Precinct: 3
Tell us a little about yourself. You can include your personal background, family, outside interests that are important to who you are as a person and a candidate.
I have served 48 years as a Town Meeting Member from Pct. 3. I was an elected member on the School Committee and now chair the Lexington Historical Commission. I taught politics at MIT and Harvard Kennedy School, and was Academic Vice-President of Tufts University and President of Lafayette College. I am a board member of the South Lexington Civic Association, Pct. 3’s representative organization.
For five decades I have advocated for sensible development that respected neighborhood interests. Recently, I led the effort to ban noisy leaf blowers and attempted strenuously in Town Meeting to keep assault weapons out of Lexington. We now have to protect the residents of Pct. 3 from further industrial encroachments and ensure that the interests of Pct. 3 residents are safeguarded as the Town grows and modernizes. I will work for a better tree bylaw and to deter increased mansionization. How best to build and pay for a new high school is an additional priority.
How has your past experience — whether in your professional life, elected office, or as a community leader — prepared you for a role in Town Meeting?
As stated above, my professional role as a student of politics (local, national, and international) dovetails well
with my long activity as a representative of Pct. 3 in Town Meeting. Since I have been in Town Meeting longer than all but two colleagues, I have a keen appreciation of what is needed to make change work at the local level.
I also have written in the NY Times and elsewhere extensively about local politics, schooling issues, and town meeting procedures nationally. As indicated above, my awareness of parliamentary procedure also helped to turn the leaf blower noise issue into a victory for home owners and the Town. As chair of the Historical Commission, I help to lead the Town’s effort to maintain Lexington’s historical character, a mandate provided by Town Meeting.
I teach OWLL courses to Lexington residents. If voters want further to discern my views on the world beyond Lexington, let my recommend free subscriptions to my Substack Newsletter — robertirotberg.substack.com
What is the most important issue in this election to you personally, and what ideas do you have about how to address this issue?
As stated above: Ensuring responsible development that respects the rights of Pct. 3 residents; paying for the new high school.
How to do both: Keeping a close eye in Town Meeting, as I have for 48 years. Asking the right questions; speaking out when necessary. And making sure that Precinct 3’s interests, too often overlooked, are brought front and center
The assault rifle issue was very contentious. Eventually those who feared gun owners (including the then police chief) and advocates of a ban on guns reached a difficult compromise.
Likewise, by agreeing to delay an immediate ban on noisy leaf blowers, we managed to pass and sustain our legislation against a landscaper-inspired referendum.
During my School Committee days, there were almost weekly collaborations to advance sensible reform practices.
One more point: at the Kennedy School, the program that I founded was called the Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution. Among the many initiatives we pursued over nineteen years was a six-year long attempt to broker peaceful resolution of the Turkish-Greek conflict in Cyprus through a Track 3 negotiation effort. I am President Emeritus of the World Peace Foundation.