By JOSEPH B. NADEAU

WOONSOCKET — Edward O. Boucher, 70, a past member of the Woonsocket School Committee and former member of the Rhode Island House of Representatives, died Wednesday at his home on Newton Avenue after a long struggle to recover from debilitating injuries.

“He was a great and very selfless person,” Boucher’s son, Edward M. Boucher, said Friday while recalling his father and his long career in public service. “He helped people and that’s how he looked at the world.”
In addition to raising his own family of four children — Ed, Darrin M. Boucher of Pascoag, Lisa E. Forestal of Mapleville, and Sandra D. Oppenheim of Woonsocket — Boucher was also a foster parent to many other children over the years.
A former president of the Woonsocket Bar Association and a graduate of Suffolk University Law School, he had served as an associate municipal court judge for the city and as a bail commissioner for the Police Department for many years.
Boucher suffered life-threatening injuries when attacked in his home by Theodore H. Cox Jr., who was alleged to have kicked him repeatedly in the head during the Jan. 4, 2003, assault.
Cox, 34 at the time, was arrested in Cranston after fleeing to that community in Boucher’s car. He later pled to assault charges in connection with the incident.
The injuries Boucher suffered in the attack required him to undergo several surgeries at Rhode Island Hospital, followed by a period of recovery at Rehabilitation Hospital of Rhode Island, before returning to his home.
Boucher made a remarkable return to the School Committee as his recovery continued, and although  he relinquishing his leadership role to Vice Chairman Peter Vangel, he served out the remainder of his term.
It was Boucher’s dedication to local schools that had earned the goodwill of Vangel, 80, a retired school administrator and superintendent with service in both Woonsocket and Bellingham.
“He was a person who was quite interested in what happened in his community and he ran the School Committee very nicely,” Vangel said. “He always gave people the opportunity to express themselves,” he said.
Boucher had first served on the panel between 1987 and 1991, a period when cuts in state aid compelled the school department to operate on austerity budgets.
He remained a fiscal conservative when returning to the panel in 1999, working with Vangel, who was of a similar mind, to ensure the school department’s fiscal resources were well spent.
“He was very conscientious about what he was doing and very conscientious that the school department’s money was spent in the proper way,” Vangel said.
 Like Vangel, Boucher took great pride in the work he did toward completing the school department’s $14.9 million school improvement bond, in particular, the construction of the new Edward Harris Elementary School on High School Street.
The School Committee led by Bouhcher had to accept design changes that made the Harris project more expensive. The panel won support from the city in that effort, Vangel noted.
“He had a deep interest in what was happening in his community and he had a liking for what happened in the school department,” Vangel said.
Boucher had also held a city record when, as a 25-year-old local Republican, he got himself elected as the youngest member of the House of Representatives at the time. He was credited with reviving the city’s long-dormant Republican Party with his Sixth District victory, earning the smae kind of credit when he returned to local politics in the 1980s.
  A 1956 graduate of Woonsocket High School, Boucher earned his undergraduate degree from Providence College in 1960. He worked as a special assistant state attorney general under Herbert F. DeSimone, and again from 1985 to 1987 when he was appointed by Attorney General Arlene Violet to handle welfare fraud cases. Boucher also worked as legal counsel to the state Department of Employment Security.
Boucher was an active member of many local civic groups including the Woonsocket Fine Arts Society, the Woonsocket Jaycees, the Greater Woonsocket Chamber of Commerce, the St. Joseph’s Cub Scout Pack Committee, the Big Brothers Association, the Woonsocket Heart Fund and the Rhode Island Red Cross.
While working on the School Committee, he helped create the school’s Department’s Recognition Awards  program during the 1980s and revived that effort upon his return in 1999, putting on tuxedo-style presentations of the awards in the high Sschool auditorium.
He was also known for his love of humor, his son Ed said, even as he continued to struggle with his disabilities. A frequent visitor to the Woonsocket Senior Center, jokes and laughter were his trademark.
“His sense of humor stayed with him right through his whole life,” his son said.
Boucher’s funeral is under the direction of the Fournier and Fournier Funeral Home, 99 Cumberland St. His funeral Mass will be held Wednesday at 10:30 a.m. in St. Joseph’s Church, Mendon Road, Woonsocket.