Affable in the neighborhoods, touchy behind the scenes
September 14, 2009
EDITORIAL
DURING the 16 years Thomas Menino has led the City of Boston, close observers have learned there are two very different sides to the mayor – one affable and appealing, the other petty and off-putting.
In his interactions with the public, Menino remains Mayor Everyman, a father figure who after nearly four terms is still a man of the people. An astonishing percentage of Boston residents say they have met Menino, and many harbor warm feelings about him. That reflects well on a mayor who has neither lost touch nor tired of attending neighborhood meetings and talking with residents about their concerns.
Still, as objects of the mayor’s ire can testify, Menino runs the city government as his own fiefdom, which can make interacting with City Hall like trying to accommodate the imperious ways of a monarch.
Almost since the day he took office, Menino has been notorious among City Hall insiders for his thin skin. Initially, speculation was that the mayor, whose fractured and fumbling speech can cause some people to underestimate his shrewdness, was insecure in a job he had won largely by virtue of having become acting mayor when Ray Flynn was appointed ambassador to the Vatican.
But even as he has come to tower over the city, his lamentable pettiness has persisted. Indeed, those who deal regularly with City Hall, be they developers or activists or other government officials, know they must treat this mayor with kid gloves.
Not a critical word can be spoken about his administration. Menino must be informed early and kept abreast of everything that happens in the city. (The mayoral comment that “they haven’t talked to me about it’’ is a well-known warning that until a miffed mayor is placated, an initiative will go nowhere.) When a plan, program, or proposal does come to fruition, the mayor must be awarded copious credit for helping to bring it about.
Violate those unwritten rules, and the reaction can range from volcanic rage to a new ice age at City Hall. On some occasions, the mayor will make his displeasure known in a public dressing down, though a telephone tirade is more frequent.
“An unhappy Mayor Menino is a torrent of abuse on the other end of the telephone line,’’ says Douglas MacDonald, who occasionally ran afoul of Menino during his tenure as executive director of the Massachusetts Water Resources Authority from 1992 to 2001. “It makes for a very difficult relationship when someone you are trying to work with is prepared to call you up and burn your ear off.’’ Asked about what Menino said in those calls, MacDonald replies: “Unprintable in a family newspaper.’’
Another person describes the Menino telephone treatment this way: “He gets very angry, he yells at you, and you don’t get a chance to get a word in edgewise. The next thing you know, he bangs down the phone, so there is no chance to answer or explain. What you wind up doing is talking to cabinet members or others close to the mayor to figure out what you should do. Most times the response is: lay low, avoid the mayor, and don’t talk to the press.’’
Other times, a phone call from an administration member will alert someone that the mayor is angry. And on still other occasions, people come to realize that they have upset the mayor only when their issues become hopelessly bogged down at a City Hall keenly attuned to the mayor’s mood.
Although “it’s never as overt as ‘Let’s slow this guy down,’ ’’ the mayor “sends signals that he doesn’t like somebody,’’ says one longtime associate.
And when he does, the wheels of city government grind to a halt. The offender will then be left to deal with being stuck in the mayoral doghouse. Sometimes that simply means letting time and temper pass. But other times, it requires finding an intermediary who can intercede with the mayor or his inner circle.
Menino’s fulminations, feuds, and freeze-outs usually occur under the public radar. Occasionally, however, they burst into full view, as happened this spring with Sail Boston and the Tall Ships. The mayor had a point in saying that Boston shouldn’t be saddled with security and cleanup expenses from the event while the state reaped the sales- and meals-tax benefits.
But more was at play there. Around town, it’s widely known that Menino dislikes Dusty Rhodes, whose company, Conventures, organizes the sailing visit. And rather than work to resolve the financial issues, Menino angrily threatened to withhold all city services for the event.
Only when the Patrick administration got involved and James Rooney, executive director of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority, stepped up with money to pay those costs was the standoff finally resolved.
Menino’s emotional approach to governance hurts the city in other ways. One example: the New England Patriots’ onetime hope to build a new stadium in South Boston. There, Menino let his anger that Patriots owner Robert Kraft hadn’t informed him early on of his plans harden into antipathy toward the project. Had he taken the high-minded view, Boston might now be the home of the Patriots’ privately funded new stadium.
Other effects are more subtle. Fear of angering the mayor silences knowledgeable voices, alienates talented people, and chills civic debate in Boston. City Hall is perceived in some circles as a place where things aren’t decided on the merits, but rather according to a mercurial mayor’s likes and dislikes. Given that reputation, it’s not unreasonable to suspect some developers have been wary about pursuing projects here.
After 16 years, there’s little reason to believe that Menino will change. A fifth term would mean more of the hardworking mayor who never tires of meeting with constituents and discussing their concerns. But it would also mean a perpetuation of his temperamental, vindictive governing style.
Voters may well decide that the former justifies the latter. What’s truly unfortunate is that Menino’s personality forces them to make such a choice in the first place.
