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Turner and Henriquez: Different approaches to solving District 7’s problems by Ashley Rigazio
MySouthEnd.com ContributorWednesday Sep 30, 2009 The two candidates square off for second time in Nov. 3 municipal election
Five-term incumbent Chuck Turner and community organizer Carlos "Tony" Henriquez will once again vie for the District 7 City Council seat on Nov. 3, bringing two distinct viewpoints on how to tackle the issues facing the district.
In an interview Tuesday, Turner explained his approach to complex, urban problems as a scientific effort, using meetings, workshops, and data collection in the community to develop strategies and change societal attitudes toward violence and education.
"It has to be rooted not in some quick fix from the top; it has to be rooted in really getting people to care about themselves," he said. "Because when people care about themselves, they wind up caring about others. ... And then their behavior changes."
But Henriquez, in a separate interview on Tuesday, said that these processes are taking too long and stagnating progress in the district, which covers Roxbury, Uphams Corner, Egleston Square, and parts of the South End and Fenway.
However, he clarified, "I, as a 33-year-old, am not running against Chuck Turner’s 43 years of service," emphasizing that he’s running against the lack of progress and poor access to city services he’s seen over the past four years.
"We don’t have another year to take action," he added. "Every day in our newspapers, we’re reading about another young person who has been shot dead in our streets."
Turner argued there is evidence of progress: in the Multicultural Dropout Coalition, which develops mentorships; the Boston Workers Alliance on Blue Hill Ave., which fights for the unemployed and CORI (Criminal Offender Record Information) reform; community organizations like the TenPoint Coalition, Project Right, and Community United for Change; and homegrown success stories like Felix G. Arroyo, a City Council at-large candidate and former Turner aide.
Both candidates agreed that education was a top issue-10 out of the district’s 11 schools are underperforming. Turner said part of the issue has been a lack of focus on struggling students.
"If you look at the numbers, you’ll see the numbers have improved," he said. "But there’s this group in terms of dropouts that is persistent, and I think one of the problems we have-and I’m not really sure how to solve it-is we need more personal work with those who are not moving forward in a pattern that would suggest that their own self-motivation is going to help them stay in school."
To remedy the problem, Turner started the Multicultural Dropout Coalition in 2007, bringing together existing groups like Freedom House and Project Proficiency to recruit mentors. The Coalition then works with the Private Industry Council (PIC) to place mentors in schools and give former dropouts jobs with community-based organizations, subsidized by PIC.
Turner added that recruiting more teachers of color would also be a crucial step toward closing the achievement gap.
"We had a hearing about two months ago on what some of the problems are, and we’re beginning to work on a strategy," he said.
A hearing is in the works for the city to collaborate with teaching colleges to set up scholarships to encourage Boston high school students-particularly minorities-to become teachers.
This would "create an ethic in the schools that teaching and education is something we value in this city," he said, adding, "If we could get four or five schools of education working together so we could perhaps have 20, 25 scholarships, I think we could begin to grow our own."
Henriquez said he has already been involved with local schools as a community organizer, mentoring students, organizing and empowering parents, and building partnerships with local businesses and organizations to expand schools’ resource pools.
"I have a customer service background and for education, the same approach needs to be taken," he said, adding that the key was engagement, not necessarily data, since that "doesn’t engage the end user"-the parents and students.
"Everyone is looking at a societal change. ... Meanwhile we’re losing those students who are failing at their MCAS [Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System]," said Henriquez. "We’ve suffered long enough that we do need to see results quickly."
Henriquez also supports a more inclusive approach to solving educational woes that not only encourages more parental involvement but uses children’s input as well.
"Too often we blame them for the problem, then don’t allow them to be part of the solution," he said. Not engaging youth in discussions about issues they face everyday, from poor schools to street violence, he said, "is absurd."
One of the more important proposals on Henriquez’s agenda is to keep schools open into the evening for athletic programs, computer labs, adult education, partnerships with churches, and to provide a safe environment for children. Doing so helps to divert youth into positive behaviors and activities, he argued, curbing the street violence that persists in the district’s streets.
"If we do that, we can get children and teens off the corners hanging around and give them sort of a social life," said Henriquez, who has worked in the South End as a teen program coordinator. "If they don’t have somewhere safe to socialize where you can direct them properly, they’ll find someone who’s going to direct them improperly. You start seeing car break-ins. No kid starts with a shooting."
Turner said the number of homicides has gone down during his 10 years in the District 7 office and that he is addressing the problem through workshops, which will produce recommendations and a strategy that will be regularly reviewed and adjusted for long-term results.
"It’s a very different approach than we’ve had before," he explained. "In the past, we had some good work, I think, in the ’90s, but then it was more connecting community organizations and law enforcement and dealing with it from the top down."
If re-elected, Turner plans to "build a movement" and culture around non-violence in his final four years of leadership. Turner plans to run again in two years but will step down after 2013.
"The reduction and eradication of violence has to be rooted in the psychology of a community," he said. "What we’re trying to do is use an organizing approach. ... We live in a society that thrives on violence, where the last president said get them before they get us. So the question is, how do we begin to look at that whole thought that we can use violence and abuse to get our way?"
Turner said he was frustrated by Henriquez’s calls for safer, cleaner streets, which he stressed were mayoral duties that district councilors have little control over.
"Why is Carlos saying it’s my responsibility to lower crime?" he asked. "What’s hard for me to understand is why doesn’t he attack the mayor?"
Henriquez, a former aide to mayoral candidate and councilor at-large Michael Flaherty, said he has built the contacts at City Hall needed to be an effective change agent, allowing him to fix potholes and streetlights and ensure access to city services for his constituents. He called trash and glass in the streets "unacceptable."
"That’s a basic job for the city councilor to make sure that the city services are delivered to the district and right to their doorstep, and that basically has not been happening," said Henriquez.
If elected, he also hopes to give residents and neighborhood associations the resources they need to makes changes for themselves.
"It’s about empowering the people who are already doing the work to do it more easily and efficiently," he said, adding, "I don’t think people are as apathetic as people would accuse. I just think elected officials need to make it easier for them to get plugged in."
While Turner called the criticisms "a cheap shot," he did pledge to take an organizing approach to the problem if re-elected, working with main street organizations and business districts in Dudley, Egleston, and Uphams Corner to develop a "cleanliness task force."
Henriquez has also criticized Turner for portraying his preliminary victory as "a mandate to keep fighting his federal case," arguing that the race had nothing to do with Turner’s federal corruption charges (which he called "a distraction from the issues") or either candidate.
"I hope people aren’t fighting so he can keep fighting his federal case. ... For me I’m trying to get out the message that there’s work to be done," he said.
Turner did not bring up the federal probe, but did outline plans for four more years in District 7.
"What I really want to do in these last two terms is concentrate on the whole issue of government’s attitudes toward our people, because I don’t think we show the people of this city that we really care, and that we really believe in everybody’s potential. We treat them like they’re throwaways," said Turner.
Going into his second November showdown with Turner, Henriquez hopes to reach as many residents as possible through neighborhood walks, door knocking, and new technologies like Twitter and Facebook. If elected, he promised that this wouldn’t change, revealing plans for monthly neighborhood walking tours and a 24-hour hotline to stay connected to constituents.
"The hand needs to be extended in leadership," said Henriquez. "That’s some of the energy we hope to bring, and the defined change that we hope to make in our district."
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