TUESDAY, MAY 28, 2002 — Taken together, two articles in today’s Boston Herald tell a story that adds up to this: former Democratic National Committee chair Steve Grossman may get on the Democratic gubernatorial ballot this fall because Mayor Tom Menino’s waterfront convention center is a flop. Neither story says that explicitly, but that’s what appears to be happening behind the scenes.

In the paper’s news pages, Karen Crummy reports that Menino may deliver his 300 delegates to Grossman, in the hopes of enlisting Grossman’s help in bringing the 2004 Democratic National Convention to Boston. The second story, on the business page, describes a multi-million-dollar marketing network for the city’s new $800 million convention center that has so far failed to attract a single convention booking. The inability to book the new center looms as a major embarrassment and failing marring Menino’s third term. To recoup, the mayor is pinning his hopes on drawing the 2004 Democratic Convention to Boston (although the waterfront convention center will not be ready by then).

There’s no question that holding the convention in Boston would offer a major boost to the city. During the 2000 presidential campaign, Boston got a taste of the excitement that comes with a national political event when former vice-president Al Gore and George W. Bush debated at UMass Boston. A political convention would run several days and would be held downtown. The 2000 Republican National Convention, in Philadelphia, gave former mayor Ed Rendell a chance to showcase the progress made by the City of Brotherly Love during the 1990s. Rendell is now the Democratic nominee for Pennsylvania governor. But perhaps more important, for Menino, the convention would also distract public attention from the hulking behemoth on the waterfront.

From a political standpoint, Menino’s purported play toward Grossman makes sense. One of the interesting things to watch is how ungrateful — or perhaps impractical — many local politicians are. Except for the mayor, few seem to have considered the implications of the Democrats’ leaving their Worcester convention next week without Grossman, a former chair of the state Democratic Party, on the ballot. If Bay State party insiders were to snub Grossman — by failing to give him the support of even 15 percent of convention delegates — you couldn’t blame the candidate for getting out of the business of helping politicians locally. For years, Grossman has been a vital fundraiser for Democrats. He even took time out of his campaign last Tuesday to show up at a low-key fundraising event for Senate majority leader Tom Daschle.

The ballot will certainly list Senate president Tom Birmingham and Treasurer Shannon O’Brien, but the other names that will appear remain anybody’s guess. Grossman? Former secretary of labor Robert Reich, who appeared to have acquired his requisite 15 percent after the Democratic caucuses? Or former state senator Warren Tolman? Menino’s goals may dictate that Grossman achieves his.