F-Line to Dudley
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Why would they? This little reinforcing shot of Big Dig Syndrome just delivered within the last couple hours only goes to once again highlight some of the long-term structural issues with the seats of power in Greater Boston.
- The "Look at all the fucks I give!" Legislature, and power inequity that more or less puts the Speaker of the House in charge of the entire statewide government. DeLeo pretended the Olympics didn't exist. It suits his interests to do as little as possible with anything until his patronage machine becomes the primary beneficiary of the spoils. Like casinos were. His patronage machine is largely intra-government, not private sector. No angles for him to exploit, so not worth one blink's attention. And the reps are so cowed by the Speaker's iron fist that they all fall in line and go silent. With iron-fist control of all joint committees with the Senate now making Senate Prez. Rosenberg--the #2 most powerful official in the state--scarily irrelevant. And his caucus even more irrelevant.
A 4th consecutive indicted Speaker may not be enough to break this cycle. DeLeo's heir apparent, Majority Leader Ron Mariano, is his attack dog. Slightly more abrasive carbon copy, came into his position out of Chair of the Financial Services committee...one of the primary holders of the purse strings and one of the biggest patronage factories in the state. He is to DeLeo what DeLeo was to Sal DiMasi, DiMasi was to Tom Finneran. This has no chance of changing except in the vanishingly unlikely event of some scandal so huge it wipes out both #1 and #2 in a twin-killing.
Long-term structural problem: Speaker of the House has become a dynastic line of succession, thoroughly anti-Democratic, and trending harder-line in that direction with each successive Leader.
- The old guard. We have a very insular bunch of core business leaders in this city. They travel in their own circles. The same names wind up on the same development shortlists every time. They're aging, and dwindling in number as more out-of-town HQ'ed companies buy up established local corporations. As a group they do not have the clout they did in the 90's and aughts, and their insularity left them ill-prepared to deal with people outside their circles.
Fish was the embodiment of everything cruising past its expiration date with this group. Conflicts of interest galore chairing the effort most likely to steer construction contracts to his own company...one of the usual suspects companies that always seems to find its way on the shortlist. Completely tone-deaf dealing with the outside world. And vague, vague, vague in what he was willing to articulate...the kind of thing you'd expect from a figure who's been coasting too long on public-private quid pro quos exchanged within his own circle.
I think it's telling that Kraft, one of the old guard who hasn't lost his fastball or retreated inside closed circles, suddenly wanted nothing to do associating with this crew after getting one whiff of how the Fishes on the inside were starting to smell.
Long-term structural problem: Our 'Titans of Big Dig-era New Boston' are old and sagging, they aren't being replaced locally as more companies go global and un-rooted in any particular location, and the 'club' has gotten so small and closed-ranks that they've forgotten how to find new people. New people who are there for the taking in the area tech economy, and by looking beyond old-fashioned notions of a residency requirement as the only acceptable way 'in'.
- Crusty old gov't institutions. It's no accident the debate about re-chartering the BRA is happening simultaneously with their lumbering presence doing what it always does here with the Olympics: move too slowly and slovenly, spec too arbitrarily, add too many unnecessary layers of abstraction and obfuscation to development matters that could/should be routine calls, and show all signs of their own old guard being in sharp decline. They have their own narrowing inner circle of aging Menino allies...ranks not replenished much in the latter Menino years as circles closed ever tighter around old hands and seemingly every new up-and-comer in got cast out of paradise for being insufficiently deferential to the Mayor or old guard. While I'm sure the veterans are as disappointed as anyone that this wasn't meant to be, I wouldn't be surprised if there are a couple well-entrenched members breathing a sigh of relief that they no longer need to challenge themselves to think outside the box in pursuit of a Really Big Thing™ and can go back to playing Too Many Chefs on the next condo project. Because it's easier to not need to push oneself and act the biggest fish in the smallest pond.
