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BC won't change name of Yawkey Athletics Center

Boston can change the name of Yawkey Way all it wants, but BC says it's sticking with the Yawkey name for its athletic center, named to honor a $15-million grant from the Yawkey Foundation, the Heights reports.

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Comments

If I were the Yawkey Foundation and they did change it, I'd want my money back.

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Within the past few years, there's been an upswell of donors suing organizations, colleges included, because the terms of their donation/grant were not honored. If the naming of the building was in the terms of the donation/grant, they could take some or all of the money back from BC.

BC may not have a choice, either keep the building name or return the money.

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Sure, as long as neither Yawkey or the Foundation never look any tax breaks on the donation. If they did, it should be seen as a donation. If they did not, it can rightfully be seen as a purchase of naming rights. When Unilever P&G bought the naming rights of the stadium in Foxboro, they didn't get to write that off as a donation, and neither should Yawkey.

Edit: wrong multinational.

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Unilever? Nope, Gillette/Procter & Gamble.

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Why would you even want the money from an org named after a racist?

If BC really cared about its principles, it would give the money back, regardless of how it impacted them.

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I am waiting to see if they change the name of Yawkey station. If they do then they will have to change the name of Lechmere station and several other stations named after slave owners.

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Richard Lechmere was a slave owner AND a Tory, who fled to England at the start of the revolution and never returned. Nothing should be complicated about that case.

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Racist history aside, I’d always thought the Yawkey Foundation was at least a legit charity… like used for building facilities for hospitals, community centers, or at the very “worst” the children’s museum… WTF was the Yawkey Foundation doing funding a college athletic department?

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an organization with balls.

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You could just as easily argue that telling a wealthy donor to screw off by changing the name of the building would take big brass ones, no?

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... calls the tune. The difference between, say, on the one hand Princeton changing the name of stuff named for Woodrow Wilson, and, on the other, BC changing the name of the Yawkey center, is that Princeton chose to bestow the Woodrow Wilson name of its own volition; whereas BC sold the right to name the Yawkey center in a financial transaction. Once you've sold something you can't take it back.

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I'll be so happy when this renaming craze winds down.

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Then we won't have to trouble our little padded heads with the information that most filthy rich organizations made their money through oppression of minorities and women!

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Call it the Yawkey Foundation Athletics Center.

The Yawkey Foundation does some great things and deserves to be honored for giving $15M (albeit, they could have also used that money to help more people than an athletics center).

Tom Yawkey doesn't.

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Why?

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1) Fitzpatrick.
2) Pumpsie Green.

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All this could be avoided by just performing the charitable act without any attention whoring at all.

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All this could be avoided by just performing the charitable act without any attention whoring at all.

It's pretty clear from the excerpted contractual language that this could just as easily be characterized as "buying naming rights" as it could "performing a charitable act."

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So give them their money back. That will fix things.

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Jean Yawkey didn't leave money to BC and MGH to "further her brand." (I swear this is like kids who know snippets of information but can't quite pull it all together as a coherent thought.)

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Jean Yawkey didn't leave money to BC and MGH to "further her brand."

Of course she did. Look at names on older Boston buildings. Study the old Boston Yankees and their Calvinism a bit. Why do you think the foundation insists on naming rights if you don't think they believe they're getting something of value in return?

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but they wont change the name of a building named after a racist? sounds right.

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Not shocking given the level of racism I've seen thrown around at BC football games by their white suburban fans. Gotta pander to the donors, after all.

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She is the one who left the bulk of her fortune to various charitable trusts which help people around Boston, including money that came years later after the sale of the team. She did more good all these keyboard warriors ever will. Talk about your attention whores.

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Well it s easier to be charitable when you marry a sports team owner.

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BC should change the name. If the Yawkey Foundation wants their money back, then so be it. $15 million is about 215 tuitions. Besides, I am SURE they have $15 million laying around somewhere- they made off like a bandit when they bought Lake Street from the Archdiocese. BC should do what’s right and step up. If they really want to make a difference, they’ll change the center to make up for some of the wrongs the college needs to address. Maybe call it the Lou Montgomery Athletic Center.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2012/09/01/first-...

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