PAUL KIRK: Good evening, everyone. On behalf of Ken Feinberg, Tom McNaught, Tom Putnam, Amy Macdonald and my Library and Foundation colleagues, welcome to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, and thank you all for being here.
For those in the audience not old enough to remember, I'm Paul Kirk. [laughter] Years ago, before Tom Menino was first elected Mayor of Boston, I was elected Chairman of the Kennedy Library Foundation, and they kept me on for a few years. That seniority has allowed me to muscle my way back on to the stage this evening to take an opportunity, which I'll do in just a few moments, to publicly convey my own personal respect and gratitude to an outstanding public leader, a wonderful human being, and a loyal friend.
But first I want to acknowledge the generous underwriters of the Kennedy Library Forums: lead sponsor Bank of America, Raytheon, Boston Capital, the Lowell Institute, the Boston Foundation; and our media partners, the Boston Globe, Xfinity and WBUR. Thank you all. [applause]
The highlight of this evening will be a very distinguished panel and moderator reflecting on the remarkable career and extraordinary contributions that Tom Menino has made and continues to make as Mayor of Boston. I'll ask you to just hold your applause until I complete their introductions.
Brian McGrory is about to complete his first year as editor of the Boston Globe. Born and raised in Boston, he began his journalistic career as a paperboy, perhaps inspired by his cousin, the late legendary Washington columnist Mary McGrory, a good pal of mine and a wonderful woman.
Brian is a 23-year veteran at the Globe, having previously served as a gifted columnist, White House reporter, Metro editor, and in various other assignments which he carried out with excellence and that has earned him what I arguably would say is the top journalistic post in New England. Congratulations, Brian. [applause]
Renowned author Jack Beatty, news analyst for On Point, the national NPR news program. Jack was a longtime senior editor at the Atlantic Monthly, having previously worked as a book reviewer at Newsweek and the literary editor at The New Republic. A Boston native as well, he is the author of The Rascal King, a biography of the legendary Mayor of Boston, James Michael Curley. We thank Jack for being here, and we will look forward to him coming back with his coauthor Tom Menino on the publication of the story of Tom Menino's life and career.
Peter Meade is Executive Director of the Boston Redevelopment Authority. Before joining Mayor Menino's administration, Peter wore many hats, having served as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate, Executive Vice President of Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Massachusetts, President and CEO of the New England Council, Chairman of the Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway Conservancy, and Chair of the Emerson College Board of Trustees. I feel like I just introduced ten people. [laughter] And among his other prestigious board assignments, Peter served with distinction as a member of the Board of the JFK Library Foundation.
Leading the discussion, our moderator is the Reverend Liz Walker. Blessed with a delayed vocation, Liz serves as an ordained minister at the Bethel African Methodist Church in Jamaica Plain. A two-time Emmy Award documentary film producer and a generous humanitarian, most recently working in the war-torn country of South Sudan, to the New England audience, she will always be known as Liz, having served 32 years as a television news journalist, nearly 20 of those visiting our homes each evening as anchor of WBZ TV news. Liz also serves on several nonprofit boards doing major good works throughout the Greater Boston community.
I now invite you to join me in a warm welcome for our panel. [applause]
As we all know, the mayor has had enormously talented staff members at City Hall, many of whom are with us this evening, I'm sure. But I know that he would agree that the one person most responsible for his success through the years is a former member of our Foundation board.
More importantly, she is the First Lady of our capital city, and most importantly she is Tom's loving wife of 47 years. Please join me in a standing salute to Angela Menino. [applause]
The core mission of this Library is to celebrate honorable politics and inspirational public service in memory of a President who proudly claimed Boston as his home. What venue then could be more fitting for this salute to an honorable politician and servant of the people of Boston whom he loves and who love him in return.
Elected five times as a City Councilor from Hyde Park, assuming the office of mayor in 1993 as the first Italian American to do so and earning the citizens' trust, year in and year out, to become the longest-serving mayor in Boston's history, Tom Menino has spent a lifetime building a better Boston for its 620,000 citizens and building a truly world class destination for the millions who visit it from far and wide.
And like President Kennedy, Tom Menino's entire public life has been guided by his core belief that government is about helping people and improving people's lives. I have had the chance to observe politics from many perspectives through the years, and I can tell you that perhaps with the exception of the office of the President of the United States, serving as a mayor of a major United States city is the toughest job in public life. And you can mark my words on this: No one, no one has served his city and his people more capably and has made his tough job look easier than our own Tom Menino.
His formula for success is not complicated: Be accessible to the people. Listen proactively to them. Hear them not just with your ears, but with your heart. Respond to their common needs with common sense. Trust them and they will give you their trust in return.
As Vicki Kennedy, who graces our presence here tonight – thank you, Vicki, for being with us [applause] – as Vicki will attest, she and Senator Ted Kennedy have enjoyed a special bond with
Tom and Angela Menino. He loved you, Mr. Mayor, and he loved working with you. The bond between these two men was forged by their shared genuine respect for the value of politics and by their common commitment to practice what I like to call the politics of values.
