Original subtitles

when he came home.

But his wife wrote to him and told him that she was just so happy that he was alive.

He cried and I cried too.

The Street right down a few houses away from me

was named Andrew Biggio Square and as I was introduced, that�s my name.

Except that Square was not named after me. It was named after my uncle

who was killed in action in World War II.

The first Andrew Biggio.

When I was a kid I didn�t know anything about it.

I told the other kids just what my parents told me that it was named after my uncle.

It wasn�t until I was getting ready to go to my first tour in Iraq...

I was looking at that Street sign saying Andrew Biggio Square

and it was a weird feeling knowing that

I was the...

I'm the next Andrew Biggio to go to war

and the first Andrew Biggio went to war and didn�t come back, so...

I survived Iraq. I survived a tour in Afghanistan

and I came home and I was staring at that Street sign again and I said

I got to find out what happened to that first Andrew Biggio on that hill in Italy in 1944.

I went to my grandmother�s house. I asked her if she still had Andrew�s letters that he wrote home from World War II.

She said she did. I went upstairs. I pulled the shoebox out of letters and I started reading them.

I started to track down men from his company that were with him.

It went from men from his company

to different types of Veterans and I ended up covering almost the whole war on the rifle as far as

divisions, places, battles.

How did I get the rifle?

I go through Andrew�s letters and I read

on how much he enjoyed to shoot the M1 Garand.

I said I�m going to buy an M1. We should have this

in our family history, we should have it forever. He died carrying this kind of a rifle.

I purchased the M1

and I�m in my house and I�m aiming in at the wall and I�m

playing Army man again at 30 years old in my living room.

But I said, who do I bring this to?

I can�t show my family. Would they really understand? They�re not Veterans.

It�s great, but now what? I bought the rifle, now what?

How do I fit the puzzle piece together on what happened to that first Andrew Biggio?

So I thought about my neighbor. My next door neighbor, Joe.

He had fought in the Battle of Okinawa and was a grouchy prick to me my whole life.

Anytime a foul ball would land in his backyard I�d hear an earful from,

he wouldn�t crack a smile to me until I graduated Marine Corp Bootcamp.

Then I started to see him wave to me from his yard.

The relationship became different. So I said I�m going to go show this rifle to Joe.

I went to his house, opened the door and he�s sitting in the wheelchair. He was 92 at the time.

And I said hey, check what I bought.

I placed the rifle which was empty, not covered in signatures like it is now,

I put the rifle into his arms.

He was in his recliner. His legs had atrophited

to nothing after years of not being able to walk at his age and illness,

and he brightened up.

It was like a burst of energy soared through his body.

He started waving the rifle around the room, smiling like he was 18 years old again.

I said holy crap, I am holding something special.

He said go into his top drawer.

I want you to have these now.

I went into his top drawer, I pulled out a velvet Crown Royal bag.

Inside of it were Japanese gold teeth.

He said, I want you to have these now.

Now, I�m not sitting here justifying war or what happened in the 1940s, but

I figured out this is why this man was a grouch.

I finally understand what was bothering this man my whole life

and what he had seen and what he had went through.

I wanted to, this was more than just oh my God, let me hear a war story.

He began to pass on the advice,

life advice and suggestions on how to live a long successful life after combat.

I was 28

when I had this conversation with him and he was 92.

I said, I want to remember this forever. I said Joe sign the rifle.

He was the first signature on it.

I left his house and I said I�m going to go around

and get as many World War II Veteran signatures as possible.

I want to be able to pass on to the younger Veterans how to live a long successful life,

to have a career, have a job

If these men could do it, what they saw in Okinawa, Iwo Jima, Normandy, Burma,

France, Belgium, Germany, Saipan, Tarawa, Tinian,

that our generation could do it too.

And that is the story of the rifle.

We come out

of the factory, and for you Ramadi vets,

we�re out on Route Michigan

and we stop two possible VBEDs.

They�re both coming down Michigan to the point that we have

I believe two Humvees.

We stop. Everyone dismounts to get more guns down range to back off the vehicles.

While that happened about 450 to 600 meters out

I look at what would be known as the White Apartments for anybody that served in Ramadi.

There�s three military aged males or...

At that time because I�m old in comparison to these new kids, Al-Qaeda,

on a roof and they�re tactically observing us.

So I go to take the shot

and then its Ramadi, it�s the middle of the day. Everyone�s getting sniped, everyone�s getting killed.

I�m going to tell the Lieutenant I�m making the shot so guys don�t think its incoming fire.

When I go to take the shot, the whole thing was a setup.

It was a sniper from my three.

So I turned at the last second before I took the shot to tell the Lieutenant.

The round actually blew through my holographic sight

and into the side of my chest.

But I didn�t know that at the time.

So, I said I�m hit.

I get in the Humvee and then I said no, I said I�m good.

I said it�s not being top. I said your adrenalin goes through the roof. Anybody that�s been shot here,

my man over there knows to say the least. And I said no, I�m good.

They stop the Humvee, I go to get back out of it,

I open the door and my platoon sergeant reaches over and grabs me

because blood's coming out of the side of my chest.

And I know at that point

he hit me exactly where he wanted to hit me,

they were shooting through the side of the pectoral into the heart.

We believe that same sniper killed a couple of my friends the same exact way.

They rushed me into the forward operating base and on the operating table.

I think OK, maybe a piece of plate got me. I feel good. I�m feeling fine.

I get out of the Humvee and that�s always a big thing. Everybody knows

if you can walk in the hospital, even if you die on the floor,

if you walk into the hospital, that�s how it goes. So I said don�t touch me.

Take my clothes off

and one of the baddest guys I�ve ever met in my entire life

that had survived a battle over there with a handful of our guys getting killed

and you know he was...

one of two survivors out of like seven guys.

He looks at me and he�s mortified.

And I have a big gaping hole on the side of my chest.

What happened was because it shot through my holographic sight,

it created like buckshot.

So now at this point I�m like, I know I�m going to die. It is what it is.

I believe in the cause, I feel good, you know, in terms of like

hey this is what it�s going to be, I�m a true believer.

They get me on the operating table

I�m saying, no but I, you know, I feel good.

They tell me the bullet�s still inside so everyone�s just waiting for me to bleed out on the table,

bleed out internally and die.

My Commanding Officer�s holding my hand and he said,

hey you know Kurt, hang in there buddy. Do you know what the date is?

Do you know what�s going on? And I said I know what you�re doing.

I said today�s October 10th.

I said I�m a lifelong Patriot�s fan.

Adam Vinatieri just kicked the game winning field goal. Best kicker in football.

I looked around the operating room and everyone was mortified,

but they knew I was going to survive.

I make it through surgery

and they said you know son,

thank you for your service, you�re going to go from Ramadi to Bagdad, Bagdad to Germany,

Germany back to the United States.

I said with all due respect, everyone�s dying, I�m not going anywhere.

