The Yes Boston Olympics group (not its real name) made its 2024 Summer Games pitch to the US Olympic Committee yesterday and got very different receptions in the local dailies.
US panel votes to submit bid for Summer Games, will select from field of four cities next month
The US Olympic Committee’s board of directors voted unanimously Tuesday to submit a bid for the 2024 Summer Games and next month will choose one candidate from among Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C., to join what is expected to be a crowded international field.
The committee gave no indication of a favorite among the four cities. USOC chief executive Scott Blackmun said the contenders were in “a four-way tie.’’
Boston mayor Marty Walsh added that “it shows you that this puts Boston on a stage. Whether or not we get the Olympics, to be able to be in the same conversation with other cities around I think says an awful lot about the strength of the city of Boston.”
Or its business community anyway.
Crosstown at the Boston Herald, the bid got significantly less play. Like page 21 play.
Can we made Dirt Digging an official Olympic event? That’ll jumpstart the fizzy local tabloid, eh?
Not surprisingly, both Boston dailies today covered the local reaction to the Ferguson grand jury (non)decision.
Boston Globe Page One:
For the trifocal set:
Just for the record, the early edition that arrived at the Global Worldwide Headquarters featured a harder-edged take.
Raucous crowds take to the streets in Boston
In the pews and on the streets Tuesday night, full-throated cries of frustration and grief echoed from Roxbury throughout Boston and beyond over a grand jury’s decision to not charge a Missouri police officer in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black teenager.
An estimated 1,400 protestors marched from Dudley Square to the South Bay House of Correction facility, then shout down the Massachusetts Avenue Connector near Interstate 93 before being blocked by a police line. Protestors pushed in unison against police, some of whom were clad in helmets and protective gear.
The web version of the story is even softer than the late edition pictured above, especially the photo/caption.
But all the versions have much the same information on the presence of high-ranking local politicians.
At the forum, Mayor Martin J. Walsh and Governor-elect Charlie Baker delivered brief addresses before ceding the microphone to others in the crowd . . .
As dozens watched on a video feed downstairs, Walsh and Baker said they came to the meeting to listen, learn, and comfort those still raging.
“One thing missing from Ferguson is the opportunity for people to grieve,’’ Walsh said. “I want to ensure the people of Boston feel safe and secure, and that we are respectful in addressing our feelings.”
And etc. (Baker wound up getting more play in the print edition than on the web.)
Notice anyone who’s missing? So did the Boston Herald.
Inside, Joe Battenfeld drops the hammer on the Bay State’s absentee governor.
Another of many missed chances for Deval
They all showed up, from incoming Gov. Charlie Baker to Mayor Marty Walsh to an expelled state rep, but the one pol who probably had the most to say to a packed crowd at the Twelfth Baptist Church was strangely absent.
Deval Patrick got elected because of his ability to connect and communicate with voters. But when the nation’s only black governor had a chance to talk directly to frustrated and angry Boston residents in the aftermath of the St. Louis County grand jury decision, he skipped out of town.
The lame-duck governor was on a plane to Atlanta for an early Thanksgiving with the in-laws last night while a packed crowd vented at community meeting and protesters closed down streets last night over the non-indictment of a Ferguson police officer in the shooting death of Michael Brown.
Final tally: The feisty local tabloid tougher on protestors and Patrick. So what else is news?
Marty Walsh needs to unkiss the Blarney Stone. On his trip to the Ould Sod, Boston’s mayor has gotten shamrocks in his eyes for the second time in as many weeks, earning him the top half of today’s Boston Herald.
The feisty local tabloid dedicates a full page inside the paper to this piece:
MAYOR OFF HIS BEANS
Walsh slips with hockey idea
Mayor Martin J. Walsh was forced to walk back yet another off-the-cuff statement, this time after a firestorm set off by his bizarre proposal to play the Beanpot hockey tournament in Belfast — the mayor’s second gaffe in two weeks that has PR experts urging his handlers to rein him in.
