Related:
Globe Fired Up About Boston
Walsh Moving Swiftly Against Slumlords
Walsh Takes Up Residency
Whipping Walsh
"Landlord rejects negligence claims; Anwar Faisal tells of new effort to meet maintenance needs" By Jonathan Saltzman | Globe staff August 13, 2014
Landlord Anwar N. Faisal told the Boston City Council Wednesday that he was “extremely disappointed’’ to be accused of being one of the city’s worst slumlords, but insisted that he is improving how he maintains his apartments and handles tenants’ complaints.
Faisal, making his first public remarks since a Globe Spotlight series in May identified him as one of the city’s most complained-about landlords who cater to college students, said he recently hired a half-dozen new maintenance employees, obtained a handful of additional vehicles for his maintenance staff, and doubled the number of dumpsters outside the buildings.
As a result, he said, his company Alpha Management Corp. can fix most tenants’ maintenance problems within an hour, in a much-anticipated appearance before the council.
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“It is extremely disappointing to me . . . after all these years to be accused by some politicians and a newspaper of hurting the people and the city I love,’’ said Faisal, who had been summoned before the council after missing two prior hearings.
Faisal said Alpha has inspected about two-thirds of the 1,000 apartments he says he owns in Boston and plans to examine the remaining third before tens of thousands of college students return to the city on Labor Day weekend. He also recently hired a new tenant relations employee, he said.
Faisal rejected accusations that Alpha refused to rent an apartment last summer to a Northeastern University graduate student because she was from India. The Boston Fair Housing Commission found probable cause in the case in June, and Attorney General Martha Coakley is investigating the student’s discrimination allegation as a result.
All this the result of one accusation?
The Housing Commission corroborated the student’s allegation by sending three young people to pose as customers interested in leasing apartments managed by Alpha, according to city officials.
Two white people were offered apartments by a real estate agent who was showing apartments owned by Faisal but working for an unrelated company. But a third person, of Indian descent, was told that no unit was available.
“I came to this country and to this city as a refugee with very little to my name,’’ said Faisal, who emigrated as a Palestinian refugee from the Gaza Strip. “I worked my way up from the bottom, believed in the American dream.’’
No wonder the Globe got on his (and an Iranian's) case while not getting fired up about the Jewish slumlords like Sterling.
About 10 current and former Alpha tenants, some of whom appeared to be of Asian descent, defended Faisal to the council. They said that they had never detected any prejudice when dealing with Alpha and that Faisal handled maintenance problems promptly and even gave them leeway if they were late with rent.
Nonetheless, Councilor Josh Zakim questioned Faisal’s commitment to nondiscrimination.
Zakim persecuting a Palestinian?
Faisal’s lawyer, Joshua Krefetz of Boston, flanking his client at a table, said he gave the Fair Housing Commission the names of Indian and Pakistani tenants who live in Faisal’s buildings, prompting Zakim to say: “So some of my best friends are Indian? That’s not really a defense.’’
“Well, it’s a defense against saying you have a policy of not renting’’ to Indians, Krefetz retorted.
At several points during the hearing, Krefetz and Zakim shouted over each another. When Zakim asked Faisal how many apartments he owned in Boston, Krefetz told his client not to answer and chided Zakim for turning the hearing into “an inquisition.’’ Faisal ultimately said he had more than 1,000 units in Boston.
In contrast to Krefetz, who was combative, Faisal was polite and soft-spoken, prompting several councilors to say he should have appeared before the council sooner and without his attorney. After the Globe reported the discrimination allegation, the council voted 13 to 0 on July 30 to issue a rare summons to Faisal or face possible sanctions.
“Mr. Faisal, speak for yourself, and you will be much, much better served than folks who want to ratchet up this conversation,’’ said Councilor Tito Jackson.
I don't blame his lawyer for being so upset with this persecution.
The Spotlight Team series relied on dozens of interviews with current and former tenants, repeated visits to Faisal’s buildings, a survey of students living in 40 apartments in six of his buildings, and an examination of hundreds of court and city records. The investigation found that many of his buildings look attractive from the outside, but that apartments are often poorly maintained and some are overrun with all manner of vermin. Faisal declined to be interviewed for the series.