And they said, you�re stupid. They said

the bullet�s still in there, your chest isn�t going to close.

No granulation. You need skin grafts.

You�re going to get infected and you�re going to die over here.

And I said like it is what it is.

I�m staying. And I checked myself out of the hospital.

I talked to my father via Sat phone and then always one of my biggest supporters,

I called my Aunt. She�s a former nun who then went onto be

very successful on Wall Street,

a no nonsense kind of woman who grew up here in the City of Boston.

And I said, you know, I need you to grab my back in this. I said I got shot.

And I�m staying. And she said, well I wouldn�t expect anything differently.

I continued to fight on the ground for eight more months

and you know, it was heavy. We lost guys

but I wouldn�t have done it any differently.

I�m an open book and I tell everyone:

listen, war is war and it's tough, but honestly the hardest part was coming home.

I said I actually know Tommy because I went through the home base program

and same thing, not to get too organization specific.

But it was the best thing I ever did.

Because I said I wasn�t scared.

I wasn�t scared when I hit IEDs. I wasn�t scared when I was shot

I knew I was going to die, but I said when I came home

and I�m on the side of 93C and my family

and Local 103 has Welcome Home from Iraq, Sergeant Kurt Power. I said it hit me.

What am I doing back here? I don�t belong here anymore.

I had never thought I would have to prepare for it because I never thought I was going to survive.

And there was a...

for guys and gals that were over

there�s a certain comfort level to that.

Listen we�re all going to die someday right?

You know it�s sooner than later over there, well then why sweat it?

That�s the reality of it. The best way to honor the guys

that didn�t make it home is to do what you can to make the world a better place

That�s how I live my life every day and I just want everyone to know

that our coming home and our going through things that you�re not alone.

We�re all in this together. Because

we�re losing 22 Veterans a day

because everyone thinks they�re the only one that ever went through anything.

Nightmares and cold sweats and anxiety, that�s all part of the process.

The only way we�re going to get people to get help

and to continue to live another day

is by being open and talking about it. So keep fighting.

Keep fighting for the guys that didn�t make it. Keep fighting for the gals that didn�t make it.

We�re proud of all of you. Thank you so much for your service and God bless America.

We went further north. In Ai Quoc.

You can see it in Ken Burns� documentary. He focuses on Con Thien.

But we were at Con Thien. We were at Geo Lin, at Camp Caroll

and almost every time we went to one of those places we were under siege.

And they were shooting rockets.

We could literally look right into North Vietnam. We could see the little sparks from the artillery guns.

And they�d usually fire three at a time. They�d fire them every hour.

Some of you have seen the Boston Marathon bombing.

Remember the panic when the first bomb went off and folks started running one way

and another bomb went off and folks didn�t know what to do?

That�s what was happening to us every hour.

Three artillery rounds would come in and guys were literally getting blown to bits.

It was clear

that we were being sacrificed. We were at the most northern outpost that the Marines had.

It was almost like we were a pawn in somebody�s chess game.

And I had the opportunity to call home.

I called my mother

and the first thing I said to her was Ma, I want to just

apologize to you for all the problems I caused you when I was in high school.

She said why are you talking to me like this?

I said because you�ll probably never see me again.

She said what do you mean? I said everybody in my unit�s dying.

We�re the most northern outpost that the Marines have. We�re surrounded.

They�re bombarding us every day. Sometimes they don�t even bring us water.

We have to drink mud and eat grass.

And my mother said, you�re not going to die. I said Ma, I�m trying to tell you something.

She said, I talk to God every day. And you�re special. You�re coming back.

I said Ma, everybody�s mother thinks they�re special.

I�m putting pieces of special people in bags. Listen to what I�m saying.

Don�t believe what you read in the Globe or what you see on the 6:00 news.

We�re losing the war. We�re being sacrificed.

You�re probably not going to see me again and she kept saying,

you�re coming back. She tried to tell a joke. She said besides, you got to come back.

I said what do you mean? She said,

if you don�t come back who�s going to pay

this telephone bill? And everytime I see or hear

anything about Veterans who lost their lives in Vietnam,

I pull up on the corner and I see guys with the cardboard placards

and their cups, I realize how blessed I am. Having gone through all that

everything that I do I do it for them. I do it for the guys that didn�t make it back.

I do it for the guys who lost their arms and legs and guys who

even lost their minds.

I long for the day with all this technology, like we walk around with computers in our pockets,

I long for the day when we can evolve to a point where

we can resolve conflicts without sending our sons and daughters to kill each other.

Let us not forget the total cost of war.

World War I was among the deadliest conflicts in human history up to that time at least.

The total number of military and civilian casualties in World War I

was around 40 million people.

40 million people

of which 9.7 military personnel

and approximately 10 million civilians lost their lives as a direct result of this conflict.

About 23 million military personnel were also wounded.

In the United States which was isolated from the combat conflict in Europe,

321,000 military casualties was approximately 3 % of the total military casualties of the Great War.

To put things in perspective, and why this date is so important,

90 million casualties of

World War II

and later conflicts further signified having a day each year

to honor and remember

all Veterans and their sacrifice

to protect our freedoms and their way of life.

Thank you for your service to our country.

Thank you for your sacrifice to our country.

To your loved ones, thank you to your loved ones as well.

Because oftentimes we don�t realize that

families are affected by not having their loved ones here.

Any gold star families here? We pray for you

and thank you as well. I have a great uncle that fought in World War I.

My family and my father didn�t talk about him much.

His name was Patrick and he left Ireland

to America and came to South Boston and he enlisted in the Army.

He went over to France and never came home.

I was at an event right after I got elected Mayor,

and I was talking to some World War I guys about

about keeping the memory alive of World War I service members.

And they sent me his draft, his card. The day he signed up.

And they sent me the letter that they sent to his brother Jimmy when he died,

when he got killed in action.

We never talked about in the house and never really

thought about it much. And my father never talked about it.

I grew up in an Irish home,

you didn�t talk about your things and I�m not a Veteran.

But I know the importance of telling what�s on your heart sometimes.

I�m in recovery. So my connection

to getting help is in recovery.

I grew up in Dorchester,

I went to work construction and you didn�t tell your feelings back then

when you�re drinking and things like that.

My drinking got out of control

so much that I ended up in detox.

It was the last place that I wanted to be.

But when I was in there...

I didn�t go there to stop drinking. Went there to get the heat off me.

But while I was in there the first night a meeting came in,

you know, an AA meeting came in and they talked and whatever it was I was interested.

It kind of perked my interest and the rest of that week,

I listened to talk of addiction.

And I learned about what alcoholism was.

And when you get out of there you�re not cured.

The key for me is the aftercare.

And 23 years later I�m still working on it.

And you think about every now and then about situations you might have put yourself in.

And if you don�t deal with it and you don�t talk to somebody else about it,

it�s going to stay inside of you.

