THIS ISSUE BRIEF is part of a series examining a variety of controversial local and national issues, focusing on specific policy proposals that are under active consideration. The premise of these essays, as outlined here and here, is that many important public policy issues are more complicated than the most fervent adherents to either side usually acknowledge, a dynamic that often hinders our ability to engage in thoughtful debate. (Earlier essays in the series have addressed proposals for free community college; free MBTA service; right-to-shelter;  rent control; supervised injection sites; school library books; reparations;  voter ID requirements; a moratorium on prison construction; and limiting investments in natural gas infrastructure.)  

The Proposal 

Enact a universal basic Income plan to ensure that every household in Massachusetts has a minimum monthly income to cover essential living expenses. 

Background 

Universal basic income (UBI) is an anti-poverty and income stability proposal intended to ensure that all households have a guaranteed income with few, if any, strings attached.   

Five cities in Massachusetts have launched limited pilot programs with monthly stipends up to $500, to evaluate the impact on recipients, especially with regard to food security, health, and employment.  State Sen. Jason Lewis has introduced a bill to establish a five-year state-sponsored pilot for 1,500 people to ensure recipients have a monthly income from all sources that is “at least equal to a living wage,” which for a single-adult with two children would average about $11,250 (pre-tax) in Massachusetts, according to the MIT Living Wage Calculator. 

A form of UBI, called the negative income tax, was proposed by free-market economist Milton Friedman in the early 1960s as a way to put cash in the hands of poor people without the need for large bureaucracies to manage anti-poverty programs. President Richard Nixon, with advice and advocacy from Daniel Patrick Moynihan, borrowed Friedman’s idea as the basis for his Family Assistance Plan, which would have replaced Aid to Families with Dependent Children, but it was rejected by Congress in 1972.   

A related approach, called the earned income tax credit, was first enacted by Congress in 1975 to provide low-income workers with supplementary income through a refundable credit against their federal tax bill. Similarly, in 1997 Congress passed the child tax credit to help pay for childcare to enable parents to work or go to school.   

The EITC and CTC have been expanded over the years and some states, including Massachusetts, have enacted their own versions to supplement the federal benefits. The federal EITC is worth up to $7,800, with Massachusetts adding up to $3,100. The maximum federal CTC benefit is $2,000 per child ($1,400 of which is refundable for families that don’t pay federal income taxes), to which Massachusetts adds up to $440. 

Although the idea of a universal basic income has resurfaced periodically over the years, it has gained political traction over the past decade, especially during the COVID pandemic when the  federal government provided billions of dollars in additional cash assistance and tax credits to displaced workers and low-income families. 

Bumper Stickers and Sticking Points 

End Poverty, Now!: Poverty is not a bug, but a feature of American capitalism. The free market is inherently rigged against poor people, limiting their opportunities for employment or forcing them into low-wage, mostly part-time jobs with no benefits. The accelerating pace of technological change is making a bad situation worse, not just for poor people, but for the middle class, too. As a result, the only solution to poverty and financial instability is to ensure every family has a government guaranteed income.  

No More Handouts!:  Cash welfare payments inevitably discourage people from working and create patterns of dependency that are passed on from generation to generation. Increasing the size of welfare checks and extending them to people who are already self-sufficient only serves to undermine personal responsibility and deepen a sense of entitlement, sapping the country of the hard-working, entrepreneurial spirit that has made it the world’s most successful economy. 

Evidence-Based Case in Favor 

The animating idea behind a universal basic income is that by establishing a financial floor under every household, federal and state governments can simplify the current patchwork of cash and in-kind benefits for low-income households, thereby increasing participation of eligible families and reducing the negative impacts and perverse incentives of “cliff effects,” wherein recipients lose public benefits as their income rises.   

At the same time, a guaranteed income promises to create greater household financial stability and security, especially in light of long-term wage stagnation and the ongoing disruption of labor markets due to technology and globalization, thereby enabling families to better plan for their future while reducing food and housing insecurity and creating a better environment for raising children. 

To date, the largest and longest running guaranteed income programs have been implemented in economically developing countries with high levels of deep poverty, such as Prospera in Mexico and Bolsa Familia in Brazil, both of which have produced positive results in terms of health indicators, educational outcomes, employment, and inter-generational economic mobility. 

More recently, a growing number of pilot programs have been launched in US cities, typically providing families with monthly cash grants of $400-$1,000. From this pool of data points, some promising findings are emerging.  

Importantly, the majority of expenditures resulting from UBI payments go for basic needs, like food, housing, transportation, and health care, according to aggregated data from over 30 US pilots compiled by Stanford University’s Basic Income Lab. In no case does it appear as if cash grants have been used for frivolous purposes, let alone self-destructive ones, such as drugs or alcohol. 

Here in Massachusetts, the Shah Foundation sponsored a 2020-21 pilot in which 2,000 Chelsea residents received $400 per month via debit cards. A study of the program by Harvard’s Rappaport Institute for Greater Boston found that about three-quarters of the funds were spent at supermarkets or grocery stores and other food retailers. 

A similar program in Cambridge provided low-income, single-parent households with $500 per month for 18 months. Recipients “reported higher incomes and lower income volatility” than a control group, according to a study conducted by the Center for Guaranteed Income Research at the University of Pennsylvania, contributing to a lower housing cost burden and greater food stability.  

Besides the positive direct financial effects associated with UBI, researchers consistently find indirect benefits related to mental health, family stability, and educational outcomes. For example, according to researchers at the Penn center, the children in the Cambridge UBI “treatment group” saw positive educational effects, such as higher grades and fewer absences. 

All these studies point to consistently positive effects of these UBI pilots, even though the monthly stipends have been relatively small, and the duration of the pilots has been short. 

A more recent large-scale example of the potential impact of cash grant programs is the expansion of the federal child tax credit during COVID. In 2021, low-income families received a fully refundable tax credit of up to $3,600 per child and child poverty dropped by over 40 percent, lifting over 2 million children out of poverty.  After the CTC expansion lapsed in 2022, child poverty rates doubled.  

Evidence-Based Case Opposed 

Universal basic income proposals can be terribly expensive and perhaps more important, most studies of UBI programs have shown little, if any, positive impact on employment and earnings.  Similarly, although there is strong evidence that these initiatives raise household income and improve living conditions, they do not appear to help families escape poverty. 

According to a 2019 analysis, a nationwide UBI program that pays $12,000 per adult per year,  phasing out at the median income level, would likely increase the annual fiscal impact of the federal social welfare programs they replace (excluding health care and Social Security retirement benefits) by over $900 billion or 250 percent.   

