Who is Jerry Sorlucco?

[Redneck Socialist]

Does anyone know anything about him and does he have any hope of beating Gallus?

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[maxanne]

1. I know about him!

Jerry lives in Littleton, he's a retired airline pilot. He's smart, and knowledgeable about the issues. I'm in his district, here in Jackson. I also know him personally, since we were both candidates in 2002, so our paths crossed a lot that year. He's on the BOD of the non-profit I work for.

Unfortunately, Gallus is extremely well known (he has a real estate biz) and liked. He's a very nice, pleasant man - it's hard to hate him. He votes the right way some of the time. He voted against SB110, which is a big issue up here in the North. He voted against SB427, the gay marriage legislation. He voted for SB458, but people in towns other than Tamworth don't see the seriousness of that piece of legislation. It takes local control away from towns, but people don't get it.

Jerry lost against him in 2002, and probably won't beat him this time, either.

[maxanne]

2. Oh boy

Redneck Socialist - do you know anything about the proposed racetrack that is supposed to be built on Mt. Whittier in Tamworth? A shady group called Club Motorsports International (CMI) is allegedly building it. CMI is fronted by Stephan Condodematrakey of Derry - his father was a politician at one point. I won't bore you with the dirty dealings that have gone on/and continue to, in Tamworth, thanks to CMI, but it's a nasty business.

Tamworth has no zoning laws, zoning being akin to godless communism there - which is why CMI chose the town in the first place. The town voted down an emergency zoning measure, thanks to CMI buying the selectmen and many townspeople, and funding the hundreds of antizoning signs that sprung up all over town.

CMI and the town worked together on developing a racetrack ordinance that presumably everyone could live with, which gave the town some control over noise, hours of operation, etc. In fact, a noise study was done, and paid for by the Tamworth Foundation - CMI initially offered to pay half, but reneged when they didn't like the results.

In any case, somewhere along the way, CMI decided the town's ordinance was going to be too restrictive, so instead of saying so, they had some legislators propose a piece of legislation (SB458) that changed the rules for "private driving schools" which suddenly CMI became. This legislation was whizzed through with great haste - and no one attended the hearings, because no one was tracking legislation for private driving schools. State Senator Joe Kenney didn't feel the need to discuss the hearings with anyone in his district - even though he knew how contentious this whole project is. The bill never went on the floor, it was slapped on the consent calendar, and signed by Governor Hummer before the Tamworth Town Meeting. At the town meeting, the racetrack ordinance was overwhelmingly voted in, by the town residents - who had no idea that special interest legislation had been recently passed allowing CMI to bypass the voters of Tamworth.

In any case, John Gallus was one of the sponsors of the bill. He actually met with me, and a couple of Tamworth residents to discuss the issue, after the fact. It seemed he'd been duped. That's how we all felt, anyhow. Remember - I mentioned he is very friendly and charming.

Doing some campaign finance research today, I find a contribution to Gallus from Stephan Condodematrakey.

I'm going to do my best to broadcast that in the north country. We take our local control pretty seriously - and everyone hates a legislator so obviously being rewarded for doing a nasty piece of business.

[Redneck Socialist]

3. Yeah, I've sort of casually been following that.

I have some friends up in Sandwich that are keeping tabs on that and have been keeping me informed.

It's a bad deal from all accounts. I understand that a lot of the locals are up in arms about it and rightfully so.

I would hope that a couple of the local pols would jump on this and make it their signature issue but my fear is that this a case of the good ol' boy network strikes again. I'm curious to see how it plays out but I don't have a lot of faith that it is going to be stopped.

[maxanne]

4. at least 2 of the local pols

are going to work to repeal it - State Reps David Babson (who has been great) and Harry Merrow. A write in candidate appeared at the primary to run against Sen. Joe Kenney, and gave him a good run for it. Willie Farnum entered the race in September, with little name recognition. He got about 42% of the vote. That should be a wake up call for Kenney, who is now backpedaling on SB458. He's taken a ton of crap about it, and deservedly so.

In 2006, we'll have a candidate who will take Kenney out.
He has his beady eye on higher office, and needs to be stopped.