Recently, a reader left me a voicemail drawing my attention to some strange doings at the Smith & Wesson shooting center. She’d shown up there a couple of times for safety instruction but found the place was closed, and workers there had few satisfactory answers about what was going on.
I confess that I never got back to her. But in today’s Republican, Jim Kinney answers her questions: Smith & Wesson’s shooting center and store are both closed, temporarily, after it was revealed that a city man now facing murder charges had illegally shot at the Smith & Wesson range last year. The man, Manuel Lora, who had previously been convicted of a drug felony, was subsequently arrested for violating a law that forbids felons from possessing firearms; he’s also one of three people charged with the shooting death, last summer, of Jonathan Tallaj on Wilmont Street.
In a statement to the newspaper, a Smith & Wesson spokeswoman said the decision to close the center for the time being was “made internally and on our own accord for a number of business-related reasons which include the many complexities of operating a public range, combined with our desire to focus on our manufacturing operation.”
In other news, the City Hall law department has made it clear that a casino committee recently put together by City Council President Jimmy Ferrera actually has few, if any powers, noting that it’s the mayor’s job to negotiate with any casino developers that come knocking. That leaves the rather bloated committee of 15 to make non-binding recommendations on the issue. More promisingly, the committee will also hold public hearings—although let’s wait to see if casino opponents get a real opportunity to air their concerns those hearings.
At Western Mass. Politics and Insight, Matt Szafranski sees Ferrera’s toothless committee as yet another example of the Council president’s “bumbling,” in an effort “to show off he can play with the big boys.” (You know, I’m starting to think that maybe Szafranski doesn’t think much of Ferrera…)
Certainly, given the big bucks that casino developers are throwing around, elected officials who can carve out some piece of the authority over the selection of a developer or the siting of a casino could find themselves richly rewarded through campaign donations. (For more on the intersection of big money and city policy, check out this excellent recent report by the Springfield Intruder’s Bill Dusty.)
The Council casino committee is chaired by Paula Meara, who served as police chief during the Albano administration but was forced out by Albano’s successor, Charlie Ryan. Ryan was a leader of the successful campaign to keep a casino out of Springfield in the mid-’90s, and it’s easy to imagine that if he was still mayor, he’d be calling for other, better forms of economic development, as Holyoke Mayor Alex Morse is. Ryan, of course, lost his re-election bid in 2007 to Domenic Sarno, who has said he’ll “lead the charge” on casino development in the city. In the end, though, city voters have to approve any casino proposal.
