It’s A Big Club And You’re Not In It
WorcesterElection.com Part Two
Hooo what a week what a week. Really excited to share this second update in the WorcesterElection.com project: Greg Opperman’s baby, lovingly crafted to let you know how elections really work around here; who makes it so six cretins sit on the city council blocking any and all progress.
Where last edition looked at the candidates, this one hones in on lesser known names: the donors.
To look at the state of municipal campaign finance, broken down the way that Greg does in this post, clarifies certain recent storylines that might otherwise seem plain weird. The obvious one is Chamber of Commerce CEO Tim Murray’s assault on the Worcester Regional Research Bureau for the apparent crime of publishing good research. He called it irresponsible to introduce the research on civilian review boards in the middle of a “competitive election.” But this is the same guy who introduced an unprecedented municipal Super PAC in October 2023, a thinly disguised cover for developers to funnel massive sums of money to preferred candidates. One of those things, in his mind, is “irresponsible.” He might also use a synonym: “political,” in the strange pejorative way the cranks use it. Giving voters good information on a relevant, significant policy decision in front of the city council is “political.” The shadow network of donors Greg illustrates is not “political.” Murray might call it “the way things get done around here.”
After Greg’s piece, I’ll have a few words on two candidate forums held over the past week, where this thread of entitlement to influence manifested as temper tantrums at the prospect of losing it.
We’ve been working really hard these past couple weeks. I’m starting to lose it. You cannot believe the beautiful interview we have in the chamber. The election guide has gone over extremely well, thank you. Aislinn’s last post is igniting the smartest conversation I’ve ever seen in a comments section. We’re doing the best work in the city right now. Between us and This Week In Worcester, the alternative press is straight up dunking on the legacy outlets.
We need all the help we can get. The Chamber of Commerce isn’t floating us. I’d like to pay Greg, for example, a lot more than I’m able for his great work on this—a whole website! New subscriptions have been slow of late, a phenomenon across the beg-for-money gigified space of independent alternative journalism. So I’m making an extended beg today. As a professional newsletterist you have to beg every time but between you and me I often phone in the begging part. It is after all sort of a humiliation ritual.
Here’s a non-phoned-in pitch: I’m able to keep this ship upright with 765 of you volunteering a few bucks a month or year. It more or less covers my being able to do this full time (and, ask Katie, full time means a lot more than 40 hours), and enough to pay my roster of writers a small fee for their work. Not nearly enough. I’d love to pay more. I’d love to have enough revenue I can offer positions. Aislinn, Chris, Greg, Gillian, Shaun, Kelly... there are a lot of smart, talented people bringing a lot to the table as contributors. We have the staff right now for a newsroom better than maybe any iteration of Worcester Magazine over its four decades of independence. We just don’t have the budget.
With even 100 more subscribers, I can up my freelance budget significantly. With 500 more, I’m looking at a part time position, making this newsletter a 1.5 employee outfit.
The dream is still a small newsroom. An editor and a few writers. At that point we say mission accomplished, alt-weekly resurrected. We’re not there yet, but we could be. And I think we’ve already established proof of concept. We have shifted the conversation in this city dramatically. And it’s why the cranks are freaking out. People previously shut out of the insular, unknowable world of city hall have been given a way in. That’s what real journalism does, the hardest and most rewarding part of it! And precisely where most local journalism comes up short.
But we have that special sauce and we are here to stay if you want us to be. The way to say so—really, the only way to actually say so—is to pony up $5 to the cause. Bonus points: doing so makes you a legitimate part of it.
Or drop any sum of money you want in the tip jar! $5,000 if you want! No rules!
Or order something from the merch store, where there’s only a few things left cuz I haven’t had the time to do that part of the job lately.
Thank you for your support, whatever form it takes. Now to Greg...
WorcesterElection.com Part 2
By Greg Opperman
Greg here, with another story on the money behind the City Council election. We’ve put in a lot of work to update WorcesterElection.com with fresh data. In Part 1, we looked at how much each candidate has raised. Today, we’re looking at where that money came from.
