Antonelli was removed from his post as the Register of Probate by the state Supreme Judicial Court in 1999 and charged with professional misconduct, according to Journal archives. Most of the monies on his campaign are loans to himself.



[From "Registry of Deeds candidates filling war chests" Somerville Journal]

...he was the first in the country to implement imaging software in the office allowing for the electronic storage of documents and allowing the public to easily download information.



"It was revolutionary," he said. "I convinced them that I would change the image of the county doing this."



It cost them more than a million dollars to implement in 1989 but Brune recovered the money in four years by selling special software he had procured. The attention it brought the registry was acclaimed even abroad and that year Brune said he gave 122 tours of the office, including foreign delegates.



[From "Registry of Deeds candidates filling war chests" Somerville Journal]

The salary is commensurate with the scope and responsibility of the job.

hates the Registry with the firey hate of a thousand suns

As a lawyer with knowledge of the registry and the law, along with my management education, training and experience prepares me to fix the registry.

[ETA 9/412 23:50: My recommendation stands.]Living as I do under a rock, I was unaware of what all was going on in the race for the Register of Deeds for Southern Middlesex (Massachusetts, USA, Earth). I just got caught up a hurry. (h/t to Heather Hoffman on the Porter Square email list, who linked to the videos.)tl;dr summary: If you're a voter in Southern Middlesex, and either unenrolled or enrolled as a Democrat, I ask youand/or (3) at least vote AGAINST Robert Antonelli.Explication:The present Register of Deeds, who has served for 24 years, is retiring. There are six candidates vying to be Democratic candidate; there being no Republican candidates, the winner of the Democratic primary will run uncontested in Nov. This means the decision will be effectively made at the Thursday primary.One of the six candidates is Robert Antonelli. Antonelli is a crook.Let's just put this guy out of our misery, shall we. For all intents and purposes, there's just five candidates. On to the interesting parts....While there are some things which have gone very right under the present Register of Deeds, Gene Brune,However, there are also some pretty serious problems.One of those problems is not specific to this office, or Massachusetts: "Robo-signing" of deeds by mortgage owners. This has to do with the nation-wide Mortgage Crisis. While it's not immediately clear what the Register will be able to do about this (several candidates have said things like "support legislation to fix it", which translates to "encourage people with the power to do something about it to do so"), but they all mention it.The other is specific to the Middlesex South Register of Deeds: The Backlog.I confess, I don't actually know what The Backlog is, whom it effects, how or why. What I do know is that it is in the Registered Land (as opposed t Recorded Land which is the 85% majority of deeds) part of the Registry, it's 7 or 8 or more years long, and absolutely nobody running thinks it's remotely okay.The question in the race is "If elected, WTH are you going to do about The Backlog." There was a debate, held by the non-partisan League of Women Voters. If you don't feel like watching the whole hour video, the take away I got is that Heuston comes across as five times smarter than anybody else at the table. I don't know why she want to be the Southern Middlesex Register of Deeds, but I'm beginning to suspect it's "This looks like a fun problem in systems and administration to solve."She actually answers questions. This impression was bolstered by her responses to the questions posed by the Somerville Journal . For instance, all the candidates were given 50 words to answer, "The starting salary for Register of Deeds is $102,000. Why does the position deserve such a salary?" The others' responses:Antonelli: "I believe that all public service salaries should be capped by the state legislature on Beacon Hill." -- Doesn't answer the question.Ciano: "The salary compared to other chief executives is in line and low. Remember police chiefs and mayors receive more and the job demands a full time, fully qualified and respected person and the salary is commensurate with the job requirements." -- Starts fine, and immediately veers into defensive, "But, mom! Everybody else gets one" argument; does not substantiate claims about job.Concannon: "I think that a person's ability to do a demanding and important job may merit a higher salary. The amount of salary for a job involves objective and subjective standards." -- Defensive answer, calling the salary "higher", and a bloviating preemptive excuse about "standards".Curtatone: "This will be more than my full time job, it will be my around-the-clock commitment. And to make me a more effective register, I'll conduct regional meetings to form a working partnership with the people. Because no one knows better what services are needed than the people themselves." -- Defensive "I'll work really, really hard" then then turns into a stump speech.Doto: "The