. Steinhilber said in the release, referring to the commissioners’ meeting that day. “The County Commissioners have heard the calls and have abandoned any plans to support an MWRA-type taxing authority.”

However, in the weeks leading up to the September primary election, Mr. Steinhilber revived the issue on his campaign signs, which stated “Eric Says No MWRA For Cape Cod.” He now claims the proposal is alive and well and being publicly championed by the chamber of commerce.

Enter The Chamber

“The chamber of commerce picked it up, quietly and behind the scenes,” Mr. Steinhilber said. “It became abundantly clear that the intent of these folks was to go underground during the county commissioners race, since it had become too charged politically.”

Mt. Steinhilber said his declaration of victory was premature as the chamber acted after he issued the statement. “I would have phrased it differently, but the message is still the same,” he said, “the sitting commissioners and Andy Gottlieb are on record opposing it, which means that proposal is dead for now. There is clearly a comeback being mounted, if you believe that these important and influential people continue to pursue it.”

“Wondering why the Cape Cod Chamber is doing this?” Mr. Steinhilber said in his press release. “Remember that the other party to the lawsuit on this issue is the Buzzards Bay Coalition and their President is on the Cape Cod Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors.”

Mark Rasmussen, president and CEO of the Coalition for Buzzards Bay since 1998, is not on the chamber of commerce’s board of directors according to the chamber’s official roster. Mr. Steinhilber later said he should have been listed as a member of the task force, not the chamber’s board.

However, Mr. Steinhilber noted that the Coalition for Buzzards Bay’s co-plaintiff in the lawsuit, the Conservation Law Foundation, opposes “big pipe” (region-wide sewering) solutions because “large sewer systems make new construction viable in environmentally sensitive areas.”

“Water and wastewater issues are among the largest restrictors of construction right now,” he continued, explaining that without those restrictions, land that could not at present be developed could become buildable, benefiting owners of such property, real estate developers, and building material suppliers.

Mr. Steinhilber maintained that the chamber task force “is already pre-disposed to the big pipe solution and most (members) are on record supporting the Taxing Authority, too. They will shock no one when they, like the Special Commission, conclude that an MWRA-type taxing Authority is the best answer,” that based on the fact Mr. O’Leary was appointed to lead the task force.

Mr. O’Leary, who was traveling in China, did not offer any comment on Mr. Steinhilber’s claims except, “I don’t hold public office, so why is the candidate running against me?”

A task force memo dated July 13 — provided to the Enterprise by Mr. Steinhilber — discussing its “communications campaign” for “how to proceed with supportive action toward solving our waste water [sic] issues” does not explicitly advocate for the creation of a wastewater authority, a regional management plan, or big-pipe solutions.

“The overarching goal is to present a message that is supportive of a process for developing localized solutions, tailored to specific communities and watersheds, which will minimize financial impact on our residents and business owners,” the memo read. “The coalition would not be specifically supporting big pipe vs. small pipe vs. alternative solutions, but a PROCESS of solution development.”

Another memo cites the need for “positive messaging during the county commissioners’ election,” which Mr. Steinhilber interpreted as evidence that authority proponents are working against his campaign.

“There can be no other conclusion than they believe Eric Steinhilber will oppose them and Flynn and Lyons will support them,” Mr. Steinhilber said in his press kit.

“If you believe that the proponents of a taxing authority continue to want that outcome,” he said, “and they are continuing to work towards that outcome…you must conclude that they believe the current board to be more favorable to reach that goal than a board with me on it.”

Wendy K. Northcross, CEO of the chamber, refuted that claim and said the task force documents “state the obvious — that is, the desire of many to keep the facts straight — especially in light of a political campaign that is using our wastewater infrastructure needs as a plank in its platform.”

“The [chamber] is keenly interested in finding a solution that is effective both in its science and its cost,” she said, and that the county commissioners’ race “is only important in that the dialogue on wastewater (as a campaign plank) be as truthful as possible and not laden with scare tactics and misinformation about the Cape’s need to address wastewater planning and infrastructure.”

“The Chamber’s interest is in communicating to the businesses and residents of Cape Cod the need for action on wastewater,” Ms. Northcross said, “and the desire for the planning process to be driven by local information, transparently transmitted, and fiscally responsible.”

“If it wasn’t so sad, in a way it would be funny,” Ms. Lyons said. “It shows me he has nothing else to offer. It’s disappointing. I’ve spoken to Eric and he’s a nice guy, but I expected something better of him.”

“The truth is that I am anchoring my campaign on the issue most call the single most important issue facing Cape Cod,” Mr. Steinhilber said. “The suggestion that anyone would think the others are anything but secondary is silly.”

