Word: arsons
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...more than tripled in the past decade, largely because of the flourishing drug traffic. Other tax-free operations: gambling, numbers, prostitution. Some critics, who believe the drug profits may be much higher than the IRS says, charge that the IRS calculations ignore such lucrative activities as loan-sharking, arson, counterfeiting, fencing, pornography and trafficking in illegal aliens. One independent estimate of the untaxed profits in these areas: $25 billion...
...when a neighborhood's real estate potential skyrockets, landlords look for a way to get the current residents out and the wealthier residents--who can pay higher rents or higher condominium prices--in. And there's no doubt that many landlords are unscrupulous enough to use arson to chase residents out. An extreme instance of such tactics was the 1979-80 string of condo conversions in already-high-rent areas, which was apparently responsible for a fourfold increase in Back Bay's arson rate, scaring off many renters who had resisted conversion...
...that several other neighborhoods around the city are on the verge of their own little real estate booms, arson is again pushing the old residents out. Either landlord are engaging in blatant arson-for profit or they're cutting maintenance to their buildings, which pressures tenants to abandon the apartments. After that, vandals may torch the building, or scavengers, called "junkies" in the arson business, strip the building for pipes or scrap metal and burn what's left to cover up the robbery. There are between 1200 and 1400 vacant buildings in Boston; once they are disposed of--as about...
GENTRIFICATION raises a myriad of further questions, including whether City Hall purposely cuts fire protection to areas eyed by property developers to hasten resident turnover--as was charged in New York by some arson-watchers after a similar wave in 1972 But in the meantime, while city officials debate what to do with all the vacant buildings still dotting the map, or how to beef up the arson squad to catch the culprits, they might do well to think a little more thoroughly about the fate of Boston's changing neighborhoods, and how to enable poorer long-term residents...
Civic boosters take pride in a healthy real estate market; it's great for Boston's image as "the livable city"--Mayor White's phrase. But if the cost of livability includes millions of dollars in fire damage and the title of America's arson capital--and the social pressures that title implies--Bostonians had better ask themselves if they can really afford...