To get a sense of Worcester’s largest political donor base, I aggregated all campaign contributions from 2024-2025 based on donors, and then went down the rabbit hole of looking into as many donors as possible. From there, I was able to log data on the top 200 donors: Who they are, where they work, and their business connections. Every single one of these donors could be their own story. While this research barely scratches the surface of Worcester’s complex patronage network, the data definitively shows who our City Council candidates serve, and who stands to profit from the influence that comes with relatively modest donations to those candidates. You can see all the data at http://worcesterelection.com/donors
Quick reminder before we get started, this data journalism takes a lot of work. We’re really proud of the work we’re doing. If you like it, consider sending me a tip via Venmo.
As of writing, the City Council election has been fueled by $689,000 in direct contributions to all 22 candidates. Of that $689,000, just over one third ($253,000) comes from the top 200 donors, not counting contributions to Independent Expenditure Political Action Committees (more on that later). Shockingly, 40 percent of the money spent on this campaign has been hoovered up by just three candidates: Mayor Joe Petty, incumbent Candy Mero-Carlson, and at-large challenger Satya Mitra. To explain why, we need to take a closer look at the donors themselves.
So who are these donors, anyway?
People and businesses affiliated with the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce dominate the top 200 donors in this election. 64 out of those 200 donors (32 percent) are members, board directors, or affiliated with businesses involved with the Chamber. Combined, they account for over $102,000 in donations to City Council candidates this year alone. Keep in mind that this is only the top 200 we were able to research - the real number is much higher. In terms of coordinated influence, no other organization comes close to having the Chamber of Commerce’s sway over our candidates.
Run by former Lieutenant Governor and Worcester Mayor, Tim Murray. The Worcester Chamber is largely made up of the people and businesses getting rich off of Worcester’s real estate growth machine: Real estate investors, their lawyers, construction companies, and businesses that regularly do business with the city in one way or another. Satya Mitra currently sits on the Board of Directors for the Chamber, and once served as Chairman. The Worcester Chamber serves as an organized influence machine to enrich its private business benefactors - they even say the quiet part out loud on their website: “Chambers are ardent proponents of the free-market system resisting attempts to overly-burden private-sector enterprise and investment.”
If you look at who in Worcester stands to benefit the most from investment-friendly, free market politics, you’ll find most of the top donors in this year’s election. These are the people propping up Joe Petty, Candy Mero-Carlson, and Moe Bergman’s campaigns. These are the people trying to buy Satya Mitra and Jose Rivera seats on the council. These are the people who expect a return on investment for their contributions. We’re going to highlight a few here, but remember to check out worcesterelection.com/donors for the full list.
Progress Worcester
Not content to give individually, many Chamber of Commerce use an Independent Expenditure Political Action Committee (IEPAC), ironically named Progress Worcester. The PAC, formed late in the 2023 election cycle, allows Worcester’s power players to give beyond the $1,000 limit per year for each candidate they support. This year, the PAC has raised $47,900 and spent $18,952 so far, running social media ads on behalf of Joe Petty, Tony Economou, and of all people, Jose Rivera. The Chamber of Commerce and Worcester Business Development Corporation have each kicked in $10,000, while Richard Rafferty, partner at Eden Rafferty, contributed $5,000, in addition to the $5,000 in individual contributions spread between him and his wife. Other major donors include: law firm Fletcher Tilton ($2,500), Craig Blas ($1,000), restaurateur and spray paint enthusiast John Piccolo ($750), and Tim Murray, via Murray Development LLC ($500).
The Worcester Business Development Corporation
We can’t talk about this campaign’s megadonors without talking about the Worcester Business Development Corporation (WBDC). If you haven’t heard much about the WBDC, you might be surprised to learn that it’s not just another generic real estate investment company, but a non-profit that serves to enrich real estate investors through a variety of services, including state and local “permitting assistance”, tax credit approvals, and construction management. The organization’s lifeblood is brokering deals between real estate developers and the local government - securing the tax breaks and deals necessary to juice investor’s bottom line. As a registered non-profit, those same investors get a nice little tax writeoff when they donate to support the organization. In 2024, the WBDC took in $1.98 million in revenue with $1.7 million in expenditures. Their portfolio page boasts about several of the projects they’ve been involved in, including the redevelopment of the Saint Gobain campus, Gateway Park, and several projects on The Grid downtown. The Board of the WBDC is a who’s who of Chamber of Commerce-affiliated donors: Chairman Stephen Rodolakis of Fletcher Tilton, President Craig Blais (the 11th biggest individual donor), Tim Murray, Dennis Kerrigan (Hanover Insurance), the list goes on.
