Mass. budget chief Kirwan resigns for Harvard post

Gov. Deval Patrick’s budget chief, Leslie Kirwan, said last Friday that she is resigning to take a job at Harvard University.

Kirwan will serve as dean of administration and finance for Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences.

In a statement, the Democratic governor praised Kirwan as a “standout in her field” and said the state will emerge stronger from its fiscal crisis due to her leadership.

Kirwan will be replaced as the state’s secretary for administration and finance by her top deputy, Jay Gonzalez. He was a partner at the law firm of Edwards Angell Palmer and Dodge LLP, where his practice focused on public finance.

Gonzalez graduated cum laude from Dartmouth College and cum laude from Georgetown University Law Center. He and his wife, Jenny Richlin, have two daughters and live in Brookline.

As Patrick’s secretary of administration and finance, Kirwan oversaw over a series of four cuts last year to balance a $28 billion budget. She also was head of the board responsible for implementing the state’s landmark universal health care law.

“She fought for the funding necessary to make reform as successful as it is in the face of the worst financial crisis to face us since the Great Depression,” said Jon Kingsdale, executive director of the Commonwealth Health Insurance Connector Authority.

Before becoming secretary, Kirwan worked under former Gov. William F. Weld and reported to Charles Baker, who was the Republican’s finance secretary. Baker went on to become president of Harvard Pilgrim Health Care, but now is a Republican candidate for governor against Patrick.

Baker has already attacked some of Patrick’s budget decision-making, a line of criticism sure to continue in the 2010 governor’s campaign. But he has been complimentary of Kirwan and she has been complimentary of him, creating a personal challenge for both.

LAWRENCE, Mass. — State Rep. William Lantigua and City Councilor David Abdoo were the top vote-getters in the preliminary election in Lawrence and will square off in the November election in the Merrimack Valley city.

Unofficial returns showed Lantigua leading the 10-candidate field in last Tuesday’s voting, followed by Abdoo.

Marcos Devers was in third place and Patrick Blanchette finished fourth.

Incumbent Mayor Michael Sullivan was barred from seeking a third term because of term limits.

Lantigua will be seeking to become the first Latino mayor in Massachusetts history.

About 31 percent of Lawrence’s registered voters cast ballots in the preliminary election.

Missing Boston mayoral e-mails recovered

City officials have released a list of more than 5,000 e-mails deleted by a top mayoral aide in a possible violation of state public records law.

A spokeswoman for Mayor Thomas M. Menino has said the e-mails were recovered by a computer forensic specialist after they were deleted by chief policy adviser Michael J. Kineavy. Secretary of State William F. Galvin had set a deadline of last Friday for recovering the e-mails and making them public. State law requires municipal employees to save e-mails for two years.

The Boston Globe, which sought the e-mails in a public records request, said those listed were sent and received by Kineavy between Sept. 1, 2008 and April 1, 2009.

The deleted e-mails became an issue during the mayoral primary, but did not prevent Menino from easily distancing himself in a four-candidate field.

Hyatt Hotel Corp. says the nearly 100 housekeepers laid off from its three Boston hotels will be offered new full-time jobs.

The announcement last Friday came after Gov. Deval Patrick urged state employees to stop doing business with the hotels unless the workers were rehired. Boston taxi drivers also threatened to boycott the hotels.

Hyatt said the housekeepers would be offered jobs with a Boston affiliate of United Service Cos., with health coverage and the same pay they made with Hyatt.

The offer did not satisfy the local hotel workers union, which called it a “smoke screen.” Local 26 said the workers should be returned to the jobs they held for years.

The fired workers claimed they were force to train their lower-paid replacements.

(Associated Press)