During the Boston mayoral debate Wednesday night, candidate Kevin McCrea leveled a series of charges against Mayor Thomas Menino and his other rivals. What follows is a closer examination of those charges based on a review of city records and interviews with city officials and McCrea.

• As an example of corruption in the Menino administration, McCrea pointed to the mayor’s signoff on the transfer of a vacant 10,000-square-foot lot in Hyde Park to a city employee at a fraction of the fair market value. Menino dismissed the charge as nonsense, saying the land sale was part of a program designed to unload vacant city-owned lots on abutters. “Your charges are out of balance,” Menino said during the debate.

         City officials say James Rourke, who lives at 1931 Hyde Park Av. and is an official at the Boston Redevelopment Authority, and his neighbor, Sue Anne Guptill of 75 Prescott st., jointly purchased the lot on June 29 for $5,000. Records show the assessed value of the lot was $99,400. City officials say the appraised value of the lot was $70,000 and the city’s asking price for the property was $56,000 under a program called Lots of Green. The program, designed to convert vacant city lots into green spaces, was created in January and targeted at parcels worth more than $25,000. Only 10 parcels have been sold under the program, city officials say.

        Sandra Duran, deputy director for real estate management and sales at the Department of Neighborhood Development, said the property was properly advertised but only Rourke and Guptill bid on it. The lot is buildable, but Duran said the city decided not to seek a developer for the property because neighborhood groups opposed development there and the parcel itself was not particularly attractive because it abuts the former Stop & Shop warehouse property in Readville.

        Duran said Rourke and Guptill plan to subdivide the property and invest money pruning trees, removing trees, planting shrubs, and installing fencing. Under terms of the deed, the property can only be used for parking, a garden, or yard for 30 years. At the end of the 30-year period, the city can extend the deed terms for another 30 years.

        Duran said the sale was handled in full compliance with state laws covering such land sales. McCrea, who was not aware of all the terms of the lease, said he believed the property was worth $200,000 to $250,000.

• McCrea alleged during the debate that Menino is giving a $3 to $5 million annual tax break to the owners of the One Beacon St. office building under a special tax agreement. In an interview, he estimated the deal has cost taxpayers up to $40 million over the last 10 years.

        The deal with One Beacon is called a 121A agreement. It was negotiated in 1969, when Kevin White was mayor, and calls for the owner of the building to pay the city 23 percent of his gross income rather than be taxed on the assessed value of the property. A BRA official said the deal was originally signed to spur development in the area by giving the developer some certainty about what he would pay in taxes. The deal had a 40-year life and expires this year. The current owner, Beacon Capital, is paying just over $7 million this year under the arrangement, according to a Boston Redevelopment Authority official.

        Ron Rakow, the city’s assessing commissioner, said the agreement was negotiated by the White administration and is binding on the Menino administration. “It’s a 40-year contract. It’s binding for 40 years,” he said.

        McCrea, in a followup interview, said it was his understanding that the city could revoke the 121A agreement if the building was sold, which it was in 2000, 2004, and again in 2006. McCrea said Menino chose not to revoke the agreement and, as a result, the city’s residents lost out on as much as $40 million in tax revenue over the last decade. He said Menino chose to forego the lost revenue to “buy influence.”

        A BRA official said McCrea is incorrect about the city’s ability to cancel the 121A agreement. “We can’t unilaterally end the contract,” the official said, except if the new owner is incapable of carrying out the terms of the original agreement.  He said that has not been the case with any of the sales because the building is already built.

• McCrea during the debate suggested Bostonians were being charged too much in taxes, noting city residents pay a much higher tax rate than residents of next-door Cambridge.

        The tax rate in Cambridge for residential property is $7.56 per $1,000 of value compared to $10.63 in Boston. As McCrea points out, a person with a $300,000 house in Boston will pay more in taxes than a person with a $300,000 house in Cambridge. But tax rates can be misleading. Many municipalities, including Boston, collect the maximum amount of property tax revenue allowed under Proposition 2 1/2. Once that figure is determined, city officials calculate the tax rate necessary to generate it. Rakow points out that the average residential tax bill in Boston was $2,762 in fiscal 2009, well below the $5,720 average bill in Cambridge.

• McCrea alleged during the debate that the Menino administration had more than $100 million in its bank account than it did earlier in the year, evidence that the city was socking away money as it was crying poor mouth to city unions and Beacon Hill officials. McCrea said as mayor he could operate the city with the existing cash flow and wouldn’t need to impose new meal and hotel taxes.

          City officials say cash flow has improved, but they say city expenses have also risen so there is no pot of money the mayor is sitting on. The officials said the city ended fiscal 2009 with a $4 million surplus on a budget of more than $2 billion.  

• McCrea during the debate said Menino’ and city councilors Sam Yoon and Michael F. Flaherty used their political connections to get their children and grandchildren into their top-choice schools.

        Boston.com reported that McCrea’s rivals or their spokespersons denied the charge. A spokeswoman for Flaherty said his 11-year-old son did get his first choice but his younger twin daughters did not. Yoon said his two children did get their first choice, but prior to his being elected to the city council. A Menino spokesman said the mahyor’s grandchildren did not get their first choice.