The Krocks
The Krocks are one of the richest, if not the richest, real estate dynasty in Worcester. Their familial patron, Aaron Krock, immigrated to Worcester sometime around 1911. Working as a paperboy for the Telegram, he was able to rustle up enough money to open up a dry goods store, then parlay that into a successful career as an auctioneer, running up commissions on federal bankruptcy auctions. By 1945, he acquired the Northworks building on Grove Street (now home to The Fix and Escape Games), beginning his real estate empire. He went on to found Commerce Bank & Trust, headquartered at the Commerce Building on Main St. Aaron set up his son, Barry, with his own bank, Shrewsbury Bank and Trust. Barry went on to succeed his dad as president of Commerce Bank, and continued to accumulate property across Worcester.
The Krock family didn’t just get rich by making smart investments and banking. They’ve been fined for violations of the Clean Air Act,related to improper asbestos handling during demolition projects. In 2006, Barry was found liable for diverting (embezzling?) over $700,000 in rental income from Park Chandler Realty Trust to another trust controlled by his family. If you’ve ever wondered what’s the deal with that huge vacant lot on Park Ave, The Park Chandler Realty Trust bought and demolished the Harrington Richards Gun Factory in the 1980s. While part of the lot became Walgreens, several other development projects have stalled or been abandoned, leaving over six acres of blighted land for decades, despite numerous attempts by the city to get the Krocks to clean it up. Incidentally, the WBDC website highlights their involvement with the lot. For more Krock family history, Nicole Apostola wrote a good series on them a few years ago.
Kathryn and Aaron Krock are second generation nepo babies, having inherited the family’s vast real estate portfolio. Barry, who died in 2024, groomed Kathryn by setting her up as manager of several properties, including the Slater building on Main Street. Kathryn’s management became a point of contention when several family members and co-owners of the building sued the Krocks over disputes related to the sale of the property. According to contemporary reporting by the Telegram:
They also charge that the Krocks drained the trust by, among other things, overpaying Kathryn Krock as manager of the properties; the suit says she is compensated more than $250,000 a year, including a car and expense account. The suit refers to the 31-year-old as a “fashion school graduate with no training whatsoever as a manager of commercial properties.”
Kathryn is listed in the state’s corporate database over 100 times (it’s common to incorporate separately for each individual property to limit liability). Kathryn’s husband, Kevin Parvin, keeps a low profile, but has been involved in the family business since they married in 2011. A quick internet search shows him as the property manager for a few college rental properties. Kathryn, Kevin, and Aaron have all become reliable Joe Petty boosters, with Kathryn maxing out donations to Petty for a solid 12 years. On top of giving to Candy Mero-Carlson ($6,250), Kate Toomey ($2,000), and Khrystian King ($3,500), she’s given over $17,000 to the Republican State Committee and $4,500 to former Republican Governor Charlie Baker.
Where are the police when you need them?
One notable cohort missing from the election contribution is law enforcement. Despite dominating the city’s highest paid employees list, and despite most of City Council constantly bending over backwards to glaze them, most Worcester Police officers pass on putting money behind their political allies.The WPD’s best friend (and Public Safety Committee chair) Kate Toomey only netted $50 and $150 from Police Union chiefs Rick Cipro and Anthony Petrone, respectively, as well as $100 from a co-worker at the Sheriff’s Department. (Kate, if you’re reading this, know your worth, girl! You can do better!)
Besides Cipro and Petrone, only two other active police officers, Matt Early and Miguel Lopez, have contributed to the election, for less than $500 total. While the WPD exerts an outsized influence in city politics, that influence decidedly does not come from money.
It’s a big club, and you’re not in it
A lot of people have a narrow, cartoonish view of political corruption. A gruff guy with an envelope of money tucked into his trenchcoat meets a political operative in a dark alley, or a parking garage, under the cover of night. “We hope we can count on your vote,” says the guy in the trenchcoat, as he slips the envelope to the dirty politician. Classic quid pro quo stuff. In reality, Worcester is rampant with a different kind of corruption, corruption that is legal, diffuse, and often right out in the open.
