Frank Baker

Frank Baker won’t be appearing on the ballot this year. After 10 years in office, the District 3 City Councilor from eastern Dorchester is calling it quits. But you wouldn’t know it by his presence in last Sunday’s Dorchester Day Parade, where he practically jogged the three-mile route, zig-zagging from one side of the street to the other, shaking hands. Why?

The Boston City Council on March 8 passed Mayor Michelle Wu’s rent stabilization proposal 11-2, with District 3 Councilor Frank  Baker and at-large Councilor Erin Murphy voting “no.”

Faced with a redistricting map that would transfer three traditionally Irish American Boston precincts into a predominantly Black city council district, Councilor Frank Baker invoked the oppression of Catholics in the North of Ireland and called out the Redistricting Committee chair for being a Protestant.

A City Council hearing on the idea of using civilian flaggers instead of police details on some construction projects got heated Monday as Boston Police Patrolmen’s Association President Larry Calderone refused to surrender the microphone after exceeding the five-minute limit for testimony, prompting councilors to walk out of the hearing, held at the Bolling Building in Roxbury.

With several outbursts and more than an hour and a half spent in recess, city councilors voted on redistricting last Wednesday, passing newly drawn district lines based on the so-called unity map advanced by the NAACP, Mijente, Chinese Progressive Association and other groups representing communities of color.

A longstanding racial divide on the City Council has moved to center stage as the 13 members of the body debate the redrawing of the city’s nine council districts.

A redistricting map supported by voting rights advocates sparked fierce pushback from white City Councilors Monday during a heated hearing in City Hall’s Iannella Chamber.