OCS Administrator Makes Bid for Office

A top administrator at the Office of Career Services will seek public office this fall on a platform of raising awareness about domestic violence.

Marc Cosentino, the assistant director of OCS and business career counselor, is running for the Republic can nomination for the Republican nomination for the District Two seat on the Governor's Council, an executive board which approves certain actions of the governor.

Cosentino joined the GOP in 1990 to vote for Gov. William F. Weld '66, and is attempting to become an alternative voice on the council, whose eight current members are all Democrats.

Although Cosentino has never held political office, he has worked on campaigns in the past, including the campaigns for two senatorial candidates, including Sen. Edward M. Kennedy '54-'56 in 1982.

He said he was prompted to run by the plight of the Framingham Eight, eight women who were convicted of killing their abusive loversin the 1980s.

"The Democrat who now holds the position voted against pardons in the cases of the three women which have come up so far," Cosentino said. "Those cases originally came up before battered women's syndrome was an acknowledged defense.

"All the cases deserve to be reconsidered individually," Cosentino said.

"The man now serving on the council said some awfully insensitive things when the cases came up," added Deborah A. Cincotta '94, Cosentino's former campaign manager.

"He said he didn't believe domestic violence existed and it was the women's fault for getting involved in the relationships," she said.

But Cincotta also said Cosentino didn't become interested in the issue of domestic violence until she suggested it as a potential campaign issue last January.

"[Cosentino] didn't know that much about domestic violence at the time, but I told him about the situation and we agreed it would be a good issue," she said. "These types of elections generally go along party lines, so he had to find an issue to draw Democratic votes, and we thought this platform could get some traditionally liberal support from women's groups."

If elected, Cosentino said, he would only vote to confirm judges who agreed to several stipulations about their dealing with domestic violence.

Potential criminal court judges would have to agree to: taking a domestic violence awareness course; asking individuals under restraining orders to turn over their firearms; being available after hours for issuing restraining orders; and, at the request of the alleged victim, ordering electronic monitoring for defendants out on bail.

Cosentino, who is expecting to face one challenger in the September 20 primary, said he thinks his theme will be warmly accepted by voters.

Cosentino said "the hardest thing" will be getting the 1,000 necessary signatures from Republicans or independent voters by the May 3 deadline for making the ballot.

He said he has gotten several Harvard students, including Cincotta, to help him in that pursuit this weekend.

Harvard students, however, will not be able to vote or sign petitions for the OCS employee because Cambridge is not one of the thirty towns in his district, which extends from Back Bay to Norfolk to Wellesley.

The Governor's Council, a body fairly unique to Massachusetts, serves several functions.

It holds hearings on all the governor's judicial appointments, approves executive appointments, approves pardons, hears veterans' appeals and approves all contract cost overruns.

Cosentino said he will continue to hold his position at OCS if he is elected.

The council only meets once a week and members are paid a little over $10,000, he said.