Menino still pushing for South Boston City Hall

He's not giving up.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino today repeated his bold - some would say, crazy - notion of abandoning City Hall Plaza, selling it to the private sector, and moving city government to the rapidly developing new waterfront in South Boston.

In a speech to the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce this morning, Menino touted the economic growth of the city, from what he called a time when "Boston was just another mid-sized Northeastern city."

"Today the city of Boston is in a league of its own," he said.

But to keep it that way will require increasing collaboration between government and the private sector.

Menino said his new Boston Redevelopment Authority director, John Palmieri, "will think boldly to empower Boston" in new ways, focusing the planning and economic development division of the authority.

The authority will continue to focus on real estate, Menino said, but it will also concentrate on creating clusters of industries, like life sciences, that foster the growth of tax revenues and jobs.

Menino said he is allocating $250,000 from the Neighborhood Jobs Trust to fund workforce development in "green" jobs to help clean up the environment.
(Thomas C. Palmer Jr., Globe staff)