Over the past decade, Faisal and Alpha have been defendants in at least 22 lawsuits and 11 criminal complaints in Boston Housing Court, according to the court and city records. In the same period, he has received 469 code enforcement tickets totaling $51,720 for violations outside his buildings, including overloaded dumpsters, but paid only $3,010 in fines. Faisal attributed some of the problems to the rapid growth of his multimillion-dollar real estate empire in Greater Boston.
“There may have been times several years ago where our staff level did not keep pace,’’ he said.
Now, he said, he can address 45 out of 50 tenant complaints within an hour. The other five might take a couple hours if he has to contact a third party to fix something more complicated, like a lack of hot water.
Faisal said 90 percent of his tenants in Boston are students. Northeastern, one of his biggest customers, has paid Faisal millions over the past decade to house undergraduate students in the Fenway that it cannot accommodate in campus dormitories. Faisal said Northeastern currently leases 137 units from him that house 360 students.
Following the Spotlight Team report, Northeastern has said it is reviewing how Faisal manages his buildings. The school says that the review will be completed in the fall and that its business relationship with Faisal may be terminated if school officials are unsatisfied with the quality of his apartments.
Among those who came to Alpha’s defense at the hearing was Marilyn Gonzalez of Brookline, whose son, Max, a Northeastern student, lives in Faisal’s building at 49 Symphony Road. She said that the building is well maintained and that Faisal’s staff is respectful. Gonazalez said she could not stand to see Faisal “vilified like this in the newspaper.’’
The Globe would never do that to anyone.
Also speaking in Faisal’s defense was Andrew Lafuente, 24, who described himself as a Bentley University graduate hired by Faisal six weeks ago as director of tenant relations. Lafuente said that Alpha has bought new computer software to hasten responses to maintenance problems.
“The volume is so great in terms of maintenance requests that it just wasn’t organized properly,’’ he said.
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I can't imagine anyone wanting to send their child to Boston to go to school.
Related: Family of BU student killed in fire prepares lawsuit
That's one family that regrets it.
"Colleges in Boston required to release off-campus addresses" by Jenn Abelson | Globe Staff August 21, 2014
The Boston City Council on Wednesday voted to require colleges with a presence in Boston to provide a list of off-campus addresses where students are residing, in a step approved three months after a Boston Globe Spotlight Team investigation, “Shadow Campus,” revealed that illegal, overcrowded apartments with hazardous conditions riddle the city’s university neighborhoods, including a large number in violation of a zoning rule that prohibits more than four full-time undergraduates from sharing a house or apartment.
Good thing it was just a couple of landlords.
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The “Shadow Campus” series found widespread health and safety issues at apartments, ranging from the kind of deadly peril that claimed Binland Lee to more ordinary hazards. A Globe analysis of records found that four student-rich ZIP codes, when adjusted for population, have 50 percent more complaints overall than the citywide average in more than a dozen categories, including mold and mice infestation, missing or broken carbon monoxide detectors, and overcrowding....
All of a sudden, the great Menino miracle is not looking like it at all. He left Walsh a corrupt and hulking carcass.
“The tragic events on Linden Street in my district last year just highlighted the problems that we have with overcrowding and landlords that don’t take care of their property,” City Councilor Mark Ciommo, who cosponsored the amendment with City Councilor Josh Zakim, said at the hearing on Tuesday. “It also highlights the overabundance of students in our neighborhoods.”
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"Chinatown shootings put focus on a tiny street; Late-night crowds trouble the area" by Nestor Ramos | Globe Staff August 17, 2014
Looking at the shell casings littering the sidewalk and police swarming the scene, Steven Bellardino thought he’d wandered onto a movie set Sunday morning in Chinatown — the Whitey Bulger movie, maybe, that was shooting near his home in Revere.
How much is that film costing Massachusetts taxpayers?
But this was a different kind of shooting.
Four men were taken to area hospitals with injuries that were described as not life-threatening after the shooting on Edinboro Street. Melvin Smith, 27, of Mattapan, was arrested after nearby police officers heard gunshots shortly before 3 a.m. Sunday and allegedly saw him flee the scene.
