Contrarian Boston/01.23.2024

Bye-bye People’s Republic of Cambridge? | Big Boston waterfront project ready to roll | Haley knee-capped by Biden write-in campaign | Racial gerrymandering at Boston’s elite exam schools | Quick hits |

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Exam school admissions controversy: Newly released documents shed an unflattering light on Boston’s drive to diversify its top schools

Socio-economic factors, not race: That was supposed to be the guiding factor under new exam school admissions standards that Boston Public Schools rolled out more than two years ago.

But the controversial new system, which purports to give a boost to students from families of more modest means, actually does a far better job of giving a leg up to students based on race, a review of new documents released by BPS shows.

The new exam school admissions system boosts diversity in large part by dramatically reducing the number of white students accepted to Boston Latin School, Boston Latin Academy and the John D. O'Bryant School of Mathematics and Science, argue critics of the policy, citing documents released by BPS under Freedom of Information Act requests.

The number of white students who applied to the city’s exam schools for the current academic year came in at just under 327, according to an analysis of the exam school admissions stats.

That’s comparable to the number of black students who applied, which stood at 300.

But no more than 62 percent of the white applicants were accepted at the city’s three exam schools, compared to 78 percent of black applicants, 78 percent of Hispanic applicants, and 83 percent of Asian applicants, according to an analysis of BPS admissions stats.

In an apparent attempt to make it difficult to track the numbers, BPS, in the newly released admissions documents, breaks out Asian, Black, Hispanic and Native American students into separate categories, but does not list a category for white students.

(Boston Latin School)

Instead, white students are lumped under a heading called “other.” Using a process of deduction based on other BPS admissions documents that do break out white students in a separate category, critics say the vast majority of those other students are white.

A BPS spokesperson could not be reached for comment.

The far lower admissions rate for students in the other/white category is a result of the way BPS groups exam school applicants into eight different socio-economic tiers based on geography and census tracks, rather than family income, which the district contends it can’t currently track.

Students from largely white sections of Boston area are packed into the two highest highest-socio economic tiers, with a set number of seats awarded to each tier.

All of which sounds equitable enough, but for the fact that demand for exam school seats is far greater in the higher socio-economic tiers, which cover parts of neighborhoods like West Roxbury, Charlestown and the North End, than it is in the less well off tiers that encompass sections of Dorchester and Roxbury.

The result? Dozens of students with straight-As and high or even perfect scores in top tiers have wound up with rejection letters from Boston Latin School and the city’s other two exam schools.

To be fair, the district’s new exam school policy has surely opened doors to long-neglected students in the city’s poorer neighborhoods. For decades, minority students at Boston Latin School were arguably underrepresented.

But there is a simple situation to the current issue, and it doesn’t involve taking away opportunities from students in Dorchester and Roxbury.

BPS could simply expand the number of exam school seats to meet demand. With BPS having lost 10,000 students over the last decade alone, there is no shortage of empty classrooms right now in a system that is spending gobs of money year to keep open a significant number of half-empty schools.

“This chart proves that under the exam school policy, tiers are a tool to exclude nearly half of white applicants,” one frustrated BPS parent told Contrarian Boston. “Legal questions aside, this is a bombshell that further erodes trust in BPS and the mayor who supports this policy.”

NH primary debacle: When it comes to stopping Trump, no united front

The last best chance of stopping Trump before the general election just collapsed with Nikki Haley’s defeat in the Granite State.

And the write-in campaign orchestrated by supporters of President Joe Biden certainly did no favors for Haley, who came within eight points of Trump after being down by double digits.

Recall that Biden was not on the ballot in New Hampshire, having helped orchestrate the move of the party’s first major presidential primary to more congenial South Carolina.

That decision, though, became a bit awkward when other Democratic primary candidates, namely Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips and author and speaker Marianne Williamson, both managed to get their names on the ballot in New Hampshire.

Attempting to create a show of enthusiasm for a candidate who has generated little visible excitement among voters, supporters of Biden, including Gov. Maura Healey, orchestrated a write-in campaign that generated tens of thousands of votes.

Yet in this case, at least some of those votes for Biden might have gone Haley’s way in New Hampshire but for the write-in campaign, not necessarily out of any love for the former South Carolina governor, but as a way to stop Trump.

Among those suspecting an ulterior motive behind the Biden write-in campaign is Jennifer Nassour, the former MassGOP chair who has spent the last several days crisscrossing New Hampshire to drum up support for Haley.

