Councilor Scapicchio to join influential law firm.

(Via Blog for Boston.)

Boston City Council candidate at-large, Kevin McCrea, points to a possible conflict of interest in District 1 Councilor Paul Scapicchio's new job with an influential law firm.

...Disrict Councilor Paul Scapicchio is joining the huge lawfirm of Mintz Levin "of counsel". The article says that the councilor "will do some work on ML Strategies real estate and (for) public policy clients." Does anyone else thinks that this sounds very much like a conflict of interest?

Mintz Levin is a huge lawfirm, with some of the most influential lawyers in the city such as Bob Popeo. In the past they have actually represented the City of Boston on Bond matters and perhaps other issues. They also represent big real estate developers.

How can an elected city official be available to be hired to work to represent a client with business before the city, whether it be by him or the firm he represents.

McCrea's blog has some good info/news about the Boston City Council. His latest post has Mintz Levin's response to the above concern, which fails to address the conflict of interest question.