E-Mail This Article to a Friend Profile in cowardice Tom Menino should debate Maura Hennigan. Also, hyperbole from Tom Reilly’s campaign, and the Second Middlesex special election. BY ADAM REILLY

Maura Hennigan’s press conference last Thursday was supposed to focus on policy: by extending Boston’s school day, the mayoral challenger and at-large councilor told a small audience gathered outside Boston Public Schools headquarters, the city could spur learning and keep kids out of trouble. But the high point came afterward, when Hennigan slipped into Latin to taunt her opponent, Mayor Tom Menino. "Praefectus urbis Menino colloquii virtutem non habet," she shouted over her posse’s applause. Then, reverting to English, she offered a rough translation: "I believe Mayor Menino does not have the courage to debate, and I challenge him to meet me face to face." As Hennigan waved goodbye, a middle-aged woman in a Hennigan T-shirt took up the cause. "Come on, Menino!" she hollered derisively in the general direction of City Hall. "Come on down!"

At this rate, it’s not going to happen. Members of the Boston media have been urging face-to-face meetings between Menino and his rival for three months. In response, the mayor has trotted out an ever-changing assortment of lame excuses: the field isn’t set yet. I’m too busy. I talk to the people of Boston all the time at neighborhood meetings.

The day after Hennigan’s press conference, the Phoenix found Menino on Boston Common, presiding over the annual opening of the Frog Pond. After glad-handing with various park workers and cute kids, most of whom were wearing de facto Menino campaign garb (shirts labeled BOSTON PARKS AND RECREATION/THOMAS M. MENINO, MAYOR), the mayor offered his latest dodge. "We’ll have discussions on the issues, no question about it," he promised. "There’s an appropriate time during the course of the campaign to have those discussions, and we’ll have those discussions." But will those discussions be debates? "I’m not runnin’ for president of the debating club," Menino non-answered. "I’m runnin’ for mayor of Boston. I want a full discussion of the issues ... I’m looking to discuss the issues in a forum where you can really get questions from people that’re affected — not people who assume they have the questions, but people in the neighborhoods who understand issues."

Not running for president of the debating club? Even by Menino standards, that’s pretty lame stuff. (Just imagine the reaction if President Bush had used a line like that in 2004.) Still, from a selfishly pragmatic point of view, the mayor’s obstinacy makes sense. Denying mayoral opponents the chance to make their case is a time-honored Boston tradition. Four years ago, Menino offered the same weak arguments before agreeing to one debate against his opponent, Peggy Davis-Mullen. That event — a half-hour session moderated by then-WB-56 political analyst Jon Keller — was broadcast on a Saturday night and Sunday morning in late October, two weeks before the election. Similarly, in 1979, incumbent Kevin White undercut his political archenemy Joe Timilty — Menino’s former boss — by agreeing to just one debate, which was held at a comparably inopportune time.

Unlike the ’79 bout — in which Timilty pressed White before losing by a relatively slim 13,000-vote margin — the 2006 Boston mayoral election is shaping up to be a classic mismatch. Menino is a three-term incumbent with high approval numbers, the support of Boston’s power structure, and approximately $1 million in the bank; in contrast, Hennigan has less than $50,000 and hasn’t won a head-to-head election in her lengthy political career. Still, from Menino’s point of view, agreeing to debates would be tantamount to turning an overmatched opponent into a political equal, if only for an evening or two. Even taking Menino’s muddled diction and quickness to anger into account, the chances of a mayoral meltdown severe enough to make the race competitive would be slim. But why take the chance?

The answer is simple: out of respect for the city Menino claims to love. The mayor has reached a dangerous point in his tenure: he’s been in office for so long, and has such complete control of city government, that anyone who criticizes a mayoral decision can be summarily dismissed as a whiner, a Luddite, an outsider lacking the authentic insight of Menino’s friends "in the neighborhoods." And 99 percent of the time, when King Tom decides not to listen to someone, whatever idea that person had is dead and buried. (Last year offered a rare exception, when a coalition led by City Councilor Chuck Turner derailed a Menino-backed push to revamp Boston’s student-assignment plan; see "Bus Stop," News and Features, February 13, 2004.) Nine years ago, when Menino told the audience for his State of the City address to "judge me harshly" if Boston’s schools didn’t improve under his guidance, the mayor at least acknowledged the possibility that he might stumble on occasion. Today, this recognition has been replaced by a kind of presumed mayoral infallibility.

Such an attitude would be problematic in the best of times. Today, however, it’s clear Menino has been unable to master some key problems facing the city. Boston real estate is brutally expensive for lower- and middle-class families, for example. And the city’s public schools continue to spook many parents, prompting them to relocate or look for private alternatives if their children don’t test well enough to get into coveted exam schools like Boston Latin. As a result, perhaps, Boston is hemorrhaging residents; just last week, the US Census Bureau reported that over 19,000 people, or 3.4 percent of Boston’s population, left the city between April 2000 and July 2004. Factor in the city’s recent spike in homicides and the steady loss to out-of-town ownership of leading corporate citizens like John Hancock, Gillette, and Fleet, and it’s clear that Boston faces some grave challenges. Menino needs to be shoved out of his comfort zone, pushed to hone his policies until they can withstand scrutiny in the electoral marketplace. Along the way, the mayor might actually benefit from exposure to strategies and solutions he hadn’t previously considered — provided that he can temporarily disable his knee-jerk instinct to scoff at criticism. One debate with Hennigan would be good for Boston. Ten debates would be much, much better.

Furthermore, a debate-rich campaign season could help reverse the apathy that has increasingly gripped Boston politics. It’s true that a handful of recent elections has generated excitement among segments of the city’s electorate. But generally speaking, participation in the city’s electoral rituals is not what it once was. In 1983, in what is still widely regarded as Boston’s last great mayoral race, 70 percent of city voters turned out for the final election, which saw Ray Flynn defeat Mel King. During that race, Flynn, King, and their primary opponents (including former school-committee president David Finnegan and former city-council president Larry DiCara) participated in approximately 70 community forums around the city. They did so out of self-interest, of course — each had an incentive to make his case to as many voters as possible — but in the process, the candidates helped generate a remarkable level of civic engagement. Contrast that with 2001, when just 35 percent of Boston voters showed up to vote for either Menino or Davis-Mullen. Menino wouldn’t single-handedly reverse this trend by debating Hennigan early and often; there are just too many other factors involved, from the steady decline in Boston’s population to the increased number of non-native residents. But he could help point the city in the right direction.

With four months to go until Election Day, Menino still has time to do what’s best for Boston and its residents. The course of action he ultimately takes will say a lot — for better or worse — about what kind of leader he actually is.