Faretra Thrown off City Council, Methuen Teachers Hypocrisy, an Illegal Campaign Rally and MORE
METHUEN THROWS JOEL FARETRA OFF THE CITY COUNCIL
Last month we got word that Methuen City Councilor Joel Faretra had moved to Manchester, NH. So, I did some digging and found mountains of evidence that this was true. I posted on Facebook a breaking headline that Faretra had moved and had not notified his constituents nor done the honorable thing by resigning.
Almost immediately upon posting that headline, friends of Joel (I assume at his urging since none of them were Facebook friends) came to my page denying that he had moved and attacked my credibility as a journalist. This is the typical tactic used by corrupt officials and their supporters any time I expose wrongdoing in the community as if they are so clever this has never been tried before.
And, of course it never works because I don’t report on things unless I have the goods.
So, these tired old tactics gave me the opportunity to post his mortgage agreement stating that his Manchester, NH home was his primary residence.
Instead of just going away, of course, his friends doubled down and continued to deny it, not only on my Facebook page and The Valley Patriot Facebook Page but on Methuen group pages, pretending that the “out of control loose cannon” Tom Duggan was making it up out of thin air.
This forced me to post a letter signed by Joel’s mother-in-law stating she was now living in his Methuen house and that he no longer lived there.
And still, Joel and his buddies continued to deny he had moved out of state while trying to remain on the Methuen City Council even though we had his IP address that he was submitting city council agenda items from with his Manchester N.H. home address attached to them.
A day later, the city council unanimously voted to remove Faretra from the city council … that is, with the exception of Nick DiZoglio who defended Faretra with silly excuses like “maybe it was a vacation home” and “maybe it was investment property. Of course, in typical Nick DiZoglio fashion, when he realized the vote wasn’t going to go his way and the council was going to vote Faretra off the council, he didn’t stay and vote for his friend, he betrayed him too and walked away from the table before the vote so he wouldn’t be in the minority voting for a scofflaw at election time.
What made this a news item of note was that it was Joel Faretra who pounded his fist and lectured the rest of us about the Methuen City Charter for six years, humiliating city workers and fellow councilors about how important the rules were for everyone to follow, and yet here he was violating the charter himself and lying about it to boot.
I understand the instinct of Faretra’s friends to defend him while he was being publicly judged. It happens. People move. Their lives change. Our families are sometimes beyond our control. It’s not what Faretra did that was so terrible, it’s the dishonesty, and the personal attacks against those who were actually telling the truth that was so disgraceful.
Not that this was Watergate, but the one thing we learned from Watergate is that it’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up and I hope this is a lesson to other Methuen officials who put themselves up on their high moral horse while publicly judging others that someday it may be them so act accordingly.
METHUEN TEACHERS UNION DOESN’T WALK THE WALK ON DIVERSITY – WOW LOOK AT ALL THOSE WHITE WOMEN OF PRIVILEGE
Here is something interesting to ponder while the Methuen teacher’s union is shoving diversity, equity, and inclusion down everyone’s throats these days, both in the classroom and in the community.
Looking at the 852 staff members in the Methuen public schools you would expect people who so openly preach the DEI propaganda to be walking the walk while talking the talk.
But you’d be wrong.
The number of Methuen residents who are Asian are 4.5% of the population.
Yet according to the school administration’s own numbers, there are zero Asian teachers and employees in the Methuen Schools.
The number of Black Methuen residents is 4.1%.
Of the 852 teachers in Methuen only 4 of them are Black!
– that’s 0.46%.
That doesn’t seem very inclusive!
But wait, it gets worse, a lot worse!
The number of Methuen residents who are Latino is 39%.
Yet only 46 of the 852 Methuen teachers are Latino.
That’s 5.39%.
I don’t see much “equity” in that!
The number of Methuen residents who are declared as mixed-race is 5%. But out of the 852 teachers only ONE is mixed race – that’s 0.1%.
But now, the kicker!
The number of Methuen residents who are White is 59.3%.
Yet, of the 852 Methuen teachers, 801 of them are “privileged White people! Can you IMAGINE?
That’s 94.04%.
That’s not very inclusive!
(Schools race percentages came from the Mass Department of Education. Community statistical breakdown by race came from the Massachusetts census.)
