Politics & Government

Q&A: Bill Walczak - More Charters, Bike Lanes, Community Involvement

Bill Walczak founded the Codman Square Health Center and the Codman Academy Charter Public School - and he'd like your vote for mayor.

By David Ertischek

Boston mayor candidate Bill Walczak of Dorchester spoke with Patch.com recently about his ideas on how to deal with climate change, the Boston Public Schools, bicycling and more.

Patch: As mayor, what can you do to decrease violence in Boston

Walczak: There’s clearly long-term and short-term solutions. The longer term solution, and definitely something that would be effective, is if more young people, especially those growing up in poverty, had hope for their future, for their career. That graduating from their school would guarantee a good standard of living and a career that means something. Unfortunately, too many kids growing up in our city are not achieving the success necessary to have a career. So the streets beckon. We need to have a better education system to make sure children are prepared for careers. 

Part of my education plan is career academies for the 11th and 12th grade parts of the education system directly linked to the business community, academia and the hospital industry so that people in 11th and 12th grade would have co-ops and internships and programs that were cooperatively run by those businesses leading toward careers. That to me is a major part that would help. A great education system that deals with the need to educate children to having a career is something I completely stand for. 

On the short term, there are a number of things that work, and we know they work. One of them is the coordination of different aspects of the criminal justice system, the community and community institutions. In the '90s I participated in what they call today the ‘Boston miracle’ as a leader in Dorchester. I can tell you that I’d go to meetings every single Wednesday to discuss policing with the community, the probate, the parole department and state police in some cases. Community groups and churches and nonprofit organizations can do this together to deal with problems, problem families and crime crises happening on different streets. That coordination results in lower crime. Another thing is the crime watch and we need to refocus on (crime watches). They are critical … But there is reluctance to participate in them.

Patch: Do you support raising the charter school cap? Why or why not?

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Walczak: I support raising the charter school cap. I’m using the term 'raise.' I am a founder of two Boston high schools; one is the Edward Kennedy Careers Academy, which is a pilot school, and part of the Boston Public Schools. The other is the Codman Charter School—a commonwealth charter school, separate from the system. We have a number of excellent charter schools doing well by students and want more to come into existence and to look at replicating successful ones. But (the main goal) is to convert all Boston Public Schools to being excellent. 

We need more access to excellent schools that includes in our district, as well as charter schools. We have the opportunity to transform our school systems with more autonomy at the school level, accountability of principals for achieving success … We need access to tutors, especially at the early primary grade levels. I have a plan for a chief service officer who would work with volunteer students from colleges, as well as people who work through our great nonprofit organizations. Every child should have access to a tutor to read at grade level at Grade 3. Early childhood education is a must. Every child needs to have opportunity to have a K-1 option.

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Patch: Do charter schools hurt non-charter schools in the Boston Public school system?

Walczak: I think we can afford to add a number of new charters without destroying the Boston Public school system because under my plan the Boston Public Schools is also going to succeed. And with that success we won’t lose the hundreds of kids a year who leave the city of Boston because there’s no confidence in the system.

Patch: What would you do with the current school assignment plan?

Walczak: I think we need to implement it. The plan that was adopted is a good transition plan. But I call it a transition plan. But we can’t go immediately go to neighborhood schools because lots of neighborhoods don’t have access to good schools. 

I was part of the external advisory committee [for the student assignment process]. We tried to make it [so students can] attend schools closer to home but always have access to get into higher quality schools. And that’s what the plan does. When more schools are at a good quality level then there will be less of an interest to drive long distances to be able to access good education because we’ll have more quality schools.

Patch: How will you utilize innovative technological advancements to keep Boston being one of the most modern cities in the world?

Walczak: There are ways we can democratize the city more by using technology. I’ve looked at software programs that are engaging the community in planning exercises for their own community. Some software programs already exist like coUrbanize—we can engage people to plan out their own communities. 

A major issue in Boston is we don’t do a good job master planning. We don’t do enough of it, or do it as well as we can. Almost 10 years ago I created a program called e-lert in Dorchester and what we did was get the Boston Police Department and the Dorchester Reporter to send out crime [information] happening within a day or two [of it happening]. … This is important, you need to know if there are a series of break-ins are happening in your neighborhood. … They won’t know that unless they’re informed. … We can do that within a few hours of alerting people who want to alerted about incidents happening in the community.

Patch: Boston Mayor Menino will leave the city in good financial standing, especially considering the recent recession. What is your budgetary experience, and how will you foster financial growth for Boston?