Because whether you�re in the battlefield and you come home

or you�re in the barroom and you�re not talking about it,

or you�re in a dark room where they�re putting a needle in your arm, and not talking about it,

there�s no way of helping.

And I equate, I connect the... not the same way because it�s very different.

The fighting for your country and coming back is different on the surface of alcoholism,

but inside it�s all the same.

It�s that feeling that hopeless, what I had,

helpless, don�t know what to do about it feeling.

And like I said, everyone had suggested that I go get help.

Many times I�m like yeah, yeah. I went to one AA meeting one time and used that as an excuse.

Yeah I got help, I went to a meeting. And I used that for about 5 years.

But it wasn�t until I hit my bottom.

And when I hit my bottom I didn�t realize it was my bottom, but I knew, it was pretty low.

And a lot of other things happened in my life that built up to that point.

Every time I drank I didn�t get in trouble, but every time I got in trouble I was drinking.

So, you think about that and I think about

sharing experiences and I love, I go to, I still go to my meetings.

Hearing people share their experience, strength and hope

about addiction, sometimes there�s somebody talking that�s in so much pain

that they don�t see the benefit.

They don�t see the hope. They don�t see the help. They don�t see the end game.

And if I get a chance to talk to them I just say, it�s a day at a time.

When I first got sober I�d hear people talk about they have a house,

a job and a car and they have this and that, and I used to be like, I want that.

But I was in no way in the situation that I could get that at that particular moment.

And seven years later I bought my house.

And I remember sitting on my back porch of my house, even

10 years after I had it. I looked up and I can�t believe it�s mine.

And it all goes back to going for help and asking for help.

And I know many of you in this room

shared your story today and I thank you for that.

And there�s probably some people in this room

that might be listening and saying I don�t know what I�m going to do.

Just reach out. Put your hand out and ask for help.

That�s all you got to do. That�s the first step. That�s the first step.

You fought for this country. We owe it to you to help you.

That�s our job. As a government that�s our job.

Our Veterans office, Veterans Affairs office,

I�m proud of the work we do because we�re there for the veterans.

I said this earlier as we went out.

In my five years as Mayor, I have never once had to suggest to the Commissioner of the Office,

you need to do this for the Veterans or do that for the Veterans. They�re already doing it.

It�s setup for you. If it weren�t for the Veterans

of the Revolutionary War, of World War I, II, Korea, Vietnam,

Iraq, Afghanistan fighting all over the world,

I wouldn�t have the opportunity to be the Mayor.

We wouldn�t have the opportunity of a democracy.

It�s because of you.

Because you fight for that democracy.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you for what you�ve done for our country. For what you continue to do for our country.

For me, Veteran�s Day is a day on the calendar just like Memorial Day�s a day on the calendar.

But Veteran�s Day, Memorial Day is every day. It should be every day in our country.

Everybody go 45 degrees towards the center.

Tuesday after the election for the Congress was complete,

I reached out to Richard Neal. Congratulated Richard Neal. He�s in line to be

the next Chairman of the Ways and Means from Springfield.

I reached out to Jim McGovern. Congratulated him.

He�s in line to be the Rules Chair from Worcester County.

That�s the seat formerly held by Joe Moakley who he worked for.

So we have some really good allies in there. I mean obviously they can�t favor Boston

per se on Massachusetts, but having them there

in their office, there�s a contact for a lot of different issues. Education, climate, transportation,

fire stuff, police stuff. That�s really important to have.

We�ll have staff in those offices that we can call, reach out directly to.

On a national level that will be important.

I also just reached out to the Governor to say that I�d like to get together with him

to talk about education, transportation and climate issues

and is there an opportunity for us to go and lobby in Washington

for those funds for the Commonwealth and the City.

I think we have decided to take a different approach.

The last couple years we haven�t done much of that because

we were used to going right to the White House.

We could go right to the Secretary�s when Obama was there.

We haven�t done that with this President. But I think there�s an opportunity for us to go

to Washington and lobby for a whole lot different pieces that we�re looking at here

through the Congressional folks right now. That�s usually how it worked in the past.

It changed under Obama the last couple years, they really made

a concerted effort to build a relationship directly with mayors.

Usually you go through the Legislative leaders like you at the State House.

So, I think that�s a really good thing for us.

Hopefully, I�m hoping good things can happen out of Washington.

There�s an openness that John has. If he opens it up we get a really

bad storm to 30 or 40 women.

It doesn�t go back down. Right.

He was willing... it worked well last winter,

to fill some beds between six and 8 p.m., but then leave a little room

for overflow from other places.

There needs to be some space because if he�s going to step up

he needs to be able to know that there is space that he's going to take these people to.

That we�re not going to be in a situation where he�s showing up at Pine Street or somewhere

and say you can�t.

A group of women who are sort of chronic...

they seem to be severely mentally ill who don�t leave shelter at all.

I mean they�re in it because we�re open 24/7 and they don�t leave.

I think we have a number of people also,

with sort of a combination of behavioral

and substance use disorders that are a combination there.

There�s a host of women who just desperately want to get housed,

who just don�t have the income you know.

Like we have a woman, an evacuee

from Puerto Rico

who just wants to get housing,

but has like a $535 Security Income check and that about 50 %

of the women also had some sort of domestic violence

or violence issue prior to coming, so we�re trying to get more service providers in.

There does seem to be a group of women who are like hiding.

Just trying to stay under the radar for whatever reason.

In the cold weather transit stations are places where people who are

sometimes less well-known or sometimes kind of hanging out have aggregated

and we know last year how the unintended consequence

of the compassion of the T at South Station

that really attracted people who were not so vulnerable, but....

- Predatory.- Taking advantage.

There was some of that for sure.

So we just want to think about this year,

what the approach is working with the team because I think

Superintendent, you want to talk a little about what you pivoted to last year,

when it was clear the South Station wasn�t working in January, February.

Unfortunately we had to just keep muddling through it.

Unless we come up with something better,

I think we�re going to have it worse this year. So at its peak we had 170 people in there.

There�s no vetting.

The place is not secure. There�s no metal detectors.

There was all kinds of activity going on, inappropriate, criminal.

A lot of people were telling me just throw more cops in there.

That�s not the answer, that�s treating the symptom and not the cause.

We�ve intelligence that suggests this year,

and everyone�s aware of what�s going on at Mass and Melnea.

We�re right in the middle. That�s where our headquarters are. There�s anywhere

as low as 50 to, as high as 200 people that are gathering there,

using drugs, engaged in violence, prostitution, you name it.

We�ve intelligence that�s already telling us that core group which is in the dozens

are going to South Station when it gets cold to do whatever they want to do.

So, it�s great. One or two nights, we hit some extreme weather,

they come in there, but last year as you know, it started November 10th.

Right away was the first day we had to do shelter in place.

Two weeks after that we went on a stretch that went 17 straight nights.

We just can�t do it.

