Come primary and election day, Menino handily dispatched his challengers. But the recent appointment of 33-year-old Mitchell Weiss as his chief of staff shows that the mayor took at least some of their message to heart.
Weiss is a Chicago native who's drawn more to the intricacies of behavioral economics than the fine-grained tribal distinctions that have long characterized Boston politics. For the past four years, he's worked as the executive director of the Tobin Project, a Cambridge-based think tank devoted to bringing academic insights to public policy problems. But in his new role, Weiss will be taking on a very South Boston project: shaping Southie's 1,000-acre Seaport District into a true 24/7 mixed-use neighborhood.