BPI in 2024: Top 5 Posts & Reader Survey
Thank you so much for reading this email and many others that BPI has sent over the last year! 2024 is the first calendar year for Boston Policy Institute, Inc and thanks to readers like you we are helping create a better public conversation.
To cap off this year, we are asking readers to fill out our 2024 Reader Survey, and sharing 2024’s most read stories from our newsletter.
BPI’s 2024 Reader Survey is just 6 questions long - please fill it out and help us improve this newsletter and BPI’s other work:
BPI’S TOP FIVE STORIES OF 2024
#5 The changes that Mayor Wu is making to Boston’s planning & development processes & bureaucracy dominated the top five spots. The title captures the subject - the state of Article 80 reforms - and the conclusions of that analysis show is that Mayor Wu has accomplished very few of the changes to Article 80 that Councilor Wu set out back in 2019’s ‘Abolish the BPDA’ white paper.
BPI ANALYSIS: Does 2024's 'Article 80 Modernization Draft Action Plan' deliver on promises made in 2019's 'Abolish the BPDA' report?
Boston’s Planning Department is currently collecting public feedback on the Draft Action Plan. The deadline for that was originally November 15, before being pushed back to today, Sunday, December 15.
#4 BPI sends out “Weekly Transcript Round-Up” every Friday, and this issue in October captured 3 of the biggest issues: budget; public schools; and housing costs. City Hall’s release of its estimate for 2025 tax rates became a major issue and how it was presented ended up deciding the fate of Mayor Wu’s tax shift proposal.
Weekly Transcript Round-Up for 10/11/24: 3 Updates from Mayor Wu on Tax Hike; MCAS & Late Buses topic at School Cmte, on Radio & TV; 4 recent reports agree - housing costs are too high
This week saw three major updates on Mayor Wu’s push for a tax hike on Boston’s commercial property owners:
#3 This post summarizes the state of Boston’s planning reforms on the eve of the City Council’s vote to move many of Boston Planning & Development Agency’s staff to a new Boston Planning Department. While there has been a lot of talk about different aspects of planning reform this year, the creation of a Planning Department was the only substantive action that the Council & Wu administration took on the issue in 2024.
March 27 set for Council's Vote on Planning Department Ordinance & BPDA's future
The Wu administration’s push to reform the Boston Planning & Development Agency is likely to face a vote by the Boston City Council at their regular meeting on March 27. That is according to District 1 City Councilor Gabriela Coletta, who laid out the timetable while chairing a working session of the Government Operations Committee on Monday, March 18, …
#2 The City Council was not the only elected body talking about changes to the BPDA and Boston’s planning bureaucracy: Beacon Hill did as well. This hearing was for a home rule petition the Council passed back in 2023, and like many of Boston’s home rule petitions, it did not become law in 2024. This hearing also featured something that would become important later in the year: State Senator Nick Collins expressing skepticism about a major City Hall legislative priority.
Preparing for Boston's BPDA Hearing on Beacon Hill
On Monday the Joint Committee on Community Development and Small Business will hold a hearing to review the changes to the Boston Planning & Development Agency proposed by the Wu administration. The hearing is set for 11 am at the State House hearing room A-2.
#1 The most popular newsletter post of 2024 was a preview of the City Council’s first hearing of the year on BPDA reform. While the Council took some action on this issue in 2023, this was the first time that the much-changed Council of 2024 would take on the issue.
Preparing for Thursday: Boston City Council's first BPDA reform hearing of 2024
This Thursday, the most important hearing so far of the 2024-25 City Council term is taking place. There are two subjects of Thursday’s hearing: an ordinance which creates a new planning department in the City and Mayor Michelle Wu’s corresponding package of reforms aimed at making changes to the Boston Planning & Development Agency (BPDA). The Wu admin…
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