A brand new controversy over two former conservative Boston metropolis councilors whose names adorn a bridge and a City Hall room might be brewing, exposing a long time previous divisions and placing present elected leaders in a troublesome place.
A former Boston metropolis council staffer and activist is demanding the town “dename” a South Boston bridge and a City Hall listening to room after the late Jimmy Kelly and “Dapper” O’Neil, who he says have been hostile towards Blacks and staunchly against busing.
“Wherever we find (racism) we need to cut it out quickly,” mentioned Jamarhl Crawford, the previous staffer and neighborhood activist mentioned in an interview. “I don’t care about hurting people’s feelings.”
Crawford despatched a letter to the Boston City Council and Mayor Michelle Wu’s workplace proposing the thought to strip Kelly and O’Neil’s names, placing Wu and councilors in a doubtlessly painful place.
That means the controversy may play out on the ground of the council, the place former Mayor Ray Flynn’s son Ed holds the gavel.
Crawford’s proposal may open the door to new awkward scrutiny of different heroes of South Boston just like the late U.S. Rep. Joseph Moakley and Flynn, who have been additionally against busing.
Moakley’s title adorns the federal courthouse and Flynn’s title is on Massport’s Black Falcon Terminal in Southie.
Kelly supporters level out that if his title is stripped from the bridge, others in Southie might be focused.
“Joe Moakley was against busing, does that mean they will strip the Moakley Courthouse of its name?” former state rep and Southie activist Brian Wallace wrote on Facebook. “Don’t worry, Jimmy, we have your back.”
Kelly died in 2007 and the town named the bridge after him a couple of months later. He was a fierce defender of Southie and was one of many main opponents of courtroom ordered busing through the Nineteen Seventies.
Not all outstanding Black leaders are for Crawford’s thought. The Rev. Kevin Peterson, founding father of the New Democracy Coalition who’s now pushing to rename Fanueil Hall, mentioned altering the title of the Kelly bridge will solely be useful if it results in “deeper dialogue” about race.
“But if people are motivated to change the name out of racial revenge or out of feelings of recrimination then it is a fruitless effort that will only stir up tensions between the Blacks and Irish in the city. It’s clear that Councilor Kelly wasn’t a racist in ways we see Peter Fanueil as a white supremacist.”
But Crawford mentioned his proposal will expose the “hypocrisy” of the Boston City Council on the problem of racial justice.
“The first thing they can do is deal with actual racism that took place in the Boston City Council,” he mentioned.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”