Pete Stidman

Dorchester Reporter
November 21, 2007

The mortgage crisis and other factors are slowing sales on Dorchester's condominium market. Dorchester's digs are getting cheaper and taking longer to sell on average. Local realtors say Dorchester's public image might also be to blame, while some areas with good locations are still selling well.

"The game has changed a lot," said 27-year-old Justin Green, a local realtor. "The big problem we have right now is the crisis in the mortgage industry. The consumer is confused right now. I'm finding that even when they're presented with a silver platter amazing deal, they're still not pulling the trigger."

One member short, survivors say morale still strong

Dorchester Reporter
November 15, 2007

Councillor Felix Arroyo didn't have enough fire in his belly. That's one version of what many political observers are saying about last week's City Council election. Few are chalking Arroyo's loss up to an apathetic electorate, even though overall turnout was so low that a proposal to match council term limits to the Mayor's four-year stints is starting to get traction at City Hall.

Even so, whether the reason for Arroyo's departure is a lackluster campaign, a rainy Election Day or fizzled fundraising, Team Unity, the coalition of councillors of color, is down to three members: Chuck Turner, Sam Yoon and Charles Yancey.

Dorchester Reporter
November 8, 2007

Now that three different Catholic hospital chains have declined to take over Caritas Christi Health Care from the Archdiocese of Boston, Attorney General Martha Coakley has deemed it a good time to perform a review of the chain's ability to "stand alone."

"It is our hope and expectation that this review will help develop a road map with which our office, the Archdiocese, Caritas management, the health care community and the communities that Caritas serves may ensure that the health care mission is preserved and strengthened," said Coakley in a statement.

Anemic turnout across city

Dorchester Reporter
November 8, 2007

In a rare rebuke by a city electorate fond of its incumbent pols, voters on Tuesday replaced at-large city councillor Felix Arroyo of Jamaica Plain with West Roxbury's John Connolly, an attorney and former teacher who finished fourth overall. Incumbents Michael Flaherty, Steve Murphy and Sam Yoon - in that order - took the top three spots in citywide balloting. Yoon, who lives near Field's Corner, won the majority of Dorchester's precincts and made strong inroads citywide, replacing Arroyo as the leading minority vote-getter in Boston.

Dorchester Reporter
November 8, 2007

Violent crime is down citywide, but Andy Barros would say the numbers are up in Bowdoin-Geneva, where he co-owns a bar on Bowdoin Street called Gigi's Palace. Recent events have made Barros, a father of five, fearful for his life. The bar may be sold or relocated.

"It's a very tough decision," said Barros sitting on one of his barstools at Gigi's. A widescreen-TV in the back is belting out the news in Portugeuse, and a small crowd of older Cape Verdean men is gathering at one end of the bar. "These are my father's customers. It's the young kids that (expletive) it up around here. How do you win when these people don't value life?"

'Best' move, says pastor; parish briefings concluded

Dorchester Reporter
November 1, 2007

St. Brendan Parish will not be a part of the sweeping plan to regionalize Dorchester and Mattapan's eight remaining Catholic grammar schools, its pastor said this week. After meeting with parents, teachers, and parishioners on Tuesday evening, Rev. James Fratus told the Reporter that St. Brendan School would opt out of the neighborhood-wide reorganization process called the 2010 School Initiative and remain a parish school.

"The parents are not against a regional model," said Fratus, "but they really feel that for St. Brendan's, the best model would be to remain a parish school. Many children are still within walking distance."

Series of closure options laid out;
Cardinal to make final call next month

Dorchester Reporter
October 25, 2007

Last June, the Archdiocese of Boston asked the parents and teachers of Dorchester's eight Catholic K-8 schools to help solve a dilemma. Enrollment was low at many of the schools, and would likely get lower. All of the buildings were in need of repair. And many of the students' tuitions were subsidized. Consultants described the situation as "financially difficult to maintain."

Now, this week and next, plans derived from committees of parents and teachers at each of the eight schools and a 2010 Initiative consultant team are being presented to the wider school community in meetings at each of the schools.

Dorchester Reporter
October 25, 2007

It is an unlikely place for a wetland, but in the shadows of the new Carruth condominium complex and the rising I-beam skeleton of the Ashmont T station in Peabody Square, a few water-loving plants may soon take root.

The Charles River Watershed Association has received a $25,000 grant to add hardy plants living in specially-engineered soils to the Boston Transportation Department's re-design of the square. The soil and plants would filter the runoff rushing through the square in rain, sleet and snowstorms and beautify two large plazas created by redirected traffic. The effort is unique in Boston and rare in the U.S., and it may indicate a fledgling trend for Main Street programs nationwide.

Dorchester Reporter
October 18, 2007

Boston Urban Gardeners has proposed giving Dorchester Gardenlands Preservations six Dorchester garden plots in varying states of repair. Officers of BUG have stopped returning Reporter phone calls, and some in the neighborhood are against the deal based on DGP's history.

"Dorchester Gardenlands has essentially wreaked havoc in this neighborhood in terms of open space," said Davida Andelman, who works at the Bowdoin-Geneva Health Center and is a longtime resident activist in the Bowdoin-Geneva neighborhood where four of the plots are located. "They got large sums of money to maintain lands from the city and they did absolutely nothing to maintain them. The (lots) became public safety problems."

Dorchester Reporter
October 18, 2007

Mayor Thomas Menino created a civilian police review board with an executive order back in March. By July, the three-member "Community Ombudsman Oversight Panel" was operational, but much to the chagrin of community members who pushed for its creation, it has yet to review its first case.

Some are calling the delay proof that the panel has little or no independence from the Internal Affairs Division, the section of the Boston Police Department they are charged with overseeing.

A brochure detailing the ability to appeal cases using the panel now accompanies all IAD decisions, and 20 such letters have been sent since July 20, according to William Sinnott, the city's corporation counsel.