What follows are my notes on the debate tonight. Props to Jon Keller for coming up with a form that allowed for an actual debate, rather than one of those stilted side-by-side affairs where the candidates never really address each other. Although with four people running, an hour was too short.
Who won? I'm terrible at judging things like that. At times, it seemed like a debate between Menino, Yoon and McCrea, with Flaherty on the sidelines. Yoon seemed too focused on Menino as the leader of SPECTRE, McCrea seemed too focused on getting the other three indicted, and Menino veered from the question sometimes (like answering some question about city finances by talking about how diverse city commissions are). But if you watched it, what do you think?
Is Boston better or worse off than four years ago?
Flaherty: We could be better. Number of areas where we're deficient: Public education. Crime. Way too many murders.
McCrea: We've had four years of essentially stagnation. We've had a corrupt City Hall. Licenses behind closed doors. Stagnating development. I want to make Boston the most open, honest and transparent city in America.
Menino. We're making progress in schools. Lowest crime rate in 40 years. Green jobs. This is about the future. We have a stablized tax rate.
Yoon: On average, we're not better off. Too many young people being murdered. We have a dropout rate that has not decreased. The Filene's Hole. A system in which a single person, the mayor, has all the power to make decisions and control city government.
Flaherty: Street workers can help cut crime, which I learned as assistant DA. The mayor cut street workers.
Menino: The police can't do it alone. We have 59 street workers, more than in many years. That's what I'm famous for, working together.
Yoon: Strong mayor system, that as a system of government does not incentivize participation. You need to give up some power to share with the DA and community groups to fight crime.
Menino: VIP program, working with families of troubled youth, peace teams. It's not just the police, it's the community.
McCrea: The mayor likes to say we have a low tax rate. It's not true. 40% higher than Cambridge. Flaherty is not only one with court experience. I successfully sued City Council over open-meeting violations.
Flaherty: (To McCrea): There was no malfeasance, city councilors were doing what they thought best. I've moved on from it, I've learned a valuable lesson. It won't happen with me as mayor.
Police details
McCrea: End police details. Have policemen fighting crime.
Menino: Details help fight crime. Give us 200 additional police officers in our city. Help solve crime. About same cost as flagmen.
Yoon: Number closer to 400. No study to actually prove that they fight crime.
Flaherty: High-potency drugs, proliferation of guns, so uniformed trained officers help fight crime. If it wasn't for paid details some neighborhoods wouldn't see police officers at all.
McCrea: We could hire tons of people in Dorchester, Mattapan and Roxbury at $15/hour as flagmen.
Menino: I saw a study that shows approximately same cost for uniformed officers and civilian flagmen. So I'd rather have trained officer on Mass. Ave.
Yoon: This is not performance based management
Menino: So why are we invited to a conference about performance-based management?
Yoon: So why no 311?
Menino: We have 635-4500.
Why is Boston continuing to lose private jobs but add municipal jobs?
Menino: Growth in city payroll is to improve schools, police and fire. Businesses are growing in Boston: Life sciences, Legal Seafood development.
Yoon: The issue is the BRA.
Flaherty: We need to stimulate green and creative economy. So many artists are leaving our city for places like Providence. And stimulating green companies means improving schools to provide trained workers.
McCrea: Flaherty was for fat government until he decided to run for mayor. Businesses don't want to come to Boston because of corruption.
Menino: The BRA preserved 9,500 units of affordable housing. The BRA does so many good things. BRA is a change agent and people don't like change.
Yoon: There are lies, there are damn lies and there are statistics, and that's what the mayor is giving us. Ray Flynn was more of a master builder than Menino.
Flaherty: McCrea, I did not oppose budget because I'm running for mayor.
McCrea: 1 Beacon St. gets tax break for being in a "blighted" area.
Yoon: We have so much talent in Boston for community development. Let's tap that.
Menino: Sam talks about community development corporations. 20 CDC directors endorsed me.
McCrea: Eliminating BRA means nothing if mayor still controls everything. Would give control over planning to the City Council.
Yoon: That would take reforming the city charter, which specifies the current strong-mayor system.
Charter schools
Yoon: I support lifting of caps on charter schools, but it won't be a magic bullet. The Athens of America has no excuse for not having world-class schools.
Flaherty: Need lifting of a cap, too many people leaving Boston because of current lottery system. Autonomy for principals, school-level budgeting.
McCrea: Charter schools are the latest buzzwords for these politicians to pretend they care about public schools. We know what really works: Longer school days, longer school years, more parental involvment. I won't cut the school budget. I will visit every school over two years to find out what they need.
Menino: In-district charter schools. I wasn't against charters schools by themselves but because of the issue of financing charter schools by taking money from public schools.
Flaherrty: 24,000 dropouts. Too many chronically underperfoming schools.
McCrea: Why don't they just expand the cap on the schools they all send their kids to? These three all got their kids into their first-choice schools. What a miracle. I'm going to change that.
Residency law for city workers
Flaherty: For it. What frustrates a lot of folks is that a lot of people have left our city, due to schools or public safety. Fix those, goes a long way to stabilize our city.
McCrea: In favor. Would offer low-interest loans to city workers to help them buy houses.
Menino: In favor. Schools are not there yet, folks, I admit that, but they're on right track. Diversity of our neighborhoods.
Yoon: Make city workers live here, but we have to get rid of patronage. Mr. Mayor, with all due respect, you have too much power.
Menino: Most of my department heads didn't work for my campaign.
Yoon: Term limits.
Flaherty: Menino ran on residency requirement, but he let up on it.
McCrea: These city councilors haven't stood up to patronage, like Ted Kennedy did with Iraq war.
Brightest new idea on money?
McCrea: Money is not a chronic problem. The problem is corruption at City Hall and a mayor who cried wolf so he could get meals, hotel taxes.
Menino: We've had the highest bond rating ever. We know how to manage our city well. We aved $30M in debt renegotiation. Kevin, we'll give you a lesson in budget management, because you don't understand it.
Yoon: Look at the BRA and centralization of power.
Menino: Diversity of our city.
McCrea: Menino practicing Reaganomics, giving breaks to fatcats.
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