City Councilor and Mayoral candidate Sam Yoon wants to dismantle the Boston Redevelopment Authority and replace it with “a comprehensive City Department for Community Development & Planning.” The new department would oversee the entirety of the City’s planning operation, which Yoon says would allow Boston to bring public input into the planning process as well as focus on transportation, green alternatives and visionary leadership (that means him.) Is the elimination of a half-century old quasi-public agency and the creation of a new massive City department the way to avoid future development boondoggles? Isn’t a new department that would absorb the BRA’s existing authority almost the same as Mayor Menino’s plan to expand the BRA to include transportation planning?
“I even want to bring the Transportation Department into the Boston Redevelopment Authority,” Menino said. “That’s on my drawing board, to move forward on that in the near future.”

Yoon has specific legislation on the table now. We'll have to wait and see what Menino's particular plan for the future of his BRA will be.