In 1960:

"...A feeling of despondency, almost municipal hypochondria, had settled over the

In 1968:

"...Anyone who looks around the City and doesn't realize that it is a better city than it was in 1959, has blinders on..."

It is difficult to assess my eight years as Mayor unless one can remember the situation which confronted us in 1960. You might recall that the tax-rate had been rising at an average annual rate of $8.00 a year; the city had lost 100,000 people in ten years; we had lost $500 million in assessed valuation in 25 years (that's one quarter of our total assessable base. But more importantly than any of these losses, the city had lost the confidence of both its investors and its residents: only two buildings of any significance had been built in Boston in over 35 years; major insurance companies across America would not loan money in Boston; our credit rating had been recently changed; and a feeling of despondency, almost municipal hypochondria had settled over the City. It was necessary, as I saw it, to do three things simultaneously, with perhaps more haste than one might have chosen to use had other options been available.

You remember that the first one was to cut the cloth and tighten the economic belt, reorganize city departments and bring about greater efficiency; the second--to rebuild, restore, and revitalize investor confidence. Admittedly these have been done. There is more building going on in the City of Boston at this moment than in any city in America--that's by dollar volume in relation to per square yard area and in relation to population served. The third aspect of the program was to endeavor to have the Commonwealth assume its fair share of the responsibility for the City.

First: We quite often forget now the belt-tightening period in 1960, when we had to initiate a no-hire-no-fire policy to cut the fat from municipal operations. We re-organized a number of city departments over the 8 years; we combined the Health and Hospital Departments which has set an example for America, an example which has now been emulated in half a dozen cities; we created the new Public Facilities Department (this I think is one of the most significant reorganizations we have made); and we reorganized the Assessing Department. We made a number of other internal and organizational changes all of which were designed to bring more efficiency and less expense.

Think back again to the physical side of the City in 1960. When I was elected the new city hall was to have been built on the site of the old Boston Post on Washington St.; the new Federal Building was to have been in Back Bay next to the Trinity Church on that block where the new John Hancock 60-story skyscraper will be and the State had some idea that they might want to build something, at sometime, somewhere. The first thing we did was to go to Washington and change the decisions which had already been made both in Boston and Washington. We brought about the concept of the Government Center to replace Old Scollay Square. We then determined, that since a new city hall is built only about once a century, that it was better to build a building that was worthy of the City of Boston and which would hopefully blend in with historic Old Boston in a sensible way, but without any effort to build a $20 million colonial building with leaded windows. So we held a national competition and came up with a very exciting design which some faint-hearted people, you might remember, were somewhat afraid of. The building will be and is already being described as the most exciting public building to be built in America in this century. I'm sure in the years to come that many people will come to Boston for the primary purpose to see this building.

It is difficult to visualize even now in its final form, because the red-brick plaza which is the cement which holds the whole project together isn't finished yet. With pedestrian underpasses going through, a plaza with trees, walks, benches, etc., one will be able to see clearly the cencept which I.M. Pei developed for the Government Center. It will provide some continuity between Beacon Hill--the State House and the red-brick sidewalks -- down through Scollay Square, to Dock Square, and ultimately to the waterfront which is also to be renewed.

This leads us next to the next renewal area. There will be some change in the off-ramps affording the pedestrian some means of direct access to the Waterfront. With a relocated Atlantic Avenue, a combination of highrise apartment houses, town houses, and some converted warehouses (into apartments), hundreds of millions of dollars is being invested in new construction for Boston in the Waterfront Project.

The plan for a Central Business District is not quite so far along though we have already entered the early land-acquisition and construction stage. The Project will be carried on in stages and will endeavor to put some order into the mish-mash of narrow streets which we inherited from our forebears.

This plan and other plans were carried out with a unique blend of private enterprise and the public sector. You will remember that nonprofit corporations took part in both the Waterfront and the Central Business District. Merchants in the business community raised the "seed" money: in one case $200,000, and in the other case $250,000. We then signed a memorandum of understanding between the BRA and the non-profit organization agreeing, not to the adoption of their plan in toto, but rather that there would be consultations between their staff and the BRA as to any significant changes.

Think back to the residential components of the renewal program. We did not wait for the riots and the disorders of 1965, 1966, and 1967 to start work on the poorer sections of Boston and the Negro sections of Boston, which were badly in need of renewal and rehabilitation. In 1960 we made the Washington Park Project a matter of first priority. Contrary to the lamentations of some in the last campaign, thousands of new apartment houses, low income "221d3" apartment houses were built; literally hundreds of individual rehabilitation jobs have been completed or are underway; a new YMCA, a new Boys' Club, a new community shopping center, and many other improvements in Washington Park have been built where formerly there existed only squalor and hopelessness. This is not to say we have done enough. But we made a start in 1960 and we are a long way along the road in 1967. Where might we have been if we had waited until 1967 to start?

The same thing might be said for the project in Charlestown which was greeted by something less than unanimous approval. There was a slightly more acrimonious debate after which the vociferous minority had more than its day in court. The minority ultimately bowed to the wish of the majority. That project is now underway.

The South End and the South Cove Projects, including the completed sections of Castle Square with its mixed housing, public housing, and "221d3" non-profit housing are also well underway.