City Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) said yesterday the city should expand its side-street speed-hump program to the city's main thoroughfares - and lower the citywide speed limit - to reduce the number of pedestrians sent to the grave by impatient speeders. Read more.
The City Council today unanimously approved a $110-million fund to help finance new housing in the city through low-cost loans for new housing that meets certain city criteria for affordable units, the use of minority- and women-owned subcontractors and climate resiliency. Read more.
Mayor Wu said today she'll ask the City Council to ask the state Legislature to increase commercial tax rates over a three-year-period to help ease the tax burden on homeowners - and hopes that now that homeowners have actually gotten their tax bills, state Sen. Nick Collins of South Boston might change his mind about letting his constituents get walloped. Read more.
The Herald reports Councilor Ed Flynn has concluded he can't raise enough money to take on incumbent Michelle Wu, so will instead run for re-election this year.
The City Council today agreed to look at eliminating current parking requirements for residential development across the city as a way of spurring new housing - although some councilors vowed to fight the proposal, warning it would destroy Boston's working class and drive low-income residents out of the city. Read more.
At hearing, mother took items out of her diaper bag: Diapers, wipes, a spare onesie and a sharps container for discarded needles on the ground.
At a hearing on public-safety issues downtown and around Boston Common today, Elizabeth Vizza had a request for suburbanite do-gooders who keep coming to the Common to feed the homeless: Stop! Read more.
The Boston City Council yesterday voted to accept millions of dollars in federal grants for projects across the city, including $20 million to upgrade Melnea Cass Boulevard, Malcolm X Boulevard and Warren Street in Roxbury, $11.4 million to plant hundreds of new trees and bolster an urban-forestry work training program and $2.3 million in two separate grants to help upgrade, expand and staff a Boston Rescue Mission program downtown that houses and train immigrants released from federal detention. Read more.
The City Council today rejected a resolution by Councilors Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) and Erin Murphy (at large) calling on the state to take over the city election department because of Election Day problems that included numerous precincts across the city running out of ballots. Read more.
Louijeune calling for a hearing and soon.
Both Secretary of State William Galvin and the Boston City Council decided today to investigate how precincts across the city ran out of ballots and numerous other ways voters had obstacles placed in the way of casting their ballots, from one polling place not having any working lights to voters with disabilities being refused access to handicap parking spaces at another. Read more.
The City Council voted 12-1 today to ask the state legislature and the governor to let Boston increase the tax rate on commercial properties to higher levels than normally allowed over three years as a way to protect homeowners from potentially large property tax rates. Read more.
The City Council yesterday approved holding a hearing at which to consider ways to combat what some said was drug use and related violence that are so bad they are making some residents think of moving away and of threatening Boston's tourism industry. Read more.
Politico reports a group of "veterans across Massachusetts" has started work to convince City Councilor Ed Flynn, and a Navy vet himself, to run for mayor next year. It has an official PR spokesman, who now has his own PR firm but who, Politico notes, is "an alum" of Regan Communications, which is run, of course, by George Regan, who wants to "save our city" from those dreaded left-wingers like Michelle Wu.
Ed Flynn being not happy about the first week of school busing.
Boston City Councilors ordered up a hearing today at which to press Boston school officials to explain how the new BPS Zum (pronounced "zoom," but for obvious reasons not spelled that way) app that was supposed to make BPS buses run as softly as a cloud instead led to some buses not showing up in the morning for an hour or more - and some kids riding buses home for up to three hours as their poor, befuddled drivers tried to navigate Boston's dropped-bowl-of-spaghetti roads. Read more.
After a man was stabbed in Downtown Crossing yesterday, City Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) called on the city to end all organized events on the Common: Read more.
The Boston City Council will consider a proposal by Councilor Brian Worrell (Dorchester) to deal with the issue of big-ass SUVs making it harder for people with driveways to see oncoming traffic as they pull out by letting homeowners create yellow-paint no-parking areas 18 inches on either side of their driveways - and then calling for $25 fines for people who disregard those zones. Read more.
The Boston City Council today agreed to look at using rodent birth-control pellets to try to control the city's burgeoning supply of rats, by building on a pilot started in Jamaica Plain last year that one councilor said had meant an 80% reduction in the gnawing, long-tailed vermin. Read more.
Councilor Fernandes Anderson decrying death and destruction in Gaza.
The City Council yesterday formally recognized Eid Al-Fitr, the end of the Muslim sacred month of Ramadan - after Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson (Roxbury), who is Muslim, gave an impassioned plea on behalf of the people of Gaza. Read more.
City councilors today agreed with a move by Councilor Ed Flynn (South Boston, South End, Chinatown, Downtown) to look at doing way more to keep pedstrians alive - the day after a man in a wheelchair died under the wheels of a concrete truck on Frontage Road and the week after a 4-year-old girl died under the wheels of a pickup behind the Children's Museum. Read more.
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