Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Monday, December 8, 2008

South Boston Groups Favor Development, Under Stipulations


By Joshua Schubert

SOUTH BOSTON – Over the past decade, cleanup crews have spent years ridding the Boston Harbor of debris clouding the water.

But property overlooking the harbor has become valuable, and new building projects threaten to repollute the harbor and increase traffic congestion, said locals.

“The fact that the waterfront is so clean has made it very attractive for development,” said Vivien Li, a spokeswoman for the Boston Harbor Association.

As developers prepare to build new hotels and other buildings, neighborhood groups are welcoming the growth, despite fears of pollution and poor use of land.

All new buildings in the neighborhood are required by law to meet minimum green standards, but they are not the only standard important to local organizations.

Green certification “tends to be a good system,” said Jon Seward of the Seaport Alliance for Neighborhood Design, but “I’m not so much concerned with a building getting a specific rating.”

A green building is one that is well-engineered and constructed, Seward said.
“The longer it can persist, the greener it is,” he said. It keeps the energy of the manufacturer from being wasted or downgraded.”

The Fort Point Arts Community “doesn’t have a specific environmental policy or mission,” said Paul Bernstein, community president. He is more concerned with the neighborhood’s cultural life.

Bernstein and other neighbors are concerned about the neighborhood’s cultural landscape and the amount of land that will be accessible to the public.

The organizations prefer the land to be used for parks, benches, open spaces, public art and other cultural facilities.

“What we’re looking for is a richly mixed-use sort of district,” Seward said.
But as growth contributes to an influx of tourists and consumers, locals also seek to limit the harmful emissions caused by increased traffic congestion.

There is a “lack of available parking for residents [and] guests,” said Timothy Brown, community liaison for City Councilor Bill Linehan.

But additional parking would cause more people to drive, Seward said.

“Traffic congestion is already a problem,” said Seward, who hopes that the lack of parking will lead to an increase in mass transit use.


The threat of water pollution as a direct result of construction is less of a concern among neighborhood groups.

“Requirements for development [along the harbor] are more stringent than inland,” said Li, explaining that the law evolved from the British concept of public access to the waterfront.

There is “very little [construction] right by the water,” so the chances of debris causing pollution are relatively small, Seward said.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

State Law Permits Obama’s Aunt to Live in South Boston

By Joshua Schubert

SOUTH BOSTON – For years, Zeituni Onyango, one of President-elect Barack Obama’s aunts from Kenya, lived in a Flaherty Street public housing facility, uninterrupted
by the media blitz that the release of her immigration stats sparked.

Obama was unaware of Onyango’s illegal status, his campaign staff said in a statement.

Immigrants in Massachusetts are allowed to keep their immigration status private under a 1977 federal consent decree.

The legal status of immigrants seeking protection in the United States is confidential and can only be released to police or elected officials upon federal permission, according to a 1995 asylum office memo.

“It appears that the Department of Homeland Security rules were likely violated when confidential materials were released for partisan purposes,” said Michael A. Olivas, an immigration law professor at the University of Houston.

The confidentiality rules were written to protect the immigrants’ safety.

Releasing information “can put any such asylee at risk---especially if they are identified and well-known,” Olivas said.

The Massachusetts decree is not uncommon and other states have similar laws, said Peter Spiro, author and immigration law professor at Temple University.

“Many states extend various benefits to undocumented aliens, but usually on their own initiative and not at the behest of the federal government,” Spiro said.

Spiro was initially “surprised that such a consent decree exists,” being as recent measures, including the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, have limited the rights of illegal immigrants.

Since Obama’s victory last Tuesday, Onyango in staying with family in Ohio, where she hired local immigration lawyer Margaret Wong.

Some say that her move will endanger her chances of remaining in the country.

“If this is so, the matter [of the Massachusetts decree] is moot,” said Sheldon Goldman, professor of constitutional law at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

But Olivas said that the courts may be sympathetic to Onyango’s case, based on the leak.

“These confidentiality rules are approved government practice and are taken seriously by courts," Olivas said.

The “regulations safeguard information that, if disclosed publicly, could subject the claimant to retaliatory measures,” according to the asylum memo.