More City Council Updates: Patricia White

The Boston Globe continues its Boston City Council candidate profiles with Patricia White, which doesn't say too much about her positions or plans, other than this:

Shaped by the pressure of being a mother and a candidate, White says she wants to help others handle the stresses of work and family. She supports universal after-school activities, expanded prenatal care, more police officers, and says, broadly, that she wants to be a voice for women's issues on the male-dominated City Council.

Unfortunately, she didn't fill out the DFA Boston questionnaire so I can't offer a much better picture--see more at votepatriciawhite.com.

Adam Reilly of the Boston Phoenix wrote a more in-depth and politically minded profile in Gender and Race, which also takes a look at Sen. Dianne Wilkerson, currently being dogged by gubernatorial candidate Tom Reilly.

Adam raises an interesting question in his piece:

Finally, a parting question for White and her supporters: what are you doing to elect Maura Hennigan? During White’s press conference, it was repeatedly noted that Boston has had a female at-large city councilor since 1973. For the past few years, that honor has gone to Hennigan. Now, though, Hennigan is waging the political fight of her life, challenging incumbent Tom Menino for the right to be Boston’s mayor. The odds are long, but Hennigan has gained credibility in the past few weeks, first by freeing up nearly a million dollars in credit to self-fund her campaign and then by spanking Menino in WGBH’s recent mayoral forum.

If she wins, Hennigan would be Boston’s first female mayor. As such, she’d have an unprecedented chance to impart a woman’s perspective to city government. You might think that White and her supporters would be working on Hennigan’s behalf — but you would be wrong. According to the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance, none of the women who publicly supported White this week (Budson, Fortunato, and Shillingford) has donated to Hennigan’s campaign. Neither has White.

The Phoenix tried contacting these women to ask if they’re backing Hennigan. These calls went unreturned, with the exception of Fortunato, who explained that she’s a long-time Menino supporter, in part because of the mayor’s outreach to the gay-and-lesbian community. (Fortunato also added some nuance that was missing at White’s press conference. "It is so beyond gender in many ways," she said. "Yes, it’s important to have a woman’s voice there, but it needs to be the right voice.")

Maybe the other women would love to be stumping for Hennigan, but think it’s too risky, especially given Menino’s notorious punitive streak. Shillingford, for example, works at the Boston Public Health Commission. And White can ill afford to alienate the mayor in a campaign year. That’s giving them the benefit of the doubt, however. Whatever the explanation, the apparent disinterest in what could be a landmark mayoral race is just one more reason that White’s call for sisterhood is hard to take seriously.

And, before we forget, here's the Phoenix's take on the City Council preliminaries, focusing mainly on challengers Yoon, White, Connolly, and O'Malley.