May 17, 2004 is one of those dates that civil rights activists will remember 100 years from now: the day legal same-sex marriage licenses became available in Massachusetts and for the first time anywhere in the U.S. So it is appropriate that we mark the 10th anniversary as a start. That achievement came because...
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Opinion
JP Observer: Bus yard belongs on the highway
Looking into details of a proposal to put a new MBTA bus maintenance and storage facility on American Legion Highway (ALH) instead of on Washington Street at the Arborway makes me pound my forehead with the heel of my hand. Of course! It’s such a good idea. At first, I was dubious just because...
Editorial: Arborway Yard needs light
Whatever minor tweaks or massive changes may eventually come to the Arborway Yard bus facility plan, there is one thing it unquestionably needs: daylight. For too long, a deeply dysfunctional relationship between the MBTA and the Jamaica Plain community has marred Arborway Yard planning with crazy surprises and bloated construction estimates. It’s time for...
Letter: Thanks for Curley Field support
We asked. And you gave! The Curley K-8 School Playing Field Committee gratefully announces that we have reached our goal! What started as a dream—raise enough funds in one year to transform a 14,000-square-foot, broken-up, unsafe asphalt lot into a safe, outdoor playing field and running track for our 850-plus students—has become reality. We...
Editorial: Our Boston Marathon
“Explosions injure dozens at Boston Marathon; many JPers in race.” So read the headline that Gazette reporters, still in shock, wrote atop a breaking news story on the afternoon of April 15, 2013. For nearly four days, the news only got worse. JP’s Faulkner Hospital filled with victims of the maniacal bombings. Nearly everyone...
Editorial: Organizing Forest Hills
Rumblings about a special Forest Hills committee for the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council and a new neighborhood association forming around Wachusett Street are different expressions of a similar truth. The Forest Hills/Woodbourne area is JP’s hot new epicenter of development and gentrification. It is also by far JP’s least politically organized sub-neighborhood. That is...
JP Observer: Commissioner search launches new City focus on arts
When the mayoral candidates, including now-Mayor Marty Walsh, touted the importance of arts during the campaign last fall, the rhetoric was refreshing for people and organizations in Jamaica Plain. Many of our residents work in the arts. The neighborhood is home to myriad musical, literary, visual and other arts events, venues and educational programs....
Editorial: Another Arborway Yard surprise
Here we go again with another Arborway Yard surprise. The MBTA’s roundabout confession to the Gazette that it is about to start “site preparation,” including a major demolition, is the latest unnecessarily confusing and surprising step in 15 years of tinkering with this crucial public transit facility. The goals here should be simple. The...
Editorial: Farewell to a JP behind-the-scenes star
Commercial landlords are rarely lauded. When things go well, they tend to be invisible, and we may only hear their names when things go wrong. Yet they shape our neighborhoods behind the scenes. In JP, some particularly committed landlords are part of the reason off-beat, indie businesses continue to thrive. Stavros Frantzis, a JP...
Editorial: State Lab safety
The latest report about the State Lab’s drug testing scandal leaves us even less convinced that a facility handling diseases and possible bioterror sample in our backyard is safe and secure. The Inspector General’s report describes management failures everywhere from the lab to the Governor’s Office. It depicts serious problems with employee background checks...