Weekly Transcript Round-Up: April 26, 2024
5 Takeaways from the 1st Week of Council’s Budget Hearings
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This week started the City Council hearings on Boston’s FY25 budget, with overviews on the Operating Budget and Capital Plan, a hearing that featured both the Boston Transportation Department and the Department of Public Works, and two hearings for all of the offices in the Equity & Inclusion Cabinet. BPI has links to all the transcripts for this week in our feed on Legislata. In this week’s Transcript Round-Up we are looking at the top five takeaways from this first week of hearings:
Chaos at Landmarks Commission and budget hearings collide;
Council President Louijeune wants to ‘right-size’ BPS;
City & Council still not clear on home rule tax increase;
Wu Administration unclear about PILOT changes, but offers a defense of City non-profits from budget director; and
“Recognizing that tension” between the neighborhood and proposed Blue Hill Ave bus lane
Check out our five takeaways - we have video of some exchanges, and where to find every quote in the transcripts.
5 TAKEAWAYS FROM THE FIRST WEEK OF BUDGET HEARINGS
1. There is a budget hearing tie-in to the hottest City Hall story of the week: the fight between Mayor Michelle Wu and the City’s Landmarks Commission.
For background: this past week has seen a lot of action at the usually sleepy Landmarks Commission, with the Dorchester Reporter reporting that Commissioners sent a letter to City officials charging that members of the administration were interfering in the Commission’s work on April 9, and Mayor Wu firing the Commission’s Executive Director on April 19. As can be seen in the reporting from the Dorchester Reporter, Herald, and Globe, details remain scarce.
The budget tie-in is District 8 City Councilor Sharon Durkan, who asked a question about the Landmark Commission on Monday, before any stories on the Commission’s letter or firing were published - she is Speaker 12 and asks the question at the 1:44:13 mark of the transcript:
Watch the video for the whole exchange - here is part of what Councilor Durkan said:
Given that the planning department is moving underneath the city, there has been a question of where Landmark should live for the future. Right now, it's in Environment, Energy, and Open Space [Cabinet], and I was just curious if there had been further thought to that placement.
Councilor Durkan’s interest in the Landmarks Commission and position both as the representative of the Back Bay and Beacon Hill where the Landmarks Commission does a lot of work and leadership position as chair of the Council’s Committee on Planning, Development, and Transportation which handles business from the Landmarks Commission makes her an important player in the unfolding drama in that body. She also has strong ties to one of the major actors in the Commission fight: Mayor Michelle Wu. Councilor Durkan served as a long-time campaign consultant to the Mayor before being elected to the Council in her own right in 2023.
The chaos at the Landmarks Commission is likely to be a topic of discussion when the different parts of the Environment, Energy, and Open Space Cabinet come before the Council for their budget hearings:
On May 7 at 2 PM the Parks and Recreation Department is appearing
On May 21 the Environment Department and the Office of Food Justice are appearing together
2. Council President and At-Large Councilor Ruthzee Louijeune attracted BPI’s attention by using a word that we hadn’t heard in some time: right-sizing. She used it several times, first at Monday’s operating budget overview hearing - Councilor Louijeune is Speaker 5 and asks her question at the 42:35 mark in the transcript.
Councilor Louijeune said in part:
To me, it seems that there are some inefficiencies right now in our Boston Public Schools budget. I will attribute a good portion of those inefficiencies to rightsizing Boston Public Schools and those are conversations that we're having now in terms of the mergers that need to happen.
Budget Director Jim Williamson agreed that there were potential savings, but did not know the totals. Councilor Louijeune then asked if “the superintendent has done any pen to paper pen to paper math on that,” and Williamson said the Councilor should ask the superintendent.
Councilor Louijeune used the word again the next day - Councilor Louisjeune is Speaker 7 and asks the question at the 33:59 mark in the transcript. She asked a series of questions about BPS’ school building plans with a particular focus on the role the Massachusetts School Building Authority played in the process, including:
I wanna continue to allow those as right steps forward. And just want to make sure that as we're having these conversations, I think that are really important around rightsizing the school district, that we are getting the community process and engagement right.
Councilor Louijeune’s use of the word “right-sizing” stood out because of the blow-back from many teachers and parents to the term during the last round of school building discussion under the Walsh Administration. Mayor Marty Walsh’s BuildBPS plan, which laid out how to spend $1 billion over 10 years to replace Boston’s aging schools, was met with resistance of the kind described in this 2018 article from the Bay State Banner.
While the City Council President using “right-sizing” alone is not an indication that BuildBPS is back on the table, it appears that a lot of DNA from Mayor Walsh’s old plan is in what the Wu administration laid out on Tuesday: spending $1.3 billion to renovate or rebuild 72 BPS schools.
3. Wu administration officials and Councilors continued to talk past each other about the Mayor’s proposed tax increase. First Boston’s Treasurer-Collector and CFO Ashely Groffenberger told the Council - Groffenberger is Speaker 1 and this statement starts at the 18:13 mark in the transcript:
“I just want to reiterate that it is important to note that while the City is simultaneously seeking a legislative change to safeguard residents against the impact of a potential loss in commercial value, nothing about the proposal changes the total amount of property tax revenue included in this budget. We are confident in these projections regardless of whether or not that measure [the home rule petition] passes.”
CFO Groffenberger has said versions of this statement before, in this case warning Councilors and residents that the administration will raise residential residential taxes to satisfy spending requirements if the Mayor’s tax increase fails to make it through Beacon Hill.