Related: Bail set at $1 million in Chinatown shootings
Why did he give the cops a false name, and what does his lawyer Cohen mean he didn't do anything?
The violence surprised Bellardino, a regular at Sunday morning dim sum. But residents and others said the narrow, one-block street’s overnight persona — where crowds come for late-night meals and drug users congregate — has been increasingly troubled in recent years....
Menino really left a shit hole behind, and the Globe sanitized it all for the send-off.
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"Landsmark appointment to BRA board back on track" by Beth Healy | Globe Staff August 21, 2014
After a rocky two weeks, Theodore “Ted” Landsmark’s nomination is now back on track. Mayor Martin J. Walsh had put the appointment on hold while lawyers battled out Landsmark’s separation package with the Boston Architectural College....
Related: BRA Has $mall Cup
And they aren't even collecting the overflow.
Landsmark had grown accustomed to the spotlight long ago, after he was captured in a famous, Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph, being jabbed by an angry South Boston protester with an American flag on a pole, during a busing riot in 1976. Landsmark went on to became a prominent voice in Boston for civil rights....
Landsmark, a Yale-trained lawyer with an environmental design degree and a Boston University PhD, is credited with overseeing the school’s conversion from a center to an accredited college offering bachelor’s and master’s degrees. He also helped make the program, long devoted to working students, one of the most diverse in the country....
His tenure at the college was marked by a period of increased spending, as the Newbury Street-based school hired more administrators and expanded its footprint in pricey Back Bay by acquiring the former Institute of Contemporary Art building on Boylston Street in 2007.
Landsmark has sought to burnish his reputation in the realm of sustainable development. On his watch, the college built a Green Alley between Boylston and Newbury streets, outfitted with permeable pavement, so water can seep through, and a geothermal well system to heat and cool buildings.
But critics say the school’s Brutalist style building on Newbury Street, built of cement like City Hall, leaks heat and is expensive to keep warm in winter.
Known for its shoestring budgets, the college has allowed expenses to rise slightly faster than revenues over the past six years. Last year, the school collected $19.4 million in revenue and spent $19.1 million.
Landsmark’s salary rose 32 percent from 2007 through 2013, to $227,615, according to school tax filings, though his benefits fluctuated. BRA directors receive a $10,000 annual stipend for attending monthly meetings.
If Landsmark is approved by the City Council, it would mark his return to city government. In the 1980s and 1990s, he worked for the city on community partnerships and workforce training, as well as anti-violence programs.
Russel Feldman, a recent former chairman of Boston Architectural College, said of Landsmark, “He really has a good sense of what cities are doing and how to make cities more inclusive, and how to make them dynamic and how to deal with the challenge of resources.’’
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Related:
Walsh goes on vacation, forgets to tell City Council
Haystack suspends parking app operations in Boston after council vote
Related: Boston Globe Haystack
"Bruins hope practice facility becomes a money-maker" by Callum Borchers | Globe Staff August 21, 2014
Boston’s big-name players are excited about the new state-of-the-art practice facility the Bruins are building in Brighton.
And the hockey players are looking forward to using it, too.
The new rink is scheduled to open in 2016 as part of the massive Boston Landing development by New Balance Athletic Shoe Inc. And it’s not just an upgrade for stars such as Patrice Bergeron and Zdeno Chara, but also a potential event space for corporate partners, such as Dunkin’ Donuts and Hallmark Health.
It's for whom our $y$tem is $erving, and that's all.
The team’s home arena, TD Garden, cannot accommodate all the requests it gets for corporate events, private functions and advertising, so the Bruins hope to redirect some of that business to the new Brighton facility. The Bruins and the TD Garden have the same owner — business magnate Jeremy Jacobs.
“We’re wondering what we can offer our corporate partners that someone else can’t offer them — that’s an experience they can’t buy somewhere else,” said Bruins president Cam Neely. “Is there an opportunity to bring people behind the curtain, so to speak?”