Future urban historians researching Tom Menino's contributions to the City of Boston might find instructive the words inscribed in London's magnificent St. Paul's Cathedral in tribute to its renowned architect Christopher Wren. This is the inscription: "Reader, if you seek his monument, look around you." Look around Boston and you see physical structures that have transformed the city during our Mayor's tenure and that just as powerfully speak to his politics of values. To name a few:
The Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge, a magnificent pathway to a city whose diversity is its strength and whose Mayor urges us all to build bridges to one another.
The Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy Greenway, a vibrant open space that, like Boston's Mayor, brings citizens and neighborhoods closer together.
The Seaport Waterfront and Innovation District, Tom Menino's new frontier for jobs, commerce and forward-looking ideas.
Boston Medical Center, a preeminent facility for healing and caring of the human condition, a value to which Tom Menino has dedicated his political career.
Camp Harbor View, Mayor Menino's public/private partnership that opens the eyes and, yes, the lives of Boston inner city kids to new experiences, new hopes and new opportunities.
Look around at this city's big events; Tom Menino's political values are there in the celebration of patriotism, tradition and civic pride: First Night Boston. Pops on the Charles, Fourth of July.
Duck Boat parades, hailing our world champion sport franchises. Thank you, John Henry.
[applause] Presidential debates in the year 2000. The Democratic National Convention in 2004.
Look around and see the Mayor's leadership on issues and values of national consequences to our lives: The environment; Mayors Against Illegal Guns; marriage equality; and social justice.
And look around Boston's neighborhoods, and like Tom Menino, you, too, will appreciate the value of politics to enhance the quality of people's lives where they live: Streets paved. Snow plowed. Trash collected. Graffiti erased. Street lights lit. Community policing. Violence intervention.
And look around this city and do not forget that it was the extension of Tom Menino's own politics of values, so bravely displayed by his team of first responders that by their example inspired and proclaimed to a shaken world, Boston Strong. [applause]
Mayor Menino has told the story of a nun who taught him in grammar school asking what he wanted to be when he grew up. Young Tom replied, "I want to be an engineer and build bridges."
The nun responded sternly, "Thomas, you have to be better at math if you want to build bridges!" [laughter] A lot of us can relate to that, by the way. But Mayor Menino looks back on that exchange and says, with his humble smile, "Well, I never became an engineer, but I do build bridges."
ALL: Hear, hear!
PAUL KIRK: In that spirit, the poet Will Allen Dromgoole wrote about a pilgrim whose career journey was nearing its end. After crossing a deep and dangerous divide, he paused to build a bridge to span the tide. A fellow traveler asked the pilgrim why he stopped to build a bridge if he was unlikely to pass over the route again.
The builder lifted his old gray head;
"Good friend, in the path I have come," he said,
"There followed after me today
A youth whose feet must pass this way.
This chasm that has been as naught to me
To that fair-haired youth may a pitfall be;
He, too, must cross in the twilight dim;
Good friend, I am building this bridge for him!"
For all the bridges you have built during your tenure as Mayor, for all the bridges you will continue to build for others in the future, and for all those whose feet will some day pass this way, we say, good friend, thank you and God bless. [applause]
LIZ WALKER: Thank you very much, and good evening, everyone. And thank you, Mr. Mayor. I am honored to be a part of this distinguished group and to be your moderator this evening. And we're going to get down to serious conversation; it will be a free-flowing conversation.
But before we get there, I just want to make one statement. More than anyone at this dais, more than anyone probably in this audience, I dare say – I'm going to take a risk here – that I have been closer to the Mayor in the number of groundbreakings, ribbon cuttings, graduations, retirement parties, charity fundraisers, the opening and closing of hospitals, hotels, homeless shelters, and I think one time we both showed up at the opening of a door. [laughter] I don't know anyone who's been closer to Mr. Mayor in doing that and has that many numbers.
And I only say that because it gives me the distinct privilege of being able to say, I know not only that the Mayor loves this city, I know how the Mayor loves this city. And he loves it one person at a time. And so, I know that I speak, Mr. Mayor, for all the neighborhoods in the City of Boston when I say that we absolutely love you, and there will be nobody like you ever. [applause]
I don't know if these guys can say that, so I just wanted to get it out. But gentlemen, I will start with the first question. And please feel free to jump in, anybody, but Brian, I'm going to start with you. What's the biggest change in this city under the Mayor's watch?
BRIAN MCGRORY: Thank you, Liz. And Paul, thank you for the great introduction. Before I answer that, Liz, it's pretty counterintuitive asking a newspaper guy to speak at a tribute. [laughter] So I admire that. And I may slip and at times say nice things. So Mr. Mayor, I have to know, you're not going to run in four years or anything like that? We're all done with all this? It's also, just to state the obvious, it's a little bit awkward; it's almost like we're doing a eulogy by committee. And at the end of services, the casket flies open and the decedent comes walking up on stage. [laughter]
The city has changed dramatically in the last 20 years. Paul alluded to some of the physical changes – the Greenway, the Big Dig, the ICA, the Convention Center, the Zakim Bridge, a bigger skyline. But in a more meaningful way, as we have built these big structures, as we have hosted the Democratic Convention, as we have accomplished what we've accomplished, for me the biggest change in the city is we have shed much of the angst which defined us through the '80s, through the '70s. We're a much more upbeat city; we're a much more cosmopolitan city, we're a much more desegregated city. And obviously City Hall, the mayor in particular, has a lot to do with that.
