The Back Bay is something of a food lovers paradise, with restaurants to suit any palette lining Newbury Street and Boylston Street.
One thing that’s always been a little hard to come by, however, is a good cupcake. Oh, sure, we have Johnny Cupcakes, but despite the confectionary name, they just sell T shirts. And yes, every once in a while Starbucks will start selling them, but then they’ll be whisked out from under noses as a “seasonal item.”
Well, soon the staff at Johnny Cupcakes will have somewhere to send all those confused patrons who wander in mistakenly looking for a sweet treat.
Sweet, a Cupcake-centric bake shop, is proposing to open its flagship location in the Back Bay at 43 Massachusetts Avenue. The Neighborhood Association of the Back Bay’s licensing and building use committee will not oppose the project after hearing a proposal on Tuesday night.
“We think that Sweet will be a good addition the neighborhood,” said committee member Tom High on the decision not to oppose.
Courtney Forrester, who proposed the project, said that she thought the bakery would fill a void in the Back Bay’s dining scene.
“There really isn’t anywhere to get fresh baked goods in the neighborhood,” said Forrester.
The baking for the shop will all take place off site at a facility in Hyde Park, according to Forrester. The shop itself will not prepare anything except fresh groumet Illy coffee. Sweet will also offer direct home delivery from the Hyde Park facility.
The 750 square foot shop will be primarily takeout, but will feature two tables for those who wish to eat in.
The menu will be made up almost exclusively of cupcakes in the early going, said Forrester. According to a sample menu, the shop will serve “sweet cake” vanilla and dutch chocolate cupcakes, as well as more exotic varieties like cappuccino cupcakes (with espresso flavored cake), lemon, and carrot cake cupcakes.
As a condition of its license, the committee will ask that the store’s logo be required to appear on all paper or plastic products used for takeout, and that trash receptacles be placed in front of the establishment.
“These are standard requirements that the City asks of all restaurants and stores that provide take-out,” said High.

An unprecedented group of over 450 of Boston’s civic and community leaders gathered today as part of the 2008 Boston Civic Summit at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center to make new connections, share ideas, and identify common priorities.
The summit, a one-day event convened by an advisory committee co-chaired by Boston City Council President Maureen E. Feeney and James Rooney, Executive Director of the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority, included networking sessions for participants, best practices workshops, engaging speakers, and a 21st century town meeting, which resulted in a preliminary report issued today with this release.
“Today was a wonderful celebration of civic engagement in Boston. By creating an opportunity for our community leaders to share best practices and discuss their vision for more civic engagement, we started a conversation that I hope will continue beyond today,” said Council President Feeney.
“So much of this day is about recognizing and celebrating the work of our city’s civic leaders who, each day, make our neighborhoods stronger and more vibrant,” said Rooney. “What we did today was create a needed opportunity for these leaders to meet and learn from one another about ways to invigorate and broaden civic engagement.”
In a high-tech interactive afternoon session, the nationally recognized organization America Speaks facilitated a “21 Century Town Hall Meeting,” summit participants shared their collective vision for civic revitalization and discussed what can be done to reach that vision.
The group agreed to focus on four key areas to improve civic life in Boston:
• Create an after school mentoring and tutoring program engaging area retirees and college students
• Expand the city program for summer employment for at-risk youth
• Create a civic association exchange program
• Organize annual civic summits at the citywide and neighborhood levels

Participants committed to action teams to work on a road map for addressing these issues, and agreed to reconvene in these groups on June 3rd at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center.
Summit participants also identified “education and youth development, “the environment” and “public safety” as the most important issues facing our city. Participants in the afternoon session, 55% of whom were ages 45-64, also identified low youth participation as a key area of concern in terms of building greater civic engagement.
In addition to the town meeting, the summit included major addresses from Alan Khazei, Co-founder of City Year and CEO of Be the Change, Ron Bell, Director, Commonwealth’s Office of Civic Engagement, and Dr. Thomas Sander, Executive Director, Saguaro Seminar: Civic Engagement in America at the John F. Kennedy School of Government. Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino also greeted participants at the beginning of the day.
The morning included “best practices” workshops in communication, fundraising, zoning and development, effective organization building, and political activism. Workshop presenters included attorney and former City Council President Larry DiCara, media and political consultant Joyce Ferriabough, veteran Boston newscaster John Henning of Denterlein Worldwide public affairs, author of Building Powerful Community Organizations Michael Jacoby Brown, Universal Hub founder Adam Gaffin, Mass VOTE Director Avi Green, and AIDS Action Committee Development Director Kelly Gaule.
In a poll taken during the event, 90% of participants said they learned something new during the day.
Those who attended the summit were also given business cards to facilitate networking among civic leaders within and across neighborhoods, a further goal of summit organizers.

