On a mission from God in East Boston

Another front line has opened up in the battle over an East Boston casino: Multifaith coalitions.

Friends of East Boston, a group of neighborhood ministers, announced their campaign against the Suffolk Downs/Caesar Entertainment plan to bring a $1 billion casino to the Suffolk Downs racetrack. Their message: “Because we believe God has something better for East Boston than a casino.”

At first glance, a coalition of neighborhood churches and other supporters doesn’t look to stand a chance against the might of casino developers. But the clergy is digging deep into the moral well of David versus Goliath symbolism to wage their uphill battle against cold hard cash.

Elsewhere in Massachusetts, faith groups have tried and failed in their campaigns against casinos. The Council of Churches of Western Massachusetts, like their East Boston brethren, had zero dollars in their effort to defeat the MGM Springfield casino proposal. Their campaign never gained any real traction. Springfield voters approved the casino plan 58 percent to 42 percent. The Council has moved onto working with MGM to mitigate the social consequences of problem gambling.

But the East Boston clergy have one element that the western group lacked, the backing of the local Catholic leaders. In Springfield, the Catholic Church, which sold a former rectory to MGM investor and Springfield businessman Paul Picknelly, pretty much stayed on the sidelines. Springfield casino opponents believe that they would have fared better with more active, public backing from Catholic leaders. The city defeated casino pushes in the mid-1990s on the strength of vigorous opposition from energized Catholic-led groups.

Catholic leaders are engaged in the Eastie group fighting the casino.  In a Boston Globe video, Rev. Thomas Domurat of the Most Holy Redeemer Catholic Church, noted that the group’s opposition is rooted in concerns about gambling addictions, especially in a neighborhood of moderate- and low-income residents.

Certainly, some residents in an area that is also predominately Latino and heavily immigrant will take church leaders’ arguments on board.  “I don’t like,” an East Boston businesswoman Juvenita Alvarado told WBUR. “I don’t like. Because if my church says no good here, I say, too, no good for here.”

Many of the churches involved in Friends of East Boston have predominately Latino congregations. Churches play crucial social roles in many such communities and clergy will have the ear of their congregations at least once a week, if not more.

While it is difficult to gauge the impact of a faith-backed opposition effort, what is quantifiable is that the support for an East Boston casino is narrow, at least further afield in Boston. A recent WBUR/MassINC Polling Group survey of likely Boston mayoral preliminary voters showed 47 percent of respondents supported a casino; 44 percent were opposed.

It remains to be seen whether a social justice message will trump the job creation and other economic talking points that casino developers pitch.  East Boston, and East Boston only, votes on the Suffolk Downs casino proposal on November 5.

                                                                                                                                                      –GABRIELLE GURLEY

MUNICIPAL MATTERS

The number of homeless families is starting to spike in Danvers again, rising from 112 to 142, the Salem News reports.

The federal government is offering Scituate or Cohasset the offshore Minot Light for free, saying the Coast Guard would continue to maintain and operate the light and foghorn while the town that takes it would be responsible for the structure’s maintenance.

The Somerset police chief, who had been on medical leave following a heated confrontation with the town administrator and a selectman, said he was cleared to return to work just after the town administrator rescinded an order changing work reporting requirements that triggered the confrontation.

Former Inspector General Greg Sullivan says Boston based its handover of Yawkey Way to the Red Sox on outdated real estate values.

NATIONAL POLITICS/WASHINGTON

There’s no end in sight to the government shutdown, as both parties in Washington spent the day playing to public opinion, Time reports. With Social Security offices shut down, Lynn residents were angry, the Item reports. In central Massachusetts, the shutdown affected Social Security, IRS, and flood control work, the Telegram & Gazette reports. A Red Cross food pantry is worried that federal funding will dry up, NECN reports. Health exchanges open in every state, Governing reports. Not all government websites have gone down. The shutdown blocks kids with cancer from clinical trials, ABC News reports. Vets stormed DC’s closed World War II memorial and gain entrance. National Review points out that the late Speaker Thomas “Tip” O’Neill was the master of the government shutdown to win policy concessions. The Chronicle of Philanthropy has a rundown on what the shutdown means to nonprofits.

Folks in Maryland are busy buying guns before a new gun law takes effect, Governing reports.

ELECTIONS

Boston mayoral candidate John Connolly says he will vote against the police contract in the City Council, WBUR reports. Jeff Jacoby says Marty Walsh was for binding arbitration before he was against it. Charlotte Golar Richie says she will endorse Connolly or Walsh within the next few days, NECN reports.

James Aloisi, in his CommonWealth series on historic Boston mayoral races of the past, reports on John Collins and his stunning upset of John E. Powers.

Mac Bell, who is running for mayor in Gloucester, shows up at a fundraiser for the incumbent, Carolyn Kirk, who asks him to leave, the Gloucester Times reports.

Two unopposed incumbents in New Bedford — a ward councilor and a School Committee member — have drawn the most donations of all city election candidates so far, according to the Standard Times.

The New York Times profiles Chirlane McCray, the wife of New York mayoral hopeful Bill de Blasio.

BUSINESS/ECONOMY

Don Chiofaro heads back to the drawing board on redevelopment the Harbor Garage.

Google is facing wiretapping allegations for scanning users’ email.

EDUCATION

While they wait for their future school to be rehabbed, students and teachers at the Lowell Collegiate Charter School move into a modular building behind a church, the Sun reports.

Harvard’s $30.8 billion endowment took a hit last year but it’s still tops among colleges and universities in the nation and dwarfs all others, including MIT, which ranks fifth with a $10.1 billion endowment.

HEALTH CARE

The Globe reports that it could be a long wait for compensation for those who suffered injuries from tainted drugs produced by Framingham-based New England Compounding Center.

Can a billboard campaign in Mattapan combat the public health scourge of urban violence?

Paul Levy posts some of the key findings and summarizes the numbers from the ongoing two-day hearing at UMass Boston on health care cost trends.

Americans really want health insurance, creating problems for new federal insurance exchanges.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE

At the corruption trial of Lawrence police officer P.J. Lopez, the owner of a towing company says he gave the officer cars at reduced rates and a free snow plow in return for extra towing jobs, the Eagle-Tribune reports.

One Brockton city councilor wants officials to map areas where there’s a high incidence of crime and share that with residents as one way to deal with the spate of violent crimes plaguing the City of Champions.

MEDIA

Bob Cousy, a total team player to the end, shares bittersweet memories of his late wife with the Worcester Telegram and Gazette.  The Celtics player’s story has struck a chord with readers on the Web.

Northwestern University’s prestigious journalism program  is wondering whether its internship program should pay students a salary, ProPublica reports.