In a move that left sports fans baffled and set Twitter ablaze, Walsh expressed his support for a “Belfast Beanpot” yesterday, telling the BBC, “In light of the recent Sister City twinning between Belfast and Boston, which is underpinned by a long-standing connection between the two cities through ice hockey, I think it would be wonderful to bring the Beanpot to Belfast and am lending my support to the campaign.”
The Beanpot Tournament is a 62-year-old Boston tradition in which Harvard University, Boston College, Boston University and Northeastern University hockey teams compete for Hub bragging rights.
That got the Twitterati’s Irish up, but not so much at the Boston Globe, which tucked the rumpus into the SportsLog section.
It all started in the Boston Globe two weeks ago with this report.
Trying to put a tribute to William Bulger in the books
South Boston’s Branch Library would be renamed for the neighborhood’s legendary politician, William M. Bulger, under a proposal by City Council President Bill Linehan.
“Bill Bulger’s advocacy and commitment to the Boston Public Library system is unquestionable,” Linehan said in a statement Tuesday. “His commitment to service, to the people of South Boston, Boston, and the Commonwealth are well documented and heralded.”
Regardless, all’s been quiet on the Bulger front until this editorial popped up in yesterday’s Globe.
Linehan stirs up resentments with proposal to honor Bulger
THERE AREN’T clear standards for naming a Boston public building after a former political leader. But there should be obvious reasons why not to make such a designation: To rehabilitate a tarnished reputation; to reward supporters of a deeply divisive figure; to score political points by sticking up for a neighborhood bigwig. All these bad reasons seem to be underlying the proposal by City Council President Bill Linehan to name the South Boston library for his neighbor William M. Bulger, the former Senate president and University of Massachusetts president. It’s a mischievous proposal designed to stir up old loyalties and resentments, and the City Council should reject it out of hand.
And etc.
As night follows day, the Globe’s sonorous editorial turned into the Herald’s screaming front page.
Today’s story in the feisty local tabloid gives you everything you want: drama, conflict, blood feuds, political waffling, Bulgerite weaseling – you name it.
Nothing cheers up Boston Herald columnist Howie Carr quite like a good case of Globenfreude. So he had to be thrilled with this news:
Note the “Globe Staff” byline: That tells you this is all corporate eyewash that no reporter would attach a name to.
Out of it Carr fashions a three-rail Marty Walsh-John O’Brien-Globe nepotism bank shot.
It’s all relative at Globe
Dear Marty,
This too shall pass. As you well know, in Boston nothing is on the level. But what you may only now be realizing is that the Globe is even less on the level than the State House or City Hall.
You merely point out the fact that John O’Brien, a hack’s hack, was just doing his job, and all of a sudden the bow-tied bumkissers are kicking you down the stairs like you’re Scott Brown.
The Globe has a long and storied history — just ask them. They had a publisher named Taylor, who was succeeded by a guy named Taylor, who was succeeded by a guy named Taylor …
They had an editor named Winship, who was succeeded by a guy named Winship. The paper was then bought by Mr. Sulzberger, who had taken over for Mr. Sulzberger.
Pretty thin gruel that quickly runs out of Globe-Globe steam and descends to this:
The editor is named McGrory. He had some old-maid relative who wrote the same column every day for 86 years, all of which began, “Golly gee, isn’t Tip O’Neill a great man?”
That’s rich coming from a guy who’s mailed in so many columns, he deserves a Lifetime Achievement Award from the U.S. Postal Service.
Proposal is richest to a city near planned Everett casino
Wynn Resorts has offered the City of Boston $1 million upfront and $2.6 million annually, along with hiring preferences for city residents, as compensation to offset the possible effects of a planned hotel and gambling resort on the Mystic River waterfront in Everett.
It is the richest deal Wynn offered to any community around the company’s planned resort, but far less than the $18 million annual payment promised to Boston by a rival applicant, Mohegan Sun, which is proposing a Revere casino.
The best-and-final offer Wynn Resorts made to Boston — but Mayor Martin J. Walsh rejected — to soften the impact of the casino it wants to build in Everett called for $6 million in one-time payments and $2.6 million annually, according to a copy of the deal obtained by the Herald.