“Focusing on sedate issues sounds the way incumbents talk,” he concluded. “The truth is, too many people have punted on important issues like this. I assure you, this issue has cost me fundraising, party support, establishment support and garnered me more grief than just the mocking tones of media, but it is the right thing to do by the people of Cape Cod. They have a right to know what is going on, especially when it will have such a negative impact on their wallets.”

Last week Eric R. Steinhilber, Republican candidate for Barnstable County Commissioner, issued a press release boasting this bold headline: Steinhilber: 1, MWRA on Cape Cod: 0 — The MWRA solution is ‘off the table.’ Steinhilber declares victory.”

What he’s referring to is the recent proclamation by county officials that a Cape-wide wastewater management agency with possible taxation authority, akin to the Metropolitan Water Resources Authority, was not under consideration as part of the county’s wastewater management game plan.

In the press release, Mr. Steinhilber claims that he first “took action” in February when the commissioners formed a working group to examine the wastewater authority proposal. He does not specify this action, which predated his official declaration of candidacy by about a month.

“After months of hard work and advocacy,” he said in the release, “the County Commissioners have heard the calls and have abandoned any plans to support an MWRA-type taxing authority.”

Uhh…what?

I contacted some of the county officials who reviewed this proposal — Commissioners Sheila R. Lyons and William Doherty, and Cape Cod Water Protection Collaborative director Andy Gottlieb — and they portrayed the public push-back against the “MWRA on Cape Cod” concept as limited to a small handful of “usual suspects” rather than a large, broad-based outcry. If anything, they said, most of the opposition they heard came from town selectmen worried more about loss of local control than the taxation issue.

(In the interest of putting the preemptive kibosh on accusations I led the witnesses, so to speak, I asked them about this without ever mentioning Mr. Steinhilber by name; they were simply asked how much negative public feedback they received.)

While Mr. Steinhilber did make the wastewater authority proposal a key issue of his campaign, and his website features a prominent “No MWRA for Cape Cod” section, trying to portray himself as the man who slew this particular dragon is disingenuous. It’s a lame effort to turn the lemon of losing a key platform issue into political lemonade.

Perhaps he did indeed speak with voters about it in his travels, but there is nothing to support the claim that he somehow sparked a significant grassroots anti-wastewater authority movement.

***

James M. Cummings, Barnstable County sheriff, this week endorsed Adam G. Chaprales for US Representative of the Ninth Congressional District. The sheriff issued his endorsement during a brief press event Tuesday, calling Mr. Chaprales “the best candidate to serve as our next Congressman.”

Mr. Chaprales is facing fellow Republican Christopher Sheldon of Plymouth in the primary.

***

US Senator Scott P. Brown (R) will be back in Falmouth tomorrow, August 18 for a fundraiser house party. If you’d like to get in on this event, shoot an e-mail to organizer Larry McDonald at lgm@lawrencegmcdonald.com for details and to RSVP.

Political news and announcements may be e-mailed to Michael Bailey, senior political reporter, at bailey@capenews.net.

Not surprisingly, voters are looking at a possible repeat of the 2010 election, when brothers Oliver P. and Charles O. Cipollini, of Marstons Mills and Fall River respectively, ran against each other – by which I mean, they were both candidates and they campaigned, but Charles kept telling voters to support Oliver.

Charles won the election and, like last year, has no primary opponent. Oliver, however, will face off in September against fellow Democrats Walter Moniz of New Bedford and Nicholas D. Bernier of Swansea.

My theory, Cynical Version, is that the general election will come down to Charles and Mr. Bernier, because voters don’t know squat about any of the candidates and will simply vote for whoever appears at the top of the ballot, and “Bernier” comes before “Cipollini.”

My other theory, the Non-Cynical Version, is that Charles will probably square off against Mr. Moniz, who ran in 2010 and got his 2012 campaign ramped up nice and early.

Either way, both those scenarios would better serve the voters than another non-campaign featuring the Not Even Remotely Fighting Cipollini Brothers.

***

The campaign events calendar is looking pretty thin all around, except for Sandwich Republican Thomas F. Keyes, who has a slew of events scheduled for this month and next.

Among the upcoming local events for the state senate candidate: house parties at the homes of Beverly Comeau in Sandwich (May 18), Frank and Andi Keohane in Falmouth (May 30), Ted and Sylvia Wahl in Sandwich (June 3); a reception with Mary Z. Connaughton, former Republican candidate for state auditor, at the Nimrod in Falmouth (June 18); a garage sale (seriously, that’s what it says) at the Sagamore home of Alice Zinkevich (June 23); and a meet-and-greet at Ms. Zinkevich’s home (June 26).

