Diversity on the Campaign Trail

The Banner had a good article this week about campaign staff diversity. They ran a picture of myself and Brunelli and Amanda two of my minority campaign staff. They rightly identified that I have had the most diverse staff of any of the mayoral or city council candidates. I believe in walking the walk, not just talking the talk. Mayor Menino has 7 of his 8 campaign staff white. The article can be seen at http://www.baystatebanner.com/frontpage5.htm.

Candidates Connolly, White, Flynn, Ready, etc. couldn't be reached for comment. As someone who sees them out on the campaign I offer the following observations:

Connolly usually travels with his white campaign manager. To his credit, I've never heard him pretend to be anyone other than who he is, and he doesn't pretend to have some special connection to the "new Boston".

Patricia White, I've never seen with anyone who wasn't white. This is particularly interesting since she once commented something to the effect that she was the face of the new boston. Also interesting to me is that she has 119 names listed on her fundraiser flyers as supporters and only one of which is clearly a male supporter. Unless Boston has become some sort of Amazon paradise while I wasn't looking, I'm not sure this is representative of Boston.

Ed Flynn is working hard on his own. I've seen him everywhere, but only by himself unless accompanied by his charming wife, beautiful daughter and cute baby. Always a crowd pleaser!

Felix Arroyo is usually with one of his three (talented) white guys Jamie, Patrick, or Kyle. Felix is allegedly trying to poach one of the hispanic staffers from one of the other councilors.

Michael Flaherty (who shook my hand again today in East Boston!) has hired William Dorcena, who is the brother of the new state rep from Dorchester. Mr. Flaherty has quoted Mr. Dorcena on his campaign brochure saying that "....we are all fortunate to have a city council president like Mike Flaherty." I wonder how hard it is to get your paid staff to write good comments about you?

I remember going to a wedding of someone very close to me who absolutely considers herself a very progressive, liberal, democratic lawyer who lived in Cambridge. 120 or so people at the wedding, only one asian woman, the date of a guest.

I am very proud of the fact that my wedding has invited guests who are white, black, asian, gay, straight, muslim, jewish, protestant, lesbian and of course hispanic people. People from all over the world; japan, columbia, england, france, vietnam, antigua, italy, ireland, etc. Wherever I've traveled in the world, I've found friendly people who want to share a drink, a story, a common bond, and I'm happy to say many have become friends.