The cash pales in comparison to the $30 million upfront and minimum annual $18 million pledged to Boston by rival Mohegan Sun for a gaming resort on the Revere side of Suffolk Downs.
That’s the local dailies in a nutshell: Sunny-side-up Globe, sunny-side-down Herald.
So, to recap for the umpteenth- hell, just see here.
The question is this: How did Marty’s Mash Note to the Boston Public Schools wind up as a full-page ad in last Wednesday’s Boston Globe?
On Friday, CommonWealth Magazine (which came late – but smart – to the party) reported the issue thusly:
THE BOSTON GLOBE FOUNDATION donated a full-page ad in Wednesday’s newspaper to Boston Mayor Marty Walsh so he could thank the staff of the Boston Public Schools at the close of the school year.
Ellen Clegg, who heads the foundation, said the mayor personally asked Globe CEO Mike Sheehan for the ad space and the foundation provided it because the message was in keeping with the organization’s focus on education and literacy.
But Ms. Clegg had previously told the hardreading staff this:
The Globe Foundation donated the ad to the Boston Public Schools pro bono, as a public service. When we get a request for support from organizations that fit the Foundation’s mission, we work with the Globe’s advertising department to donate pro bono print ads in space that would normally go to unpaid “house ads.” It’s a great way to engage with the community. Other recent examples of pro bono ads include the One Fund and the MLK Summer Scholars Program, which the Foundation co-sponsors with John Hancock.
C’mon – “[donating] an ad to the Boston Public Schools pro bono” and kowtowing to the mayor of Boston aren’t even in the same zip code.
Regardless, Ms. Clegg perpetuated the split decision yesterday in these post-CommonWealth answers to our pre-CommonWealth questions, which took her initial explanation at face value:
• When you donated the ad to the Boston Public Schools, did you know it would take the form of a letter from Mayor Walsh?
Yes.
• Who did the creative/production of the ad?
The Globe’s advertising department.
• Given the ad’s content, did you have any concerns that it would appear you donated the ad to Mayor Walsh, raising questions about the appearance of compromising the Globe’s arm’s-length relationship with him?
The Globe’s newsroom is independent from the business side of the organization, and from the Globe Foundation, and had no involvement here.
I’m sure you’ve seen the newsroom’s recent scrub of Mayor Walsh’s hiring record (link below). I have confidence that our journalists will continue to scrutinize public officials and powerful institutions, including City Hall.
Frankly, we’re more interested in scrubbing Ms. Clegg’s record of telling the hardreading staff one thing and CommonWealth another.
From the start of John Henry’s dual ownership of the Boston GlobeSox, the paper pretty consistently ignored conflicts of interest in his business dealings with the Menino administration (see here and here). If Henry is now dancing to Marty Walsh’s tune, he should own up to that, too.
Last Wednesday, this full-page ad appeared in the Boston Globe:
That got the headscratching staff to wondering who paid for Marty’s Mash Note to the Boston Public Schools. So we sent a note to the Boston Globe Foundation (see lower left in the ad) asking just that: Did Mayor Walsh (read: Boston taxpayers) foot the bill? Did the Globe Foundation? Did no one?
And here’s what Globe lifer Ellen Clegg replied:
The Globe Foundation donated the ad to the Boston Public Schools pro bono, as a public service. When we get a request for support from organizations that fit the Foundation’s mission, we work with the Globe’s advertising department to donate pro bono print ads in space that would normally go to unpaid “house ads.” It’s a great way to engage with the community. Other recent examples of pro bono ads include the One Fund and the MLK Summer Scholars Program, which the Foundation co-sponsors with John Hancock.
(The hardquizzing staff followed up with an email that asked Ms. Clegg these questions: 1) When you donated the ad to the Boston Public Schools, did you know it would take the form of a letter from Mayor Walsh? 2) Who did the creative/production of the ad? 3) Given the ad’s content, did you have any concerns that it would look like you donated the ad not to the BPS but to Mayor Walsh, appearing to compromise the Globe’s arm’s-length relationship with him?
(We have yet to hear back.)