PETER MEADE: My day job at the Development Authority, let me first take a look at that. In the last 20 years, we have built 11% of the square footage that exists in this city. And you don't see people writing about Tom Menino being the development mayor or the downtown mayor. I was at a meeting in East Boston and somebody said, "He's really been the East Boston mayor." And people will say, “Oh, yeah, he's been the education mayor, he's been the neighborhood mayor, he's been the public safety mayor.” He really has had a clear absolute sense that this city should welcome everybody. And when he said everybody, he actually meant everybody.
One of the hardest things I think, when he first became mayor, Tom Menino decided not to march in the St. Patrick's Day Parade in South Boston because gay and lesbian and transgendered folks weren't welcome. That was a pretty gutsy move for a guy from Hyde Park to do. And here's a guy, he was having kidney stone problems in the hospital, but went to the banquet at South Boston before the Parade to make sure everybody knew that he understood what he did and he was standing up.
I can't tell you the number of times in staff meetings or cabinet meetings or the end of department heads meeting, the mayor turns to the folks who are working for him and says, "And don't ever forget, it's not about us, it's about all of those people out here." And he meant it. He meant it about every person.
The biggest change -- and I think Brian and I are saying the same thing in different ways -- by the way, we're the youngest city in America. We are a majority-minority city. I hate it when people say we tolerate each other. Under his leadership, we welcome and celebrate each other. I think that's the biggest difference in the last 20 years. [applause]
LIZ WALKER: Jack, anything?
JACK BEATTY: Thank you. It's an honor and a pleasure to be here. The Mayor answered that question. Brian Mooney asked him this over the summer. He asked, "What was your greatest accomplishment?" And the Mayor said transforming Boston into a different city without the reputation for racism that plagued it for decades.
Of course, I have the map of Ireland all over my face; I'm not the one to say whether the city is more or less racist than it was. But that's something people say and that's something people believe. I think it's something exemplified in the behavior and in the tone of the city.
What's remarkable is how far back that goes, how much that vision stems from what Paul called the politics of values, but specifically the Mayor's values. Here he is in 1993 -- 20 years ago -- talking to Peter Canellos of the Globe. Peter asked him – he's running for Mayor – "What issue is so personal to you, so important that you'll never change your opinion on it, no matter what?" And the candidate Menino answers, "Racism. I will not tolerate it. I will not tolerate racism, will never tolerate people being discriminated against. That's the interesting thing about my life. I was in the 1st grade. I will always remember this. It's only a little thing, but I always remember it. My name is spelled M-E-N-I-N-O, unlike the Meninno that's on the mushroom jar. And the 1stgrade teacher in school told me that my parents didn't know how to spell my name. I went through the 1st grade with that name spelled wrong. And that little thing, it has stayed with me. It hurt me because they said my parents, as Italians, didn't know how to spell it. That's a little thing, but it's always, always stayed with me, that little thing. And I'll always remember that. I think of people who can't speak English or look different than we do. I mean, some of my colleagues called me Councilor Compassion, but I really, really feel for those people. That's what we're in this business to do, help those people."
Well, that's value. Those are his values. And one of the big questions about political leaders is how much are they responsible for changes that happen under them or is it just the times.
There's a wonderful story that Gibbon tells in The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire about the barbarians invading Rome. They invade, they throw the legion out. The legion retreats to the capital hill, puts up a rampart. That night the barbarians steal up to the rampart. They build a human pyramid. The topmost barbarian peers over it. The guard is asleep, the legion is asleep. The moment looks right. But the legionnaires have gathered geese to feed themselves and the geese spot the barbarian and begin to quack. The quacking wakes the guard, wakes the legion. The legion attacks the Gauls. The Gauls are defeated. Rome is saved. And Edward Gibbon said the Capitoline geese saved Rome, not because they were they, but because they were there.
Well, I don't think there's any question but that on this fundamental matter of racial amity and tolerance, Boston has been transformed not because Mayor Menino was here, but because he was he. When you talk about a leader, the city is his monument not just in the physical sense, but I think in this moral sense as well.
LIZ WALKER: Well said. [applause] There's been so much said about the Mayor's attention to the small things, making sure the buses run on time, and that the potholes are filled, and that that has so much to do with the big things. How do you see that impacting this vision thing, taking care of the details? And I'll throw it to you.
PETER MEADE: One of the things he realized a long time ago that for most people who live in the city or visit it, our workforce doubles in size every work day. So for the people who live here and work here, if there are potholes, if there's graffiti, it has a profound impact in your sense of who you are and where you are and who respects you.