Here in Massachusetts, the Department of Transitional Assistance estimates that there are about 700,000 recipients in the Commonwealth of SNAP (Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program) and/or TAFDC (Transitional Aid to Families with Dependent Children) cash grants. Taken together these programs provide the average participating household with about $12,500 per year in benefits – not counting additional funds low-income households can access through federal and state CTC and EITC refundable tax credits, which average over $5,000 combined.  

If Massachusetts were to provide additional cash grants on top of existing federal and state benefit programs to get all households to the poverty line (pegged by the federal government at close to $80,000 statewide for a family of three) it would cost the Commonwealth billions of dollars. The pilot program proposed by Sen. Lewis would be even more expensive, since it ties UBI payments to a “living wage,” which averages close to $135,000 per year for a single-parent family of three in Massachusetts, according to the MIT Living Wage Calculator. 

But that’s not all. Most UBI proposals are designed to go beyond low-income families. As a result, they would include more numerous working- and middle-class households that would end up receiving the bulk of additional resources, even if cash grants were gradually phased out as earned income increases.   

UBI programs that narrowly target low-income families would be cheaper, but they would present the same “cliff effects” as the existing social welfare system, since any additional earned income would reduce public cash grants, thereby discouraging work.   

Notwithstanding the potential costs of UBI, there’s little evidence to suggest that they enable, let alone encourage, the surest pathway out of poverty, namely work.  

A recent randomized controlled trial of two privately funded three-year pilot programs in Dallas and Chicago found that a $1,000 per month stipend caused “a 3.9 percentage point decrease in labor market participation. Participants reduced their work hours as a result of the transfers by 1-2 hours/week and participants’ partners reduced their work hours by a comparable amount. Among other categories of time use, the greatest increase generated by the transfer was in time spent on leisure.” 

The potential for negative effects on employment – especially full-time employment – not only undermines the likelihood of escaping poverty in the near term, it also raises the risks of ongoing inter-generational dependency.   

Potential for Common Ground or Higher Ground 

Poverty rates in America have long been among the highest in the economically developed world, with little movement since the 1970s except in response to the ups and downs of the overall economy, despite several rounds of policy reforms. In many respects, UBI proposals are a natural reflection of these frustratingly stagnant trends.   

The difference of opinion over UBI generally comes down to what’s valued most by either side of the argument: reducing the effects of poverty now or increasing self-sufficiency in the future. 

There’s no solution that’s been shown to do both together and, unfortunately, neither are there cost-effective approaches that have even been able to achieve either one separately. While the current patchwork of social services and income supports is overly complex and expensive to operate, as a practical and political matter the best near-term option may be to pursue incremental improvements, rather than sweeping transformation.   

EITC, CTC and SNAP appear to have the biggest impact on reducing childhood poverty. EITC directly incentivizes work by supplementing earned income, while CTC and SNAP directly address the basic needs of children and families. CTC, which is the largest anti-poverty program targeting children, also fully phases out at relatively high income levels, thereby mitigating some of the “cliff effects” associated with increased earnings. 

Less than 80 percent of eligible EITC and SNAP households participate in those programs, while over 90 percent receive CTC benefits. Fully aligning or even consolidating all three programs (or at least EITC and CTC) would simplify and improve access, as would more efficient or automatic methods for enrollment. Other reforms related to eligibility, work or education and training requirements, and the phase-in and phase-out rules could also be considered. 

Regardless of the path forward, it seems impractical for Massachusetts to make significant changes to social welfare programs on its own, including the implementation of some version of UBI, without the full participation and leadership of the federal government. 

James Peyser served most recently as Massachusetts secretary of education under Gov. Charlie Baker. 

Data: 

• Poverty rate in MA (2024): 10.4 percent (39^th in the US) 

• Median household income in MA (2025): $89,645 (2^nd in the US) 

• Percent of MA population enrolled in Medicaid (2025): 27.2 percent (23^rd in the US) 

• Projected Fiscal Impact of MA Earned Income Tax Credit (2025): $341M 

• Projected Fiscal Impact of MA Child and Family Tax Credit (2025): $460M 

• Average annual SNAP benefit per MA household (2023): $4,020 

• Average annual TAFDC benefit per MA household (2023): $8, 532 

• Overall public welfare spending in MA per capita (2022): $4,545 (1^st in US) 

Sources and Resources: 

US Census Bureau:  https://www.census.gov/topics/income-poverty/poverty.html 

US Department of Agriculture Food and Nutrition Service: https://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/supplemental-nutrition-assistance-program-snap 

Internal Revenue Service:  https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/tax-credits-for-individuals-what-they-mean-and-how-they-can-help-refunds 

Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy:  https://itep.org/ 

Peter G. Peterson Foundation: https://www.pgpf.org/issues/social-programs/ 

Stanford Basic Income Lab:  https://basicincome.stanford.edu/ 

Center for Guaranteed Income Research:  https://www.penncgir.org/ 

MIT Living Wage Calculator: https://livingwage.mit.edu/states/25/locations 

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THE MBTA, desperate to replace its aging fleet of subway cars, is getting caught in the tariff crossfire between President Trump and China.

Trump initially proposed a double-digit increase in tariffs on imports of Chinese goods. China responded by hiking tariffs on US goods. And now Trump is retaliating by increasing the US tariff on Chinese goods to a total of 104 percent. The tariffs took effect early Wednesday morning.

MBTA officials declined to discuss what the tariffs will mean for its China-based subway car supplier, but it appears Trump’s tariffs would effectively double the cost of the subway shells and other parts being delivered to the Springfield factory where the cars go through final assembly.

A spokesperson for the Massachusetts affiliate of the Chinese company, CRRC MA, issued a statement on Wednesday saying the tariffs will increase project costs, strain operations, disrupt the company’s supply chain, and “negatively impact rail car production.” The statement said CRRC MA remains committed to the project and is seeking the help of partnering transit agencies and the Massachusetts congressional delegation.

The big question is who will pay the cost of the tariffs. “While there are no contractual provisions related to costs associated with new tariffs, the MBTA is actively assessing the impacts — potential or otherwise — on existing and future contracts,” the T said in a statement.

That statement — as vague as it is — represented a slight shift from what MBTA General Manager Phillip Eng said on the Boston Public Radio show on March 12. During that interview, Eng said any new tariffs would only impact CRRC and suggested the T would not have to cover their cost. “Right now, that is not part of the discussion,” he said.