I think we�re doing them more disservice,

we got killed in the media. We got killed amongst homeless advocates

because when you think of a homeless shelter, right away you think of showering facilities,

food, mental health, medical. We have none of that.

And I can tell you that the folks that are paying

a lot of rent inside South Station were beside themselves.

Commuters coming in, in the morning were beside themselves.

This isn�t me getting it thirdhand, and I personally would respond.

I would say a vast majority of, probably weren�t even homeless.

And it�s impossible for us,

I wouldn�t ask my officers to subject themselves to all kinds of accusations just to go around

and pick and choose who should stay in there and who shouldn�t.

I think we need to come up with a better solution.

I�m willing to hire people

and transport people all over the city, all night long.

We want to be good and responsible neighbors and we want to do our part.

But just from seeing that firsthand, I think we were almost causing more harm than good.

None of the folks who left South Station when the overnights ended,

very few of them ended up out in the street in places we saw.

They migrated to other places.

We have to work together to make sure that the transportation is offered,

that the shelter capacity we�ve added is available.

The most humane thing that we can do for people

who find themselves in the middle of a very bad weather situation

is to get them to the place where they can get the support and the resources they need.

Get a meal, there�s a bathroom, there�s a shower and there�s support there.

Leaving them at South Station especially some of the more vulnerable folks...

I feel like the public position,

we�re in a strong position to say that the T is stepping up doing what it does best.

Transportation.

The weekly outreach meetings on Tuesdays

we�re making sure that we have represent... because the other first responders,

the Boston Police Department, District I,

the Boston EMS, the Squad 80 Group,

and the State Police are all at that meeting.

Making sure we have conversations in those meetings about how the outreach networks can help.

Anything in your pockets?

Do you have anything in your pockets, ma�am?

- Any metal in your pockets? Phone, keys? - Belt?

No, belt's fine. Just your pockets

Have a good one, sir.

The Fair Housing Act of 1968 pretty much eliminates

or it makes it illegal for anyone to discriminate

when it comes to housing, especially for certain classes of people

based on race, gender, color, sexual orientation and a bunch of other things.

Currently, House and Urban Development has proposed a new rule.

It�s proposing a new rule under the Trump Administration.

And as you know,

the Fair Housing Act of 1968 has for the last 50 years governed or guided

the laws of fair housing.

What�s happening is that with this new rule,

under the Fair Housing Act, let me start by saying that there�s a portion they call Disparate Impact.

Under Disparate Impact what it does is it allows a complainant,

meaning anybody that has a complaint of discrimination happening in housing

against a policy or practices that are happening to bring a complaint, formerly bring a complaint

against a bank, landlord, lender, or any kind of housing provider.

So, currently what�s happening is

the HUD wants to propose a rule

that is going to make it basically next to impossible for people

or anyone who is

experiencing any kind of discrimination under the Disparate Impact Rule,

to be able to bring a complaint. How this will work is:

currently there�s a very neutral task for it. All that needs to be shown

is that there is a...

whatever the policy or practice is has a wide reaching discriminatory effect.

But under this new rule what�s going to happen is that

anyone that brings these complaints

will now have to show not only that it�s doing this, but also intent.

That whomever the housing provider is,

has these policies or practices that are happening

and not only do they have them, but they intend to discriminate against

a person of color, race, gender, sexual orientation, what have you.

The problem with this is that

it makes it next to impossible because people who normally bring these complaints don�t have the time,

the money, the resources under the current rule as it is to do this.

That�s why we�re able to investigate if such a thing happens.

Under the current Disparate Impact Rule we�re able to look into it.

Or HUD is able to look into it and investigate and figure out if this is happening.

With this new rule it makes it next to impossible.

And it shifts the burden onto the complainant. The complainant will now have to show this

that it�s happening. So we have written a letter along with the Mayor to challenge

the Federal government on it. Challenge HUD on this new proposed rule.

Our department has linked up with other city agencies

and we have been part of the comment period that is currently open

and the Mayor has also written a letter to HUD

opposing this new rule because if it does in fact pass,

then this thing not only is it going to affect how we currently

do fair housing under the Disparate Impact Rule,

but it has far more wide reaching effects which is an attack against civil rights.

Because the Fair Housing Act was enacted under civil rights.

And if you can erode this rule then you can erode civil rights,

when it comes to discrimination, segregation, voting rights,

equal opportunity in employment because these things we all follow the same thinking process.

And it�s under the civil rights umbrella. So if HUD is able to do this

that means later they�re going to be able to attack all these other civil rights

that the country has fought for over the last 51 years to make sure

that people have or are being treated fairly.

So, this is a really huge thing at the moment.

We don�t know what�s going to happen with it.

We�ve submitted a comment letter. We encouraged all of the other FHIPs and FAPs,

fair housing providers and the agencies that are involved in this work,

to submit comment letters as well too.

The mayor wrote a really good comment letter

that hopefully we�re praying we get some traction with HUD.

But in the event that it doesn�t pass, a

and the HUDs new proposal rule does pass, then we are now in a situation where

basically we are watching the erosion of civil rights in the country.

What do we have here in Boston

that highlights the strength of diversity and of our immigrant population?

How can we celebrate what unites us here in the City?

And having Boston be a city of immigrants

with a majority, minority population?

What do we have to say here

and what can we do to really communicate

and celebrate that our diversity makes us stronger

and it actually leads us back to one another and to a sense of unity

and solidarity with one another? And that is that our diversity

and our strength really comes from the immigrant population.

So that�s really where it came from.

Just really thinking about how can we highlight these intersecting types

of issues around health which have to do with food,

with the activity that we started with

at the Armenian Heritage Park starting with walking and physical activity and meditation.

And then coming over here and being,

and having a cooking class to sort of celebrate all of us being together,

healthy food and again, all the ethnic cultures of Boston.

That was really the goal of this series,

to break down some of the barriers that have historically existed here in Boston

and sort of, by being next to one another, by being together sort of

create the sense of community

that really exists and breakdown some of the separations that have historically

existed here in the City.

So the meal that we�re going to demonstrate today

is Shrimp Lo Mien.

So Mien in Chinese means noodles.

And Lo in Cantonese means stirred. So it�s a stir fried noodle.

And noodles in the Chinese cuisine symbolizes longevity and prosperous life.

Traditionally, it�s served at celebrations such as Chinese New Year or birthdays.

So, for the sauces we are going to use today

is oyster sauce, low sodium soy sauce, cooking wine and a little bit of sugar.

Some spices, either chili powder or the pepper, black pepper.

And it will also give it a flavor without adding too much salt.

That�s what we call rice noodle.

So it has different flavor and goes with different kind of sauces

and a lot of people from China, they go back to their home town just to have that dish of

the noodles that were in their childhood memory.

And we also put a tablespoon of our cooking wine

and just to give it a little flavor\and also to reduce

the fishy smell in the shrimp as well.

Now we put into the shrimp.