The event was funded through the generosity of corporate and foundation sponsors led by State Street Corporation, and including Bank of America and the Boston Foundation. The Massachusetts Convention Center Authority donated the meeting space for the event at its Boston Convention & Exhibition Center.
“It is important that this spirit not end here, that this event is seen as the beginning of the conversation, not the end,” said Council President Feeney.
In addition to issuing a preliminary report and convening action teams which will meet on June 3rd, the Boston Civic Summit Advisory Committee will reconvene to evaluate the event and discuss next steps.

Bob Colombosian, founder of New England-made Colombo yogurt, presented a $1,500 check on behalf of the yogurt company to Joyce Hampers, president of the Newbury Street League on April 29, during Colombo’s Newbury Blueberry celebration. Colombo recently re-named its blueberry flavored yogurt “Newbury Blueberry” to celebrate its New England heritage and launch the Name Your Colombo contest, which encourages yogurt lovers to re-name Colombo flavors with New England-inspired names, for the chance to win a New England getaway. Submit your names at NameYourColombo.com now through May 30, 2008.

On Friday, April 28, the Hill House/N.E.A.A. Majors baseball season opened with a parade of teams down Charles Street led by a city fire engine and Wally, the Red Sox mascot, who signed hats and gloves to the delight of players and the crowd. After Mayor Menino threw out the first pitch on the Little League field on the Common, the Cubs played the White Sox in an exhibition game showcasing the pitching skills of returning Cubs Doug Krolman and Jack Ditomassi as well as White Sox veterans Ian Iwanicki and Jake French. White Sox Aaron Wang made a statement at the plate going 2-3 and driving in 2 runs.
On Saturday, April 26, the Marlins overpowered the Red Sox 10-2 on the North End field. The Marlins scored a run in every inning, led by Tripp Kaelin, who went 4-4 including a triple and a double driving in 4 runs. Both Matt Perkins and Jasper Schilling contributed with 5 RBIs between them. Supporting this offensive attack, Perkins pitched 3 scoreless innings for the Marlins. But the play of the game was the towering homerun blast by Red Sox Nick Iudiciani that disappeared into the trees in deep left field.
Also playing on Saturday but on the Common field were the Giants and the Dodgers, a new team this season, making for a total of ten in the league comprised mostly of players from Back Bay, Beacon Hill, and the North End. The Giants overpowered the younger team 18-10 with solid pitching by Dave Conforti and timely hitting from Pearse Martin. Martin, also playing catcher, made a key play lunging for a foul pop up to end a Dodger rally. The Dodgers were led by the hitting of Eli Swab and Joe Salibe.
In a well played game on the North End field, the Cubs squeaked by the Mets 4-3 on Wednesday, April 30th when Seamus Matlack drove in the wining run in the bottom of the sixth inning.
On Thursday, May 1, the Dodgers enjoyed their first league victory beating the Indians 9-3 on the Common field. Joe Salibe paced the Dodger’s offensive attack with 5 RBIs. The highlight for the Indians was the smooth double play from the spinning Julius Grossman to the sure handed TJ Shea.
As the rain arrived for the weekend, the Giants managed to get in their Friday game with the Cardinals. The Giants won their second game of the young season 8-4 with standout pitching from David Conforti and Pearse Martin. Graham Hobika and Tom Cohn provided power at the plate for the Giants in their 7 run first inning. The Cards fought back with clutch pitching from Navide Aminpour and rookie JC Pezutto, as well as some timely hitting from Will Byrne and Nicolas Slotine, but came up short.

Hill House dash

This Saturday (May 10) starting at 11:30 a.m. the annual Hill House Dash will be held on the Esplanade at Fiedler Field. Everyone is invited to this annual fun event. For more information access the Hill House website at www.hillhouseboston.org.


Civic Summit
A huge success

The Boston Civic Summit held last Saturday was a success as more than 450 participants from throughout the city took part in daylong workshop. The goals of the summit were to give the participants the tools and training to make civic involvement easier, a place to meet other community leaders and a discussion to revitalize city life. As Co-Chair and City Council president Maureen Feeney said, “We need more and newer civic leaders because today there are too few and they are too tired.”
There were several workshops hosted by Boston leaders. In a workshop led by Attorney Lawrence DiCara, former Boston City Councilor, he stated that there has been a tremendous growth of associations that all seek a place at the table. He said that in his opinion, Quincy Market would not have been rehabbed if the amount of associations that exist today had been in existence back in the early 1970’s. The fact that there are the growing numbers of associations is good but that the associations need to have a common plan and goal to be effective. As an example he pointed out that in the South End alone, there are associations for almost every street in the neighborhood.
(See story on page 1)

New sign
At the Mandarin

A new sign recently appeared on the façade of the Mandarin Oriental, Boston. The building located on Boylston Street is scheduled for opening in the early fall. The sign will stay up until the grand opening and is part of the fan campaign. The meaning of the fan in the sign would be phrased in a Jeopardy question this way: who are some celebrities who are fans of the Mandarin like Lance Armstrong and Vanessa May?