Then there was this question from District 7 City Councilor Tania Fernandes Anderson asking how much revenue the Mayor’s tax increase was expected to raise, which CFO Groffenberger did not have an answer for. CFO Groffenberger said:
“Once we have updated values we'll be able to tell you and everyone the value of that shift, how much is shifting from one side to the other. But without updated values, we can't provide [that information].”
Councilor Fernandes Anderson is Speaker 3 and asks this question at the 1:20:44 mark of the transcript.
4. The push to find new sources of revenue outside property taxes has put the focus on PILOT payments, which also got a number of mentions in Monday’s Operating Budget & Revenue Overview. District 6 City Councilor Ben Weber asked a question about what the Wu administration was doing to increase PILOT payments - he is Speaker 10 and asks the question at the 1:18:07 mark of the transcript. CFO Groffenberger responded:
PILOT has been a big focus of the Mayor and the administration. There are ongoing conversations happening with some of the big institutions to, you know, hope to modernize that program and update it and make it more reflective of current values or current property in the city.
An hour later Councilor Flynn followed up Groffenberger’s answer with a question about what specific actions the administration was considering to increase PILOT payments, which neither administration official was able to provide specifics for. Check out the video of that exchange here:
After that exchange, Budget Director Jim Williamson made a strong statement in support of the City’s non-profits - he is Speaker 2 and makes the statement at the 2:15:51 mark in the transcript:
“We always say eds and meds, education, medical, all of those things are elements of the economy that we want to contribute to the vibrancy of the economy and make it more diverse. There are organizations that we want to get a fair share of their contribution and recognize the benefits they get from city government for being in our city. We also want to acknowledge the fact that they contribute to the economic vitality of the city.”
While the Wu administration didn’t provide any specifics on their plan to increase PILOT payments at Monday’s hearing, there is a plan that could be dusted off: the 2018 proposal from then-Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jay Gonzalez. Here is how his plan to tax large university endowments like Harvard was summarized by the Harvard Crimson:
Gonzalez’s plan would levy a 1.6 percent tax on private, non-profit colleges and universities in the state whose endowments total over $1 billion. Harvard would qualify, as would four of its fellow research institutions — MIT, Tufts, Boston University, and Boston College. The four other affected schools are small liberal arts colleges Wellesley, Amherst, Williams, and Smith.
According to the Harvard Crimson that plan would have cost Harvard more than $500M a year in new taxes - more than Boston’s projected annual shortfall in commercial property tax revenue due to declining office values. Three of the affected schools - Harvard, Boston College and Boston University - own significant amounts of property in Boston.
5. At Thursday’s hearing with the Boston Transportation Department and Department of Public Works At-Large Councilor Julia Meija urged the Wu administration to start “recognizing that tension” between residents, businesses, and the proposal for a new bus lane on Blue Hill Ave.
Councilor Meija focused all of her first slot of questions on concerns of Blue Hill Ave business owners - she is Speaker 8 and her line of questioning starts at the 1:14:44 mark in the transcript. While starting with infrastructure work being done on the street, Councilor Meija eventually got to the neighborhood’s hot-button issue: a dedicated bus lane on Blue Hill Ave - the first question on this issue is at the 1:24:07 mark. The first exchange provides a window into what BTD does - or in this case does not do - when preparing for a major project like the Blue Hill Ave bus lane, with Jascha Franklin-Hodge, who oversees both BTD and DPW, saying “It is not common practice for any transportation project of this scale to do economic impact analysis,” - Jascha Franklin-Hodge is Speaker 1 and this at the 1:25:23 mark. Councilor Meija appeared to sum up the feelings expressed by many residents of the neighborhood with this:
But there is a sentiment in terms of folks who have grown up here, who have lived here their entire lives, who feel like a lot of these designs that are being implemented and considered are not for them.
Though Councilor Meija was the only councilor who asked a question about the Blue Hill bus lane, it has been a major issue in that neighborhood for years. This was best demonstrated during the 2022 race for State Senate, when then-candidate and current State Senator Liz Miranda was quoted in the Dorchester Reporter expressing similar sentiments to her three opponents:
“There is such a thing as Green Racism and most of the transportation plans that have been put forward by [city agencies] have not centered the voices of community folks,” she said. “What we see is that they’re making changes to our community at American Legion and Columbus Ave. and now they’re saying they want to change Blue Hill Ave. But Blue Hill Ave hasn’t recovered since 1968. I’m glad this seat now centers on Blue Hill Ave., so we can finally pay attention at a state level and community level to a corridor that should be full of promise and opportunity, and it is not.”
WBUR reported in March 2024 that two years after that election, several other elected officials, including Ways & Means Chair and District 4 City Councilor Brian Worrell’s brother, State Representative Chris Worrell, still refuse to support the project. In that WBUR article State Senator Liz Miranda said:
Added State Sen. Liz Miranda, who represents the entire Blue Hill corridor from Mattapan Square to Dudley Street: “I am grateful for the public investment in the corridor, which will enable improved safety for students and seniors, while improving the built infrastructure with new sidewalks, crosswalks, tree canopy, and lighting. Hearing both positive and concerning feedback from constituents, the part we can all agree on is that our neighborhood deserves the same investment as others across the City of Boston.”
The Blue Hill Ave bus lanes has a more than decade long history, having been proposed and rejected during Governor Deval Patrick’s Administration, something that then-Transportation Secretary Jim Aloisi has spoken about at length - back in 2019 with WGBH and this past March with WBUR.
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