It seems to me that if the Methuen teachers really cared about “diversity, equity and inclusion” these mostly White women of privilege would give up their jobs to Blacks, Asians, and Latinos.
“But Tom!” one Methuen educator stated on my Facebook page when I revealed the actual numbers.
“We just don’t get minority applicants for these jobs; what are we to do?”
I hear these same excuses in nearly every school system that preaches DEI but is dominated by White liberal women of privilege as if their hands are tied.
But their hands are NOT tied.
When they advertise these positions they always advertise in white liberal newspapers of privilege like the Boston Globe and the Eagle Tribune, so of course they aren’t going to be attracting minority candidates to teach.
And that’s the point!
These so called educators want to talk a good game while they indoctrinate your children about hatred of White people and instill fear and loathing of the White race, but they aren’t reaching out to the Latino community or communities of color themselves when it comes to employing those very colorful communities.
They aren’t advertising Methuen Public School jobs in Spanish language media like Rumbo, or La Mega, or Power800 or any of the other hundreds of Spanish language media outlets.
So please, Methuen teachers, spare us the DEI platitudes and racial pandering while you stack your ranks with liberal White women of privilege because those of us who have long opposed DEI are on to you and now so is the rest of the community.
DEI is nothing more than racism disguised as anti-racism by people who have white liberal guilt for all their White liberal privilege who want DEI to apply to everyone but themselves so they can pretend that they are go “good” white people.
METHUEN TEACHERS WANT A RESIDENCY REQUIREMENT?
Speaking of the Methuen Teachers Union, the never disappoint when it cones to providing humor and entertainment in the community and it’s really something to watch.
The Laurie Keagan/Dan Shibilia Perv Brigade and their little minions who speak for them at public participation and defend them on Facebook spent an awful lot of time during this election season attacking yours truly because, of course, “Tom Duggan doesn’t live in Methuen he lives in North Andover, so who is he to have a say in our School Committee elections”?
Talk a bout arrogance and a stunning lack of self awareness!
Just think, Tom Duggan should have no say over who runs the Methuen Schools because he doesn’t live in Methuen yet the Methuen Teachers Union interviewed and endorsed candidates for school committee and I bet you will never guess where the vast majority of their members live? Or I should ask where they DON’T live! That’s right! The vast majority (more than 70% by my count) of the Methuen teachers don’t live in Methuen.
Which begs another question: why are the people who are supposed to be governed by the school committee involving themselves in who sits on the school committee? Isn’t that a conflict of interest? Is it to line their pockets and make sure they get all that sexually explicitly material pumped into the classrooms like Dan Shibilia, Laurie Keagan and Mary Beth Donovan Grassi have been doing on their behalf for the last two years?
This also begs another question, if the teacher REALLY think that only people who live in Methuen should have a say over who educates the kids of Methuen maybe what they are really saying is that Methuen needs a residency requirement. And I think that might be a good idea! Maybe the Methuen School Committee should start drafting a policy to purge teh school system of people who don’t live in Methuen and give those jobs to Methuen residents who represent the demographic makeup of the community. You know… if we really believe in DEI and only letting Methuen residents influence what goes on tin the schools.
METHUEN SUPERINTENDENT KWONG CAMPAIGNS IN
CENTRAL OFFICE
Why was the Methuen Superintendent of Schools Brandi Kwong having a “retirement party” that turned into a campaign rally in central office for school committee candidate Martha Sirois (who is her executive assistant)? And why did the Superintendent lead everyone to chant “VOTE FOR MARTHA! VOTE FOR MARTHA!” on school time, on school property, while everyone was on the clock and outsiders who are not school employees were invited to attend?
The Valley Patriot has verified this and the fact that food was served and that Kwong paid for that food out of pocket.
The Valley Patriot has filed a complaint with the MA Ethics Commission, the Attorney General’s Office, and the Office of Campaign and Political Finance Division of the Secretary of State’s Office.
As a side note: Kwong has banned all celebrations in the schools and all food being brought into the schools (like pizza parties and cupcakes) for any reason since COVID. I guess the policies apply to everyone in the schools but… Brandi Kwong. Just imagine the arrogance of using public school property to campaign for her assistant and lead public school employees under her authority on a campaign rant while serving food even though she has banned celebrations and food in all the schools.
