Boston Globe Fares Better with Taxi Butterfinger$

July 6, 2016

Very good (samaritan) story in today’s local dailies.

Start with the Boston Herald piece by Jordan Graham and O’Ryan Johnson.

Cops hail cabbie after turning in nearly $200G

Bundles of bills found in bag

Screen Shot 2016-07-06 at 1.19.10 PM

A Boston cabbie is being praised as a good Samaritan after finding and returning a passenger’s inheritance — nearly $200,000 in cold hard cash — accidentally left in the back of his taxi.

“Fifty percent of people say, ‘Yeah, you should have done that.’ The other 50 percent say, ‘You should have took it,’ but I’m not a crook,” said Raymond MacCausland, who found the green backpack filled with approximately $187,000 in cash in his cab on Saturday. “I always return things.”

 

Even the really big ones, apparently.

As for the absent-minded passenger, who told MacCausland he was homeless and moving into a motel, he wasn’t talking – at least to the Herald.

Reached by phone after the money was returned, the passenger declined to comment.

“I’m all set, I’m all set,” he said.

 

Crosstown at the Boston Globe, however, it was a slightly different story in Nestor Ramos’s hands.

[W]hile MacCausland was driving around Back Bay with a small fortune in a tattered backpack, the man to whom the money belonged wasn’t worried.

“I knew he’d find me,” the man said. “I didn’t panic at all.”

 

Beyond that, Ramos also generated this gem:

Standing outside his hotel on Tuesday, the heir said he was going to take a year to recover from many months of homelessness and decades of hard living. He checked into a hotel and was still getting used to not having to hide his meager things from overnight thieves.

After that, he wasn’t sure: He’d been trying to find an apartment, but his credit is disastrous. He says he has more inheritance money coming in the years ahead, but was unsure of the terms.

Eventually, he said, “I’m going to do what I always said I’m going to do: Die in Prague.”

 

Note to Mr. Butterfingers: If you need a taxicab in Prague, check here.


Northern Avenue Bridge: Fix It or Nix It?

January 28, 2016

From our Late to the Bridge Party desk

The headscratching staff freely admits we’re confused: Is Boston’s venerable Northern Avenue Bridge slated for a $100 million fix or a $100 million replacement?

Or are they the same?

From yesterday’s Jordan Graham/Owen Boss piece in the Boston Herald:

Public shock unlikely to derail GE deal

Critics blast tax breaks

Screen Shot 2016-01-28 at 1.32.04 AM

Massive tax breaks that helped bring General Electric’s world headquarters to the Hub are being blasted by critics for creating too sweet a deal for the global conglomerate — but don’t expect a public movement like the one that derailed the Boston 2024 Olympic bid to sidetrack the relocation.

In exchange for agreeing to move its global headquarters to the booming Seaport District, GE will get $145 million in grants and tax breaks from the city and state. But under the agreement, Boston will also pay up to $100 million to fix the dilapidated Northern Avenue Bridge . . .

 

Then again, there’s Shirley Leung’s column in yesterday’s Boston Globe.

Out with the old, Lynch says

The Northern Avenue Bridge could soon fall down, and US Representative Stephen Lynch is ready to release $9.4 northern ave. bridge 1-175606million in federal funding to help design a new one.

The city will need to match a portion of the money, but Lynch has been waiting more than a decade for Boston to do something about the century-old span. Last week, officials said they plan to start removing the dilapidated bridge in March after the Coast Guard raised concerns that it might tumble into the Fort Point Channel.

 

But here’s the headscratching part:

The Walsh administration will begin a formal public process this spring to decide whether to rehab the bridge or build a new one. The city has to do something after committing up to $100 million to replace the link as part of its agreement to woo General Electric Co.’s world headquarters to Boston.

 

Except the Herald says the commitment is to fix the link, not replace it.

So, to recap:

The local dailies agree that the Northern Avenue Bridge is dilapidated.

But, as Leung might say, will the state fix it or nix it?

You tell us.