Sometimes, donations appear to be a thank you for a job well done. In July 2024, the United States Supreme Court ruled that “a federal anti-bribery law does not make it a crime for state and local officials to accept a gratuity for acts that they have already taken.” That November, Moe Bergman joined Petty, Colorio, Mero-Carlson, Russell, and Toomey to kill a proposal for a report on limiting the construction of new gas stations. A month later, Hassan Yatim, who owns over twenty gas stations, including four in Worcester, cuts a $500 check to Bergman’s campaign and follows up with another $500 in May. Overall, Hassan has spent $10,500 on this election, in addition to $3,000 from his business partners: wife Maria and brother Tarek.
Sometimes, the donors are paying for what a candidate won’t do, as opposed to what they will do. For example, Jose Rivera’s top donors are all landlords: Sander Depetri, Adam Gavel, the Sallooms, the Cutlers, et cetera. There’s a reason they’ve all cut checks, and it’s not Rivera’s visionary proposals on housing policy. His opponent, Etel Haxhiaj, supports implementing a tax on large real estate transfers to create an affordable housing fund, something that would cut into their profits by a small percentage. If elected, Jose Rivera would join a cohort including Petty, Toomey, Mero-Carlson, Bergman, Rosen (probably), Colorio (maybe), who oversee City Manager Eric Batista. All of them look at one-sided developer deals where investors bank on tax breaks, renege on their promises, and drive up housing costs, and say “Great job, no notes.” Several candidates, Rivera included, have made “getting back to business as usual” a centerpiece of their campaign, meaning a focus on small-town grievances and laissez-faire attitudes towards big business.
Sometimes, a political donation is just the cost of admission into the club of people with access to power. Candy Mero-Carlson gets an outsized amount of donations because of her position as chair of the Economic Development Council, and because her husband is one of the most powerful union leaders in the state. Joe Petty has commanded the most money, by far of any candidate, partially because he’s Mayor, and partially because he chairs Economic Development Coordinating Council, a secretive group that meets weekly to negotiate development projects between the city and private investors (the Chamber of Commerce and WBDC are founding members).
By all measures, Joe Petty is going to sail to re-election. Petty placed first in the preliminary, beating out 2nd-place finisher Kate Toomey by over 800 votes, and netting 30 percent more votes than his mayoral rival Khrystian King. He hasn’t spent a dime in the last month, outside of some payment processing fees, nor does he need to. Petty knows he’s going to win and so do his donors. Nevertheless, he’s collected $11,080 in donations in October alone: $1,000 from Dave Greaney, CEO of Synergy, the Boston-based developer that owns the skyscraper across from City Hall; $2,000 from Richard and Jeanne Rafferty; another $1,000 from Jane Guthro, who works at Rafferty’s law firm; $1,000 from the aforementioned Maria Yatim; $500 James Madigan, whose construction company built the Beechwood Hotel and the Tatnuck Country Club; a top-off of $100 WBDC President Craig Blais.
Presumably, these are some of the smartest and most successful people in town. They do not spend money carelessly. Joe Petty doesn’t need the money, but his constituents still pony up every year. Why? These donations buy access to a not-very-exclusive but very, very profitable club.
You can also follow the money trail to see who doesn’t have influence. Out of the top 200 donors, several owners of local healthcare businesses have contributed about $18,000 to this election campaign, among them Dorit Herlinger owner of The Oasis at Dodge Park retirement home, Wilberto Rodriguez, CEO of Compassion Healthcare, and Jesus Suarez, CEO of Renaissance Medical Group. If you guessed they’d spend money on the Chair of Public Health and Human Services committee, Luis Ojeda, you’d be wrong. All three of them have maxed out donations for Joe Petty. (Unrelated: Wilberto Rodriguez was indicted for multiple counts of larceny and fraud in 2016 on allegations of routinely overbilling and falsely billing MassHealth for services that were not authorized or provided to patients.)
