Politics

People who vote in Brookline this year - whether at early voting locations or at their normal polls on Election Day - won't be getting those hum-drum little oval "I Voted" stickers that voters in certain neighboring communities can expect. In a statement, Town Clerk Ben Kaufman said:

These stickers were made to increase attention to elections and help drive voter engagement. Any chance we have to talk to voters and encourage them to make their voices heard in our elections is an opportunity we will take.

Scott Van Vorhis reports a possible deal between Mayor Wu and the heads of area businesses and local commercial property owners on a plan that would let Boston temporarily increase taxes on commercial property to minimize the amount city homeowners would see their bills go up because of the Covid-related decline in property values downtown - just by a smaller amount than Wu had originally proposed. The move still needs the approval of the legislature and governor.

A correspondent forwards this video of some Trump supporters in Brookline's Coolidge Corner today, waving, among other things, the flag Iran used until the Shah was overthrown in 1979, as the Orange One blares about how he'll ban vaccinations in schools and suppress transgender athletes, in one of the places least likely to vote for him - in 2020, Biden defeated tfg 87-11 in Brookline.

Harvard acted to bar outsiders from the Yard after somebody, apparently not affiliated with the university, vandalized the statue and the building with red paint as a protest against Israeli actions in Gaza, the Crimson reports.

Eric Adams and Michelle Wu both won election in 2021. About a year later, the New York Times posed the question of which leadership style Democrats wanted. Given events of the past couple days, you think the Times would ever ask that again? Read more.

Our own Ron Newman took in the BSO's free Concert for the City, which featured Mayor Wu performing a piano solo of Gershwin's "Rhapsody in Blue." Before the main event, the Pops Gospel Choir performed.

Dorchester Reporter publishers Bill and Linda Dorcena Forry (she was the first Haitian-American to be elected a Massachusetts state senator) state the obvious in a city with a large Haitian community.

Smith reports on a minivan turned sound truck roaming around the South End last night, "imploring me to vote for Roy Owens in November." Read more.

Lisa Kashinsky reports Democratic voters in Suffolk County have picked Allison Cartwright, who has actual legal and managerial experience, as the next Suffolk County clerk of the Supreme Judicial Court. Read more.

Bill Walczak, who once served as president of Carney Hospital, explains - and notes that a private company stationed an ambulance at the now closed hospital over the weekend, because people who needed ER care kept driving up.