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April 8, 2004

Mayor seeking new image for Boston

Yawu Miller

For decades Boston has been known as a hotbed of racial strife with a national reputation for being unwelcoming to blacks.

When the city was under consideration as a host site for the 2004 Democratic National Convention, party activists raised concerns about the city’s national image, before ultimately giving the Hub the thumbs up.

Now, with the city poised to grab the national spotlight, Mayor Thomas Menino is determined to re-define the city’s image in the national court of public opinion. Monday, Menino came to the Roxbury office of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Initiative with a group of city officials and business leaders to announce Celebrate Boston 2004, a month-long effort to showcase the city’s diverse cultural, intellectual and civic life and the more flattering aspects of the city’s history.

“It’s a month-long celebration of cultural activity highlighting our city’s diversity and innovation,” Menino said during the press conference.

The celebration is set to kick off with the city’s 4th of July celebration and will feature events aimed at highlighting the themes of citizenship, diversity and creativity and innovation.

DSNI was one of the first neighborhood agencies to sign on to the celebration and will host interactive neighborhood tours that will highlight the community-based organization’s use of cutting-edge technology as tool to aid in its mission of community organizing and empowerment.

The celebration will be accompanied by a national media campaign aimed at re-defining the city’s image. The Boston-based advertising firms Arnold Worldwide Partners, Inc. and Hill, Holliday, Connors, Cosmopulos, Inc. are collaborating to generate print, television and on-line advertising for the city.

Venture capitalist Chris Gabrielli, who is heading the marketing effort for Boston 2004, said the effort would catalyze introspection and foster civic pride among Boston residents. And with the national newsmedia focusing on the convention, it will give the city a unique opportunity.

“A national presidential nomination is an opportunity to spotlight Boston,” Gabrielli said. “We will be ready for the spotlight. We will show the world what we’re all about.”

The campaign’s emphasis on the city’s neighborhoods may well be the best way to showcase its diversity. Although the 2000 Census indicated that Boston for the first time has a majority-minority population, the city’s elected representatives and business leaders are overwhelmingly white. Just three of the 13 city councilors in Boston are of color.

Even Menino’s Celebrate Boston 2004 co-chairs are overwhelmingly white. Frieda Garcia, Bill Russell and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. are the only people of color on the body.

But Russell, who was often critical of Boston’s atmosphere of racial intolerance during his days as a star player with the Boston Celtics, said the city now has a much better atmosphere for people of color.

“This city has evolved and is probably one of the most progressive cities in the country,” he said.

By the time the 15,000 delegates, party officials and members of the press expected to attend the convention arrive in Boston July 25, Menino says every neighborhood will be showcased.

“We’re going to every neighborhood to showcase the diversity,” he said. “Our diversity is our strength.”

 

 

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