By 8 a.m., 232 people had voted at the Holy Name Parish Hall in West Roxbury and Dorchester resident Ayanna Pressley had greeted most of them in her bid for an at-large seat on the Boston City Council. And that total nearly doubled to 439 voters by 9 a.m.

Despite weeks of long days of campaigning citywide, from the early morning hours of greeting people at MBTA stations to listening to their concerns at community meetings into the night, Pressley was just as enthusiastic as the day she announced her first-ever campaign for public office on April 28.  Read more

With an unabated fiscal crisis expected to again tear apart the city’s budget, voters sent City Hall incumbents back to their seats this week and elected the City Council’s first African-American woman and second Latino.  Read more

It was Mayor Thomas Menino’s toughest test in sixteen years and he passed with the highest grade: The onetime Hyde Park city councillor bested challenger Michael Flaherty of South Boston by 16,355 votes, thereby rolling to his fifth term and into the city’s history books.  Read more

In historic Faneuil Hall, the mayoral race formally entered its final stretch at around 8 o’clock on Tuesday night when Mayor Thomas Menino and City Councillor At-Large Michael Flaherty stepped off the stage, having sparred during their final forum together.

Education dominated the 90-minute back-and-forth: Charging that the city was “stuck in neutral,” Flaherty continued to hit Menino over the city’s underperforming schools. Out of the city’s 143 schools, 100 of them have been labeled “underperforming” by the state, Flaherty pointed out in one of his stronger performances.  Read more

The two mayoral candidates this week offered a preview of the closing weeks of the campaign as incumbent Thomas Menino defended a record of lower crime during his tenure and a history of fighting foreclosures, while City Councilor At-Large Michael Flaherty hammered the mayor over underperforming schools in the system and City Hall’s e-mail deletion controversy.  Read more

The eight contenders vying for four citywide seats were split this week over how long pols in City Hall should warm the seats in the mayor’s office and on the City Council.

At a forum sponsored by the nonpartisan voting rights group MassVOTE, the City Council At-Large candidates also reiterated their stances on any reform of the Boston Redevelopment Authority, the city’s planning and development agency that has received a fierce drubbing on the campaign trail over an alleged lack of transparency.  Read more

City Councillor At-Large Michael Flaherty, who is running for mayor against incumbent Thomas M. Menino, chats with Councillor Sam Yoon, who Flaherty says will be his deputy when the “ticket” defeats the mayor

Boston voters – and name recognition – propelled two incumbents to first and second place, with six newcomers rounding out the rest of the pack of candidates seeking the four City Council At-Large seats.

The top four vote-getters – and the people the other candidates will attempt to beat on Nov. 3 to win a seat – are Councillors At-Large Stephen Murphy and John Connolly, Felix G. Arroyo, a labor organizer and the son of the former city councilor, and former U.S. Senate aide Ayanna Pressley.  Read more

Michael Flaherty talked about the campaign after the results were in.

Updated on Sept. 28: Mayoral hopeful Michael Flaherty told supporters tonight that third-place finisher Sam Yoon will not only endorse his campaign tomorrow, but will join Flaherty on the campaign trail in a bid to become his "deputy mayor." The two plan to explain the development at a 10:30 a.m. press conference outside Boston City Hall. Read more at the Lit Drop.  Read more

Days before voters head to the polls to narrow the field of mayoral candidates, incumbent Thomas Menino has been thrown into damage control mode as city officials attempt to get out from under the controversy over employees regularly deleting their e-mails, a potential violation of the state’s public records law.

Secretary of State William Galvin has ordered the city to find the e-mails of top Menino aide Michael Kineavy.  Read more