And in talking to the police commissioner about breaking-and-enterings or a pocketbook being stolen, it doesn't seem like the kind of high and mighty thing that Mayors want to do. He's on it all the time because I think he understands how people live, where they live, and what are the kind of problems they deal with.
Great riding in the car with the Mayor. He calls the 24-hour service probably more than any citizen in the city – "Yeah, a street light at Bowdoin and Cambridge Street, it's out. I called yesterday and it was out. It better not happen tomorrow." [laughter] I mean, he can deal with the how do we do this, what's the philosophy of our education, how do we develop the city. But in front of your house, whether it's plowed or clear, he understood those things and cared about them deeply.
BRIAN MCGRORY: I had the opportunity to go through some old clips of what I had written about the Mayor over the last 20 years. [laughter]
PETER MEADE: No wonder he has the bat! [laughter]
BRIAN MCGRORY: I had covered Mayor Menino's first run in 1993 for Mayor, and I had done a lengthy, lengthy profile of him. And as part of the profile, what you do is this kind of standard operating thing where you follow the Mayor – he was then an acting Mayor – for the day. And exactly what you described, Peter, he's picking up the phone. I think they didn't even have a 24-hour line then, but he's calling and barking orders into his cell phone.
We get to City Hall and he sits in on this meeting of neighborhood services in this dingy conference room on the sixth floor, and he was there for over two hours. His aides had these stricken looks on their faces as he got into all the details. And when they were talking about one street in particular, the Mayor looked at one of these young advisors and he said, "What about Mrs. Carmichael's parking problem?" And everyone was like, "Oh, my god, we've got a Mayor who knows about some woman's parking problem. [laughter] What are we going to do here?" And I had a line that I thought was rather clever in the story at the time, saying that some critics believe he can't see the metropolis for its people. And over the years, what I have learned is the metropolis is its people, and the Mayor already knew that at the time. [applause]
The fact I was only 12 years old 20 years ago, I think that gets me a pass on that. But if you pay attention to a thousand details, it adds up to something significant.
JACK BEATTY: I think it also sends a message of respect. If it's the pothole that's been knocking hell out of your tires, it's the pothole that really matters to you. And to have somebody say, "Because it matters to you, it matters to me," I think that says "I respect you." I think that's the message that that sends.
After all, we live in a world where the government seems so abstract and beyond any human measure; we can't even begin to fathom the federal government. To actually be able to pick up a phone and say, "I've got a pothole," and to have it fixed after all, that's the way it's supposed to work. The government is supposed to be the servant of the people. To actually make that work is to make government legitimate. Look at the problems we have today with just this ridiculous website, making government look like a fool. I mean, government has to do things right, because the whole of civic confidence depends on it.
PETER MEADE: I was at a meeting at the Parkman House – this is years ago when I was Executive Vice President at Blue Shield. There had been a couple of shootings and the Mayor had some people from the business community and folks from the neighborhood talking about … All of us in the business community are sitting there just quietly, and the Mayor's talking to folks. Somebody said, "There's a drug problem at Wainwright Park. This is what's going on." And he turned around and he said, "Doris, you live in Santuit Street, you're two blocks from …"– I couldn't believe it! I mean, the integrated memory that he had. And she said, "Yeah, my grandkids …" and went into a discussion about it. That kind of knowledge that is applied regularly is both admirable, mind-boggling, and frightening if you work for him. [laughter]
LIZ WALKER: How does that speak … To your point, Jack, we live in a time where there's so little trust in government and our public officials. So how does Mr. Mayor's style or his approach speak to this trust? What lessons can we give the rest of the world, the rest of the country about trust?
JACK BEATTY: Well, I think in these illustrations, being responsive, taking people where they are. They're not with the Federal Reserve, they're with the pothole. They're not with Afghanistan, they're with order in their neighborhoods. Finding people where they are and responding to those things, I think that's the basis of trust in government.
And I think once it's built, it's money in the bank. I mean, again and again in his career, just as I'm looking at it – Brian would know more about it – the Mayor has taken unpopular positions – you mentioned the St. Patrick's Day Parade – because he has sort of moral capital in the bank from earning people's trust. And earning the trust that way by following through, but also earning the trust by not misrepresenting things to them.
His staff told me they were so proud of his insistence when he was ill last fall, that he'd be completely transparent about his condition, no gilding the lily here. And he had a press conference where he was clearly suffering but he says, "That's communicating to people exactly where I am. I'm not going to fake about that." As they say in show biz, sincerely, you can't fake that stuff. I mean, when you have it, you have it. I think that politics of trust has been there.
LIZ WALKER: Absolutely.
BRIAN MCGRORY: It's a great answer to a great question. I think there's another level to it as well and that is we live in an age in which absolutely nothing is getting done in Washington, and it's as if people go to Washington not to accomplish great things but simply to fight each other and to prolong these miserable battles. Paul Kirk would know that better than anybody. Vicki saw it first hand down there.
