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Doubts dog Romney’s diversity council
BY ADAM REILLY
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When the Governor’s Diversity and Equal Opportunity Advisory Council meets for the first time later this month, its members will face a daunting task. Thanks to an executive order signed by Governor Mitt Romney on June 17 — always-sleepy Bunker Hill Day — the state’s Office of Affirmative Action (OAA) is no more. Romney insists that the Office of Diversity and Equal Opportunity (ODEO), the successor agency created by his executive order, will pursue the OAA’s goals more effectively than the OAA did. But critics like Boston city councilor Chuck Turner complain that Romney — who also scrapped seven previous executive orders regulating affirmative action at the state level on June 17 — has created a new system devoid of meaningful enforcement mechanisms. So all that members of the advisory council will have to do is help convince the public that criticisms like Turner’s are misplaced. In the meantime, even though the council’s complete membership hasn’t been made public yet, one of Romney’s appointees has raised questions about his selection. State Representative Benjamin Swan, a Springfield Democrat and member of the Massachusetts Black Caucus, has been tapped to represent the House on the council. But Swan says he misunderstood the nature of the ODEO when he originally agreed to participate. "To be perfectly honest with you, when I was asked about this new advisory group, it was not my understanding at that time that the Office of Affirmative Action would be demolished," Swan said Tuesday. "When I was asked to serve on [the advisory council], the Office of Affirmative Action still existed, and I thought it would continue to exist." The Massachusetts Black Caucus was scheduled to meet to formulate a position on the ODEO after the Phoenix went to press. Swan — who says he and the Caucus at large oppose the OAA’s elimination — remains open to serving on the new advisory council, but he’s not making any promises. "I think it’s important to still be involved in the process, attempting to gain equity and participation in government," he says. "If I’m convinced I can do it through this process, I will go forward with it." State Senator Dianne Wilkerson, a Democrat from Boston, confirmed that she has been asked to serve on the council as representative of the Senate. Not that she’s all that happy about it. The senator has already publicly slammed Romney’s elimination of the OAA last week, and tells the Phoenix that she is participating in the advisory council despite deep frustration with the governor’s decision. "I stand by this position, that there was no public input or even legislative input into the nature of the review this administration did of those seven executive orders that led them to decide they had to be repealed," Wilkerson says. "That’s just a fact.... Frustrated is not even the word. It’s what I’m expecting — it’s just the way this administration’s been operating." Wilkerson adds: "When I got a call from the governor’s office asking if I would consider serving, I had to think about it for a day. The way it came down was, I had two choices: I could wait and see what the [advisory council] did, and sit outside second-guessing and criticizing. Or I had the opportunity to be in there at the table and be a vocal, forceful participant." When the ODEO advisory council does finally meet this month, its deliberations could determine whether certain provisions jettisoned on June 17 are re-implemented. Down the road, for example, the advisory council could play a major role in determining new state hiring practices. According to Ruth Bramson, the state’s chief human-resources officer (and, as of June 17, its new chief diversity officer), an official announcement of the advisory council’s full membership should come this week or next.
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