Rosenberg turns focus to policy issues
Chris Cassidy Matt Stout
A day after Democrats closed the door on his return to the state Senate presidency this session, an upbeat Stanley C. Rosenberg rattled off a list of priorities he still hopes to accomplish in the next six months, even as an ethics investigation looms.“I love being here,” Rosenberg told the Herald yesterday, showing no sign […]
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Boston Herald
A day after Democrats closed the door on his return to the state Senate presidency this session, an upbeat Stanley C. Rosenberg rattled off a list of priorities he still hopes to accomplish in the next six months, even as an ethics investigation looms.

“I love being here,” Rosenberg told the Herald yesterday, showing no sign he’ll resign from the Senate, even after one Democratic gubernatorial candidate called on him to do so earlier this week.

The Amherst progressive seemed genuinely surprised and elated when a Herald reporter asked him about policy, after weeks of being barraged with questions about the scandal involving his now-separated husband, Bryon Hefner, and the politicking around the Senate presidency.

He emerged from his office a minute later with a yellow Post-it note scribbled with priorities for the new session: a housing bond bill, zoning reform, automatic voter registration, criminal justice and health care reform, and energy and fantasy sports bills.

“Some of these are definitely in play and others — there’s still six months to go, so we have bandwidth,” Rosenberg said.

Only this time, he’ll have to campaign for those initiatives as a rank-and-file senator with a basement office, not as the powerful president ensconced in palatial digs with a direct line to Gov. Charlie Baker and House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo.

Asked what the reception from his colleagues has been in the last few days, Rosenberg said: “Very positive.”

He declined to discuss anything related to an ongoing ethics committee probe into whether he broke any Senate rules. Rosenberg stepped down as Senate president after allegations of sexual assault or harassment emerged against his husband, Hefner.

Four senators have showed interest in vying for the presidency in 2019, including the Senate’s budget chief, Karen Spilka; Everett’s Sal DiDomenico; Eileen Donoghue of Lowell; and Eric Lesser of Longmeadow.

But Harriette L. Chandler herself — installed as the Senate president for 2018 to help calm the behind-the-scenes jockeying for the post — added a potential fifth name yesterday: Sen. Mark C. Montigny, an assistant majority leader.

“I think he is open to the idea, if the right circumstances present,” Chandler told reporters.

Montigny, however, said he hasn’t asked other senators for support, nor has he personally pushed his name as a candidate. But he didn’t completely close the door, either, acknowledging others have encouraged him to enter the fray.

“I wouldn’t say unequivocally that I wouldn’t stand for it,” he later told reporters in his office. “It’s not some raw ambition of mine. … It’s easy to see why people might speculate but I have not added to the speculation, in my opinion, at all. I don’t really do the dance.”

Rosenberg, earlier, also dodged questions about whether he’d try to reclaim the presidency, saying, “I’m here to vote for Sen. Chandler.”