OLDEST IRISH AMERICAN NEWSPAPER IN USA, ESTABLISHED IN 1928
Category: Archive

Southie wants its share

February 16, 2011

By Staff Reporter

By Jim Smith

SOUTH BOSTON — The traditionally Irish-American enclave of South Boston is again making headlines, this time over a political dispute involving how much money it will receive from the massive waterfront development now under way.

At issue is a 1998 memorandum of understanding hammered out by city officials and South Boston political leaders, including City Council President Jim Kelly and State Senator Stephen Lynch. In exchange for the neighborhood’s acceptance of construction of a $700 million Boston Convention Center and related waterfront development, South Boston would receive 51 percent of the so-called "linkage funds," which is the money that Boston developers must pay toward a public fund used to build affordable housing units throughout the city.

Those linkage payments, which equal $5 per square foot of the total construction above 100,000 square feet, are expected to total more than $60 million, just over half of which would go to the neighborhood most impacted by the massive construction, South Boston.

South Boston leaders claim, and city records confirm, that South Boston has received less than 4 percent of linkage money distributed by the city since the linkage program started in 1986. Roxbury, a minority community, has received 37 percent of those funds. City officials argue, however, that the discrepancy is attributable in large part to the relatively small number of applications made by South Boston officials, who have only recently begun to make demands for affordable housing.

Skyrocketing rents are now forcing many working-class families out of South Boston, and leaders say that about 1,600 units of affordable housing will be needed over the next 10 years to prevent further displacement of longtime residents.

Never miss an issue of The Irish Echo

Subscribe to one of our great value packages.

Late last week Mayor Thomas Menino and South Boston leaders began working on a compromise over the amount of linkage money that South Boston will receive. The meeting helped to quell the firestorm of controversy that erupted on May 24 when the Boston Globe first reported on the 1998 agreement and questioned its fairness to other sections of the city.

Although there appears to be some progress toward resolution of the linkage question, the related issue of "community benefits" remains a major point of contention.

Those benefits, also known as "mitigation funds," are designed to compensate communities negatively impacted by massive construction projects. They are being privately negotiated by elected officials and developers and collected by the South Boston Betterment Trust, a non-profit entity composed of 15 South Boston residents selected by Mayor Menino, Rep. Joe Moakley, and local elected officials.

One of the primary goals of the Betterment Trust is to build affordable housing for longtime South Boston residents who are at risk of being displaced from the neighborhood because of the high cost of housing.

Late last week, federal officials expressed concern that South Boston leaders who are intent upon building affordable housing for its longtime residents, most of whom are white, may be seeking to skirt the federal Fair Housing Act’s affirmative action regulations by building housing through private negotiations and a private trust.

At a public meeting on June 13 at the Gavin Middle School in South Boston, about 1,000 residents gathered to hear their leader demand fair compensation.

"It’s finally, finally our time to receive the benefits," said Gerry Vierbickas of the South Boston Residents Association. "Woe to anyone who reduces what we should rightfully receive. If anyone tries to cut into this, we will remember in perpetuity who our friends are."

Others roundly condemned the Boston press, likening recent criticism of the proposed linkage agreement to what they described as unfair and insulting assaults upon their community during the mid-1970s when parents took to the streets to protest the forced busing of their children to sections of the city far from home.

The June 13 public meeting was reminiscent of the January 1997 meeting at the same school when residents voiced opposition to a proposed football stadium for the New England Patriots in South Boston. That proposal was withdrawn within weeks after that meeting despite strong support for the proposed stadium by the Boston Globe, then-Gov. Weld, and the sports media.

Resurrected stereotypes?

Whereas in the past South Boston residents have been frequently caricatured as racist, unenlightened and short-sighted, the current charge is that the neighborhood is greedy and has little regard for other sections of the city.

Senator Lynch told the Gavin audience Tuesday night that recent Globe reports are resurrecting negative stereotypes and inflaming passions. "Every opportunity has been taken to engender hatred of this neighborhood," he said. "It is shameful what has been happening in the last three weeks. For this neighborhood to be singled out as it has and for a newspaper to derive such pleasure from engendering hatred for this group of people is absolutely wrong."

Council President Kelly, writing in the South Boston Tribune, has recently charged the Globe with conducting a "vicious crusade against South Boston’s elected officials and the newly created South Boston Betterment Trust." In a column last week, Kelly said that "the Boston press pretty much despises South Boston, especially the ‘old’ South Boston epitomized by those of us who cling to traditional values."

In a similar vein, John Ciccone, director of the South Boston Information Center, wrote in a recent column: "Expect to hear more howling, whining and gnashing of teeth by a news media so obsessed with its hatred for South Boston that it will do and say whatever it can to divide this town and block this neighborhood from getting its fair share of the linkage funds."

At beautiful Pleasure Bay in South Boston on Saturday, locals strolled the waterfront, enjoying the scenery and the salt-water air. "I love it around here," said 65-year-old Mike Kineavy, who has lived in South Boston for most of his life. He and his friends Frank Hawe and John Scott expect that their neighborhood will ultimately get its fair share of the development pie.

"We deserve compensation for the traffic problems we’ll have around here," Kineavy said. "Parking around here is terrible as it is and will only get worse with all that development going on."

Kineavy, a homeowner who could sell his house for plenty of money in today’s market, has no intention of moving out of the old neighborhood. "It’s very safe around here, and it’s handy to everything," he said. "Why would I want to live anywhere else?"

Other Articles You Might Like

Sign up to our Daily Newsletter

Click to access the login or register cheese