So the shrimp is already cooked

for our demonstration, but we do recommend

to prepare the protein separately from our noodles

just to make sure that it�s cooked all the way through

and then reach the internal temperature that�s recommended.

55 % of Bostonians

are non-White, so in addition to be a majority city of color, we are also

a city of immigrants. And so 28 % of Bostonians are foreign born

and come from about 150 countries of origin.

Immigrants own 33 % of incorporated businesses

And in 2014, according to Brookings Institute,

Boston was ranked number one in terms of income inequality.

By 2017, they ranked us number seven and that was due primarily

to the increase of income in the lower income brackets.

And the Federal Reserve Banks' Boston�s Color of Wealth Report,

it listed different things. First it was the first report to

break out net worth by ethnic groups.

It�s a fascinating report if you have a chance to look at it,

but for Black Americans, U.S. Blacks as it listed it,

the net worth, median net worth for U.S. Black families was $8.00.

And the medium net worth for White families in the same period of time $247,000.

This is not something we�re proud of.

Many Bostonians are

under employed, over credentialed,

so meeting with companies and doing a comparison on their job postings,

in Boston versus job postings around the country,

we�ve got some folks,

I won�t name them, but

we looked at one company and like 100 % of their jobs you need a Bachelor's.

And it�s like really?

And then when you look at like jobs around the country it�s just not true.

And so having conversations with employers that allow us to access those jobs is important.

Jobs are a big part of the work that we do.

So the Boston Resident�s Job Policy which was a policy that was developed in 1983,

was recently updated by Mayor Walsh. And this policy essentially

mandates that in the construction space

where there is any private development, or public development that is looking for a private

variances or any kind of public approval,

we are mandating

51 % of those on a construction site be Boston residents,

40 % people of color, and 12 % women.

And this is something that

is really important because the construction jobs end up being pretty good jobs.

And so part of that is creating a pipeline

in working with the Unions and others to make sure that we have a diverse workforce

so that we can hit those numbers.

The other one frankly though is the new

good jobs policy that the City just announced on RFPs.

So any City land that is being disposed of,

the Mayor announced that we will be looking for a good jobs analysis, or a good jobs program

for the permanent jobs that will be built or attracted to

the developments built on City land.

We don�t have the necessary legal levers to demand certain wages,

so we set criteria definition for what good jobs are and certain wages and benefits and conditions.

And we want the developer to respond to that.

Once the developer responds to that program and says

here�s what we�re going to do in front of the community and of the City,

we will then codify them in the City agreement to what�s going to happen on that land.

We are leasing the land so we will have

serious legal levers on any lease, on what they should be doing with permanent jobs.

On the small business side, the other piece is following the

Federal Reserve Bank's Color of Wealth Report, we do believe that there is

an ethnic strategy to wealth creation.

So the ethnic groups are very different in how they approach wealth and wealth creation.

So, how do you have the conversation with the immigrant communities?

And the different immigrant communities look very different.

Some immigrant communities are

high unemployment so their employment rate for some of the immigrant communities.

Cape Verdean�s, which is an immigrant group here, from West Africa,

their employment numbers are really high,

but their entrepreneur numbers are really low.

It does something for income, but does nothing for wealth.

How do you have that conversation with that community;

When you look at the Black community which is very diverse in Boston,

when you look at the U.S. Blacks,

it�s one picture. When you look at Caribbeans,

the Blacks from the Caribbean, it�s a different picture.

How do you help to think about

what�s happening there and how we have different strategies.

So we�re rolling out and we haven�t announced this publicly,

but we�re rolling out conversations that are ethnic based. The BDPA has

set up some research around it. We�ve got some numbers.

We did an internal presentation recently

and we�re going to roll out ethnic based conversations to have a conversation about the difference

in approach in our ethnic communities, not bad or good.

But we�re going to put out the number,

we�re going to set up panels of people from the community to have the conversation

about what this might mean and what might be new strategies

and how we can approach this to make sure we�re having

a very responsive conversation about the economy that people live in.

We�re now mandating that people tell us how their team

is diverse and inclusive in all areas. And then we will score them on that

diversity inclusion in a way obviously

that those who are more diverse

and inclusive of women and people of color on their construction team,

on their design team, on the development team,

on finance, on operation, on ownership.

And so we�re driving to use public assets for...

and align it to the Mayor�s agenda.

We�re also asking that people work with us

in terms of what the community has said it wants to see in the neighborhood.

The recent RFP that we put out is actually in response to what's called Plan Dudley Square.

And we�re making sure that there is clarity between alignment on what the community has asked for

and what these developments are bringing. The second innovation is we picked

a neighborhood, following

the first comprehensive citywide plan that Boston�s done in 65 years,

or 50 depending on how you look at it, alled Imagine Boston 2030,

to pilot an effort of trying to develop a neighborhood

without displacing the neighborhood.

One of the strategies called for the City being more aggressive in acquiring property.

It�s something we�re doing now on the housing side as well.

We are out there acquiring existing property

and not trying to just create affordability on new developments that are coming.

How do we go after the high risk property, buy them and then make them permanently affordable,

hopefully making the tenants the owners of those properties.

So now we�re doing that on a neighborhood wide scale in Upham�s Corner,

acquiring as much property as possible before we launch any kind of public conversation

around the development of those properties. The third one would be

working with corporations that are coming to Boston

who are looking for tax incentives or any kind of incentive to relocate to our city.

Or bring a headquarter to our city. We have an agreement with Amazon

who is building about a million square feet in the Seaport

which equates about 4,000 jobs in two waves.

2,000 for the first wave, another 2,000 for the second wave.

There�s an agreement with Amazon that we will use a linkage fees

that that construction is producing

to create a workforce,

development and placement program specifically for those 2,000.

We�re meeting with HR this December. We�re going to look at the criteria�s, skills, what�s needed.

We�re then going to work with Tren and her team

on an RFP that looks at the workforce development in being specific

in designing that pipeline, or that journey to those jobs.

This is something we�re doing more and more of

is linking the employers or employment opportunity to the development

and programs that are happening all the way down to high schools.

Which is something we didn�t talk about here, but Boston�s effort to map

the job development ecosystem and then link it in a way that it�s more effective and evaluated.

The concept of resilience is a powerful one.

It resonates with every aspect of city life and planning

in our city and what we do in our city every day.

And our decision to focus

on our racial equity work was important to our city to move on.

And to move forward really. Not move on, move forward.

It�s something that�s important.

I grew up in Boston in Dorchester during the bussing, when bussing came in.

I was at grammar school

and I used to walk to...

my mother and father are immigrants from Ireland.

And when they came here they sent me to parochial school, Catholic school.

I used to walk by the William E. Russell every day in the early 70s

and the kids would come up in the school buses, but they were led

by motorcycle police officers.

And there was a motorcycle police officers behind them, and one on each side.

And they were moving kids in and out of schools and I thought that was

a little hard when you think I�m walking down to St. Margaret�s down the street.