Here in Boston, we have somebody who represents something far different. The Mayor has always been an interestingly bipartisan, and perhaps even nonpartisan, Mayor. You'll recall when Jane Swift was Acting Governor, she was taking a lot of heat from the news media. The Mayor was the one front and center defending her at all times. He saw potential in her that perhaps some others didn't see. The Mayor had ongoing conversations with Scott Brown.
It didn't matter if you were a Democrat, it didn't matter if you were a Republican, it didn't matter where you were. This is a Mayor who just liked to get things done. We just didn't see any of the bickering and the partisanship here that has been so endemic of politics everywhere else. [applause]
PETER MEADE: The lack of trust in government and politicians has largely been earned by the people who are in government and run for office. I also think people in Brian's business have aided and abetted it.
BRIAN MCGRORY: Somebody mark the time. [laughter] That was only 20 minutes until we took a little shot at media. [laughter]
PETER MEADE: Hey, I spent a dozen years in the media. But I think given what happened with Watergate and Vietnam, you just name the scandal and the crisis and you say to yourself …I mean, we've trained reporters not to trust anybody. I think for us, for citizens, it's at a point where you just say, “Wait a minute, who's doing what?”
The subject of our evening is Tom Menino. Ernest Hemingway would call him the “True Gen,” the genuine article, the real deal, the real thing. Through all of the years, no matter what the story was, no matter what he did, what position he took, people understood this is the real deal.
LIZ WALKER: What do you think was Tom Menino's biggest change that he went through over the years? What have you seen, if anything, that's changed him? Anybody? [laughter]
BRIAN MCGRORY: There are so many great answers. [laughter] I'm sitting here saying, “Do not use the word girth.” Peter, why don't you go first? [laughter]
PETER MEADE: I don't know when it happened or how it happened. Probably Angela would be the best person to talk about this. But for any of us, when you go to a new job and it's … For all of us who grew up in the city, I mean, being Mayor of Boston – Paul Kirk talked about being a big city Mayor and in Boston you have most of the power that exists in the government in the Mayor's chair. I don't know when it was, but at one point he said, "I really know how to do this." And he did, and he does.
President Kennedy told us that the best training for being President is being President. I think that's true of mayors as well. So I think at the point at which he realized, long ago, "I've got this."
BRIAN MCGRORY: Great answer. One of my early encounters with the Mayor during the '93 campaign, I was with him and he was talking to a business group in the Financial District. He was unabashed in telling people – this is almost an exact quote – "I'm not a downtown Mayor, I'm a neighborhood Mayor." I think what we've seen is somebody who has changed over the last 20 years. He never shed his neighborhood roots; that never happened. But he began to understand that what is important in the business community is also important in the neighborhoods.
If you looked at Kevin White as the downtown Mayor and Ray Flynn as the neighborhood Mayor, Tom Menino was the Mayor of both parts of Boston. I think that was one of the areas where he grew the most.
JACK BEATTY: I'll turn the question around slightly. What I'm struck with is the constancy, the consistency of identity and of values. As Senator Kennedy's memoir, True Compass, is that the title? I love that title. Well, I think that's the case with the Mayor; the compass has just not changed, and it's been on the right things.
I mean, he committed himself to improving the Boston public schools. He invested his prestige in that. He doubled the budget of the schools in the 20 years. No one can doubt that that is a passion of his, that giving the kids, the children of Boston a better life, the kind of opportunities he felt he had, that those values go right back to Hyde Park, to his mother whom he was just talking about this evening, about how she helped people coming over from Italy, told them where to go to get citizenship, how to buy a house, how to go to school. She was like a local social worker. That woman and that man, that's the compass.
I drove around Boston with him some months ago and if he said it once, he said it four times, "You know, Jack, these kids just need a break." Five minutes later, "You know what? You had teachers who made all the difference in your life, didn't you? I did, too. I want that for these kids." Twenty minutes later, "There are only a few bad apples in the bunch. Most of these are good kids. They just need a break." That's not how politicians talk about children. That's how a father talks about children. That's how a parent talks. [applause]
PETER MEADE: Two things. I think one of the reasons for the trust in Tom Menino and the city – and his favorability rating is beyond any politician's hope or belief and that's after 20 years. His numbers are the kind of numbers people hope to have on inaugural day. [laughter]
JACK BEATTY: There's a headline: "Menino More Popular Than Kittens." [laughter]
PETER MEADE: But here's part of it: Tom Menino wanted to be Mayor of the City of Boston. He didn't want to be something else. He wasn't using the office to run for anything else. And we've had a series of governors who, as soon as they had a cup of coffee, wanted to see where else they could go. I think it's typical of a lot of folks who are elected officials. But people knew what Tom Menino wanted to be was the Mayor of Boston.
Quick thing on kids: He was addressing the Municipal Research Bureau a couple of years ago and was asked a question about education and charter schools and he said, "The charter schools are good, and it's good that we have them and all of that. But we take everybody. We take all of the kids who are special needs kids. We take all of the kids who have language problems as they come to this country. We take all of those kids." And he stopped and you could tell, I mean, I know … He said, "Those are my kids." And he meant it as just that.
