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Fire drill disrupts work at Menino campaign headquarters

E-mail|Link|Comments () September 22, 2009 06:48 PM

By Michael Levenson, Globe Staff

A fire alarm sounded this afternoon at 2 Center Plaza, forcing Mayor Thomas M. Menino's campaign headquarters to evacuate, right as staffers were working the phones to get out the vote. Perhaps inevitably, the alarm raised eyebrows on the campaign because Boston Firefighters Local 718 has been at loggerheads with Menino for months and has endorsed Councilor Michael F. Flaherty in the mayor's race.

Nick Martin, a Menino spokesman, said about 50 people in the office were forced to leave the building for about 30 minutes.

“It was supposedly just a routine drill, but it’s a little bit of coincidental timing,” Martin said. “There were people trying to make phone calls at the time and they had to leave for half an hour, so that was definitely a disruption.”

Steve MacDonald, a Fire Department spokesman, said the fire drill was scheduled by the building management.

“We had absolutely nothing to do with it,” he said. “It was strictly building management.”

Equity Office Properties, which owns 2 Center Plaza, described the drill as a routine safety precaution.

“Like many building owners and operators, Equity Office Properties holds fire drills at all of its buildings in the event of an actual emergency," Karen Baker, a senior vice president at the company, said in a statement e-mailed to the Globe. "This was a routine drill. As always the safety of our tenants and employees is our first priority.”