Nassour is co-chair of Women for Nikki Massachusetts with state Rep. Hannah Kane of Shrewsbury.

It’s not exactly a secret that Haley comes out ahead of Biden in national polling, as opposed to Trump, who is more evenly matched.

“That’s 1000 percent the case,” Nassour told Contrarian Boston, who believes that drawing off support from Haley was at least partly behind the Biden write-in effort.

Don’t think it would made a difference? Well, on Tuesday evening, Biden was on track to garner almost as many write-in votes as Haley received in the Republican primary.

Of course, to be real here, Biden was the least of Haley’s headaches given the toxic divisions within her own party.

In a hot mic moment as he exited the race, fellow Republican Chris Christie helpfully predicted Haley would “get smoked” by Trump, while Ron DeSantis dropped out only to endorse Trump, who had savagely taunted and belittled him for months.

What a snake pit.

End of an era: Developer eyes construction start for the last building in Boston’s Fan Pier waterfront megaproject

The Fallon Co. has pulled a building permit for the last piece of the multibillion-dollar Fan Pier.

Led by veteran Boston developer Joe Fallon, the real estate firm recently obtained a building permit from City Hall to start construction of a $165 million, 14 story residential mid-rise at Fan Pier’s Parcel H, reports BLDUP, an online publication that tracks major projects.

Plans to build out a new waterfront neighborhood next door to the Moakley federal courthouse in the Seaport had been stuck in the drawing boards for years when Fallon took over the project in the mid-2000s.

Rendering of final piece of the Fan Pier megaproject (CBT Architects)

Over the past 17 years, Fallon and his firm have steadily built out the site with a collection of high-end condo, apartment and office buildings.

The new building will feature 122 residential units along with civic and cultural space and a restaurant.

The decision to move forward, in turn, marks a small bright spot amid an otherwise gloomy picture for new housing development in Boston, with residential construction having plunged in the city over the past 18 months.

Changing times: Cambridge no longer a hotbed for rent control activism as Boston, other cities take the lead

We'll see whether it’s truly time to put aside the old schtick about the “People’s Republic” of Cambridge.

But as the debate has heated up in neighboring Boston, Somerville and Brookline over proposals to cap skyrocketing rents, Cambridge has gone uncharacteristically silent on the issue.

City councilors in Cambridge, including some die-hard progressives, say they are wary over reviving a debate that was the cause of such bitter acrimony years ago, according to a recent piece in the Harvard Crimson.

As a result, while Boston and Somerville have passed their own proposals to bring back rent control and are now lobbying for state approval, Cambridge has effectively taken no action.

City Councilor Paul Toner, who said he is opposed to bringing back rent control, offered up a similar take when Contrarian Boston caught up with him.

A moderate Democrat, Toner jokes that makes him the conservative on the City Council.

“An awful lot of people in Cambridge who remember how divisive rent control was here in Cambridge don’t want to reopen it,” Toner said.

Cambridge City Councilor Paul Toner

But along with not wanting to reopen old wounds, city councilors in Cambridge also appear to have found what they believe to be a more pragmatic strategy to combating crazy rents: revving up construction of new apartments.

Toner and other city councilors have embraced the idea that boosting housing production, especially of affordable units, is the best way to make progress after years of underbuilding.

“I guess I am a little bit surprised it hasn’t come up,” said Toner of the rent control issue. “Most of us on the council feel the way we are going to lower the cost of housing is to build more housing and try to support rezoning and considering different parts of the city for different heights.”

Quick hits:

Great story from the Wall Street Journal, which pulls no punches in its analysis of why anti-Trump Republicans have failed to stop his catastrophic candidacy: “The GOP Wants Pure, Uncut Trumpism”

Interesting take by the Globe’s Larry Edelman on a hospital investment deal that doesn’t look so hot in retrospect: “How a private equity firm made a killing on Steward Health Care”

The fines are mounting and could hit $200,000 by Thursday night: “Newton’s striking teachers remain undeterred despite facing largest fine in decades” Globe

Execs pony up for state auditor’s campaign to bring transparency to the State House: “Donors to DiZoglio campaign mostly hail from business sector” CommonWealth Beacon

The next Picasso. Who knew? “Hunter Biden’s paintings have sold for a total of $1.5 million” Washington Post