He is wooing wider support for reelection and future hopes
The chicken wings have been served, and the party guests have been quieted. Michael F. Flaherty Jr. is standing in a tiny Roxbury kitchen doing the familiar work of all campaigning politicians, trying to win votes from an unfamiliar audience. In gray suit and immaculate gray hair, the City Council president from South Boston drifts through topics: affordable housing, drug treatment centers, and schools.
Then he is questioned by people in the crowd of mostly elderly women.
''I worked in Southie, in the Charlestown area," says Peggy Kennedy, 70, who is hosting the house party for Flaherty. ''That place is immaculate. I don't see the litter there like I do in Roxbury. I really, truly don't see it."
Flaherty is careful with his response.
''The battle is, you need to pick up the phone, you need to call the office, and we need to connect," he begins.
It is the kind of diplomatic response Flaherty has become known for. As council president, he has been anything but incendiary, as some council presidents have been, preferring to cultivate a thorough and businesslike body that keeps its controversies private.
At 36, he remains one of the younger councilors. But, as though his prematurely gray hair (he says it began to turn in fourth grade) has something to do with it, he also stands somewhat apart even from youthful colleagues. Soft-spoken and shy of the news media, he settles most disagreements on the council in the same forum he cracks jokes: behind closed doors.
''I'm a guy who likes to get results and likes to get to yes," he said in an interview yesterday. ''It's really about communication, and by communicating with colleagues I can get a lot of things accomplished prior to 11:30 on Wednesday," when the council meets each week.
Flaherty is running for his fourth term. Though he is not in danger of losing his seat -- he has raised more money than any of his colleagues, and he finished first in last week's preliminary election -- the pressure on him is immense. He has made no secret of his ambition to be mayor, which means he wants to finish first again in the general election.
Councilor at Large Felix Arroyo, the first Hispanic councilor, is also interested in the mayor's job, and he finished a strong second last week. That leaves Flaherty laboring to strengthen the connections with minorities, gays, and liberals that in 1999 helped the son of an old-school South Boston politician get elected.
Flaherty likes order, and he dislikes being unprepared. On the first day of first grade, he said, he was so afraid of being late for school that he woke up in the middle of the night and put on his school uniform.
''I woke up to my mother being very upset because she had ironed everything the night before, and when I woke up, I looked like an unmade bed," he said.
Unlike most city councilors, he filters press calls through aides; though his home phone number is published, he does not give out his cellphone number.
''When I come home, that needs to be family time for me," he said. ''I think to the best of my ability I make myself accessible."
The middle of three children, with a huge Irish-American extended family, Flaherty spent his earliest years in public housing in South Boston -- something he often mentions on the campaign trail -- while his father was working as an insurance claims adjuster and attending law school at night. Michael F. Flaherty Sr., who went on to serve 24 years as a state representative, instilled in his son a passion for helping others and a love of politics.
As a boy, Flaherty was an avid hockey and baseball player, but after he realized he was not good enough for the National Hockey League, his interest in politics grew. He attended Boston College High School, Boston College, and Boston University School of Law.
He said it never occurred to him to leave town -- ''I've been to Ireland for vacation" -- because that would mean leaving family, friends, and community. He coached youth baseball and hockey throughout college, and he worked his way through college and law school as a courier for Airborne Express.
He was barely out of law school when he delved into local politics, serving as South Boston coordinator for Ralph Martin's successful 1994 campaign for Suffolk County district attorney. The next year, he made his first run for city council, with help from Martin, a black liberal Republican from Jamaica Plain, and about 15 high school and college friends. He fell short, as he did a year later in a race for state representative.
But over the next couple of years, he worked as a prosecutor in Roxbury District Court, sometimes helping out in East Boston and Charlestown. That gave him the professional experience he had lacked in his first couple of runs, he said, and helped him cultivate ties with police, court officers, judges, and civic organizations from neighborhoods outside South Boston. He also got married and had his first child.
In 1999, he made the cut. His victory was hailed as a new era in Boston, as a young father from Southie who had strong ties in the gay and minority communities, he beat the legendary Albert L. ''Dapper" O'Neil for fourth place. Two years later, with the backing of Mayor Thomas M. Menino, he was elected council president.
He has been a stabilizing force on the council, putting a stop to debates on issues outside the council's purview. He has also ruffled some feathers lately. A longtime supporter of Boston University's plans to build a high-security biolaboratory in the South End, he recently changed his position, saying he couldn't support the project until the city had a detailed plan for emergency evacuation. That pleased Roxbury and South End opponents of the project, but aggravated other councilors who were hoping to sidestep the divisive issue during the campaign.
Though Flaherty argues that he felt compelled to raise concerns after news stories suggested the plan was inadequate -- ''leadership is about . . . asking questions and doing what I think is right" -- his colleagues privately accused him of pandering for votes in the African-American and Hispanic neighborhood near the proposed laboratory site.
Flaherty's role on the council probably will come under increasing scrutiny in the years ahead if he begins to be seen as a prime candidate when Menino leaves office. In that event, he will be also looking to build more citywide appeal, as he was in the Roxbury kitchen recently. Winding up his pitch to the crowd, he said, ''I'm here because I need your help." 