The City Council agreed today to a hearing to press for action to keep BTD and other city workers safe on the streets following a Friday attack in Grove Hall that sent a BTD supervisor - just months from retirement - to the hospital with serious injuries. Read more.
Last week, Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) demanded and won immediate passage of a federal public-safety grant, which he said was too important to wait for a hearing so that the council's four new councilors and others could get up to speed on it. Read more.
After years of Milton residents fretting about evil Bostonians swarming their town, it's time for some turnabout: The executive board of the Cedar Grove Civic Association in Dorchester says its residents should join the fight against a ballot question in Milton that would allow denser development in parts of that town, to keep more commuting Miltonians from swarming their neighborhood. Read more.
City Councilors Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, downtown) and Erin Murphy (at large) yesterday sounded an alarm about a for-profit company's plans to open an urgent-care clinic less than a block away from the South Boston Community Health Center on West Broadway, warning that the new clinic could skim patients with disposable income away, threatening the health center's long-term viability and its commitment to caring for people who couldn't otherwise afford to see a doctor. Read more.
Weber explains his proposal.
The Boston City Council yesterday agreed to look at setting up a pilot program to help tenants facing eviction by giving them access to a housing attorney. Read more.
Ed Flynn, worrying about Boston's neighboring cities.
The Boston City Council today approved a $13.3-million federal homeland-security grant without the normally required hearing after Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, downtown) warned there was no time left, that surrounding communities that would share the grant need the money now. Read more.
Mayor Wu is asking the City Council to begin deliberating the end of an independent BPDA - which she wants to subsume into a new Boston Planning Department completely under the control of the mayor and the city council - and with a new emphasis on urban planning and affordable housing. Read more.
City Councilor Julia Mejia (at large) had a proposed grant from the Department of Homeland Security sent to a committee for further study before the committee as a whole votes on the grant, which would fund regional anti-terrorism and natural-disaster response.
WBUR recaps Mayor Wu's annual state of the city address, notes that unlike last time, she made no mention of rent stabilization, which would require approval from a state government that isn't feeling it.
The owners of 21 North End restaurants and the North End Chamber of Commerce yesterday sued the city over its 2022 fees for restaurants in the neighborhood that wanted to use public sidewalks and streets for patio seating - and its ban on such patios last year - alleging the Wu administration and a local residents' groups hate Italians for some reason. Read more.
The State House News Service reports on at-large Councilor Ruthzee Louijeune's plans for the office in which she replaces Councilor Ed Flynn.
The conspiracy. See it larger.
Shiva Ayyadurai, who has more MIT degrees than you, has filed a new federal lawsuit in which he alleges a federal cybersecurity agency, Facebook, Google and Elon Musk's X are all conspiring to limit his social-media reach - with a reaction time measured in minutes and using techniques perfected by British censors and the Massachusetts Secretary of State's office. Read more.
The State House News Service reports that State Sen. Nick Collins of South Boston has teamed up with a Worcester County Republican to file legislation that would bar cities and towns from deciding whether to accept federal public-safety grants, after the Boston City Council rejected a $13.3-million Homeland Security grant. Read more.
Update: Thanks to a reader who is far more eagle-eyed, we've updated the story because there are three candidates from Massachusetts listed on that ballot.
Take a look at an official New Hampshire Democratic primary ballot and after you realize that Joe Biden isn't listed (because he believes New Hampshire has had more than its 15 minutes worth of first-primary-in-the-nation fame), you'll notice three candidates from Massachusetts: Perennial head-boot wearer and pony promiser Vermin Supreme of Rockport and Don Picard of Cambridge. Read more.
Wu and Bennett's nephew, Joey, hug as other Bennett familiy members and Alan Swanson look on.
Mayor Wu and Police Commissioner Michael Cox today apologized to Willie Bennett and Alan Swanson, who were investigated and even arrested for supposedly killing Carol Stuart when, in fact, it was her husband Charles who shot her after they left a childbirth class at Brigham and Women's Hospital on Oct. 23, 1989. Read more.
No doubt you've heard about all the racists jumping on Michelle Wu because somebody in her office goofed and sent out an invitation to an Electeds of Color Christmas party to white councilors, instead of just the Black and Latino ones. It's been in all the papers. Read more.
Louijeune explains her votes.
The City Council today rejected an anti-terrorism grant from the federal Department of Homeland Security when it deadlocked, 6-6, on accepting the grant. Read more.
Flynn before realizing why Mohamed (l) and Blackmon were getting the congratulations he'd signed.
The Boston City Council yesterday officially congratulated two New Mission High School students for their activism without realizing that that involved organizing a walkout at the Hyde Park school last week to call for an end to Israeli warfare in Gaza and freedom for Palestine. Read more.
Boston city councilors today condemned what they call an abuse by the state-owned Reggie Lewis Center at Roxbury Crossing: Boston student athletes have to clear out by 3:30 p.m. so busloads of students from well-off suburbs can use its state-of-the-art facilities for training and not get home too late. Read more.
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