It's no accident that the City Council has almost never been more toothless than it is now. What did they do all year while B24 was toiling? Concern-troll, pass a couple "I have an opinion!" show votes, and generally prove themselves irrelevant and easy to ignore. Old hacks, thinnest bench of young unknowns in recent memory, too many up-and-comers of recent years past who not only quickly exited in frustration but...alarmingly...have also outright left Boston in some cases soon after their Council experience.
Long-term structural problems: The BRA's turn-of-century salad days are as past-due as the rest of the old guard, and they are too habitually cumbersome to act nimble or daring. The well on the Council has run dry and few see it as a relevant body anymore or a steppingstone to better things.
- The universities. Nobody has been a bigger recipient of public largesse or public contribution of matching planning resources in Boston than the very largest universities. We were counting on them, especially Harvard with all its unbuilt land holdings acquired via the public, to lend a hand in hosting the games. The response from Harvard, BU, etc.? "Fuck you, I got mine." Even UMass got into the act, with pushback from the Boston campus and pressuring to get the Lowell and other campuses in as hosts.
This is one of the most troubling takebacks from the experience. The city's very partnership with its universities needs major re-examination, since they're treating it as a one-way street that demands but never gives back. What does this continue to say about Harvard? The only entity that seems to be held to any schedule deadline on its Allston master plan is the city, and public infrastructure resources for their campus. Conversely, the keepers of the world's largest U endowment are content to sit on empty property until they damn well fucking feel like lifting a finger to erect a crane. If Allston is any indication we're looking at 20 years of barren weeds and no tax revenue out of Beacon Park, and barren weeds and no tax revenue out of Beacon Park serving to suppressing the land value of other sites--like Widett--until Harvard damn well feels like it.
This is a public-private partnership...how...again? And there's no consequences for this...why...again? Deep soul-searching to do here about the very bedrock the U & city relationships stand on. Deep soul-searching.
Long-term structural issues: Fissures of dysfunction opening up in city's relationship with its largest educational institutions, pervasive attitude amongst U's that public partnerships are spoils with no reciprocal obligations, city is not getting ROI from deferred land use, no easy way of calling out the U's on this without risking a growth-stunting Cold War.
This is a public-private partnership...how...again? And there's no consequences for this...why...again? Deep soul-searching to do here about the very bedrock the U & city relationships stand on. Deep soul-searching.
Long-term structural issues: Fissures of dysfunction opening up in city's relationship with its largest educational institutions, pervasive attitude amongst U's that public partnerships are spoils with no reciprocal obligations, city is not getting ROI from deferred land use, no easy way of calling out the U's on this without risking a growth-stunting Cold War.
- The governorship. Because of the rising structural inequities in the balance of power with the Legislature, Gov. of the Commonwealth is the weakest position it's been in over half a century and one of the weakest governorships in the U.S. Baker knows damn well he's only #3 on the pecking order, and that DeLeo is there to remind him of that frequently. The only guys who can seem to stand the job like they enjoy it are the ones who either use the power of the podium to push a tone like Patrick was good at, or narrowcast oneself as a transactional agent like the niche Baker seems to be carving out. Or equal parts both in the case of Duke's long career. Trying to actually, you know, be an Executive with expectations of executing a plan...that's just a one-way ticket to losing all interest in a toothless job as Weld, Cellucci, and Romney found out in their respective wanderlust.
The governor had limited means of influencing the bid. He had limited means because the Speaker didn't give a rat's ass, and if Baker made full-throated push the Speaker would teach him a lesson by thwarting him 3 of the next 5 times he tried to do something important transactionally. Just to remind him. This is why "Cadillac Deval" pretty much had to choose to be what he was, drifting above it all. It was the only way his testicles could stay attached without getting stuffed into a lockbox under the House lectern. Has Baker decided that the only way to keep his players out of the penalty box is to always be in-wait for a study before taking a stand, and letting someone else do the dirty work or take a dirty fall? We've seen that prominently 3 times this year: coping with winter, the MBTA task force, and 'Lympics passive- passive-aggressiveness with Walsh doing today's dirty work. What does this imply for the next 3 years? Is there any forward momentum that can be milked out of this seeming survival strategy of his?