While a lot of money is changing hands in aggregate, individual donors can reap huge sums for very little investment. After finessing a $159 million public investment into Polar Park, PawSox Owner Larry Luchinno gave a paltry $500 to Joe Petty (and we know how that’s going). Just this week, the city announced over $1.25 million in developer subsidies, including $225,000 for Curtis Apartments, built by Trinity Financial. Trinity’s CEO Patrick Lee kicked in $2,000 each to Joe Petty and Candy Mero Carlson, while his business development director, Michael Hunter, has given $1,250 to Candy. Incidentally, Candy’s husband Joe is the chair of the Worcester Housing Authority. The extent to which being in-the-club contributed to that outcome is difficult to prove, but it certainly didn’t hurt, either.
Worcester is built on hundreds and thousands of these little deals, both formal and informal. The Chamber of Commerce, and Worcester’s donor base at large, spends a lot of money and effort to make sure business-friendly politicians control the levers of power. The candidates take that money and use it to manufacture consent for the real estate growth machine. They would prefer that the election be about decorum, sidewalks, and snow plowing, when in reality, millions of dollars in tax breaks and development deals change hands in exchange for hundreds of dollars in campaign contributions.
While we can’t possibly know the full extent to which our councilors’ donors get rewarded for their monetary contributions, it doesn’t take much imagination. A kind word to the right person at the permitting office here, looking the other way on a distressed property there, the occasional $100 million handout to a minor league baseball team. When considering a change to a zoning rule, or an ADU ordinance, ask yourself, “what would Tim Murray Do?”
Everybody knows, or should know, the George Carlin bit about wealth and power.
“I’m talking about the real owners now, the real owners, the big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations...they own this fucking place. It’s a big club, and you ain’t in it. You and I are not in the big club.”
In Worcester, that club is a few hundred people. Tim Murray and Craig Blais are in the club. The Krocks and the Yatims are in the club. Your landlord, and their lawyers, are in the club. You and I are not in the big club.
Odds and ends:
Remember folks, it would be extremely funny if the Chamber of Commerce threw away $100,000 on Satya Mitra. It would also be really, really funny if the chair of the Economic Development Committee lost her seat on the council. Remember to go vote on Tuesday!
The FBI has been visiting people who have attended No Kings Protests, much in the same way they recently visited a local WPI student for supporting animal rights causes. We wrote about how this would definitely happen a few months ago.
The Snotty Specter of Thomas Duffy
Ok back to me (Bill). Greg’s so awesome for making that website. Another round of applause!
A few notes from me now from the two candidate forums on Thursday—the long awaited and almost didn’t happen D5 debate, then the mayoral debate at Mechanics Hall right after.
As is the case over the past year the aura of one Thomas Duffy loomed large over both events—a stupid and malicious through line to complement a stupid and malicious political project.
As it happens, there’s a video floating around that encapsulates what I mean. A reader sent me some security camera footage they’d taken of Thomas Duffy walking up to their door, blowing a giant snot rocket on the readers’ stoop, wiping the excess snot off his nostril with two pinched fingers, then with the same hand—no wipe!—grabbing a stack of police union campaign mailers he has apparently been dropping off by hand.
This is the video.
This is what the mailer looks like.
Because of course that’s what it looks like.
Here he is at the D5 forum, standing menacingly in front of the food drive Etel Haxhiaj organized to make the event less pointless. Under his track jacket you’ll see a barely-concealed sidearm.
For about 20 minutes I was next to Duffy in the back of the room, a trash can between us. He occasionally looked up from his phone, glancing over at what I was writing in my notebook, or at least that’s what it felt like. About 36 minutes into the hour-long event, he left.
Jose Rivera said something so stupid at one point people burst out laughing. He said it in support of a smarmy attack: Etel is an expert in homelessness policy, but homelessness has gotten worse while she’s been a councilor. All of her proposals to make the situation better have been voted down by the six councilors with whom he’s politically aligned. But he doesn’t say any of that. Instead, he says:
We have a lot of people on the streets who don’t want to go to shelters. There’s room and boards available for a lot of housing on the unhoused population but they’d rather be on the streets.
And laughter rippled through the room amid louder groaning. The guy next to me said “what a dumbass” lol. Duffy right next to me, face buried in his phone. The guy he’s launching snot rockets for getting ridiculed by the townsfolk. For the record there’s a massive capacity deficit of even emergency temporary shelter, which only the most craven person would classify as “room and board.” There are no rooms, there is no board.