Keep up with Mr. Keyes’ campaign events at www.votekeyes.com/events.

***

Sheila R. Lyons, incumbent Barnstable County Commissioner, is preparing to launch her new campaign website. There’s just a placeholder page there now, but I’ll let you know when the full site is up and running.

One of her opponents, Eric R. Steinhilber, has also launched his campaign website, which already has some content on it.

The third candidate, incumbent Mary L. (Pat) Flynn, does not have a county commissioner-specific website up yet.

Political news and announcements may be e-mailed to Michael Bailey, senior political reporter, at bailey@capenews.net.

Tuesday marked the deadline for candidates for district and county offices (not including the Barnstable County Assembly of Delegates, more on that below) to file their nomination papers with their local registrars of voters, and the final tally is pretty sad: only five of the Cape’s 12 incumbents seeking re-election — two State Senators, six State Representatives, two Barnstable County Commissioners, and two county officers — have challengers in the coming election.

Senate President Therese M. Murray (D – Plymouth) is poised to first face a new (and so far invisible) primary challenger, Democrat Stephen M. Palmer of Plymouth, and the winner of that contest will face Sandwich Republican Thomas F. Keyes. State Representative Demetrius J. Atsalis (D – Barnstable) will take on Centerville Democrat Brian R. Mannal, and whoever prevails will go on to the November general election unopposed.

The other contested local races are State Representative Randy Hunt (R – Sandwich) and Sandwich Democrat R. Patrick Ellis for the Fifth Barnstable District; and Commissioners Mary L. (Pat) Flynn of Falmouth and Sheila R. Lyons of Wellfleet against Eric R. Steinhilber of Barnstable (see below for the latest wrinkle in this race).

There’s a chance this number could dwindle further if, during the nomination paper certification process, any candidate should become disqualified for failing to collect enough valid signatures, but this happens infrequently.

I’m truly surprised by the slim pickings considering this is a presidential election cycle, which is generally more active than mid-term elections, but I also feel sorry for voters. Solid contests are good all around: they make the incumbents work for their jobs, open up opportunities for new blood and new ideas and government, and lead to more educated voters. A greater number of contested races would have been beneficial all around.

***

On the plus side, the race for US Representative of the Ninth Congressional District is looking ever more robust. Republican Adam Chaprales of Sandwich is throwing his hat in the ring, setting the stage for a GOP primary race; Christopher Sheldon of Plymouth is already running.

Mr. Chaprales is a former one-term Sandwich selectmen whose main claim to fame is that at age 21, he was the town’s youngest-ever selectman. Now 28, he works for New York Life Insurance Co. He launched his campaign this past weekend. His official campaign website is www.adamforcongress.com.

(One bit of web design advice for the candidate: that floating “sign up for updates” bar is wicked annoying. Lose it.)

Incumbent Rep. William R. Keating (D), Democrat C. Samuel Sutter, the Bristol County District Attorney, and non-party candidates Daniel Botelho of Fall River and Peter A. White of Mashpee are also running.

The deadline for Congressional candidates with party affiliations to file their paperwork is this coming Tuesday. Non-party candidates have until mid-summer.

***

Nomination papers for the Barnstable County Assembly of Delegates were distributed this week to town clerks and Janice O’Connell, clerk of the assembly, and we already have two confirmed candidates for the county’s legislative body.

One of them is Falmouth’s Andrew V. Putnam, and the other is Ronald R. Beaty Jr. – the same Ron Beaty who was running for county commissioner…and I say “was” because none of the town clerks I spoke received his nomination papers by the Tuesday deadline.

This effectively ends Mr. Beaty’s plan to run dual races for county commissioner and the assembly. Earlier this year Mr. Beaty sought an opinion from the office of the Massachusetts Secretary of the Commonwealth – Elections Division and was informed that he could legally could hold both seats, as long as he exercised due diligence to avoid voting on issues as a member of one board that directly impacted the other (e.g., he could not as a county commissioner vote to raise the stipend delegates receive).

Now, however, it looks like he’ll be running only for the assembly. “After carefully reevaluating the political ramifications of my non-party candidacy for Barnstable County Commissioner, I have finally decided to formally withdraw myself as an Independent Candidate,” he wrote in an e-mail, “and to throw my complete support to Eric Steinhilber and his candidacy.”

He is dedicating himself to his assembly run, and said his “various positions on the respective issues currently related to county government will now be vigorously pursued via that potent avenue!”

Political news and announcements may be e-mailed to Michael Bailey, senior political reporter, at bailey@capenews.net.