Jim Aloisi, the former state transportation secretary and member of the advocacy group TransitMatters, said the tariff stakes are huge. The MBTA has been spending heavily to reduce slow zones on the subway system, but that effort will be thwarted if passengers get stuck riding subway cars that are beyond their 30-year useful life, he added.

Aloisi said the first priority is deciding whether the subway contract can move forward with the higher tariffs or whether the T needs to move in a different direction with a different supplier.

“No one’s blaming the T for Trump’s behavior, but we need to know what it is going to cost,” Aloisi said.

The rising tariffs come as CRRC-MA was turning around its performance, finally delivering well-working subway vehicles on time. The turnaround began after the MBTA a year ago signed a new contract with the company, forgiving $90 million in penalties that CRRC owed for failing to deliver vehicles on time and paying an extra $148 million to the Chinese company to cover unexpected cost increases brought about by the pandemic and tariffs on the subway cars imposed by the first Trump administration.  

The changes brought the total cost of the CRRC-MA contract with the MBTA to more than $1 billion. Any new tariffs would be imposed on CRRC-MA, which would then have to decide whether to absorb that cost or attempt to pass all or a portion of it along to the MBTA.

Even though last year’s contract change for new subway vehicles addressed the lingering cost of previous tariffs, the new document did not address how any future tariffs would be handled, according to T officials.

The subway car contract is not expected to be completed until 2027. According to T officials, 142 of the 152 new Orange Line cars have been delivered and are operational while only 40 of the 252 new Red Line vehicles are running. The older Red Line cars are either 57, 37, or 31 years old.

Trump has been erratic in his approach to tariffs, announcing them and then quickly retracting them. But over the last week his stance has hardened on imposing tariffs, particularly on China. Indeed, leaders of the two nations have made harsh remarks about each other, suggesting a tariff war may be long lasting. 

This story has been updated with comment from CRRC MA.

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JUST MONTHS into Donald Trump’s second term, Massachusetts nonprofits face seismic changes for the sector. The president and his administration have frozen federal funding for nonprofits, restricted whom nonprofits can serve, and threatened the status of individual nonprofit organizations. Under the guise of “decreasing waste,” efforts to reduce the federal workforce jeopardize a critical relationship with nonprofits that ensures Americans receive crucial services.

It makes for an uncertain moment for frontline nonprofit workers who provide services like housing assistance, health care, legal aid, food access, child care, and arts and educational programs – all services considered “essential” during turbulent times like the COVID-19 pandemic.

As we saw during the pandemic, the accelerating demand for services without increases to salaries led to high burnout and turnover across the sector, disrupting the delivery of vital services to communities across the country. Once again, we are at risk of losing these essential services and the workers who provide them.

Despite these pandemic lessons, we have failed to fix the salary and compensation problems that drive nonprofit professionals out of the sector during times when we can least afford it. Today, 22 percent of the nation’s 12.7 million nonprofit workers experience financial hardship. With a higher-than-average cost of living in Massachusetts, the situation is even more dismal for the state’s 550,000 nonprofit workers.

Recent data from TSNE’s Valuing Our Nonprofit Workforce report, supported by the Boston Foundation, shows that almost two-thirds of nonprofit workers in the Commonwealth who provide essential services may not earn enough to make ends meet. This reality runs counter to Elon Musk’s misleading claims of self-enrichment across the sector. Thousands of nonprofit workers providing services in Massachusetts often are forced to rely on safety net services for their own survival.

They turn to organizations like Bridge Forward Fund, a nonprofit that provides cash assistance to Massachusetts professionals to cover basic needs during destabilizing emergencies and wrap-around services that promote economic mobility.

Cindy, a nonprofit employee providing administrative and direct care support at one of Boston’s biggest hospitals, shared her experiences, which encapsulates the reality for many Massachusetts nonprofit workers.

A single mother of two who fled domestic violence, Cindy works full-time to provide for her family. In her nearly 10 years at the hospital, she earned promotions that came with increased pay and responsibilities. Still, her income was low enough that she relied on benefits like the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) and health coverage through MassHealth.

Her most recent promotion, however, came with a salary increase that made her ineligible for these programs. In other words, an unintended consequence of her decade of hard work was the “cliff effect.” While she has health insurance through her job, she pays extra to get coverage for her children to match what they had under MassHealth. Cindy says the new expenses reduced her limited savings to cope with emergencies, plan for retirement, support her children through college, build wealth, or see a future for herself in the sector.

Stories like Cindy’s are increasingly common for nonprofit workers throughout the country. Women in the sector are especially vulnerable. In the Commonwealth, women lead around two-thirds of nonprofit organizations, employing a workforce that is around three-quarters female.

Despite improving gender pay equity in the sector, women of color hold the lowest-paid jobs and fewer positions of leadership compared to white men and tend to run organizations with access to fewer resources. Even with increased cost-of-living adjustments, front-line and even middle management workers across the nonprofit sector, overrepresented by people of color, remain underpaid and undersupported.

The problem lies in nonprofits’ limited budgets. Nonprofits of all sizes struggle to balance budgets amid growing demands for their services and rising operating costs. Societal conditions and public policies, often beyond organizations’ control, limit their ability to pay staff living wages.

Inflation, reduced giving, anti-aid amendments, restrictive grantmaking practices, and the end of pandemic-era investments in the sector are shrinking budgets. A recent study by the Urban Institute shows that federal funding freezes may affect 73 percent of nonprofits in the Commonwealth.

It is unclear how Gov. Healey’s proposed caps on charitable giving deduction would impact the nonprofit sector. Lessons from the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which similarly reformed deductions on charitable giving, suggest the governor’s proposal would weaken nonprofits and their ability to adequately compensate nonprofit staff.

The ripple effects of government policies continue to punish the already precarious state of the nonprofit workforce. A 2023 report by the Provider’s Council, Massachusetts’s largest human services membership organization, estimates that one-quarter of the state’s front-line human services positions are vacant, as high burnout rates and low wages make filling these positions impossible.

TSNE’s report shows that despite significant salary increases for direct care counselors, the median salary remained $11,000 below the state’s median wage and well short of living wage benchmarks. For dedicated workers like Cindy, even career advancement and salary increases can’t close the wage gaps driving people out of the sector.

That illustrates a tension regarding nonprofit work. On the one hand, society expects nonprofit staff—who make up 17 percent of the Massachusetts workforce—to sacrifice wages for the opportunity to advance altruistic causes. On the other hand, professionals need high enough salaries to provide for their families.

Studies show that nonprofit workers are increasingly prioritizing financial stability, resulting in sector turnover. Resourcing nonprofits so they can increase staff salaries would help attract and retain workers who provide timely delivery of high-quality services.

