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City Council Chief Shifts on Biolab

Posted on: Thursday, 15 September 2005, 15:01 CDT

Sep. 15--The City Council president, Michael F. Flaherty, withdrew his support yesterday for a proposed Boston University biological laboratory in the South End, writing the director of the National Institutes of Health and urging that plans to build it should be halted immediately.

In a letter to Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, which would fund the lab, Flaherty asserted that Boston is unprepared to deal with an accident at such a lab, and that building it would be "neither a responsible nor safe venture."

Flaherty said he had reconsidered his position after he had seen the "total breakdown of government response" after Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf coast.

"Due to the fact that Boston, indeed the nation, is not prepared for a major disaster, I must insist that plans for the construction of the biolab be halted immediately," Flaherty wrote.

Flaherty's move, a reversal of his strong support, is being seen by some as a signal of opinion turning against the lab.

With city preliminary elections two weeks away, Flaherty, a moderate who has won support of some liberals, has been unable recently to win the endorsements of political committees in several liberal areas -- Wards 4 and 5 in the Back Bay and Beacon Hill, Ward 9 in Roxbury, and Wards 11 and 19 in Jamaica Plain. Across the city, liberals generally have been seen as opponents of a biolab in Boston.

The proposed $128 million biolab -- a high-security facility with a biological safety classification of level 4, where some of the world's deadliest pathogens would be studied -- has generated fierce opposition; many foes argue that such a lab should not be in a densely populated area.

But the lab also has strong proponents, including Mayor Thomas M. Menino. Building trade unions support the project, which Boston University officials have said will generate 1,300 construction jobs. Union leaders, who were holding campaign signs yesterday for Flaherty in Dorchester, were unaware of his changed position.

"I'm pretty disappointed," said Michael Monahan, business manager of IBEW Local 103. "This is good for the local economy and will spin off thousands of jobs. We shouldn't forget that other states wanted this place."

Menino, too, said he had not known of Flaherty's change.

"He's misinformed," Menino said. "He doesn't understand the issue. . . . His original position was the correct position. I know that it comes with some heat. But we're elected to stand up for positions we believe in."

Opponents of the biolab praised Flaherty.

"I can only say it's great," said Klare Allen, a leader of Safety Net, an organization spearheading opposition to the lab. "We do believe there is a need for research, but we don't feel it belongs here in our community."

Ellen Berlin, a spokeswoman for BU Medical Center, said the lab poses no substantial risk. Flaherty "is assuming there are high quantities of substances that would necessitate an evacuation," Berlin said. "The quantites are of minuscule amounts. Nothing would leave the laboratory."

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Source: The Boston Globe

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