Boston mayoral candidate Josh Kraft enlisted two of the mayor’s most vocal critics on the Metropolis Council to collectively blast the Wu administration for purportedly blocking debate on hot-button matters by pushing these hearings previous the election.
However Ed Flynn and Erin Murphy, the 2 councilors flanking Kraft at his Metropolis Corridor Plaza press convention Thursday, mentioned their public present of assist for Mayor Michelle Wu’s opponent isn’t essentially indicative of how they plan to vote — or probably endorse — within the mayoral race.
“At a time when Boston is facing serious challenges, from the crisis at Mass and Cass to unsafe sidewalks to overflowing trash and school bus safety, Mayor Wu is preventing the City Council from doing its job,” Kraft mentioned.
Referencing a number of current Council hearings which have been canceled and rescheduled at a later date based mostly on the provision of invited Wu administration officers, Kraft accused Mayor Wu’s workplace of dictating which points the Metropolis Council can handle and which points “get swept under the rug until post-election.”
“For months, we’ve seen a troubling pattern from the mayor’s office: blocked hearings, ignored Council orders that have kept critical conversations from happening in public,” Kraft mentioned. “The mayor has a lot to say about democracy in the face of Donald Trump, but this is not how democracy operates.”
Kraft, a son of the billionaire New England Patriots proprietor Robert Kraft and longtime philanthropist, mentioned Wu, and by extension her Council allies, who he says have been blocking hot-button debate on her behalf, “should not simply stonewalling Councilor Murphy and Councilor Flynn.
“She’s stonewalling every single resident in the City of Boston,” he mentioned.
Kraft convened the day’s press convention amid current media scrutiny round a slew of canceled Council hearings, with an absence of availability from the Wu administration cited as the rationale, on points that may very well be seen as politically dangerous for the mayor heading into the Sept. 9 preliminary election.
The media scrutiny was largely based mostly on the problem being raised by Councilors Flynn and Murphy. They have been later joined of their criticism by Councilor John FitzGerald, who cited problem in scheduling an off-site listening to on Flynn’s decision calling for an emergency declaration at and round Mass and Cass, the town’s open-air drug market.
Kraft mentioned the listening to, which FitzGerald has mentioned the Wu administration had requested to push again till after the election, has been scheduled for the initially focused date of Sept. 4, after public strain, notably from Flynn.
“It’s these quality of life issues that have been neglected and not focused on by the City Council, because City Council chairs work closely with the mayor,” Flynn mentioned. “And if it’s a controversial issue, that subject will not be heard. … Even though it’s frustrating that these hearings are not taking place because of politics, we’re not giving up on the city.”
Whereas Thursday was the primary time Flynn and Murphy have spoken at a Kraft press convention, it’s not the primary time they’ve been current at one. Each have been current when Kraft criticized Wu’s dealing with of Mass and Cass spillover into surrounding neighborhoods at a press occasion he held within the South Finish final month.
Nonetheless, whereas the 2 councilors are aligned with Kraft in being important of the Wu administration, each Flynn and Murphy declined to say how they deliberate to vote within the mayoral race.
Murphy mentioned she wasn’t planning to endorse a candidate within the mayoral race as a result of she was targeted on her personal crowded at-large race.
Flynn mentioned he was nonetheless weighing whether or not he would throw his assist behind one of many candidates, however acknowledged that his criticism of the Wu administration may very well be seen as a tacit endorsement of Kraft’s bid for mayor.
“I could see people seeing that,” Flynn mentioned. “If people see me challenging the administration, and they think that I’m challenging the administration and therefore I’m supporting Kraft, I understand that logic.”
Wu, when talking with reporters after her personal press convention on a separate matter, hit again on the criticism raised by Kraft, Flynn and Murphy, whereas questioning the motivation and timing behind it.
“We do our very best on the administration side to respond to the many, many requests that we get from councilors to come and provide information,” Wu mentioned. “It’s not at all times attainable to clear everybody’s schedules and present up for a metropolis council listening to once they would possibly wish to have a specific headline occur proper earlier than a marketing campaign, or this or that.
“We do our very best, and we’ll continue to try to prioritize, but our team has already been to well over 120 hearings just this year alone. That is certainly more hearings than when I was on the City Council, that administration officials participated in.”
The mayor added that the Metropolis Council, as its personal separate department of presidency, doesn’t must ask permission from her administration to carry hearings.
“As a city councilor, I often held many hearings that were scheduled according to when community members could be there and did not require administration officials to drop everything to attend,” Wu mentioned. “You don’t must ask permission and also you don’t must level fingers if you may be doing the work that you’re attempting to get completed.
“So, we’ll always try to be a good partner in that,” she mentioned, “but the Council is responsible for their own business.”