During the three years of working with Cindy, Bridge Forward Fund has helped her avoid eviction, afford basic needs, pay utility bills, insure the car that gets her to work, and envision a future for herself and her family. These interventions have helped Cindy continue her work in the sector supporting people in her community. But we can’t expect a system built on emergency aid alone to support the hundreds of thousands of nonprofit workers who are not being paid a living wage.

Investing in nonprofits’ workforce increases the sector’s resilience during uncertain times and, as a result, strengthens communities across the Commonwealth.

Carlos Muñoz-Cadilla is a senior associate focused on nonprofit sector infrastructure at the Boston Foundation. Luisa Peña Lyons is CEO and founder of Bridge Forward, which helps individuals and families experiencing financial hardship with multi-year financial and coaching support to propel them toward economic stability and greater wealth.

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IN JANUARY, Boston planning officials unveiled a new zoning proposal for a large area of the city’s downtown, a proposal that would dramatically alter the size and scale of permissible buildings within one block of Boston Common and the Public Garden. Under this proposed new zoning, luxury residential towers as tall as 500 feet – or about 50 stories – would be allowed, as a matter “of right” with no city review of a blanket increase to that height.  

This proposal, dubbed PLANdowntown, would permit these towers in a large part of the historic area that fronts the Common called the Ladder Blocks, which are the seven short blocks that run between Washington and Tremont Streets facing the Common. This new tower zone would be extended to also include Park Plaza, an area that turns and runs further along the Common and Public Garden between Boylston and Stuart streets. 

Fortunately, Mayor Wu recently proposed a virtuous delay in this PLANdowntown process –welcome news as history has taught us that urban growth and change must not come at the expense of quality of life. Citizen groups anxiously await a more inclusive and thoughtful planning process as part of the mayor’s commitment, one that is hoped to begin in earnest in  April. 

The idea that 500-foot towers would be allowed in proximity to the city’s historic and iconic downtown parks has produced very significant public pushback because it would dramatically change the city’s scale and loom over existing parks and historic buildings. This would also give an immediate and irretrievable windfall benefit to developers without providing any well-defined public benefits. It would likely lead to building demolition throughout, and also upend the 30-year stability of the Park Plaza area that was previously established with very definite building parameters specifically designed to hold back this kind of out-of-scale development.  

The proposed rezoning in PLANdowntown suggests that we have not learned from a battle that played out 50 years ago, a showdown that offers some lessons in history that we’d do well to heed, rather than be doomed to repeat it. 

The dramatically greater density that would be allowed by the city’s January zoning plan is quite destructive because it makes the value of land higher than the value of the existing buildings upon it. This encourages existing owners to just sit on their properties without signing leases or making repairs as they wait and speculate on this new high-rise potential.  

The buildings impacted are irreplaceable parts of the downtown that Bostonian’s identify as part of our city. They include the Old Corner Book Store, the Boston Five Cents Savings Bank and the Jewelers’ Building, among many others, The proposed zoning changes are likely to encourage massive demolition (also reducing real estate taxes) with no incentive to repurpose existing structures even though they have significant structural, aesthetic, or historic value.  

The new PLANdowntown’s proposed zoning naively supposes that increased building densities and heights will cause responsible investment. It presumes that there is a public purpose justification in developing new luxury towers everywhere, while it virtually ignores the need for low- and middle-income housing. Furthermore, it does not directly drive the rehabilitation of existing structures; rather, it destabilizes land economics at the expense of lower existing buildings, including those constructed or restored in recent decades.  
 
The PLANdowntown zoning proposal and today’s negative public reaction to it is quite similar to the Park Plaza controversy of the 1970s. At the time, the Boston Redevelopment Authority proposed a similar radical increase in permitted density to heights of 450+ feet in the blocks between Boylston and Stuart streets, also adjacent to Boston Common and the Public Garden. 

The proposal then was justified by the BRA as a necessary “opportunity to jump-start” real estate development in an area that was in danger of being overtaken by crime in an expansion of that era’s Combat Zone. These are the same words we are hearing again today, arguments that have to do with crime and drug use in the area without a full consideration of the city that would be radically altered in its physical form.   

Citizens vigorously opposed that 1970 plan, and rallied to the cry that the towering, Manhattan-style buildings proposed would cause damaging shadow impacts to the use of Boston Common and the Public Garden, thus degrading the most loved parks in the city. Correctly anticipating the creation of an antiseptic, “Manhattanized” neighborhood with no connection to the historic nature of the area, community groups and park advocates generated dramatic and effective opposition.  

The Commonwealth then used a little-known state approval power to reject that BRA plan, in large part because the BRA had not prepared a proper environmental impact report on its proposal (notably, there is no such analysis in PLANdowntown today, either). The resulting impasse set the stage for a new plan to be developed, one prepared by working to find consensus with community members and the state, all in full compliance with Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act procedures. 

This subsequent Park Plaza planning successfully converted a very controversial BRA idea into a productive and sustainable neighborhood.  Height and density limits in the area were strictly controlled to make clear that there would be no exceptions in the form of zoning variances or other “spot zoning” dispensations, signaling that property owners should invest in compliance with expressed height limits.   

A law partially governing shadows upon the parks was also passed (though it has proven to be insufficient because of limitations in the seasonal periods it controls, and because it can and has been amended).  

The transformation that followed included: construction of the Massachusetts Transportation Building; development of the Four Seasons Hotel and Condominium, the Heritage on the Garden and One Charles condominiums; renovation of the Paine Furniture Building and Park Plaza Hotel; restoration of the Majestic and Colonial theaters, and the Little Building (the latter three by Emerson College); and revised and renewed urban infrastructure including improved streets and parks.  

Since that time, we have witnessed successful redevelopment elsewhere in this area of downtown: restoration and functional modernization of the Opera House, Paramount, and Modern theaters; construction of Millennium Tower, which preserved the historic Filene’s department store building; development of the mid-rise Millennium Place condominium; creation of the Godfrey Hotel from older office buildings; and modernization of the Parker House and nearby structures ringing downtown’s historic cemeteries.  

In addition, the conversion of older Ladder Blocks buildings into less expensive housing has begun at 44 Bromfield Street and on Hamilton Place, for student housing at 101 Tremont Street, and already completed affordable housing at the YMCA building on Boylston Street.  In each of these cases, careful planning was informed by an understanding of the inherent worth of many historic buildings and has resulted in increased economic value and tax revenues — all with strong public support.  