Southern Middlesex Registry of Deeds is the largest registry in the state, 8th largest in the nation. It is responsible for accuracy, safe-keeping and filings of hundreds of thousands of land documents and records from 44 communities." -- Okay, but answers by implication.Heuston: "The Registry handles roughly 300,000 crucial legal documents every year. The Register manages a staff of approximately 67 people, an annual budget of 3.1 million and revenues of $65 million." -- Emphasis mine. PAY ATTENTION, PEOPLE, THIS IS HOW YOU ANSWER A QUESTION: a summary of substantiating facts, followed by a statement of conclusion.Also, as is characteristic of her debate answers, crunchy, crunchy facts are included. At the Belmont Candidate's Night , when asked what she'd do about The Backlog, her answer was informative and interesting: they are down staff because the budget is insufficient to replace a bunch of departed employees, but to get the legislature to increase their budget, they'd have to make the case, which the previous dude tried and failed to do; she'd approach it by "audit and analysis" to try to address problems internally, but also, if necessary, to make the case to the leg to increase staff. She pointed out that 15% of land is handled through the Registered Land Div, as opposed to the 85% of land in the Recorded Land Div, but Registered has 50% of the employees. "Something's wrong there." In both the Newton debate and the Belmont candidate's night, she was the first -- or maybe only -- candidate to use numbers in answering questions.Also, she invoked "queuing theory".Her experience is predominantly in administration, and she's stumping on the position that This Job Requires An Administrator. Interestingly, it's in medical administration -- including at Harvard Vanguard and Cambridge Health Alliance -- and she's arguing that managing a registry of important legal documents has a lot of similarity with managing a repository of personal medical information. She's also been an alderman of Somerville, and says she's had a bunch to do with things like 311 and other ways Somerville has used new media to become more accessible to constituents. Which, if you don't know, Somerville has indeed been rocking like a rocking thing. (CAMBRIDGE WHY CAN'T YOU BE THIS COOL?)Another debate take-away about another candidate: for Tiz Doto, it's personal. On his website he says that as a matter of principle he's accepting no donations from the Registry's unions or any employee or their families, because the Register should appear "above reproach". But in the TV interview, he brought up the no-donations-from-Registry-unions-or-employees thing in a way and tone of voice which made it absolutely clear how little he thinks of the Registry unions and employees. His answer to how he's going to improve the place was, in res, to kick ass and take names. Also? Tiz Doto is probably the candidate with the most personal experience actually using the Registry as a customer, in his capacity as a lawyer (four are lawyers, but he clearly spends more time there), andis highly motivated to make the Registry into the efficient, ethical institution Massachusetts citizens deserve.I don't know if that makes him a terrible candidate or an excellent one. I was initially taken aback by his animosity, but it certainly sounds like he's earned it. I think maybe he's my second choice.Both Concannon and Curtatone unfavorably impressed me in the debate. Concannon handwaves and bloviates and rambles. Curtatone... reminds me of nobody so much as W. She seems to have taken a page from the Republican playbook: "There's a problem! A big, big problem! And I'm gonna solve the heck out of that big bad problem for you in some completely unspecified way! Don't you worry about it, I've got you covered, I'll solve that problem for you even though I won't talk about what the solution is at all! Also, here are some completely extraneous sympathy-fishing facts about me, like that I'm a mother of two!"I wasn't too impressed by Ciano, either, because (1) he stumps on the position that he's "not a politician" and that his pertinent experience has been the various presidencies of bar associations, which I have to assume are not appointed; and (2) his written answers to the Somerville Journal's questions were ungrammatical, e.g.:Sic. They're all like that, all his answers. Which, considering he tried to position himself during the debate as the egghead/wonk with the deep legal knowledge of probate law that the position requires, is extra special headdesky. In the Belmont candidates night he actually said, "That's whom I am."So. If you're in the relevant jurisdiction and have the relevant qualifications, please show up and vote. I recommend voting for Heuston.ETA: Welcome,& PSNA; my work schedule is such that I will not be able to answer questions or unscreen comments here, until late tonight (Tue 9/4) at the earliest, and possibly not until Wednesday evening. I encourage you to take discussion to your respective fora, though you are welcome to comment here if you really want. Certainly, if you know some reason I really shouldn't be supporting Heuston, commenting here will be the fastest and surest way to get it to me.[ETA 9/412 23:50: My recommendation stands.]