Newspaper boxes
Are going to disappear

If Thomas Menino has his way, many of the newspaper boxes that appear throughout the city will be a thing of the past. Menino said that he will be filing an order with the City Council in the coming weeks to ban newspaper boxes. At the Back Bay Association annual meeting he noted that the beautiful architecture of the Boston Library in Copley Square is ruined by these boxes, which also hold magazines, real estate journals and a variety of publications. Some boxes display names on them of companies that are out of business.

No Doubt who is
Boston’s Biggest
Booster

Mayor Thomas Menino was awarded the “Heavy Lifting Award” at the annual meeting of the Back Bay Association that was held on Tuesday morning at the Colonnade Hotel. More than 350 business people attended the annual breakfast business meeting. During the meeting, it was noted that the new Natick Mall is directly targeting the customers who frequent Back Bay businesses. Menino got a round of laughter from the audience when he said, “If you go to Natick, then you are stuck. There is nothing else to do. I know the town adminstrator of Natick but I promote Boston.”
First reports on the newly configured Natick Mall are that the economy is hurting smaller specialty stores intended for high end Boston shoppers who have not materialized the way they were expected to.

Flowers coming
to Boylston St.

The flowers on the streetlights along Boylston Street will be appearing again in the coming weeks. These flower arrangements are always a welcome sign as the warmer, brighter, natural image they convey softens and adds panache to a street that has more than its necessary share of concrete and brick.

Boston Center for
Adult Education
Gets the go ahead

The last hurdle for the new building and headquarters of the Boston Center for Adult Education (BCAE) was cleared on April 29 when the Boston Zoning Board approved the last requests that were sought be officials from the BCAE. The new building will be located at 122 Arlington Street in Bay Village and the Gambel Mansion at 5 Commonwealth will be sold to a private individual who will return the house to a residence. The construction time for the new building on Arlington Street will be approximately 11 months.

Boston’s First Lady Angela Menino welcomes (left to right), Meg Albert of Reynolds DeWalt, Peggy Dray of the Fairmont Copley Plaza Hotel, Julie Burns from the Mayor’s Office of Art, Tourism and Special Events, and Mary Hines from the Boston Parks and Recreation Department to the Taj Boston for an afternoon tea to plan the Rose Garden Party. The party, which benefits the ParkARTs program, presented by the Boston Parks and Recreation Department in partnership with Bank of America, will be held on June 19 at the Kelleher Rose Garden in the Back Bay Fens.

“God helps those who help themselves,” it is written in the bible. “God’s work on this earth is our own,” commented the late President John F. Kennedy.
Indeed.
The Newbury Street League and The Neighborhood Association of Back Bay (NABB) are to be congratulated for taking these words and putting them into action. A new initiative “Clean to the Curb” is being unveiled this month and will run from May 1 to October 31. The goal is to improve the appearance and cleanliness of Newbury Street and adjoining alleys according to Jo-Ann Leinwand of NABB and Susan Kelley of the Newbury Street League who will be heading this campaign.
Business owners and residents are being asked to sweep sidewalks, adopt a tree, identify and remove graffiti, pick up trash and litter in front and in back of the building and maintain dumpsters.
Walking up and down Newbury Street, restaurants like Scoozi are almost on a daily basis washing their sidewalks in the morning. Other businesses like the Barbershop at 245 Newbury Street have an elaborate planting arrangement leading to their stores.
These are but a few of the many businesses that go above and beyond the nominal clean-up effort but 100% cooperation is needed.
Going above and beyond is necessary for all Newbury Street businesses and residents. At a recent meeting of the Back Bay Association, business owners were told that their customers are being directly targeted to spend their dollars at the Natick Mall. The conditions of the economy reinforce that we cannot afford to lose any retailing dollars. Newbury Street has a lock on tourists but their dollars are the gravy, not the meat and potatoes that are needed to run a yearly business.
The bottom line is that shopping must appeal to all the senses. We have convenience and we have the top stores, but if the path leading to these stores is unattractive then business will suffer.
We encourage all businesses to take part and to do their share and to do more. When representatives of this campaign come, welcome them and listen. They are here to help not to criticize. The campaign will be rolled out in stages in the coming months with the area of Newbury Street from Dartmouth to Fairfield Street already underway.