BRIAN MCGRORY: Peter, that's a great point. Tom Menino is never looking over the proverbial shoulder of the city at the next best job. But not only that, he truly loved the job he had. Every day he kind of celebrated being the Mayor of Boston. I remember, again, I hate to keep harking back to 20 years ago, he had just moved from his small city councilor quarters into the Mayor's suite, and he took me into his pantry to show me where he stored his caramel corn. [laughter] He was so excited that he had a pantry and a private elevator. But those are just the little perks. What he was really excited about was the authority of the mayoralty. He never looked elsewhere; never looked at the Senate, never looked at running for Governor, even with those gaudy popularity numbers. It was really remarkable.
LIZ WALKER: I've got two choices for the last two questions before we get to questions from the audience. What would you describe or what do you think was the toughest time for the Mayor to be the Mayor in this city? And how did he handle that?
PETER MEADE: I think lying in a hospital bed hearing that your city's just been attacked. You don't know by whom or how deep the damage is, or where it's going to go. And getting up out of that hospital bed, that whole week – you were there at the cathedral that day, you did a great job of intro-ing it. I was talking to some of the nurses at the hospital where the Mayor was, and the doctor who was treating him was watching him at the cathedral. He insisted, against doctor's orders, doing what he shouldn't have done and that is to stand on those legs that he had just had a problem with. As everybody in the city says, "The Mayor's getting up!" And everyone's going, "Go, Tom, go, go, go!," his doctor is sitting at the nurses' station saying, "Sit down, sit down!" [laughter]
But I think that week of leadership and saying to people in the police department and the fire, "Go do your jobs." I think it was an extraordinary … This happened Monday. Tuesday he called me at home, "How are we getting the businesses back to work? I need a plan. I want a plan in my office tomorrow morning on all of the businesses. What are the permits they need to get back in? How do we do this? How do we coordinate with all of the agencies?" He was on it from jump street. [applause]
BRIAN MCGRORY: I couldn't agree more. It's one of the toughest things that any Mayor anywhere could ever go through, never mind sitting in a hospital room when it all happened; it was truly extraordinary what the Mayor did at that time.
But it wasn't all that long before that the Mayor labored over his decision on whether to run or not run. I think that, just a couple months before the bombs went off on Boylston Street, was probably the most difficult time he has had as Mayor. Peter, stop me if I'm wrong here, but I think Tom Menino hated to let go -- hated to let go because he loved the city. That was a very difficult decision. I don't think – we can ask him, he's here – I don't think he ever doubted it since he made that decision. But I think that was a very tough time in his life.
JACK BEATTY: I can't add to any of that.
LIZ WALKER: Last question: Your best Mayor Menino story. [laughter]
BRIAN MCGRORY: There are a lot. [laughter] We're going to leave all the sports aphorisms out. So the Mayor calls a lot -- calls everybody a lot -- but likes to pick up the phone, likes to belt out your number. And in full disclosure, I would often call Tom's office seven o'clock at night, as recently as a couple of weeks ago, and most of City Hall is emptied out and there's one guy in there and he answers the phone, "Tom Menino." And you can just picture it: City Hall is dark; the lights of Quincy Market are below him and there he is in his waning days in office still working at night. But one day I pick up the phone, and I had done a couple of columns about Don Chiofaro – you know Don Chiofaro, don't you?
PETER MEADE: I actually met him. [laughter]
BRIAN MCGRORY: He is a developer who's got plans -- which I thought were quite good -- to build a beautiful tower, a pair of towers – it was a little bit on the big side – but on the Greenway. I pick up the phone one day and I just hear the word "bloop, " then there's a pause and then I hear "bloop." Then there's another pause and then "bloop." And I'm about to hang up and then I hear Tom Menino's voice saying, "You're in the tank for Chiofaro." [laughter] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.
JACK BEATTY: Well, the Mayor's one-liners are what I'm impressed with. He doesn't have a reputation for that, but yet when you start to read the clips, they just loom. One in particular: In 1997, I think it was, the Patriots wanted to build a stadium in South Boston. The Mayor didn't want them to do that because that would step on his Convention Center, which had economic significance in the way a stadium didn't. Meanwhile, Providence was courting the Patriots. After one of the playoff games, the NFL, in spite -- sort of to strike at the Mayor -- made Providence their host city for a week. For the first time in 350 years, the words excitement and Providence appeared in the same sentence. [laughter]
But Buddy Cianci, the Mayor, the redoubtable Buddy Cianci made a lot of this. He said, "Well, we know how to treat a team down in Providence. They're making us the host city. It's going to be great, and we'll treat you better and you can come down here." And the Mayor's comment when the press said, "What do you think about Providence getting all this?," he said, "Oh, I guess Pawtucket was all booked up." [laughter]
PETER MEADE: I'm going to give Don Chiofaro more time than he deserves. [laughter] Second day on the job, I'd read all the stories in the paper about Don Chiofaro and he can't build a building because the Mayor doesn't like him. [laughter] There's a long list of that club. But for somebody who was concerned about the Rose Kennedy Greenway, what you do in the Harbor and what you do in the Greenway, all those kinds of things are important. But second day on the job, I'm in the mayor's office and I said, "I called Don Chiofaro yesterday." "Good move! That was very smart." I was, “Wow, this is great”. And one of the things that he does … There are a lot of elected officials who, if you work for them and you're having a bad time, your agency's under fire or you are personally, they get the ten-foot poles out right away and sort of want to go through, "I know I appointed him, but I barely know him. I know we went to grammar school, but he was in this other class."