Walczak: I have been in charge, and the president of an institution that had a $115 million budget and more than 1,100 employees. I also grew the Codman Square Health Center; we started with nothing and now have more than 350 employees and more than $20 million. When I left the Codman Square Health Center it had more than $10 million in investments in the bank, no debt, and had 100,000 sq. ft. of commercial space completely owned by the health center, and a great team to take over. I’m a person who really knows how to manage money and institutions, and that really differentiates me from the field, as an entrepreneur who can build institutions and showed that I can manage them very effectively over my life.

I think Tom Menino has done a great job with the municipal budget, and I want to continue the AAA bond rating. I also know we have unfunded liabilities in excess of $4 billion in pension and health care costs for retirees. Although we are moving to pay that off by 2025, I support that and achieving that goal of the pension. But we have not put money aside for health care costs and we need to do that. We cannot leave that to the next generation for the cost of paying for the previous generation. We have to make sure we’re paying off debts, such as pension and health care costs.

Patch: Talk about your environmental plan to deal with climate change and rising sea levels.

Walczak: The major crisis facing the world right now is the global sea level due to climate change because the earth is warming. We need to go to more new renewable energy sources. The city of Boston has a great plan, (through the work of) the Green Ribbon Commission. The city of Boston has created a plan of producing fossil fuels and being able to increase the amount of renewable energy. It’s going to be implemented by the next mayor. All new buildings need a range of things to have to happen. We need to make sure all new buildings have the capacity for solar panels and that new buildings built can mitigate the effects of storm surges that can flood Boston, and retrofit housing near coastal areas, and that’s going to be a really complicated thing. 

We need to engage the tremendous resources of the universities and institutions [in Boston] and learn with how to deal with coastal areas that will be flooded during storm surges and make sure our buildings are safe. … In sections of the city we may need to build up. Morrissey Boulevard floods every time we have a full moon. The worse case scenario is flood-and-fix. Hurricane Sandy cost $68 billion across the region. If Hurricane Sandy hits Boston six hours earlier we’d be dealing with a flooded Big Dig and a flooded MBTA.

My environmental blue print also includes bicycling and making it safer and encouraging bicyclists by creating special roads that are usable by MBTA buses and bicyclists. I think a good model is Washington Street in the South End that has an entire lane for the Silver Line and bicyclists. When I drive downtown I take Washington Street, it’s 10 feet wide and you can see the Silver Line buses. I think we can do that around the city, and make MBTA service faster, and giving good access to bicyclists to get them in and out of town.

Patch: You’re well known in Dorchester, how are you spreading your candidacy outside of Dorchester?

Walczak: I’ve had seven or eight events in Jamaica Plain and met people in living rooms including one on Moss Hill, numerous home events in the South End. We’re set up for Hyde Park, West Roxbury, Allston and Charlestown. I’m putting myself out there and canvassing over the weekends in Mattapan. The week before was JP and Roxbury. 

We have more than 300 volunteers who are helping with getting my name out there. I also have a strong reputation with the nonprofit sector and the healthcare industry beyond Dorchester and Mattapan area from my work in the last 40 years. Also by participating in things like the creation of the Boston Medical Center, the founding president of the of the Statewide Nonprofit Association, youth programs across the city of Boston as part of health initiatives. I’ve definitely been involved for a long time.

Patch: What color are your candidate signs? Why did you go with that design?

Walzcak: The Green Monster. It’s supposed to be of enlivening the Green Monster. It’s the same colors, and have that red line. It’s a Green Monster sign. We thought about it quite a bit, and one of our creative people said, ‘what’s more Boston than the Green Monster?’

Patch: Anything else you'd like to tell Patch readers?

Walczak: My housing policy. It is one of the major problems we have in the city. We don’t have enough housing to keep the price on housing lower. We need to create a lot more, and in creating a lot more need to make sure it’s affordable. There are ways of doing that is using Linkage funds, and part of it is lowering the cost of construction, development, and come up with ways to have quality housing at lower cost—including high quality pre-fab housing. That allows dropping the cost of housing by a significant factor, and be able to produce more housing. 

[Boston needs more] transit-orientated development with housing for people to live in higher-density areas near transit without a car. ... We need to produce more units of housing and do it every year, more than we’re producing. I think housing is needed overall. But it doesn’t have to be everywhere. We need the number of housing units to increase. Where it goes is the joint responsibility of the government and communities.  


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