We�re walking down to school and these kids are being escorted by the police. Not understanding at that time

what was going on because I was six and seven and eight years old.

I wasn�t really sure what was happening and going on.

Since that time Boston has made some progress.

And we�ve worked on that progress with other elected officials

and talking about addressing the disparities,

addressing racism and addressing the past that we�ve experienced in the City of Boston.

But the disparities remain deep

and there�s a real, the distrust we have is real in a lot of areas of our society.

People wanted more open and honest conversations

and I saw the duty as a Mayor who�s a White Mayor,

Irish Catholic White Mayor of Boston,

to start by listening and learning.

And that�s something important you have to do because

if you get somebody making conversation and trying to make up answers,

like I did when I was a candidate, it�s not the way to go. And I did that as a candidate.

Trying to see what I could do.

A city can�t thrive if we�re disconnected from each other.

And that�s something also important as far as the work that we do moving forward.

Racial disparities are our deepest form of disconnection that we have in this country.

And I realize in Boston we can�t solve the problems of the United States of America in here.

What we can do is work on the issues that we�re dealing with here in Boston

and hopefully other cities will see what we�re doing

and mistakes we might make, they won�t have to make those mistakes.

And what is successful in our city,

they can say OK this is something we can do and use in our cities.

We were just in Columbia, South Carolina

with Mayor Stephen Benjamin a couple weeks ago, about 40 mayors I think there,

and inevitably this conversation comes up about equity and race. And we tie it into

what happens on a national level, but we also come to saying that the impact can be made locally.

All it takes is one city.

One city to do something about it. To be able to share best practices and ideas.

That�s what we do as Mayors, as cities, as city councils.

That�s what legislatures do: they take ideas from each other and use best practices.

I just continue to have these dialogues, continue to have these conversations

and hopefully we can continue to move forward as a City of Boston, but also as a country.

The Food Bank is a great partner to the City of Boston.

They work closely with our Office of Health and Human Services and Office of Food Access as they do with the State.

They�re member of our Boston Food Access Council

and we all know how important this partnership is.

One out of every 6 Bostonians struggle with food insecurity.

One out of every 6 Bostonians struggle with food insecurity.

We�ve added 20,000 new jobs every year for the last five years.

We have $9 billion dollars of new development going on in the City of Boston.

We�ve built almost 28,000

new homes in the City of Boston in the last five years.

We have great prosperity in the City of Boston right now

and one out of every six Bostonians are struggling with food insecurity.

That�s the message today.

That�s something that we need to work together to tackle this issue

to get that number to zero. No one should have

to worry about where their next meal�s coming from.

Everyone deserves access to food and that�s everyone�s basic human right.

In Boston, we need to know that that work of fighting hunger is important

and the impact that we�re doing in fighting has to go much further.

I don�t know what it�s going to take the United States Congress and Senate

to recognize the need for gun legislation.

And also, we can look at Boston and see when we have a homicide in Boston,

you can generally tie it back to poverty,

maybe dropping out of school, lack of education, desperation, whatever it might be.

I don�t think anyone�s ever done a real study on what�s going on with these mass shootings.

These mass shootings don�t happen in other countries.

They happen in the United States of America. They�re targeting seniors, religious groups, kids

and nightclubs. It�s the second nightclub shooting

in the last couple of years here and Pulse was the first.

Something has to give here.

You can only protect the NRA for so long.

They have an obligation, the National Rifle Association,

if they don�t want to change the laws,

they have an obligation to the American people to come up with some solutions.

When Purdue Pharma, I�m not going to give him credit here,

had their back put up against a wall on oxycodone, they tried to offer some solutions.

The Labor Movement, when their back's up against the wall they have to come up with solutions.

The NRA needs to be held responsible and accountable for coming up with solutions.

And if we can�t pass legislation maybe that�s the route we have to take.

The NRA is allowing

mass shootings to happen by not letting any action happen in the Congress and that�s a sin.

The ultimate goal of making this stuff usable, at getting out here to West Roxbury

is one way to get to this data, but if we get it all online you don�t have to travel all the way up here.

Let�s say somebody is looking at

a governor�s mansion in Virginia and wants to compare it to the governor�s mansion in Massachusetts,

they may not even have to do anything more than open a computer

to get all of our data.

They might have to email or call us to find out

what do we mean by this or that or the other thing,

but the more accessible our data is the more usable it is.

Frankly, the more usable it is even here. So when I look for something,

I either have to know which box of the 2000 boxes we have contains the artifact

or I can look it up on our searchable database and open it up.

If a researcher comes in looking for a certain type of artifact

I can actually search our entire database to see if we have it or

how many do we have and what sites it turns up in.

And within 20 minutes Sarah or I could get out to the box and pull it for researcher.

Which is how it works. Usually when I get research requests, somebody will say,

I want to look at one particular type of ceramic.

If I don�t know where every piece of that ceramic is in our two million artifacts,

I can�t make it accessible to them even though I know we might have some of it.

It�s making them usable by people who may not even know that

we have these collections. I, myself am still learning what we have every day.

I haven�t seen most of this stuff, even while we were digging,

because I was in the home most of the time, not seeing the actual artifacts, but...

there�s some really cool stuff here.

Can I talk about the clams real fast because the clams are really cool.

I�ll take it all.

When we were digging we got down to the very bottom of the site and we hit a layer of clay

which is this deposit here, in the very bottom of our site.

It was manmade as far as

where it came from because there�s little bits of brick in it, so we know it wasn�t natural clay deposit.

But it�s a blue clay. We call it Boston blue clay.

And it�s a marine clay that was deposited by the glacier

right after the glacier left. It melted a lot of soil.

Basically the ground that Boston is was pushed down by the glacier

and when the glacier melted it was still down a little bit deep.

It�s almost like jumping off a dock. The ground bounces up after the glacier leaves.

But before that happened the ocean flooded Boston.

So we have a couple thousand years around 10,000, 15,000 years ago

where Boston was under water completely. And then it bounced back up above water.

But during that time it laid a huge deposit of clay

and that�s the Boston blue clay. And you see it in construction sites all over the place.

We found clay that was then dug up by somebody probably in the

late 1800s, early 1900s and they used it to line something,

we�re not even sure what it is. A cistern, a water collection, something like that.

And they dug up the clay and they pulled out all of these shells in the clay still.

These were stuck in the clay from where they dug it out. So these are actually clams that were living in Boston

when it was flooded that are between 11,000 and 15,000 years old.

So these are like prehistoric clams. They�re really thick. They�re huge.

And it�s just really kind of fun to see them from 11,000 years ago stuck in the clay,

scallop in two soft shell clams.

I just think they�re really cool to find. Basically they�re fossils.

We don�t get to find a lot of fossils in archeology so we don�t do dinosaurs,

but it�s nice to happen every once in a while.

In that deposit we also have artifacts from the 1700s, like this

1800s, like this glass. And 15,000 year old clams.