This guy stands up for his people. And the loyalty he's had from the people who work for him is a reflection, a mirror reflection of the kind of guy he is. I think that's one of the things that I will always take away from my relationship with Tom Menino, his fierce loyalty for the people who work for him, who he sees as working for the people of Boston.
LIZ WALKER: Thank you, thank you. [applause] I have a couple of questions from our audience. The first one: In his next career at BU, what issue do you hope the Mayor will be able to help the US address more effectively?
PETER MEADE: Well, I think we all agreed about kids. And there are so many kids' issues about education. Massachusetts is doing better. We've still got work to do. The key that education becomes very important and I think that's part of it. The other thing is, Jack, we've talked a number of things. We were in Upham's Corner one day, and there were a group of kids on the corner. He gets out to talk to them, of course. And if a kid's been arrested – I mean, I wasn't a bad kid, but I could have been arrested a couple of times. His sense about these kids – and he doesn't pretend that their innocents, but just the notion of giving them a chance and a shot.
He also should be talking about how to build cities and things like that, because he's done such a good job with that. But I think focusing on kids and how you make things better in our cities for kids today would be the work that he does now.
JACK BEATTY: Hear, hear. [applause]
BRIAN MCGRORY: I would second that, but I would add that, again, getting back to this age of paralysis. If there's one thing that he could bestow on other mayors, others governors, other elected executives, it's getting stuff done and how to do it. And not getting bogged down in all the partisanship that is too endemic in our political society now.
JACK BEATTY: Yes, and I think this is a new country we live in, in a fundamental respect. It's a deeply unfair country. We all know that. The clichés about inequality are now just conventional wisdom. And nowhere is that more apparent, it seems to me, than in a city. I walked down past the glittering buildings of the Innovation District and looked at the towers and the Palm Restaurant and all the rest, and that's great. It's wonderful to see that in a city. But a city can also look awfully unfair. And this city is next only to New York City in inequality. I hope the Mayor gives some thought to that.
One of the things he's done as Mayor has been to say to people, "Look, you don't have to be rich in Boston to live a rich life." And we're going to try to use economic inequality – that is, the kinds of taxes people have to pay for homes on Beacon Hill – to strengthen social equality, to build the parks and the recreation centers and the clubhouses for kids in the neighborhoods and the health clinics, and all the rest. I think that model of, “Look, you don't have to be rich to live a rich life,” that's such an important message to people today. And to somehow strengthen social equality so that people do not feel just because they can't go to the bloody Palm that they're not significant, that they don't matter. They do. They live in Boston. That matters. [applause]
LIZ WALKER: Final thoughts?
PETER MEADE: He's a hell of a guy. It's been my joy to work for him. Thank you, Tom. [applause]
BRIAN MCGRORY: It's been interesting for me, because I intentionally don't get close to people I cover, for reasons that are fairly obvious. Yet, over 20 years I will say that Tom Menino and I have had hundreds upon hundreds of conversations. It's been a very unique and rewarding relationship.
In many ways, Tom Menino, we're talking about why he connects with the public in the way he does. And part of the reason is he's not a blown-dry politician. He's not too smooth. He's not – don't take this the wrong way – he's not incredibly well spoken. [laughter] He is what he is. And in fact most people can connect with that, because that is what most of us are. I think that has been one of his big gifts, to connect with the city of Boston. He is us in many, many ways, and it's been very rewarding to get to know him in that capacity. [applause]
JACK BEATTY: I just would second that, that sense of authenticity. I think of Senator Kennedy in that regard. I mean, the man was who he was. Or Tip O'Neill, Tip O'Neill would be going to fight with Reagan, he'd look in the mirror in the hallway and his wife Millie would come up behind him and put her hands on his shoulder and say, "Tom, you know you're right, don't you? You know you're right?" And she didn't mean right intellectually; she meant right from the heart, right morally, right in values. I think the Mayor has not had a day in his life when he has had to ask himself what's right. I think he's known. [applause]
BRIAN MCGRORY: In that regard, he has had Angela to do what Tip O'Neill's wife did and that is to keep him on the right. I just want to add, I've also sued Tom Menino for documents. I also have written about him in ways that have caused us not to speak for several weeks at a time. [laughter] But, yet, he is always somebody who will come around and pick up the phone and understand what it is that we all do not only in the news media, but other politicians in the city and people who are advocates for things that he doesn't always find himself on the same side with -- maybe Don Chiofaro excepted. [laughter]
LIZ WALKER: I want to thank you gentlemen for your reflection, your unique perspective. I will never forget the Mayor's powerful words at the interfaith service at Holy Cross Cathedral after the Marathon bombing: "It is a glorious thing, the love and the strength that covers our city. It will push us forward. It will push thousands and thousands and thousands of people across the finish line next year. Because this is Boston, a city with the courage, compassion and strength that knows now bounds."