These outcomes were possible because there was a working process that recognized problems and solved for agreed upon outcomes. Planners combined policy goals in zoning with well identified public benefits. Contrast this with recent Boston Planning Department thinking that an autopilot, “as-of-right” zoning amendment in PLANdowntown would magically work by transferring valuable property rights (created by up-zoning) to private developers without any conditions other than the creation of luxury towers. 

There is hope that we will have learned from the Park Plaza saga, and I do have faith in the mayor’s proposed re-engagement in this PLANdowntown process. I also look forward to a concomitant reset of PLANdowntown, one that truly encourages rehabilitation of older buildings and their conversion to more affordable housing.  

Instead of high-rise luxury housing, we should aim for programs that transfer increases in value to historic buildings or to sites that can accommodate affordable housing in configurations that are less expensive to build.   

Downtown citizens believe that a well-run public process would lead to a consensus, one that unlocks the latent value in the historic Ladder Blocks through a deliberate incentivizing of building rehabilitation. It would include stabilization of the Ladder Blocks and Park Plaza with easily described and sensible zoning height limits; and could include a required coupling of the proposed new SKY-HIGH Financial District zoning (a new city proposed zone deeper within the Financial District) with funds for building conversion into more affordable housing inside the Ladder Blocks.  

Any plan would also logically call for state investment to upgrade the very center of the MBTA rapid transit system at Park Street, Downtown Crossing, Boylston, State, and Chinatown stations to support a growing downtown. 

This can all be accomplished by City Hall if it embarks upon a reciprocal, interactive process with the public, including residents, park and historic property advocates, landowners, and the state. Together we can identify a path forward that can build on models of past success, We all believe that the city we love can survive this moment of déjà vu all over again.  

Anthony Pangaro, a downtown Boston resident, is an architect and real estate developer whose projects included Millennium Place, Millennium Tower, and the restoration of the Filene’s building on Washington Street; the Four Seasons Hotel and Condominium and One Charles Condominium at Park Plaza; and restoration of the Paine Furniture Building on Arlington Street. His firm, Millennium Partners, also played an important role in preserving the Opera House and Paramount theaters. He is part of a coalition of 15 neighborhood organizations that are seeking input in the revised PLANdowntown zoning proposal now being developed. 

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HUNDREDS GATHERED outside Hadley Town Hall Sunday protesting a deluge of changes to the USDA by the Trump administration, including frozen grant money, program cuts, staff layoffs, and the slated closure of Massachusetts’ Natural Resources Conservation Service office.  

Facing a crowd of supportive community members, local and regional growers, and a line of six tractors, concerned farmers and state and federal elected officials outlined the possible consequences of losing these funds and services.  

“Our farm estimates over $200,000 in lost revenue this year due to these funding cuts,” said Harrison Bardwell, a who owns Bardwell Farm in Hatfield, referring to recently cut programs like Local Food for Schools (LFS) Cooperative Agreement Program and Local Food Purchase Assistance Cooperative Agreement Program (LFPA), both of which provide the state with funds so schools and food banks can buy food from farms like Bardwell’s. That represents 20-30% of the farm’s expected revenue for 2025.  

“We have bills to pay, we have loans, and we have employees to support. I’m troubled by the sudden change,” he said.  

Between the cuts to the LFS and LFPA programs, Massachusetts would lose more than $18 million in subsidies that go directly to farmers for providing fresh food to schools, if the cuts stand. Ashley Randle, commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Agricultural Resources, sent a letter to Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins in early March to urge the funding be reinstated. The uncertainty around federal funding, Randle noted, made it particularly difficult for farmers to plan their crops at a critical time during the spring season. 

In early March, the Department of Government Efficiency’s website listed the Natural Resources Conservation Service for Massachusetts in Amherst, a federally run office, as one of dozens whose leases will be terminated, according to several news sources. Representatives for the agency, which works with farmers and other landowners across the state to protect natural resources like soil and water, referred CommonWealth Beacon to their national press department, which did not respond to a request for comment by press time.  

Annie Diemond from Diemand Farm, a third generation farm in Wendell, described the precarious position that frozen Rural Energy for America Program funding has put her business in. Her farm secured $139,000 in REAP grant money to help pay down a $250,000 loan for rooftop solar. Now their first loan payment is due, and she can’t access the funds.  

“We just don’t have that kind of money sitting around,” she said. “I wish people would understand the reality that farmers face.” 

US Rep. Jim McGovern expressed outrage on behalf of the farmers. “They are launching a full assault on the people who feed this country,” he said.  

“You picked the wrong group of people to mess with,” he said in a complaint to Rollins, receiving cheers from the crowd.  

The USDA did not respond to requests for comment by press time. But in early February Rollins said she supported DOGE’s cuts. “I welcome DOGE’s efforts at USDA because we know that its work makes us better, stronger, faster, and more efficient. I will expect full access and transparency to DOGE in the days and weeks to come,” she said.

Protest-goers held signs with messages including “Cut Hay, Not USDA,” “Don’t Bite the Hands that Feed Us” and “Sequester Carbon Not Government.” A table was set out where attendees wrote letters directly to Rollins.  

Kerry Taylor of Brookfield Farm in Amherst, one of the rally’s organizers, said, “This is a manufactured problem that Secretary Rollins needs to fix.” She called on Rollins to “stick to the agreements that they made with farmers … and pay the farmers what they promised.” 

Some farmers, like Suna Turgay of Flowerwork Farm in Northampton, were particularly worried about the climate impacts that could result from USDA cuts, both in terms of adaptation and mitigation. 

“I was expecting four years of Climate-Smart agriculture grants. These grants help farmers adapt to extreme weather, to become more resilient farms,” she said. “These practices improve soil health, increase productivity, conserve natural resources, improve food security and reduce the temperature of our planet.”  

Beth Girshman, a resident of Conway, was one of many who showed up to support farmers and the regional food system that they make possible.  

“I’m here because I think farming is essential to the local economy and food security. It makes us one of the best places to live in the country.” 

Jesse Lederman, regional director for Sen. Ed Markey’s office, said his office has launched formal inquiries with the USDA on the status of “that were legally appropriated and committed to our farmers.” 

“I will not rest until these dollars are out of Elon Musk hands and invested in Massachusetts farms where they belong,” he said. “If they continue to violate the law, we will see them in court.” 

The protest closed out with country music blasting from one of the tractors. 

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PRESIDENT TRUMP has made immigration a top issue of his second term, signing a number of executive orders and promising further action. These policies include limiting legal immigration and ending birthright citizenship.