Rivera’s stumbling attack and the getting laughed at for it perhaps factored into Duffy’s early departure. About five minutes after that moment, some 35 minutes into the hour-long session, Duffy scooted out of the packed hall, his hand pulling his track jacket down over his gun like a kid walking out a gas station with a candy bar.
Duffy also loomed large at the mayoral debate at Mechanics Hall, though in a more subtle way.
About 41 minutes into a 55 minute affair, Mayor Joe Petty said “Wusta has been really successful because we’ve all worked together without throwing cheap jabs at people.”
Then, 10 minutes later, he threw a cheap jab. Wild! Almost like he doesn’t mean what he says. During closing remarks, he tells people to go back to a two-minute portion of the Dec. 17, 2024 city council meeting.
“In two short minutes, Councilor King labeled the men and women of the Worcester Police Department as uninformed and insulted three of my colleagues, Councilors Ojeda, Toomey and Bergman by referring to the public safety subcommittee as impotent. And he lost his composure to the point he approached the rostrum, at me.”
I’m probably the only person who did go back to that two-minute portion. And wow Joe was uhhh not close with this characterization. An extremely cheap jab from the guy who just said he doesn’t do cheap jabs.
On the first allegation, that the police department was “misinformed” here’s what Khrystian actually said...
I’m asking by way of a motion, Mr. Chairman, that you work to provide a thorough review of the summary ... It needs to be done immediately, because those folks walked out of here uninformed.
What he was referring to were the police union officials who testified during public comment to the DOJ report being a wholesale fabrication. Worst of all, of course, was Duffy, who said “this sham of an investigation was a new low point, with hardly any factual information.” Watch the whole thing, it’s nuts.
Duffy was joined by compatriots Anthony Petrone and Rick Cipro, who made similar statements but without barking so loudly. That’s obviously what Khrystian was referring to. Those were the people he was calling uninformed, not the “men and women of the police department.” He was trying to make sure the rank and file got good information. That they weren’t just being lied to by Thin Blue Line propagandists.
On to point two, about the Public Safety Subcommittee, Khrystian was just right. Dead right. And I think Luis Ojeda, who barely gets a word in, and would be overruled 2-1 on any independent suggestion, would agree. Here’s a fun read about how in nine years of chairing the committee Toomey did not once take up an item about police misconduct.
On point three, Joe jumps the shark. Khrystian lost his cool, sure, but he lost it because Petty was breaking council rules to stop him from speaking about the DOJ report. Who wouldn’t get frustrated? The real villain of this little moment is Joe, who looks at a Black man in a room stuffed with cops—remember, the entire department came out to fill the chambers and cheer for the officers who spoke. In that position, knowing he’s not at all threatened, that King’s just mad at his bullshit, he says “are you threatening me?” Racist, dangerous, irresponsible behavior. Johanna Mulhane did a good job of pointing that out in a post to the Worcester Political Dialogue Facebook group.
Petty should have publicly apologized to King first thing Wednesday morning. His words were textbook examples of implicit racism. Black men and women in this country have been SENTENCED TO DEATH with those words. It was shocking to watch live. I wish I could properly articulate just how gross it was.
King also responded at the time with a statement. It was a whole thing. But none of that matters at all to the cranks. They see the mayor being a racist and they say more of that, please. We need to get back to that. We need to return. We need civility.
Ok that’s all today! I gotta get going. More real soon. Maybe tomorrow.
Oh one last thing, check out this election guide zine by Ariel Amasifuén over at Technocopia. It draws on some of our work and presents it in a fun way.
Remember what I said up top—the more paid subscribers the more ass we can kick around here.
P.s. thank you to Shaun for the suggestion: new Guided By Voices record kicks ass. This one… What a track.
Preaching to the choir, Bill and Greg. But you're shouting louder every time. Keep it up.
Joe Petty is an unabashed shill for special business interests. Under our form of government, the perfect candidate. And he'd be the first to agree.
I can't imagine anyone from the WRRB, WBDC or the EDCC soliciting and implementing the input of Jose Rivera in their development plans. But apparently, he's smart enough to take Etel's seat on the City Council. It's been said, "All politics are local, and local politics are personal". Vote for change. No later than Tuesday 2025-11-04.