Should the BRA's Urban Renewal Authority be Extended?

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JeffDowntown

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Urban Renewal authority, granted by the Commonwealth, gives the BRA execeptional powers in the designated urban renewal districts. These powers are about to expire, unless they are renewed/extended. The BRA is asking for a 10 year extension.

Are Urban Renewal powers like property taking by eminent domain and the ability to override local zoning still appropriate for Boston? Or should the BRA be restricted to standard planning and development activities, within normal city powers?

The BRA is running a series of community meetings to talk about Urban Renewal. The one I attended last night was something of a charm offensive and PR campaign rather than a serious discussion of whether 1950's style Urban Renewal powers are appropriate for Boston in 2015.

http://www.bostonredevelopmentautho...o-host-workshop-series-about-the-future-of-ur
 
They don't engage in much in the way of 1950's Urban Renewal-type projects anymore, so this is more or less renewal of a vestigial organ. Of course they don't want to lose power, but eminent domain gets used very judiciously these days because the political capital burnt with each instance is so difficult to replenish. I don't think it matters a whole lot either way since that self-check mechanism on political capital keeps its application pretty rare...and rare by the BRA's own self-interest.


I'd definitely be in favor of dropping the damn thing if that just spurs the action on cleaning house in that ossified fiefdom and rebooting the whole thing to something less-wasteful, more responsive, more able to actually deliver on the developments it promises, and less a circle jerk of the same rapidly aging old hands and most-favored developers who've long since lost their fastball. Unfortunately every pol who campaigns on "blow it up" suddenly finds the BRA very convenient to have around once they do get in office and have ability to get embedded in those halls of power. Et tu, Marty's campaign promises. So I have less-than-zero confidence that anything will change or that anything will amount from this conversation.
 
Has Marty come out on the issue of extending the powers of the BRA?
 
tangent said:
Has Marty come out on the issue of extending the powers of the BRA?
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Yes, Mayor Walsh came out in favor of extending the BRA's Urban Renewal powers back in December 2014. He helped solicite the temporary one year extension of 15 or the 18 Urban Renewal districts that would have expired in April 2015 (three small districts were allowed to expire). The BRA is now working on getting a 10 year extension of those 15 Urban Renewal districts covering about 10% of Boston.

Globe article from December:
https://www.bostonglobe.com/busines...ewal-powers/YVusQSa7f1YWMlyBsuTYIO/story.html
 
The answer should be no. The BRA itself should be abolished. But short of a return to the rule of law instead of the rule of an appointed shadowy cabal of insiders... There should at least be so some shadowy deal making for Marty to get his scapegoating powers back.
 
Sounds like the entire State & Govt Agencies at this point.
Wasted Taxpayers money in the Billions: No efficiency for the common good
 
Political unaccountability was the point of the BRA... politicians didn't want to be blamed when this faceless bureaucracy came in and bulldozed your homes to make way for luxury condos and commercial redevelopment. They wanted to be on your side fighting against the mean public planners. But ultimately shrugging that they were powerless to stop progress. And then collecting their kickbacks...

Even this article appears to be another exercise in scapegoating so Walsh can continue to clean house and install his own people.

The question is whether there is a better public planning model for big cities. The current one is messy and prone to personalities, politics and ultimately pretty blatant public corruption.

Which is what you get when the law gives over discretionary power to people rather than treating laws and regulations as something to be applied to everyone equally. Currently you pretty much can't build anything without getting permission from the BRA which to me is the big issue.

If you really had a plan for the city that was being followed in good faith and special permits and variances were the exception rather than the rule, then I would say we had a healthy planning process. But it appears that many of the regulations are there almost purely as an exercise of personal power and not good government.
 
tangent said:
Even this article appears to be another exercise in scapegoating so Walsh can continue to clean house and install his own people.
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I'm always skeptical when McKinsey is brought in to do these "impartial" audits. The firm's first priority is always to make the client happy, so they tailor their findings to confirm what the client wants to show. If the client is Governor Baker and he wants to make the MBTA look bad, McKinsey will fudge the numbers until they arrive at the desired outcome. Same goes for when Mayor Walsh is the client and he wants to build support to shake up the BRA.

This isn't to say that the BRA isn't truly messed up, but McKinsey has decades of experience in shaping investigations to arrive at a pre-determined outcome and then publishing slick reports confirming it.
 
JumboBuc said:
I'm always skeptical when McKinsey is brought in to do these "impartial" audits. The firm's first priority is always to make the client happy, so they tailor their findings to confirm what the client wants to show. If the client is Governor Baker and he wants to make the MBTA look bad, McKinsey will fudge the numbers until they arrive at the desired outcome. Same goes for when Mayor Walsh is the client and he wants to build support to shake up the BRA.

This isn't to say that the BRA isn't truly messed up, but McKinsey has decades of experience in shaping investigations to arrive at a pre-determined outcome and then publishing slick reports confirming it.
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I have the same reaction to any report out of the pointless and redundant "Boston Finance Commission", or "FinComm". There is no such thing as "outside" review.

"Skeptical" is probably too light a word to use for this well worn political and PR tool for bolstering your position with "outside" and "independent" reports.
 
tangent said:
I have the same reaction to any report out of the pointless and redundant "Boston Finance Commission", or "FinComm". There is no such thing as "outside" review.

"Skeptical" is probably too light a word to use for this well worn political and PR tool for bolstering your position with "outside" and "independent" reports.
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As part of the current dance of the absurd, the BRA right now is actively and agressively trying to increase lease revenues from currently owned propoerties to help pay for the Boston 2030 planning process. This includes leasing properties for purposes that will probably not align with the outcomes of the planning process (because those uses are at odds with recent neighborhood planning work -- planning that is much more current than the BRA's current Boston plan).

The funding mechanism for the BRA is broken.
 
JeffDowntown said:
As part of the current dance of the absurd, the BRA right now is actively and agressively trying to increase lease revenues from currently owned propoerties to help pay for the Boston 2030 planning process. This includes leasing properties for purposes that will probably not align with the outcomes of the planning process (because those uses are at odds with recent neighborhood planning work -- planning that is much more current than the BRA's current Boston plan).

The funding mechanism for the BRA is broken.
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Pretend for a minute that I assumed the BRA was funded like a normal city department from general funds.... Why are they getting money directly from any one dedicated source of city income?

That is always the insideous downside of dedicating specific revenue to specific spending. If the interests aren't aligned then it is corrupting of purpose.
 
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