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Michael Flaherty and transparency
By adamg on Sun, 01/25/2009 - 11:59am
We have our first fight of the young mayoral campaign - over openness in city goverrnment.
In his announcement video, City Councilor Michael Flaherty makes a point of the need for transparency in city government and how he's against closed-door government. Kevin McCrea, who announced his campaign last week, wonders if that means Flaherty will disclose all the clients of his private law firm who do business with the city or if Flaherty will make a personal appearance in Suffolk Superior Court on Feb. 24 when a judge tries to do something about McCrea et al v. Michael Flaherty and the Boston City Council, the case in which the city has already admitted repeatedly violating the state's Open Meeting Law.
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Comments
How about the BRA and all those development deals?
How about the travesty of Dubai-on-the-Harbor that Menino has built? A once in a century development opportunity, and look at the crap we see built - all with "favored" architects and developers.
How about all of the buildings Menino names after himself? Fer God's sake, mayor, you should let others memorialize you after you're out of office, don't memorialize yourself! What's next, a Kim Jong Il style statue of him on City Hall Plaza?
Thank God someone is seriously running. We need relief from the oppressive hand of Menino and new ideas. My contribution will be on the wire as soon as Flaherty has his website up.
Aside from the extension to the Hyde Park library ...
What buildings are named after Menino?
Boston University Med Center
Adam - there's a Menino wing of the BU Med Center - you drive under it as you go along Mass Ave toward the Expressway. Any others out there?
Oh - and do all those signs that say Welcome to (fill in the Neighborhood), Thomas Menino, Mayor count as buildings?
Thanks, didn't know about that one
Signs don't count. Every mayor/governor has them.
Megalomaniacal Menino
There's also an elderly housing project named for him on Geneva Avenue in Dorchester. How can the BHA name a project after a sitting mayor, and how could BMC and BPL name buildings after him?
Plus, the Herald reported that there is a deal to name the Convention Center after him.
It's creepy and Stalinist.
McCrea is the better candidate
It looks to me like Flaherty is stealing sound bites from McCrea's platform. Flaherty has acted against / resisted efforts to bring transparency to the City Council.
Although McCrea and I are of different parties and differ in several of our views, if he can bring transparency to City government and help push out the career/professional politicians in favor of outsiders he has my full support and my vote. This alone would go a long way towards eliminating corruption and cronyism.
Politics should be an avocation, for citizens who take leave from their professional lives in order to bring their fresh perspective to whichever seat they occupy. They should then go back to their respective professions. We should also have re-districting set by an independant body based on some simple division by grid or other straightforward geographical method and once set, no gerrymandering by sitting politicians should be allowed.
What do they actually do when you contact them for public info?
They are in denial when it comes to sunshine open public meetings principles, FOI Freedom of Information public records principles of open government. They merely enunciate the principles well enough but in practice do otherwise. It's not their words. It's what they actually do when you contact them for public information.
They appear to believe they do the right thing. But they don't.
The Zak
All hail The Zak - the zenmeister of the political blogosphere!
Who is this masked man of the ethernet!