Order for a hearing on Workforce Development Housing for City of Boston Employees. On motion of Councilors Mejia and Lara, Rule 12 was invoked to include Councilor Worrell as a co-sponsor.
Thank you, Counsel Fernandez. Innocent Docket 048020482.0483.804842. Docket 0486 will remain in committee motions, orders and resolutions. Mr. Clerk, please read docket 06160616. Counsel is me here, and Laura offered the following order for a hearing on workforce development housing for City of Boston employees. Thank you. Look, the chair recognizes. Councilman here. Councilman here. You have the fourth. And so. Council, City Council, which. One of several. Supported council were added as the third co-sponsor. Thank you, Mr. President, and thank you to Council a lot for co-sponsoring this hearing order alongside our office, as well as Councilor Burrell for joining us. The city of Boston employs close to 20,000 workers, and most of them are required to live in the city. But as housing prices continue to rise, wages remain where they have been for decades. And we have to start asking ourselves, how is it possible that our city employees are able to afford to live here in our office? Many of our staff have had to live in subsidized, subsidized housing or live with two, three and even four roommates just to be able to afford the rent at the end of the month. The federal poverty poverty level for a family of four in the United States is 27,750. And in Boston, a 70% AMI, which is the cap for most affordable housing for a family of four, is 84,550. Looking through Boston's payroll, we found that there are over 7500 employees who are making just below the poverty level, but not enough to be able to support themselves or their families without the help of subsidized housing. This is unacceptable. It is not fair for us to require City of Boston employees to live in the city and not provide adequate means to achieve housing security. Now, I personally don't think that we should do away with housing requirement. I think it's important for us to live in the city that you are tasked to serve. But we clearly need to be doing better to boost wages and include and increase housing affordability for everyone, but especially those who are legally required to live here. This is a housing issue and it's also a workforce development issue, and it's also a mental health issue. Nobody should ever have to make the choice between food or housing or heat or or medical bills or housing. We have to do better. I look forward to this conversation and to working alongside council a lot on all things housing. I just I just wanted to just quickly also uplifts the fact that, you know, we we hear from a lot of our city employees about all of the discrepancies that exist here in the city of Boston. But at some point, we have to lean into it and say, what are we going to do about it? And I think this is an opportunity for us to really have a conversation and figure out what more can we do than just have a hearing, right? Where the investments and how we are going to lean into this conversation in a way that is going to uplift the voices that we've been hearing. This was really inspired by this conversation in particular. A few years ago, I had someone on my Instagram live who was a who is still a city of Boston employee and has to work. 2 to 2 jobs just to be able to stay here. And she loves her job. And we should not be creating financial hardships for those who are serving our community. We need to really hold ourselves accountable to to addressing this issue in a way that it's going to invest in workforce development housing. So I look forward to working alongside my colleagues and to doing just that. Thank you. Thank you, counselor. Here, the chair recognizes counsel. Our counsel. Laura, do you have the floor? Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to my co-sponsors on this matter, a fact that will surprise absolutely no one. The city of Boston sits among the top 1% most expensive cities globally and ranks 26 as the most expensive city in this country. We are not currently paying all of our employees an equitable rate that aligns with their needs and the cost of living in the city, which presents an issue for not only securing but retaining talent that can meet our city's residency requirement. It impacts the diversity of our workforce and by extension, the quality of the services that we provide our constituents. I'm really excited to work on this issue because I think that we need to get creative around solving the issues that we have. And short of requiring that the city pay a living wage that is in alignment with the cost of living in Boston to every employee. Where's the camera, wink? We have to explore other solutions ultimately, and I'm really excited to work on this issue with council and we're all in council over here and I hope that we can follow the example of other cities in securing affordable housing for everyone who works for the city of Boston. Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Laura. The chair recognizes counsel. We're counsel. You have the floor. Thank you, President Flynn. And thank you to my co-sponsors. As we all know, housing is one of the top priorities here in Boston, and we see that reflected in our work on the council. From ideas on increasing IDP rent to own in a homeownership voucher program, we are working on some significant support to increase affordability and access to housing for our residents. But it's important that we continue to be intentional and equipping our residents with tools to assist our friends, families, neighbors and colleagues who are stuck in the middle with a lack of affordable options or real pathways to homeownership. But who are making too much for housing assistance to attract and retain talent for our economy? And short, long time residents do not become displace. You must act to make home ownership a reality and housing affordable to all. I think it's important for us to explore how we can use local options and work with fair housing to see how we can create equity and priority app applicants in our housing process. I'm encouraged by our mutual mutual partnership, creativity and attention to housing. I'm looking forward to working with all of us on this important matter. Thank you. Thank you. Counsel world. The chair recognizes Counselor Fernandez innocent. Counsel Fernandez innocent. You have the floor. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. President. Thank you to my colleagues. Counsel me here, counselor counsel Arroyo, for creating this dope ass idea I will be applying. And this is ridiculous. Second of all, we need to teach those crazy chairs. How are your backs, colleagues? My people like it's bad. Everybody's back hurts on those chairs and we are just not helping our employees and they're awesome and they're the best. And I support this. I had a pretty fancy speech. But you don't need you don't need all that. Please put my name on this. I support it. Thank you. Thank you. Counsel Fernandez Emerson. The chair recognizes Counselor Baker. Counsel Baker, you have the floor. Thank you, Mr. Chair. First sign signed my name on and thank the sponsors for for this legislation. This is good legislation. A couple of suggestions. We need to invite the unions because I believe this could be in grants to the unions that they're able to trickle down to the to their membership and also invite the credit union and the firefighters credit union. I bought my first house about 30 years ago in 1994, and of course, that was when nobody wanted to be in Boston. I think we had two or three abandoned houses on my street that I grew up on. I bought an abandoned house with money from the credit union, rehabbed it myself, and lived in there for a while with roommates. But that was that was what basically allowed me to. Subsequently, you know, by the House, I mean, now that I raised my family. But I think there are some some good ideas. The firefighters credit union just did some some creative packaging where they come up with a new product. I don't know if it's a I don't want to speak about it too much, but it may be a 40 year, 40 year term. But basically what I found the most difficult thing in home ownership is that initial that initial down payment. You really want to get 10%, 20% to avoid EMI, which is which is insurance, which adds to you to your monthly payment. We have to be able to get people to a point where they can get that initial payment and then realize that even though the House may cost five, 50, six, 50, whatever it is, the monthly payment might only be 2500 bucks or something like that. And we have to educate, educate people on that. But I think, again, not to keep hammering up some of this up housing money should go towards the unions where we demand that people that are making 30 grand stay in the city. How do they do it? How did I buy a house when I was only making 50 grand? And I don't know how I did it, but I did it probably because of sheer stupidity and didn't realize that I could have put myself in the in the in the poor house my whole life, which I kind of did . But anyways, I've got I've gone on, I've gone on long enough. But this is this is good legislation. But I think it has to happen with real money that goes for the unions to be able to give to their rent and to give to their membership. He has his 25,000 for a down payment. 50,000 for a down payment. Those are the that's the type of money that we're going to need to give to down payments. And that's not even talking about the supply. That's a whole nother conversation. But thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for the lead sponsor in the sign on sponsors. Thank. Thank you, counsel Baker. The Chair recognizes counsel. Counsel, you have the floor. Thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and thanks again to the sponsors. I think this is great legislation and I would act to me it feels like as Counselor Baker saying something that actually links a housing benefit to the city of Boston employment and also I think looks for ways to leverage our public lands better. I know that the administration's doing a survey of sort of all the land we hold, but I know it's something that's come up a few times is, you know, are there opportunities with some of the access spaces like land and parking lots that BP owns to maybe put housing for teachers on site? I think thinking creatively about places where we could actually not only provide cash benefits, but also actually like create workforce housing for our city. Workforce is a direction I hope this will go. So please sign my name and thank you again to the sponsors. Thank you. Counsel Balk The chair recognizes counsel and consultation. You have the floor. Mr. President, and thank you to the makers for this legislation. I think it's a great idea and workforce development. I also think that we also just need to be paying our employees a lot more money. I have been, you know, having so many conversations with folks, offering them positions that I know that I'm like they I know that they want to move to Boston and I tell them what the potential salary is and they're like, Do you think I can make it? And I honestly know and I don't and I can't in good conscience tell you to come work in my office. Right. So we have a lot of work to do to make sure that we are we are respecting the incredible work that my staff does and I know everyone else of staff does by making sure they can find housing in this very ridiculously expensive city. So add my name and I look forward to supporting this legislation. Thank you. Counsel who's on the chair recognizes counsel for charity. Counsel for charity. You have the ball. Thank you, Mr. President. Please add my name to the makers. Just. We had a hearing on residency. This was several years ago, and the law department came down saying that we couldn't do it, but they didn't have any case law to support it. So threw the chair to the makers if they could during the course of. This hearing, bring the law department. Down so they can't give us the swerve. And it's a great idea. Long overdue. We've got city employees that are the unsung heroes of our city, scratching, inquiring, in some instance, working two or three jobs just to be able to stay in the city. We know a lot of those folks are our constituents, our neighbors, our friends. Some of our staff members. And so that long overdue. But we need obviously to get clarity because we raise this very issue during the residency hearing a few years ago and kind of got a. Little stiffer from a lot of and so I would ask that a lot of time and be required to attend that hearing. Thank you. Thank you, counsel. Clarity and I will speak on this as well. I also think that's a great proposal. I just want to echo what counsel, clarity and counsel Baker mentioned just just a side story. I was visiting a friend up at the Galvin house yesterday. It's a it's a residential program for for for people. With substance use challenges. And one of the one of the men that was living there said to me, Counselor Flynn, you you proposed that the office of returning citizens should be able to get a fair shot at working in the city that public works. The city should be more career friendly. And I said, yes, I, I did say that I think would be a great idea. He said, Well, that would mean that we would have to live in the city of Boston for ten years making a salary of I don't know what they start out at 30, $35,000. So, you know, we can say that we want to help returning citizens. We can help them with courtroom Corey reform. But then we're going to make them live in Boston on a salary of 30 or $40,000 a year. It the math just doesn't add up. So just wanted to highlight that maybe that's an issue we can also focus on. But again, I want to say thank you to my colleagues, the makers for their their important work on this. This is this will be a great hearing. Thank you. Would anyone else like to speak or add their name? Please raise your hand. Mr. Clarke, please add Councilor Royal please that Councilor Baker Council BLOCK Councilor Great and Council Fernandez Innocent Council for Charity. Councilor Region Councilor Murphy. In the chair. Docket 0616 will be assigned to the Committee on Housing and Community Development. Mr. Kirk, please read Docket 0617, please. Dr. Number 0617 Council member here offered the following order for a hearing on government transparency and accountability towards service provision and spending on e-health students.