Meanwhile, as the redoubtable Dan Kennedy pointed out to us, the redoubtable Dan Kennedy pointed us to this piece in Commonwealth Magazine, where it seems to us Ms. Clegg told a very different story to CommonWealth Magazine (which, frankly, came late to the party):
Globe Foundation gives full-page ad to Walsh
Mayor approached CEO Sheehan for space
THE BOSTON GLOBE FOUNDATION donated a full-page ad in Wednesday’s newspaper to Boston Mayor Marty Walsh so he could thank the staff of the Boston Public Schools at the close of the school year.
Ellen Clegg, who heads the foundation, said the mayor personally asked Globe CEO Mike Sheehan for the ad space and the foundation provided it because the message was in keeping with the organization’s focus on education and literacy.
Yes, well, Ms. Clegg might want to focus on her own message(s). Clearly, she gave us a mere bag of shells.
The hardreading staff will call Ms. Clegg tomorrow and try to clarify all this, because turning your newspaper into a mayoral Make a Wish fund is a lot different from “donating an ad to the Boston Public Schools.”
On Wednesday, this full-page ad appeared in the Boston Globe:
That got the headscratching staff to wonder, Who picked up the tab for Marty’s Mash Note to the Boston Public Schools?
So we sent a note to the Boston Globe Foundation, whose logo appears lower left, asking if they could tell us if Mayor Walsh (read: Boston taxpayers) paid for the ad space or the Globe Foundation did or if any money changed hands at all.
And here’s the reply we received from Globe stalwart Ellen Clegg:
The Globe Foundation donated the ad to the Boston Public Schools pro bono, as a public service. When we get a request for support from organizations that fit the Foundation’s mission, we work with the Globe’s advertising department to donate pro bono print ads in space that would normally go to unpaid “house ads.” It’s a great way to engage with the community. Other recent examples of pro bono ads include the One Fund and the MLK Summer Scholars Program, which the Foundation co-sponsors with John Hancock.
Ms. Clegg graciously offered to talk with the hardquizzing staff and we have a call in to her.
As the hardreading staff has noted on numerous occasions, the relationship between Boston Globe/Red Sox owner John Henry and the City of Boston (read: Tom Menino) over the past several years became increasingly – and profitably – chummy, from Landsdowne Street air rights to Fenway Franks.
Boston Mayor Marty Walsh has always struck the hardreading staff as deep-down a Boston Herald kind of guy. But you can’t tell by looking at the local dailies today.
Boston Globe, Page 9:
Boston Herald: Nada thing.
Of course this logo lower left in the ad might explain that.
Subsequently, the headscratching staff sent this email to the Boston Globe Foundation:
I produce the website It’s Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town and I read with interest Mayor Walsh’s full-page ad in today’s Globe. I also noticed that the Boston Globe Foundation logo was included lower left.
Can you tell me if Mayor Walsh paid for the ad space? Or if the Boston Globe Foundation did? Or if any money changed hands at all?
When I got to chat briefly with Linda [Pizzuti, Henry’s wife] after the Chamber breakfast, she described her role at the paper as “evolving.” Is there any greater sense of what exactly her role will be yet?
Linda is fully engaged working on important issues for the Boston Globe. She is leading initiatives to activate our subscriber base connecting the Globe to the community. She is heading up the Boston Globe Foundation. And she serves on a number of internal committees that deal with real estate, circulation, social media and other business issues.
She was the driving force behind our recently launched Globe GRANT program, which gave our subscribers vouchers they are assigning to non-profit organizations for advertising space in the Boston Globe. This program has been very warmly received by charitable organizations and subscribers.
(Henry also writes in the exchange, “Mike [Barnicle] knows everyone worth knowing.” Huh.)
Anyway, we’re hoping to hear from the stately local broadsheet’s stately local do-gooders.
Did Marty Walsh (read: Boston taxpayers) pay for yesterday’s full-page ad? Did Linda Pizzuti? Mike Barnicle? Nobody?
Summer Games and next month will choose one candidate from among Boston, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Washington, D.C., to join what is expected to be a crowded international field.
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It's Good to Live in a Two-Daily Town 