The Valley Patriot has also filed a public records request for the surveillance video footage of outside the superintendent’s office directly before and directly after the illegal campaign rally in the central offices of the Methuen School System. To date, the city of Methuen and in particular Mayor DJ Beauregard who sits as the School Committee Chairman is in violation of Massachusetts General Law, Chapter 66, Subsection 10 so an additional complaint has been filed and I will surely keep you up to date when they eventually reveal that they destroyed the evidence and what excuse they use when they reveal that.
DAN SHIBILIA’S FAKE FACEBOOK ACCOUNTS
What a coward!
One of the more troubling revelations on social media during this election season is the fact that Methuen School Committeeman Dan Shibilia (who was also a candidate for West End City Council and came in last) created several fake Facebook accounts, one of which was under the name of “Chuck Kirk” which he used to anonymously attack Methuen City Councilors Neilly Soto, Nick DiZoglio, Councilor Ron Marsan, Mayor D.J. Beauregard, School Committee members Kristen Maxwell, fellow School Committee members Ryan DiZoglio and Ken Willette, State Rep. Ryan Hamilton, Senator Pavel Payano, his opponent in the West End Patricia Valle, and of course yours truly.
We caught Shibilia in the act as he forgot he had swapped over to his regular account from the same IP address and started “liking” posts by his fake account on the Methuen Politics Facebook Page, which of course, he is the sole administrator.
As soon as I called him out on it, Shibilia quckly named someone else as administrator of the page for deniability, but we had already caught him in the act with screen captures.
As a side note: While Shibilia was denying all sorts of accusations on social media that week about his other childish antics, never once did he deny being “Chuck Kirk” a not-so-subtle attack on conservatives mourning the loss of national icon Charlie Kirk. He also never denied the other fake accounts we caught him using.
Days later Shibilia attacked Patricia Valley on social media under his own name (finally) claiming he was a better candidate because he was a white male.
Man, I cannot wait until that guy is no longer an elected official in Methuen, which will be shortly after New Years.
AUDITING PEOPLE’S FEELINGS
Well, the long anticipated “Methuen School Audit” has been released to the public and at the end of the day the city spent $140,000 to ask school employees, parents, and students about their feelings when the school committee could have saved the taxpayers a chunk of cash and paid The Valley Patriot $50,000 to get the same results.
OR, they could have saved themselves the entire $140,000 and listened to what School Committee Members Kristen Maxwell and Ken Willette have been publicly saying for the last two years: lack of morale, poor or non-existent communications from the administration, inconsistent and unfair discipline practices, lack of accountability for bullies, literally no discipline in the classrooms at all, lack of focus on academics, and the sanitization of the schools with the banning of Christmas and other holiday celebrations, banning outside food of any kind (like cupcake and pizza parties) and promoting and demoting employees based on “politics”.
But the $140,000 was not a complete waste because now that it’s public it has validated Kristen Maxwell and Ken Willette who have long been mocked and disrespected by Laurie Keagan and Dan Shibilia who are nothing but puppets and mouthpieces for the school administration.
FOSTER KIDS OF MMV ISSUES CALL FOR SANTAS HEPERS
Foster Kids of the Merrimack Valley (FKMV), a non-profit organization dedicated to serving the needs of foster children in the Merrimack Valley, issues a call for Santa’s Helpers to support the Annual Foster Kids Christmas Party. The Santa’s Helpers is a volunteer program designed to anonymously match up individuals or groups from the local community with one or more foster children to help fulfill their Christmas wish lists. This program is part of the Annual Foster Kids Christmas Party organized by the FKMV, whereby age-appropriate toys & clothing are distributed to local foster children. The Santa’s Helpers program provides a personalized, unique kind of gift-giving and creates a memorable holiday season for foster children.
October: The sign-up process when businesses and individuals
volunteer to become a Santa’s Helper. Deadline to sign up is November 1st.
November 7th: Each Santa’s Helper will be assigned a child and receive a wish list that will provide the age, gender and sizes of the child.
Sunday, November 30: All unwrapped gift items are due and can be dropped off at: Methuen Karate Association
70C Bonanno Court
Methuen, MA
To register as a Santa’s Helper, please contact Our Website: fosterkidsmv.org Email: Christmas@fosterkidsmv.org ◊