Boston City Hall concludes 2022 with a well-stocked mayor’s cabinet that includes several members with Dorchester ties.
Mary Skipper, principal of Boston Public Schools (BPS), was a resident, founder of TechBoston Academy, formerly known as Dorchester High School, and Police Commissioner Michael Cox, before moving to Ann Arbor. I lived in the neighborhood. Michigan.
After working for the City of Detroit and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Arthur Jemison returned to Dorchester and moved into a three-story condo. He previously worked for Governor Deval Patrick’s Office of Housing, the Massachusetts Port Authority, the Boston Housing Authority, and the Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA).
“I wanted to go back to my neighborhood because it’s where my family and I had a great time,” he told reporters earlier this year.
Of course, it’s worth noting that there are other people in the Wu administration who are associated with Dorchester. Dion Eilish, Operations Director, and Mariama White-Hammond, Environmental Director, are also founders of Dorchester’s New Roots His AME Church. Wu’s head of communications, Jessica Pierre, lives in Dorchester and is a former reporter and columnist.
But new recruits Jemison, Skipper, and Cox have one more thing in common. We all face the challenge of rebuilding public trust that has been shattered in the face of scandals and public skepticism about public institutions.
Despite being rebranded under the Walsh administration, residents continue to view the Boston Planning and Development Authority (BPDA, but formally the Boston Redevelopment Authority) with suspicion. He continued to be a candidate’s punching bag in the 2021 mayoral race.
The city remains one of the safest cities in America, and the Boston Police Department houses criminals from overtime thieves to long-time union leaders convicted of child rape.
In BPS, enrollment continues to decline as violence rocks some schools. Wu managed to stem the state’s takeover of municipal schools just days before the school board voted to select a skipper by a narrow margin.
Skipper joined Wu at an event in Matapan the day after the vote and told reporters she’s lived in the neighborhood for nearly 30 years. . “I feel like I’m coming back to Boston, the place that literally raised me as an educator, where I learned to be a teacher, where I learned to be a principal, where I learned to be a district leader. is very natural and works in the community where I live.”
Mattapan’s Campbell wins AG race, government reveals Healey as first gay
The City Council has become the starting point for more highly elected offices in the last decade than it has in the last decade. Mattapan’s girlfriend Andrea Campbell added her name to the list this year.
Months after losing the 2021 mayoral primary, Campbell turned to running for Attorney General. (Charlie Baker, part of a dwindling crew of moderate Republicans in Massachusetts, has flipped the domino effect by saying he won’t run for re-election.)
The Democratic primary hinged largely on Campbell, who represented Matapan and Dorchester as 4th District Councilors, and Shannon Rhys Riordan, a labor attorney who put more than $9 million of his own money into the campaign. . Campbell raised millions of dollars from donors and was backed by an outside group, also known as a Super PAC, which has few funding restrictions.
Campbell won the primary by 16 points, defeating Republican candidate Cape Cod attorney James McMahon and giving the Massachusetts Democrats another win. She is the first black woman elected statewide to hold an office for the AG.
In the same ballot, Healy won, becoming the first woman elected, the first openly gay, and to win the corner office chairman. A rioter who never won more than 34 percent of the vote in a Massachusetts presidential election.
In Boston, Deal lost by more than 100,000 votes. This was a much larger margin than when Baker had lost the Democratic Party home four years earlier by about 4,000 votes.
Also on the ballot this year was the so-called billionaire tax, which was passed by 52% to 48% in favor. The constitutional amendment, which proponents say would transfer billions of dollars to education and transportation accounts, would set an additional state income tax of 4% on annual taxable income over $1 million. increase. Taxes will be due next Sunday.
down vote brawl
The statewide race was mild compared to what was happening in the polls. Towards the Suffolk District Attorney’s bitter tussle dominated the headlines.
The Boston Globe landed like a depth charge on the running candidate.
Hayden won 53.5% and Arroyo 45.6%, with 8,340 voting to skip the race. Hayden did not run against Republican opponents in the general election.
Primary elections also played a decisive role in the 2nd Suffolk Senate District and 5th Suffolk House of Representatives elections. His two seats are the result of Senator Sonia Chan Diaz, who was first elected in 2008, deciding to run for governor. She took a break from her campaign in June.
State Rep. Liz Miranda won a primary that included fellow State Rep. Nika Elgard, former state senator Diane Wilkerson, and former federal housing official Minyad Culpepper. In the race for Miranda’s seat, Boston planning and development staffer Chris Worrell defeated former Walsh administration aide Danielson Tavares.
Miranda and Worrell will take the oath of office and will begin their two-year term next week.
5 new council members active.reorganize the body
This year marks the 200th anniversary of the city of Boston, joining 13 city council members with five new members. Its first government consisted of the mayor, aldermen, and her 55-member Common Council. With the reforms of 1909, the city council became one, and further changes (such as the number of incumbents) took place over the years. As Mayor Wu pointed out at an open-air swearing-in ceremony last January, it would take more than 100 years for women or people of color to be elected to the city council. was the first woman elected to the city council on behalf of the
New members included Ruthzee Louiseune, the first Haitian American. Former teacher, Dorchester Erin Murphy. Tania Fernandez Anderson of Roxbury, the first Muslim immigrant from Cape Verde. Dorchester’s Brian Worrell became the first black member of the city council since 2017 when Tito Jackson gave up his seat to run for mayor. And Jamaica Plain’s Kendra Lara is the first person of color to represent District 6. Election. )
The thirteen immediately set to work choosing the Chairman of the Council, an internally elected office. But while Ed Flynn won the presidency and the bigger office that came with it, he won it with the help of Ricardo Arroyo and his Hyde Park Alderman allies, and Arroyo gained a lot of influence. I continued to exercise.
It became apparent in the battle over redrawing congressional district boundaries, also known as redistricting. Flynn stripped Arroyo of his chairmanship amid escalating legislative conflict. This included responsibility for bringing to the mayor’s desk a new map focused on the district’s population diversification. The move drew criticism from Arroyo’s allies over the lack of due process.
But both ostensibly and behind the scenes, Arroyo worked with outside supporters and new chairman Liz Bleddon of Allston Brighton to create a compromise. The one that passed 9-4 and was signed by Mayor Kure had the Arroyo stamp.
The cacophony played during the Attorney General’s race carried over into the twists and turns of the reorganization, as the Attorney Generals squabbled over which constituencies would go where for weeks. Frank Baker, a Dorchester Hayden supporter who called Arroyo a “predator” on the council floor, saw a significant portion of his district south move into the one Worrell represented. Meanwhile, Flynn lost several South Boston neighborhoods to Baker.
Before the final map vote, an enraged Baker accused Bleddon of having anti-Catholic prejudices. Breddon fought back, telling his colleague: I stand for the right of Hispanic, Asian, Black, and other minority communities to have equal access to the ballot and elect the candidate of their choice. “
On Dec. 20, just days after the last city council meeting of the year, Flynn sent out a summary calling 2022 a “year of transition” for the city. The memo included her $2.2 million for parks and playgrounds, her support for renaming Southend schools after former Rep. Melking, his $500,000 for sidewalk improvements, and more.
“The list of things we’ve been working on is long and I’ll include the details below,” Flynn wrote, citing public hearings on pest control and waste containment and resolutions in favor of various unions. Declaring gun violence a public health emergency.
This report used material from the reporter’s previous articles.