Not very typical, but it�s interesting.

Do minority and women owned businesses face any barriers

when it comes to city contracting?

The disparity study is designed to assess that question in a number of different ways.

So first, we�ll look at the degree to which minority and women owned businesses

participate in city contracts relative to their availability for that work.

I�ll unpack those terms in just a few minutes.

We�ll also provide a comprehensive analysis of the local marketplace to help understand

whether minorities, women and minority and women own businesses

face any barriers working in the Boston region, and whether any of those barriers lead to

less success with city contracting in particular.

We�ll also provide a comprehensive review of the contracting policies

and program measures that the city uses to help identify

any policies or practices that might be inadvertently

making it more difficult for small businesses and minority and women owned businesses

to compete successfully for city contracts.

Then we�ll also provide a great deal of insight and recommendations

around how the City can refine

the programs it uses to encourage minority and women owned businesses' participation

and what programs it can consider using in the future.

Educate me a little bit about this.

Disparity studies. I�ve been in this business in my industry for the past 30 years.

I have encountered all kind of difficulties and I�m still a small contractor after 30 years in business.

When you say disparity study, meaning a study that is a doubt.

Is there a doubt that this exists?

Because I find it in this 30 years the difficulty in contracts

for me to achieve all years in the study. I don�t think there should be a kind of a doubt.

Maybe we're looking for proof.

But I been part of it and not too long ago,

I was a minority in a contract, a State contract with housing.

I was a third tier subcontract

just so I can fill the minority quorums,

but there is a major company, let�s say White right in front of me to hire me just for that.

Is that something why wouldn�t I be directly to the GC?

Why do I have to be second and third tier?

So we know that thing happens where connections are made to just use us for the particular.

I�m sorry if I�m out of the equation

or I�m getting out of the point that we�re talking.

But for the past 30 years,

I can feel it... If the dollar is taken green,

I�m suddenly all the qualifications... I can�t meet them.

Usually like I was speaking here to Greg,

I cannot do a 20 or let�s say $10 million, let�s say $2 million project.

But I have 10, 12, sometimes 15, $200,000 projects.

I can do 20, as many as 200, but at one

then so really you'll see that

what is there that is something to keep us or keep me still on that $200-300,000,

but where the dollar is greener. So the disparity is there.

If it�s proof you�re looking, you come to me. I�ve been a victim of it for the past years.

It�s been very hard for a small company like myself to grow.

And usually I find let�s say major stream what do you call it,

not by using the color of the skin,

but the mainstream companies in five years in construction,

they do it in 20 or 30 million and they speeding up there.

And what we say if you really want to help this,

I don�t understand that in bigger companies, bigger projects.

Like I heard Honeywell has so many million dollars, negotiated contract with the city.

The casino was negotiated.

Why with a small contractor so we can�t negotiate with the city

to get that has to be different ways of doing it

that we can sit down and negotiate contracts and make sure we eliminate that gap.

Suddenly with us it�s illegal. With major companies it�s not illegal. That�s my point.

Question is there. I think essentially it was

why do the disparity studies? So there�s a belief on the ground that

these barriers exist.

So there�s a few reasons why we have to go through this process.

One is as researchers we, as strong as though, as strong as

our feeling is that these barriers might exist or not,

we�ve got to do the work and understand and look for evidence,

objective evidence that this exists. The reason why is because

in order for the city to develop its program

and for the city to develop a program that can stand up to legal scrutiny,

there has to be objective evidence in place

that they can point to that informs what programs they use and why they�re using those programs.

That�s really the reason.

I wouldn�t use the word doubt necessarily,

but it�s really an exercise in making sure that we�re gathering

the evidence that the city needs to make sure that it�s tailoring its program appropriately.

That�s really what it comes down to.

There is no doubt that there are disparities that exist in doing business.

There�s no doubt that there are disparities in our economy.

In fact, the Mayor would be very clear and has been very clear,

his number one priority right now is addressing

inequities that exist in the participation of our economy.

All over the City.

Now we think the inequities that exist in the participation in doing business with the City

is where we need to put real effort and try to lead.

And so there�s been historic

challenges doing business with women owned and minority owned businesses here in the City

way before we got in,

and there are systemic barriers and policy barriers.

And we want to address them.

We�ve been doing things

and there also have been challenges,

legal challenges to policies that the City

before we got into office, but all over the country,

whenever a City adopts a policy

that begins to work with one group or another, people will challenge it.

And say hey, is that fair? Is that not fair?

BBC, Sameer, is representing the city�s effort to make sure that we are well informed

when we introduce any of these policies.

And more importantly, that they can stand up in court.

Good boy.

So the good news is to take his temperature I don�t have to put a thermometer in him.

I have a scanning thermometer I can just put on his skin.

And it�s going to scan for his temperature.

- Perfect. He doesn�t have a fever. - He�s neutered correct?

So the plan for today because he�s already got his rabies vaccine,

we�re going to do a distemper parvo vaccine.

We're going to give him a kennel cough vaccine which is a drop that has to go into his nose.

We�re going to give him a de-wormer and we�ll do a blood test.

We�re testing him for heartworm disease. That�s transmitted by mosquitoes

and it�s a horrible disease

to have to treat that�s really easy to prevent.

Distemper. Ready?

What was that? Nothing.

Rabies. I�m sorry little girl.

So you want to giver her a bath now?

You can call 1-800-PETMEDS and ask for a prescription

of heartworm medication and they�ll call here to verify that the test was clean.

But the way to keep him healthy

is to have him on the preventive medicine once a month, all around the year.

This organization is incredible.

Morgan Memorial we all have a story growing up of Morgan Memorial

and Goodwill, providing opportunities for training,

for housing, for food,

for supplies, for clothing,

helping people. This organization has always wrapped its arms around people that are in need.

It�s one of our largest employers for people with disabilities. I want to thank you as well for the great work you do there.

I want to thank all the people that are here today that we had the honor of serving.

Thank you for letting us serve you today. Thank you for letting us be part of this day.

Thanksgiving is...

one of those holidays I think that

allows us the opportunity to come and serve somebody else.

And a chance to see people and it should fill our hearts with gratitude for what we have.

And on behalf of myself and all the folks from the City and the State,

I want to thank you because my heart is filled with gratitude today

because of the great work that Goodwill does

and the great work of the young people and the people that are here today.

So I�m going to stop talking and then we�re going to have, we�re going to have dancing.

Will the runners go to the kitchen and dinner will start.

We�re going to be doing the general contracting. We�re the developer and the property manager

and this is some of the additional organizations that we have.

We�re very proud of Cruz�s Care because it�s a nonprofit that does

outreach to youth. We mentor young people, we take them on trips, we do computer learning.

We do all kinds of backpack giveaways, but the most important thing is we spend time

with youth that live on our properties because we think mentorship

and interaction is vital in young people�s lives.

And next slide.

We also have heard through the community in this process,

about the wealth gap that exists.