Long-term structural problem: The governor's job is so limited by the Legislature these days that distorted M.O. is the only way to stay sane in the job...and that does not lend itself well to initiating or giving full-throated backing to major public works.
- The Mayorality. Actually, I don't think Mayor's office is much of a problem in itself, other than being limited by too many other limited institutions and individuals he has to work with to get things done. Walsh made some rookie mistakes for sure. But not even the #10TwitterPeople flap is going to be remembered beyond next week. His first year has been a painful lesson in starting over. The Menino machine didn't outlive Menino; Walsh gets little benefit from pre-existing structure like Menino inherited from Flynn and Flynn inherited from White. That was the price of all the protégés falling out of favor and there being nothing left at the end but the oldest of old hands...the ones who are now part of the problem at institutions like the BRA, and no one with enough life left in them to feasibly be part of the solution. We're in a rebuilding year. We took on an Olympics bid in a City Hall rebuilding year. That's impressive in itself. But Team Walsh is going to be inconsistent like any rebuilding team. Inconsistent isn't nearly good enough for something like this, though he did superficially burnish his street cred with this morning's presser. Superficially.
(maybe not Long-term) structural problem: City Hall's political machine hit its evolutionary dead end and has to rebuild at a time when brain drain is sapping other institutions. Tough environment to compete in. Stay tuned for how they handle it.
- "Professional trolls". I wouldn't even call it NIMBY-ism or BANANA-ism anymore. Massachusetts NIMBY's have gotten so out-of-control with consequence-free Operation Chaos tactics against anything civilly engineered that it takes digging through 20 yards of unspeakable filth to find the nugget of reasonable objection and talk rationally about it. And it's succeeding beyond its wildest dreams at stirring up the uniformed masses and keeping them uncomfortable and unbalanced consistently enough that cooler heads never prevail. The Olympics were a whole, ominous other level in the efficacy of "TrollBY" tactics for the pure joy of watching the world burn.
The shouters who stormed every community meeting were professional trolls. The Fish-era union bullies who stormed every community meeting were professional trolls. NoBoston2024 and their online ilk were professional trolls in members-to-posts ratio. Evan Falchuk and the FOIA brigades were professional trolls. City councillors became (usually ignored) trolls and little else. The suburbs became professional trolls, alternately screaming about the traffic while making demands about outsourcing events. A couple of secondary local media outlets were professional trolls. Shirley Leung...well, she was more cartoon character than troll, but her employer sure did engage in some alternate reality scene-setting.
You can't have a dialogue amongst the shouting. And you can't habitually let the shouters be in control of the messaging as much as B24 let itself habitually get put in a defensive position of making reactive statements to somebody else's accusation. Who gets the first word and who acts proactively matters. Who's "right" doesn't, when the right words are consistently a step behind the wrong words. The institutions are getting their asses whupped on this count, and the trolls are taking their game to new heights. And this isn't just the Olympics...it's everything in the built environment.
Long-term structural problem: The institutions are not evolving their messaging skills as fast as the swarming trolls are evolving theirs, and too many old/not enough new hands at the institutions has a lot to do with this.
This is all a lot bigger than B24. And it's all deeply, deeply rooted in our institutions. Structural problems just don't get solved overnight. We've got a lot of hard issues to think about as a city and state about how to move forward amid these structural problems. Some solvable at great effort and creativity, some needing a miracle or improbable sea change in the way politics work. If there are lessons to take away from this experience, it's that B24 pretty much touched on and highlighted all of the major prevailing structural flaws that we have to engage as a region to get Big Things™ and Good Things™ done. And if we don't forget that, this grand tour of those structural flaws will help inform better decision-making in the future.
I hope.
Hope is still a good thing.
