Boston Mayor Michelle Wu in her first time period has employed 301 new workers with a 3rd of them incomes greater than $100,000, as she’s renewed her legislative push for tax reduction for householders whereas price range cuts have been raised in its place.
Wu, in a Tuesday letter to the Metropolis Council, mentioned the common wage amongst these newly created positions, added over a three-year interval since she took workplace in late 2021, is $84,781.
The full salaries quantity to $27.6 million, or 0.6% of town’s $4.6 billion price range, which grew by 8% this fiscal yr.
“These positions represent important investments that have been carefully analyzed through the city’s budget process and deliver key improvements in core key operations and services that our constituents depend on,” Wu wrote.
“Particularly in 2022 and 2023, the administration and Council invested in the staffing necessary to actively recover from both the COVID-19 pandemic and multiple mayoral administration changes which led to significant understaffing and the expiration of all municipal collective bargaining contracts,” the mayor added.
The information was offered by the mayor in response to a 17F request made by Councilor Erin Murphy, by the use of a Council device that compels the mayor to supply the requested info every week after it was authorized by the physique.
Murphy had first requested the knowledge on Oct. 23, or 85 days in the past, and it was lastly offered by the mayor on Tuesday, following a menace made by Councilor Ed Flynn that the physique would search to delay the beginning of Wednesday’s midday assembly till Wu delivered the paperwork to councilors — and amid a rumor that Murphy meant to comply with by means of on that menace this week.
Of the 301 new positions, 112 and 135 had been created in these first two respective years of the Wu administration, 2022 and 2023, with the opposite 54 added in 2024, from January to November of final yr, the mayor’s letter states.
The brand new hires don’t embrace staffing will increase at Boston Public Colleges and quasi companies, just like the Boston Water and Sewer Fee, as these entities have separate budgets and are lined by “separate personnel management systems,” Wu mentioned.
Ninety-seven of the brand new jobs are for metropolis workers who had been employed at greater than $100,000 — with pay topping out at $194,300 for the July 2022 addition of the “office of people operations chief,” in line with knowledge compiled by Wu’s workplace.
Murphy took goal on the “troubling” prevalence of high-paying “upper- and middle-management positions” added by the Wu administration, which, the councilor mentioned, embrace beginning salaries “exceeding $80,000 — and many well over $100,000.”
“Adding layers of management risks bloating bureaucracy without delivering tangible benefit to our constituents,” Murphy mentioned in a press release. “At a time when residents are burdened with higher tax bills and the rising cost of living, we must prioritize tightening our belt and ensuring that every dollar spent serves our community directly.”
To that finish, Murphy — who raised questions as to why the mayor selected to create sure positions to realize her letter’s said targets slightly than reallocate or upskill present workers — mentioned she is asking for a “reevaluation of hiring priorities.”
The evaluation, the councilor mentioned, would concentrate on increasing entry-level job alternatives that prioritize “local residents,” growing pay for lower-wage staff, bettering transparency by establishing “clearer justifications for the creation of new positions and the allocation of funds,” and defending the roles of lower-wage workers “in the event of budget cuts.”
Wu refiled laws Monday that seeks to supply reduction for householders hammered by double-digit tax will increase by shifting extra of town’s tax burden onto companies, past what’s allowed by state legislation.
The mayor’s prior tax shift invoice was authorized by the Metropolis Council, however didn’t move the Legislature amid criticism that Wu ought to have as an alternative thought-about chopping town’s $4.6 billion price range, which grew by 8% this fiscal yr, given the challenges going through the post-pandemic industrial sector.
Prior budgets reviewed by the Herald present metropolis spending has elevated by greater than $1 billion for the reason that begin of the Wu administration.
Wu states in her letter, nonetheless, that the brand new hires signify lower than 1% of town price range and “Boston’s staffing trends are consistent with national municipal employment numbers.”
She additionally hits on the distinctive problem going through her mayoral administration, as the primary in Boston to be confronted with having everything of municipal labor contracts expired on the outset of her first time period.
Eighteen months later, all however a type of contracts was closed, Wu mentioned.
Town payroll development, of 1.4% and 1.7% in 2022 and 2023, is just like the 1.5% improve of full-time native authorities jobs nationwide over that very same time interval, Wu wrote, whereas citing figures from the U.S. Census Bureau.
A lot of the staffing development, the mayor mentioned, was concentrated in primary metropolis companies (67 jobs), human companies like group facilities and libraries (40) and public security, the place 39 positions had been added. That development, she mentioned, added 311 and 911 call-takers, together with hearth and police cadets.
And lots of the new positions, Wu added, had been “specifically requested or designated by the Council through budget amendments or created through ordinance,” and authorized by councilors by way of the price range course of.
Wu factors, for instance, to the Workplace of Language and Communications Entry and Black Male Development, which had been created by ordinance and embrace positions with salaries within the $80,000 to $100,000-plus vary.
The mayor additionally references the Workplace of Participatory Budgeting, which provides residents as younger as 11 management of a portion of the price range. The workplace was created by a poll initiative and consists of quite a lot of positions that prime off within the six-figure vary.
“We are proud of our city workforce who keep Boston running and deliver excellent municipal services each and every day,” Wu mentioned, “and have worked diligently throughout our administration to support our workforce.”