Top sports franchises already have mastered the art of profiting from their home arenas on nongame days. The Red Sox use Fenway Park for everything from European soccer matches to wedding ceremonies. The TD Garden hosts concerts, skating events, and once was even rented by Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney to use as an enormous war room on Election Night in 2012.
I'm glad there is plenty of money in Bo$ton.
But the Bruins’ plan for the Brighton practice rink reflects how some sports teams are turning the places where players scrimmage and run drills into legitimate attractions.
Not every team can pull this off. Clubs with little history or shine — think Milwaukee Bucks or Carolina Hurricanes — struggle to sell game tickets, never mind function space at practice sites.
Franchises with rich traditions and loyal followings, however, are realizing the marketing value of anything that makes people feel as if they have gained special access. A team’s practice facility is usually smaller and more intimate than the game venue, lending a quality that can make an event seem particularly exclusive.
“It’s the power of the Bruins as a brand,” said Stephen A. Greyser, a sports marketing specialist at Harvard Business School. “They will make it convenient for people who are hot about hockey to have a Bruins-esque experience there, to have a sense of being associated with the Bruins.”
The Los Angeles Kings, winners of two of the last three Stanley Cups, offer a prime example. Team owner Philip F. Anschutz also has a 135,000-square-foot practice facility, the Toyota Sports Center, that includes a sports bar. Fans can buy gym memberships, and even throw kids’ birthday parties there.
The New York Yankees’ spring training field in Tampa is not only the home ballpark for one of the club’s minor league affiliates but also a concert venue, a photo backdrop for rent at $100 per hour, and the site of fantasy baseball camps that charge participants as much as $4,950 to spend a week pretending to be pros.
Maybe the biggest practice facility gold mine will soon belong to the Dallas Cowboys, who are constructing a multiuse megaplex on 91 acres in Frisco, Texas. It will include a 12,000-seat indoor stadium that the team will use for practice but will also make available for high school football games and other events, such as cheerleading competitions.
Most striking, though, is that the project, called Cowboys Alley, will also include residences, a hotel, dining, and retail.
The Bruins facility in Brighton will not be owned by Jacobs. The club has signed a letter of intent for a long-term lease with the real estate development arm of New Balance, whose 14-acre Boston Landing project includes a new company headquarters, a hotel, and another sports complex.
But the rink will have a pro shop, where the Bruins can sell merchandise, and the team will be able to book corporate functions and sponsorships there. At Ristuccia Arena in Wilmington, where the Bruins have been tenants since 1987, the club has seldom — if ever — hosted events, according to rink manager Bob Rotondo.
Moreover, the money the Bruins will make from events in Brighton carries a powerful added value: It will be exempt from the National Hockey League’s revenue-sharing program, which funnels some profits from successful teams to struggling ones. Neely declined to discuss specifics about corporate events the club may host in Brighton. But whatever the Bruins collect, they can keep.
For the Bruins, a new forum capable of holding corporate functions is consistent with other recent moves marketed at business clientele. A $70 million Garden renovation project underway this offseason will expand the Legends Club restaurant and bar for season-ticket holders, many of whom are businesses, and add dozens of new video boards where companies can show ads.
An executive club, known as the TD Garden Business Network, debuted during last season’s Stanley Cup playoffs and uses a mix of social media and in-person gatherings to facilitate schmoozing during hockey and basketball games.
Bryan Hoertdoerfer, whose Manchester, N.H., dental practice is a Bruins corporate partner, said he’s eager to find out what the team has in store at the new facility. He’s attended corporate functions at the Garden and meets players when a rough night on the ice lands them in his dentist’s chair. But an event at the practice rink would be something new.
“It could have a behind-the-scenes feel,” Hoertdoerfer said.
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Wealth inequality no big deal when it comes to the diversion of sport.
Related: Bye-Bye, Boston
NEXT DAY UPDATE:
The last hours of Dawnn Jaffier
Also see:
Young woman is shot to death in Dorchester
Shooting victim had gift for connecting with youths
Nearly 1,000 gather to honor slain Brighton woman
Gang link to Dorchester parade shooting alleged
At bottom it was still a fun time for all.