Amid these sweeping policy changes, a rift has emerged amongst the President’s allies. On one side, Sriram Krishnan, Elon Musk, and their allies advocate for increasing high-skilled immigration; on the other, Steve Bannon and his allies call for limiting all legal immigration.

A major source of this rift is growing evidence that immigration, especially highly skilled immigration, is a net benefit for host nations. Indeed, recent research suggests legal immigrants are net job creators because of the exceptionally high likelihood that they will own businesses.

A 2023 Pioneer Institute study confirms that this is true for Massachusetts, where immigrants own half of all Fortune 500 companies headquartered in the state, employing almost 900,000 people. Another recent Pioneer study finds that the most immigrant-dense large cities in the US host 15 percent more startups per capita than their less immigrant-dense counterparts and more than double the IPOs and high-value acquisitions per capita. 

In almost every geographic context, immigrants with both high and low levels of education are more likely than non-immigrants to open businesses. 

Unfortunately, we are not taking full advantage of the economic potential of legal immigrants. Despite most Americans supporting steps to make the immigration process easier, 99.4 percent of immigrant applicants were ineligible to come to the U.S. in 2018. Not only is immigration almost impossible because of strict caps, but the immigration system itself is complicated with onerous steps and over 22 classes of visas divided into about 185 visa types, each with very specific pathways into the U.S. 

Additionally, labor market restrictions stifle the ability of legal immigrants to contribute to the American economy. For example, many immigrant STEM graduates are prevented from opening their own businesses for years after graduation because of H1-B visa restrictions that only allow an immigrant to work for the employer that sponsors his or her visa. Refugees must wait a month before they are even allowed to work. And most state legislatures, including every New England state, restrict legal immigrants’ access to professional licenses.    

These restrictions threaten America’s competitiveness, and other countries are beginning to take advantage of our inability to properly harness immigrants’ potential. Canada has instituted a program to allow U.S. H1-B visa holders a three-year open work permit in Canada, and some Canadian companies have gone so far as to plaster billboards in Silicon Valley enticing highly educated immigrants who might be worried about their visa status.  

To take better advantage of the entrepreneurial bounty immigrants offer, US officials should take three major steps. First, caps on legal immigration need to be raised. Because immigrants of all education levels are highly entrepreneurial and innovative, every law-abiding immigrant who is denied entry equates to fewer potential businesses, new jobs, and life-improving inventions. 

Second, officials should streamline and simplify the US immigration process. Its complexity translates to wait times for residence permits that are measured in years, not months or days. This clogs the system and delays the contributions immigrants can make. 

Finally, federal officials should end unnecessary immigrant-related labor market restrictions. H1-B visa constraints delay the contributions of highly educated immigrants who want to start high-impact businesses, and work restrictions for other visa categories strip immigrants of their autonomy and ability to pursue gainful employment.

If federal officials are unwilling to act, there are steps state officials can take. Arkansas, Colorado, and New Mexico have already passed laws to remove immigrant-specific barriers to professional licenses. 

Massachusetts has used a more creative approach to side-step inefficient federal immigration policy. With the Global Entrepreneur in Residence Program, Massachusetts universities can sponsor cap-exempt H1-B visa petitions for graduates with advanced degrees who have founded companies. Other states should emulate the program.

While many were understandably alarmed by the lack of control experienced on our southern border, legal immigrants are not a burden. Rather, they are an incredibly positive force in our country and communities. It is time we act like it. 

Joshua Bedi is a senior fellow in economic opportunity at Pioneer Institute, a Boston-based public policy think tank, and author of a new report on the threat of outdated immigration policies to US economic competitiveness. He is an assistant professor of economics at the University of Wisconsin – Superior.

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IN AN ERA where the lines between work and personal life are increasingly blurred, the rise of new worker surveillance and control technologies is creating a dystopian reality that demands urgent attention from policymakers.

Legislation filed on Beacon Hill, An Act Fostering Artificial Intelligence Responsibility, known as the FAIR Act,  would provide Massachusetts workers with much-needed protection against reckless and harmful uses of “bossware” technologies. Employers use these electronic and algorithmic decision systems to automate managerial functions, including determining whether workers get a job, tracking workers’ locations and communications throughout — and sometimes even after — the workday, and deciding how much workers get paid and whether they get promoted, demoted, or fired.

To workers across sectors — in warehouses, offices, factories, and job sites across the country — these technologies and their wide-ranging risks are not theoretical or distant. Call center workers have long experienced continuous, intrusive monitoring. AI-powered cameras monitor delivery drivers, who have even been forced to sign biometric information consent forms. The Trump administration and its Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have installed software that tracks federal workers’ mouse movements and keystrokes and can even remotely activate their webcams.

Unchecked surveillance threatens workers’ privacy, and research shows that it increases the risk of accidents, injuries, and numerous mental and physical disorders. Automated decision systems have caused workers to unfairly lose job opportunities and face pay cuts and termination based on inaccurate or incomplete data, often because those systems are deeply flawed and biased.

The FAIR Act (SD.838/HD.1458) would establish crucial safeguards, including limiting electronic monitoring to situations necessary for a legitimate business purpose, such as quality control and network security. Employers would have to notify workers of their electronic monitoring activities. The bill would also restrict the sale or transfer of employee data and prohibit the collection of sensitive information like biometric data, including fingerprint, face, and iris scans.

A recent study by the Center for Democracy & Technology and Coworker.org found that workers desire protections like those the FAIR Act offers. After participating workers discussed various types of workplace surveillance among themselves, the results were striking: overwhelming majorities strongly supported requiring greater transparency regarding employers’ surveillance and data collection practices, prohibiting off-clock surveillance, limiting location and biometric tracking, and barring employers from engaging in productivity monitoring that would harm workers’ mental or physical health.

Notably, this support transcended traditional political divides. For example, nearly identical and overwhelming majorities of liberal (96 percent), moderate (95 percent), and conservative (94 percent) participants favored requiring employers to disclose what types of employee data they collect and how they collect it. The FAIR Act’s electronic monitoring protections are thus not merely the right thing to do for workers; they also have the support of workers from all political backgrounds.

Of course, new technologies can also help workers perform their jobs better–but only if workers have input and autonomy in how those technologies are used. The FAIR Act thus protects workers’ roles in decision-making by shielding employees from adverse actions if they reasonably refuse to follow the output of an AI system because it would lead to a negative outcome. This ensures decision-making authority ultimately stays with humans rather than machines. That benefits not only workers, but the clients, customers, and patients their employers serve.