Ladies and gentlemen, His Honor, the Mayor. [applause]
MAYOR TOM MENINO: Thank you, Liz. Thank you, Liz, for those words. Thank you all for being here this evening. This is probably the longest wake I've ever gone to. [laughter] It started in March. [laughter] The flowers are dead. The bill's getting higher with the undertaker.
Thanks, Paul Kirk, for those words. Thank you very much, thank you for your friendship over the years. Vicki, you're my darling; her and Teddy, the best, they really were. We had a lot of good times together. What was interesting about Teddy was he was one of those guys in this business who never forgot. He'd call you up on a Saturday night or a Sunday morning and said, "You know that issue we talked about three or four months ago? Here's the answer." I forgot the question. [laughter] I played along with him so I could feel I was doing. But a very special guy, Ted Kennedy. We really miss him.
And thank the panelist here. McGrory, hmm. [laughter] You only have 34 more days, pal, and I’m gone [laughter]. You can do anything for me now anyways. In a few more weeks, I'll be in academia where you're an elected official, everybody trusts. No one checks your judgment, no one says "Why are you saying this." In academia, you're the smartest person in the whole world.
[laughter]
Brian's not telling the real story. Brian and I go back a long time. We do have some issues at times. He got the newspaper tinge to it; I have the real truth. [laughter] But we were trying to hire a new Superintendent of schools and Brian and I had a long conversation about that. So he says, "If it happens, call me." And so it happened around midnight that we hired Carol Johnson. I waited till seven o'clock in the morning to call him. He said, "What are you doing, calling me at this time?" I said, "Brian, you told me to call you when I had the information. I called you." But he was sleeping, the poor guy. I was out working.
Brian, Peter, Jack, thank you for those words.
The Reverend Walker, Liz Walker. Not a TV person, she's a Reverend. She has a great little church in Roxbury. She does a great job.
All you folks here, thank you for being here. The 20 years I've been Mayor, I don't think I did anything special. I did what you're supposed to do – help the people. Take positions on issues that you believe were right. You never sold your ideals for other people's special interests. And I just want to say I've enjoyed every day of it.
It's been an interesting time in my life. And Angela, it's been an interesting time for her, also, as we went through this journey. When she married me, I was an insurance man; she never thought I'd have any of this stuff. [laughter]
The issues I took on, the people's issues. I just hope we can go forward and we continue those people's issues because government's about helping people. It never should get away from there. But I see government going the other way. It's not about people anymore, it's about a lot of issues that don't make a hill of beans. Every issue that doesn't make any difference, we take on. My philosophy in government is how do we make people's lives a little bit better.
I think Boston today, after 20 years, is a little different city than when I took over. We don't have the racial tensions we had. In 1973, '74, '75. I was at Hyde Park High trying to break up the fights with kids because of forced busing. I learned from that. And I see how the city was divided. I came home one day when I first became Acting Mayor, I think it was. Angela and I were driving through – I was driving, somebody was driving me. I'll tell you another story about that. [laughter] I said to Angela, "The only thing I want out of this job is to make Roxbury just a little bit better than it is today. Make sure they get their fair share of city services." That's all I ever wanted out of the job, and I think we have done that. The inner city's a much better place today because of the things we did together.
Let me just finally say to all you folks: Thank you for your support. Mayors don't do it alone. I can't do it alone. It's my great staff I have; I have a fabulous staff in city government who does it for me every day. And the folks who live in the neighborhoods of Boston, and the business community, and the healthcare industry. That's the success I have; it's not Tommy Menino, it's all you folks out there. It's believing in people and trusting people, and people trusting you also.
So as we gather tonight, I just want to say I really appreciate that.
Now just one more story: I haven't driven in 20 years. I still think they have clutches on cars, but that's okay. [laughter] So Sunday I went for a drive. I took my son's car out for a ride. Oh, boy. They have all these buttons now. [laughter] You push a button to start a car. You push a button to talk to somebody on the phone. You get too close in the car, bells go off and everything like that. [laughter] Wow.
So I just want to say thanks to the JFK Library. Thank you, guys. My memory of JFK gave us hope when he ran for President. The night before he ran for President, I was supposed to be in BC in class. I cut class and heard his speech at Faneuil Hall. Only Gerard and Paul probably know that. I snuck into Faneuil Hall and heard him speak, and then the motorcades when down to the Boston Garden. I chased that motorcade all the way down, ran behind it. I couldn't get into the Garden.
But he gave us so much hope for a better future. He gave us opportunities that we never thought we'd have. And him and Teddy, wow, best of all, especially Teddy because I knew him better. He was my inspiration every day as Mayor. And in my office I have this big flag Teddy gave me. I'll remember that day when Teddy said, "Thank you, Mayor, all you did for me." And to all you folks, thank you for all you've done for me. I appreciate it. [applause] Thank you very much.
THE END