Bostonians will head to the polls tomorrow to narrow down the city's race for mayor from the four current contenders to two. Calling for a change to Boston's political scene, the three challengers face a steep challenge against incumbent Thomas Menino.
Voters will choose from Menino, City Councilors Sam Yoon and Michael Flaherty and real estate developer Kevin McCrea.
As the incumbent, Menino is considered the most likely candidate to win the election. First elected to office in 1993, he seeks to capture an unprecedented fifth term as mayor. Menino has enjoyed high levels of popularity throughout his tenure in office and has largely relied on his record to speak for itself during the campaign.
"[Menino] believes he is the person who can continue to move Boston forward and who can build on the progress we have made while in office," spokesperson for the Menino campaign Nick Martin told the Daily. "The school system has improved. The neighborhoods are safer. Another term would be an opportunity to build on that."
Martin said Menino has made progress in a wide range of areas for the city of Boston, citing the Mayor's plans to turn "Beantown into Greentown" with a lofty environmental agenda and the Boston Main Streets urban revitalization program focusing on community design and economic restructuring.
In an election that has largely focused on Menino's extensive political record and his 16 years as mayor, his three challengers have emphasized their divergence from Menino's platform and advocated a more decentralized mayor's office.
"Boston needs to change, change in a deep and fundamental way," Yoon told the Daily. "Menino has been in office for 16 years and at no time has he ever thought about making it less about him and more about democracy, new ideas and real partnerships."
Four years ago, Yoon was relatively new to the political scene and unknown by most. Now, after a historic city councilman run that marked him as the first Asian-American to hold the position in Boston, Yoon is attempting to become one of the few Asian-American mayors in U.S. history.
Yoon supports mayoral term limits as part of his goal to limit the power of the mayoral office.
"The system is designed so that once you are in power, you have the tools to stay in power forever," he said. He referenced James Michael Curley, who stands as the last Boston mayor to be voted out of office after losing his bid for reelection in 1949 following a stint in jail for fraud.
After nabbing an endorsement from the Boston Globe yesterday, Flaherty stands as the potential frontrunner among the three challengers. He has also emphasized the need for a fresh take on Boston politics.
"Michael is running for mayor because this city has been stuck in neutral," spokesperson for the Flaherty campaign Natasha Perez told the Daily. "We are not the modern 21st century city that we can be."
Flaherty, who was born and raised in South Boston, has been a member of the City Council since 2000 and served as the City Council President from 2002 to 2006. One of his biggest campaign issues is keeping Boston's youth from leaving the city.
"A third of the people in the city are young people," Perez said. "They come here to go to college. The problem is that they are the largest group leaving Boston as well."
Boston's current opportunities are inadequate for the city's rising professionals, she said.
"Young people really fall in love with the hipness and youth of Boston, but they don't fall in love with the structure that exists, the housing, the jobs and the schools," Perez added.
McCrea, a real estate developer, faces steep odds as a relatively unknown contender. While McCrea has no experience in an elected office and has dedicated most of his life toward his construction company, Wabash Construction, he sees this out as an asset.
"Kevin may not have much elected political experience per se, but politics is not all about elected office," McCrea's Campaign Director and mother Joanne McCrea told the Daily.
"He has had a big role in community activism," she added. "He has taken an active role in investigating all the waste that happens in the city."
Joanne McCrea said that the city needs a fresh take on its politics and sees McCrea's outsider status as a benefit. "The people that are there now have seen what is going on in City Hall and done nothing," she said. "In fact, they have been complicit in it. There is no benefit to being a political insider if you haven't used your power to improve the politics."
The McCrea campaign has proposed a bold plan to change the way Boston government works. The primary initiative of that plan is McCrea's "Total Transparency Project," in which every government document would be available to Boston residents on the Internet.
"It's about making a system where everyone is accountable," Joanne McCrea said. "We depend on promises, personality and a smile. None of that works. Transparency is the first crucial step in restoring the public's trust in government."