Importantly, the FAIR Act would also tackle automated decision systems by requiring independent impact assessments before employers implement such systems, banning their use in predicting employee behavior or interfering with protected activities, and ensuring workers receive meaningful notice before employers use them to make key decisions about them.

Bossware practices, and the dystopian workplaces they create, do not align with Massachusetts values. Unfortunately, we cannot expect the Trump administration to adopt rules or regulations addressing these practices — but as technology reshapes our workplaces, our laws must evolve to protect workers’ rights and dignity.

The FAIR Act represents a thoughtful, balanced approach to addressing the challenges posed by bossware systems. By passing this legislation, Massachusetts can set a national standard for worker protection in the digital age.

Chrissy Lynch is president of the Massachusetts AFL-CIO. Amanda Ballantyne is executive director of the AFL-CIO Technology Institute. Matthew Scherer is senior policy counsel for workers’ rights and technology at the Center for Democracy & Technology. Lynch is a member of the board of MassINC, the nonprofit civic organization that publishes CommonWealth Beacon.

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 IN JANUARY, nine South Shore towns voted in a landslide to build a new, larger vocational technical high school for the region, broadening opportunities for generations of students and bolstering the economy with the promise of young, skilled workers. 

In an age of close votes, this special election wasn’t. The proposal, to build a new $273 million school facility that could open in 2028, won 78 percent of votes cast across the nine towns. The new facility will allow the South Shore Regional Vocational Technical School in Hanover to increase student enrollment and offer new programs in fields that range from plumbing to veterinary science. 

It marks an important stride forward in our state’s growing embrace of vocational technical education as a lynchpin of our secondary school offerings – at a time when the state sorely lacks the number of seats needed to satisfy the surging demand from students and parents. And the timing for those future members of the workforce couldn’t be better; the demand for skilled, properly trained workers virtually ensures these students a bright career pathway. 

The resounding endorsement of a greater role for voc-tech also signals a major opportunity to expand seating capacity in such schools, simultaneously equipping more kids for successful careers and addressing a skilled labor shortage – recently labeled a “long-term” threat to the state’s economy by Associated Industries of Massachusetts president Brooke Thomson. 

Policymakers should take notice and grab for the win-win.  

On Beacon Hill, Gov. Maura Healey and Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll recently put down a marker of $75 million for laboratory modernization funding in the Fair Share supplemental budget that was filed with the Legislature. Similarly, in the higher education bond bill filed by the governor, a $100 million reauthorization of the capital skills grant program was requested.

These are both positive steps, but not sufficient to meet the overwhelming demand for Chapter 74 voc-tech education by Massachusetts students and families. However, there is room for the House and Senate to build on their own record of support for vocational and technical programs in the upcoming budget and legislative process. And advocates from all sides need to seek compromise in the debate over vocational school admissions so that the primary focus remains on the root problem – eliminating voc-tech waiting lists across the state for students seeking this unique form of education that prepares them both for a career and/or college. 

Social justice advocates, using selective data, argue that regional vocational technical high school admissions practices are discriminatory. The state’s Department of Elementary and Secondary Education recently conducted study sessions on voc-tech admissions policies. These sessions have highlighted that certain criteria, like middle school grades and guidance counselor recommendations, may have a negative impact, while assessing student attendance, discipline history, and interest voc-tech can be critical to participation in this unique form of education. 

Moreover, these sessions have highlighted the fact that efforts by voc-tech administrators to increase and diversify their applicant pool are significantly hampered by some school superintendents not allowing voc-tech schools access to middle school students to educate them about how they can choose voc-tech for high school.  

These superintendents, often in urban communities, deny students and families this information because funding follows the student should they choose to attend a voc-tech school. Meanwhile, more forward-thinking superintendents at traditional high schools have been adding Chapter 74 voc-tech programs to their own offerings to students to meet this growing demand, bringing the statewide total of such programs to 92. This builds capacity beyond the seats available at the 29 regional voc-tech and agricultural high schools. 

These sessions have also demonstrated the financial chaos that a blind lottery for vocational school admissions could create for existing regional voc-tech seat allocation agreements between member municipalities and elected school committees. This would be hugely disruptive and counterproductive to our collective efforts to expand access for all students to a voc-tech education. 

Compromise among those with different viewpoints is what the Healey-Driscoll administration and the Legislature, working with the state education department, should be seeking. Divisive, prolonged arguments about competing data points do a disservice to the students and families that want a vocational technical education, as evidenced by both the recent South Shore vote and student waiting lists that exist across the state. Meanwhile, the Massachusetts economy and employer community scream for more voc-tech grads.  

The most direct route to sustaining a thriving, diverse population for our vocational schools is building capacity to allow for more seats for more students. Additionally, voc-tech school officials should be allowed full access to reach out to all middle schoolers to make them aware of their opportunities and alternatives. Youngsters, and their parents, uninspired by traditional high schools should have access to the information, as well as to enrollment in a nearby vocational school. 

As the proud parents of two daughters who graduated from Worcester Technical High School, my wife and I have seen the benefits of a voc-tech high school diploma. A student with a diploma, an industry-recognized credential, has a lifelong competitive advantage. This advantage benefits both the student and the Commonwealth, whether the student enters the workforce immediately after high school or upon college graduation.  

As lieutenant governor, I worked with Gov. Deval Patrick and the Legislature to establish what is now known as the Capital Skills Grant program, which has thrived over three administrations, representing both political parties, allowing voc-tech schools to upgrade and expand, but also for traditional high schools to add Chapter 74 programs of their own. Funding for this program, Lab Modernization Grants, and enhanced Massachusetts School Building Authority funding should be the cornerstones of a sustained multi-year effort to expand access to Chapter 74 programs. 

While in office, I visited each of the 64 vocational-technical education programs in the Commonwealth that were in existence at the time, because the students training in those schools represented the workforce of the future. Now, as president of the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce, I know how vital those well-educated, properly trained students of yesterday have become as workers in our current economy. 

Those students equipped with voc-tech experience are work-ready, because they’re sent to the workplace.  Students with the entrepreneurial itch leave voc-tech schools ready to launch their own careers, drawing on the skills they’ve developed in high school. Why wouldn’t we want more kids with skills like that? 

Voters, students and their families, as well as Massachusetts businesses want more voc-tech seating capacity. The primary and bedrock focus for policymakers, parents, and the business community should be providing as many students as possible with the high-quality opportunities that a voc-tech education provides while maintaining many of the tenets that have made this form of education so successful. 

