On November 3, 1998, Paul Cellucci was elected Governor of Massachusetts. He had been serving as Governor since July 1997 when Bill Weld resigned the post. Cellucci was elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts in 1990 on a ticket with former Governor Bill Weld.
Paul Cellucci’s career in government began in 1970 when he was elected to the Hudson Charter Commission. One year later he won a seat on the Hudson Board of Selectmen and he served on that panel until 1977. In 1976 he was elected to the first of four terms in the Massachusetts House of Representatives. In 1984, Cellucci was elected to the Massachusetts Senate from the Middlesex and Worcester District, and during his third Senate term became the Assistant Republican Leader.
Cellucci, a strong advocate for smaller government and lower taxes, signed the largest tax cut in Massachusetts’ history. He has also been a leader in education reform, access to health care, and the fight against domestic violence.
Cellucci’s private sector experience includes almost 30 years of work with his family’s auto dealership, and 17 years in the private practice of law, eventually serving as partner in the Hudson law firm of Kittredge, Cellucci and Moreira, P.C.
Cellucci received his law degree from Boston College Law School in 1973. In 1970, he graduated from the Boston College School of Management where he served in the Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC). Cellucci also served in the U.S. Army Reserves from 1970 until 1978 when he was honorably discharged with the rank of Captain.
Both natives of Massachusetts, Cellucci, 52, and his wife Jan Garnett, reside in Hudson with their two children. Jan is a librarian at Boston College. Their daughter Kate recently graduated from Boston College and Anne is a senior at Harvard.
On November 3, 1998, Jane Swift was elected Lieutenant Governor of Massachusetts. Her career in government began in 1991 when, at 25, she was the youngest woman ever elected to the Massachusetts State Senate. Swift quickly made her mark, becoming the youngest woman in Senate history to serve in either party’s leadership when she rose to the rank of Assistant Minority Leader. While running for Congress in 1996, Glamour magazine listed her as one of "Eleven Women Who Could Change the Country." As a member of the Senate, Swift advocated effectively for her constituents, paying special attention to the issues of education and the budget. As a member of the Senate Ways & Means Committee, she helped steer much of the Weld-Cellucci economic recovery program into law. Swift also helped craft the historic Education Reform Act of 1993 as a member of the Education Reform Conference Committee.
In 1997, Swift became Director of the Massachusetts Office of Consumer Affairs and Business Regulation and had been Director of Regional Airport Development at the Massachusetts Port Authority before assuming that position.
Following her swearing in as Lt. Governor, Swift chaired the transition team for the new Cellucci-Swift Administration. Privacy was raised as a major concern during the transition period and Swift filed an omnibus bill covering both online and offline privacy protections. In January of this year, she was chosen to be a member of the Federal Trade Commission’s Advisory Committee on Online Access and Security and is the only elected official to sit on the panel.
Swift graduated from the North Adams Public Schools and earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from Trinity College in 1987. She is a corporator of the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts and sits on the Board of Directors for the Western Massachusetts Girl Scout Council.
Swift, 35, is a native of North Adams. She, her husband, Chuck Hunt, and their daughter, Elizabeth, who was born two weeks before Swift was elected, now reside at Hunt’s family farm in Williamstown.