Brune to News: Can we set the story straight?

To the editor,

For a long time now I have had to listen to and read the many varied and wild stories in reference to the sale of the former Western Jr. High School site, now known as the tab building. The article would always mention that when serving as mayor I gave away the building to tufts for $1.00.

  I always thought that newspapers did everything possible to check the facts before putting something in print. In the Nov. 8 ‚ÄúNews Talk‚Äù column, your newspaper failed to do so.
  The  facts, as I remember them, are during my tenure as mayor, when it was decided that the former Western Jr. High School was no longer needed by the School Department and in very serious disrepair, it was turned over to the city.
  Because it was not needed by the city and too expensive to repair, I thought it would be in the best interest of the city to sell the building and invest the proceeds in education and the remodeling of the Teele Square fire station. Both of which I did.
  Certainly we wanted the school building to be used for something that would benefit the city and not be a hardship on the neighborhood, or negatively affect the children attending the adjacent Powderhouse Community School.  After going out for bid the city ended up with two bidders, Flamingo Construction Co., who wanted to renovate the building and rent space to an assortment of companies, and Tufts University, which was willing to move their administrative offices into that location. Both were willing to lease back space to the city for 25 years to be used for our senior center, SCALE and other non-profit activities.

  Tufts University came up with the highest offer of one million, six hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and was willing to rent space to the city starting at $8.90 a sq. ft., including  utilities. They proposed to give us a ten year lease, with the option of three additional five year terms.
  Flamingo construction offered the city much less and, in fact,  went bankrupt six months later. As I remember, seven aldermen agreed that tufts would be our best choice.  Four aldermen wanted Flamingo Construction Co. Even though they offered a lesser price.
  Also, I personally called then Tufts president Jean Mayer, and asked him for an additional three hundred thousand dollars to be placed in an interest bearing account to be used after the first ten years of the lease to pay for any increase in cost for space rented by the city for our senior center and SCALE.
  In retrospect, I was asking tufts to finance any future rent increases by them. President Mayer said that he would honor my request. When the city had to renew their lease the three hundred thousand, with interest, was almost six hundred thousand dollars.  One could say that Tufts University paid almost two million three hundred thousand dollars for the Western Jr. High School site. That is a far cry from the $1.00 figure that is always used by those who may by chance dislike me or Tufts.
  Any one who observed me during my ten years as mayor in the eighties, saw me work through perhaps the worst financial times in years, having the most dangerous chemical spill in the history of the state, taking on proposition 2 ¬Ω, having been stuck with several appellate tax cases requiring millions of dollars to be paid back, and having the cities health insurance bill double.  Despite all that I brought the red line into Davis Sq., built a new comprehensive high school, planted over 4000 trees, refurbished every city park and square,  rebuilt over two hundred streets and much more,  yet in my ten years I never once used any part of the 2  ¬Ω percent that I could by law use to raise  taxes. All of this is a matter of public record and fact. This doesn‚Äôt sound like a mayor that would give a building away for a $1.00. 

Eugene c. Brune
152 curtis street
Somerville
Former mayor
Present register of deeds