Timothy Murray is president and CEO of the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce and chair of the Alliance for Vocational/Technical Education and the Worcester Technical High School General Advisory Board. He is a former mayor of Worcester and lieutenant governor of the Commonwealth.  

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A WALPOLE MOM was devastated: When she went to pay for her groceries recently using her state SNAP EBT card, she found her account empty and had no way to pay for food.

“In an instant everything was taken from us,” she told Channel 25, “and I have nothing for my children, no money to pay my bills.”

Every month in Massachusetts, tech-savvy thieves wipe out roughly 1,700 low-income families’ Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, often forcing seniors or parents with children to go without sufficient food for the month. We can easily fix this, help keep families fed, and protect taxpayer dollars by following California’s lead and adding a secure chip to EBT cards.

This has always been a no-brainer – which is why your bank and credit card company did it years ago.

But improved card security became even more urgent in December, when Congress ended replacement of SNAP funds stolen from families, leaving them with no recourse when they are victims of theft. And that means that more than $1 million a month taken from Massachusetts families through no fault of their own, usually through skimming devices planted at grocery stores, is simply gone — wasting tax dollars and worsening food security.

Advocates estimate the cost to the state of transitioning to more secure, chip-enabled EBT cards would be about $5 million, with a $5 million match available from the federal government. That investment would nearly eliminate the $1 million per month theft of taxpayer-funded benefits.

Nearly every other credit and debit card in the marketplace utilizes chip technology to protect against card-skimming. Neglecting EBT cards leaves them as a prime target of thieves, who have engaged in sophisticated and coordinated efforts to steal SNAP benefits.

In 2024, the federal government finally provided national standards for states transitioning to chip card technology in the SNAP program. California’s experience has shown the way forward, particularly in how to bring grocers into compliance with the new cards.

The Healey administration needs to start now. Moving the Commonwealth’s 670,000 SNAP households to new cards is going to require a minimum of several months’ work, and — at the current rate of theft — each month means another $1 million stolen and another 1,700 families scrambling to pay for groceries.

The federal government isn’t just walking away from programs that help struggling families – it’s running away. And although the state can’t make up for every federal funding cut, we also can’t sit back and permit taxpayer dollars meant to cover families’ grocery bills to be siphoned off by thieves.

The Healey administration needs to adopt chip EBT cards to protect our tax dollars, and in the interim, it needs to continue providing families with funds to replace SNAP benefits stolen through skimming theft – theft that is preventable.

Over the last two years, Massachusetts was a national leader in providing state funding to cover losses not fully covered by federal rules. But, distressingly, those state funds recently ran out. Gov. Healey and the Legislature need to make a plan now for continuing to reimburse theft victims until chip cards are in place.

Given the rapid changes we are seeing in Washington, our state leaders must proactively defend low-income consumers and protect our safety net programs. The obvious solution is for Massachusetts to adopt technology that prevents theft, keeps families from going hungry, and safeguards taxpayer dollars.

Victoria Negus is a benefits policy advocate and Betsy Gwin is an attorney focused on SNAP and safety net benefits at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute. 

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IN THE BIGGEST sign yet of persistent trouble in Boston’s commercial real estate market, a 36-story office tower that boasts more than 1 million square feet of prime class A office space is heading for auction. 

One Lincoln Street, the former longtime home of State Street Corp., will be put up for auction next month. It’s the first Boston building with class A office space to meet that fate since the pandemic upended the commercial real estate market, according to Jim Rooney, president of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce. 

It’s “a statement about the condition of the real estate market here in Boston,” Rooney said. 

It’s also potentially a statement about the city’s fiscal health. Property tax revenue accounts for three quarters of the city budget, and about 60 percent of that amount comes from commercial property. 

The question now is whether One Lincoln’s plight is an exceptional case, or a sign that the distress that has hit lower-priced class B office space could be making its way to the city’s higher-end class A office buildings. 

News of the auction was first reported on Friday by Banker & Tradesman. It will take place on March 20, 

State Street had occupied more than half of One Lincoln’s 1.1 million square feet of office space before the financial services firm decamped in 2023 for the new 43-story tower at One Congress Street. That left a huge hole to fill at One Lincoln in the middle of the pandemic-fueled contraction in demand for office space. The building landed one big tenant, HarbourVest Partners, a private equity firm that leased 250,000 square feet, but it apparently wasn’t enough to keep things operating in the black. 

A spokesperson for the building’s owner, New York-based Fortis Property Group, did not respond to an email seeking comment. 

The commercial real estate market in Boston, as in other big cities, has been battered by the shift to remote work. The Boston office vacancy rate stood at 23.2 percent at the end of 2024, a historic high, according to the latest market report from Colliers. 

Less expensive class B office space has suffered the most, but even within the class A market,  tenants are being drawn to the newest buildings with the most amenities, leaving property like the Lincoln Street tower, which opened in 2003, more vulnerable. The class B vacancy rate stood at 26 percent, while the class A rate was 22 percent, according to the Colliers report on the fourth quarter of 2024. But with more than three times as much class A space in the city as class B, most of the vacancy is among class A buildings. 

The shaky condition of the market has been the obstacle to the ongoing, and so far futile, campaign by Mayor Michelle Wu to win legislative approval to raise commercial tax rates. Wu wants to hike commercial taxes beyond the rate currently allowed in order to cushion residential owners from the tax increase they’re facing. 

Her effort has faced strong opposition in the business community, and hit a dead-end on Beacon Hill, where lawmakers say it would be ill-advised to raise taxes on a struggling sector that is contending with depressed values and lower revenue because of the high vacancy rates. 

Rooney and other business leaders have instead called on the city to rein in spending. 

Tamara Small, CEO of NAIOP Massachusetts, which advocates for commercial property owners, voiced concern that the looming auction may not be the last one to hit prime office towers. “While we all hope that One Lincoln is an outlier, I believe we will see more buildings like this in the next year or two,” she said. 

Jeff Myers, research director at the Boston Colliers office, said conditions in the city remain troubled. “There’s a lot of lingering distress in the marketplace,” he said. “High vacancies are not limited to a couple of buildings.”

Rooney doesn’t think the One Lincoln auction will necessarily be repeated with other class A buildings. “I think a major tenant loss like that with nothing that could backfill it makes it a somewhat unique circumstance,” he said. 

That said, he thinks it will take years for the overall commercial real estate market in the city to stabilize. 

With assessed values of existing buildings down and the decades-long development boom that brought new buildings – and their tax revenue – over, he said the city leaders and budget officials have to recognize that we’re in a new reality. 

“It’s a very, very difficult financial situation for the city,” he said. “We can’t do business as usual.” 

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