(Hour 3a,b&c)
Mayor Gatsas
This morning Mayor Ted Gatsas came in. Rich didn’t waste any time and started the segment off with queries surrounding Commissioner Virginia Barry and
her meeting with the school board on May 4th. Tom Raffio, the State Board of Education chairman, was the one who first told the Mayor that Barry was inquiring about having a meeting. The big question on Rich’s mind was whether or not the Mayor will allow a public comment portion in the meeting, as is the case with the average meeting. You’ll have to listen in to find out the answer.
Rich and Mayor Gatsas talk about Senate Bill 113. The Mayor says that he has not gone through the legislation line by line, but his concern with it is concerning entities such as the Verizon Wireless Arena. If there are no restrictions what could hold the casino from having a 10,000 seat stadium, which would be taking customers away from the Verizon arena. Rich kept at the topic and wondered if the casino would rob smaller downtown restaurants, of their paying customers. “I don’t think that you’ll find people going from Manchester and staying in Salem. It’s a twenty minute drive.” They also discuss having the state police involved in the casino. “What is the rational for having the state police?” Rich asks. Listen in for the Mayor’s answer.
In our final segment Rich started with the Uber Stupor. The Mayor tells us that the issue with Uber is “all about public safety.” We have heard from former taxi drivers who are now Uber drivers. They detail some of the difficulties with being a taxi driver as poor customer service and city regulations, as well as some other things. Rich goes after the Mayor about the safety issue. Is it fair to say that Uber has public safety issues when a good number of taxi drivers have spotty records? You’ll have to listen for more details. Click here for our interview with Jon DiPietro about Uber.
Rich and the Mayor also touch on the heroin epidemic. “We need to get control of this. We are not going to arrest our way out of it” says the Mayor. They discuss drug courts as well. Does it make financial sense to just keep throwing drug addicts in prison? Click here to hear more about the drug problem from Tim Soucy’s segment
(Part 1: Rich and the Mayor on Commissioner Barry)
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(Part 2: Rich and the Mayor on casinos)
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(Part 3: Rich and the Mayor on Uber and the heroin epidemic)
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