And we all know in the Black community the wealth gap

between Blacks and Whites is 275,000

for an average White family and 750 for an average Black family.

So one of the things that we made as part of our mission in this proposal

is to give as much back economically to the community

and leave it better than we find it.

We just want to give folks a bit of sense of what we do from a payroll standpoint.

This is the last seven years. You'll see our people

of color percentages go up from 77 to 93.

Boston residents are in the 60�s. Women and Section 3 workers.

And we continue to put money back in the community.

And this is not only on an employee�s standpoint,

but on a business standpoint.

We think it�s very important that we support local businesses of color.

So these are MBE numbers.

Utilization of firms of color in the last seven years.

And you see out of 152 million of total development costs that we�ve done on average

75 to 78 % have gone to firms of color. And you look at the worker hours.

We�ve hit as much as 95 % on 35,000 hours.

So again it�s about Ngiving back to the community.

To talk about the program, it�s now 160 units. When we were selected it was 150.

But as you get more into design

and more finite layouts you find that you have a little bit more footprint.

So right now, it�s 160 units of which 105 are home ownership condominiums

and there�s 15,500 square feet of retail space.

That�s also an increase

from when we were designated because during, we�ve had about nine meetings

with DND, BPDA and part of the feedback,

most of the feedback we incorporated

and you�ll see in the design we have more of a street presence

and as that evolved it opened up for more retail space.

So you�ll see when they do the architectural

that our retail space has in fact increased.

Estimated real estate tax, people ask us, is about $700,000 annually.

As some of you know, as part of our community benefits we are going to be leasing space

to the NAACP at no cost for 10 years.

In addition to that we�ve endowed a $5,000 scholarship

annually for 10 years for them to allocate anyway that they want.

We also have agreed, YouthBuild Boston for those of you who aren�t familiar,

is an organization that trains young people in the trades.

Helps them get on a straight path.

We�ve committed $100,000 to that organization over five years.

Plus we�re going to hire at least one YouthBuild graduate

in every major trade or during the life of the development.

The life of the construction and we have estimated that to be about 20 positions.

Community benefits should be driven by the community

and not by a developer.

I�m not taking issue with that. It�s a broad statement that I�m making.

It�s not targeted at crews specifically.

What, in that sort of proposal and package can we revisit and look at

and really build more consensus around from the community�s perspective

as to what they would like to see as a community benefit.

Much of what you listed out

of course NAACP, I�m not sure they need 1,000 square feet of space.

And some of the others that are noble endeavors, but could there be others?

And that make more sense particularly for this site?

So I would just like to hear,

I think from not only the IAG group,

but also from the community

and have that community benefits process be more

inclusive of what the community wants,

as opposed to relationships that developers have with specific groups of people.

It may not be that thing, but it can look like that.

For us to go a little deeper on that.

I would like to respond.

We tried to get out ahead of...

Anytime we put in a proposal, as part of that we think about the benefits back to the community.

And I think the Roxbury Strategic Master Plan Oversight Committee asks the question,

how come the Cruz�s proposal has benefits and none of the other�s had them?

And it�s because we always try to be proactive.

So we can always have a discussion.

You know John�s always open to having conversations and considering things.

But we made a commitment to the NAACP in writing.

That not only would we give them free space for 10 years...

Not to date myself, but when I was growing up the NAACP was on Mass Ave, the prominent side.

You drive by you see them, you had ethnic pride because you knew their mission.

Now, unfortunately

they�re in the Washington Park Mall where no one sees them.

So we thought it was an excellent idea

to have them visible, where better than in Dudley Square.

When people come down. So we made that agreement with them.

We also made an agreement to fund a scholarship

at $5,000 a year for at least 10 years that they would have the control

to determine who got it. We wouldn�t be involved in that at all,

just from the vantage point of giving them the money.

And with YouthBuild. YouthBuild does a great job.

If you�re not aware of them just Google them.

Not that a lot of organizations don�t, but they do a great job

taking our troubled youth

and turning them around when their next step is either incarceration

or they have to turn their lives around. And so we thought that that was a high priority

for us to make a commitment on

and providing jobs. We�ve worked with them before, in fact

John has hired at least 10 YouthBuild graduates

in probably the last 10 or 15 years because we think it�s so important.

It�s like ex-offenders. They need a chance. They need another chance.

So, conversation on community benefits

is not off the table, but the ones that we�ve given

we feel like we�ve given our word to those people.

To those organizations. It would be hard to go back and say,

we�ve changed our mind.

Community benefits should be driven by the community.

It should have its focus come from the community.

I understand that you as a developer and others want to, some of you,

not all developers want to get ahead of that and put on the table,

meaningful, long term community benefits.

That�s the other thing and this is also more for the City that

community benefits shouldn�t just be a shot in the arm. It should be long term.

It should be, it should you know,

build equity in the community.

That�s my concern and my concern is that the voice

that carries that piece around community benefit

resonate and comes from the community.

I�m here today to tell my story on

how I got in front of the hydrant and why I�m in front of the hydrant.

First of all I�m not denying I parked there. I was wrong in parking there.

How I ended up there?

My industry�s biggest conference of the year

is September 22, 23rd. That�s something I know.

It�s also happened to be two weeks before my wife�s due date.

It was a big debate throughout the year if I should go, if I should not go.

That conference was in Rockland, Maine.

So predictably,

Tuesday night, September 23rd, I get a phone call, my wife�s having contractions.

And I race home to, from Rockland, Maine, Bar Harbor area.

So I drive home three and a half, four hours.

It�s East Boston past midnight.

There�s no parking anywhere within two miles of my house.

I�m a first time father, new father.

I have no idea what to expect. I just have to get a parking spot.

2:30 in the morning I park in front of the hydrant.

I wake up the next day and there�s not one, but two tickets on my car.

So, I�m here, letting you know I was wrong,

but as an exhausted, stressed, tired new father

that is facing a pile of medical bills, asking for reprieve from one of those tickets.

Based on the evidence you provided,

as well as the evidence provided by the Officer who wrote the tickets,

factoring what I�m allowed to factor in, legally speaking

I should deny the appeal today.

What I�m going to do however instead I�m going to dismiss both tickets.

One with a warning the other with a final warning.

That means is a couple of things.

First, in the future you got to make sure

you check where you park because especially with issues like this,

and with no stop or stands, they can tow the car if they really wanted to.

Which would not have been helpful in this entire process for you.

Second, if you filed an appeal you do need to bring

all evidence that you have that can corroborate any testimonies,

paperwork, receipts, photos, whatever.

And third, means you don�t have to pay anything today.

Thank you very much.

For the record we�re here today for ticket 754471406

issued to us in a resident permit only on 8/9/2019

at 10:09 p.m. at 343 Congress Street.

So what can you do to prove the ticket was given incorrectly.

It�s tough for me to prove the ticket was given incorrectly, but...

When I parked the car there wasn�t any sign for