GREEN SHEETS: Preview of 09/30/26 Boston City Council Meeting
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GREEN SHEETS: Preview of 09/30/26 Boston City Council MeetingOIG report on mismanagement at BPS takes center stage with public sector union contracts, push-back from Culpepper, & 3 17F requests from Murphy; PLUS MORE
ICYMI: BPI’s Executive Director Gregory Maynard spoke to the Boston Herald’s Gayla Cawley this week about the recently scheduled foreclosure auction for 100 Summer St, a trophy downtown office building, and what the foreclosure says about Boston’s office market, and the City budget that depends on it.
This week’s Council Agenda is crowded, but there is a major focus: the continuing fall-out from the Inspector General’s damning report about mismanagement and fraud in BPS - read the report. That issue is seen across today’s meeting:
There are some other issues to watch, in particular 2 dockets from Councilors that push back against Mayor Wu:
In this preview there will be the docket number, along with the page numbers and a short description of the docket. You can follow along in the agenda packet: First up is “COMMUNICATIONS FROM HER HONOR, THE MAYOR,” which are items being sent to the Council by the Mayor that will see follow-up hearings before being voted on by the Council. There are 11 dockets in this section and 10 are for 5 collective bargaining agreements - 2 dockets per contract - all of which are between Boston Public Schools and their unions. While BPS Office of Labor Relations Counsel Mike Ryan presented these contracts to the BSC at that body’s meeting back on July 8 - he starts at the 1:47:00 mark - there are still 2 big questions:
Docket #1829 (p. 10-11) & #1830 (p. 12-13) is 1 of 5 recently settled contracts between BPS and the Boston School Police Patrolmen’s Association. While the contract says that it is for FY27, the date for the contract is 09/01/26 to 08/31/27, which means the contract will extend 2 months into FY28. That means the $269k increase in FY27 that these dockets request is not the full amount that this new contract will cost the City of Boston. Docket #1831 (p. 14-15) & #1832 (p. 16-17) is 2 of 5 recently settled contracts, this one between BPS and the Boston School Police Superior Officers Federation, but the timeframe for this contract is different. It is for FY25, FY26, and FY27, so runs from 07/01/24 to 06/30/27. The cost is low considering this contract is paying out 3 years of wage increases: it is just $112k. That is much lower than both the contracts covered by #1829/#1830 and #1833/#1834. Docket #1833 (p. 18-19) & #1834 (p. 20-21) is 3 of 5 settled contracts, this one between BPS and SEIU Local 888, Professional Employees Chapter, Department of Planning and Engineering that runs just for FY27. The cost of the new contract is $86k. This contract (along with the next 2 in #1835/#1836 and #1837/#1838) should attract attention from the Council, public and press because the employees subject to it work in BPS Facilities, where the Office of Inspector General found extensive mismanagement and fraud in their damning recent report - one of the folks named in the report is in this photo celebrating a union member’s retirement on 888’s website. Since both Mayor Wu and Superintendent Skipper have claimed that the district was already both aware of, and in the process of addressing, the issues revealed by the OIG, the labor relations staff from City Hall and BPS should be able to talk about how those issues informed this contract - read that statement. For more on how these unions interact with other parts of BPS, this 2015 decision in a lawsuit - Boston School Committee vs James W. Kelley - lays out the relationships. Docket #1835 (p. 22-23) & #1836 (p. 24-25) is 4 of 5 settled contracts, this one between BPS and the Boston School Department Plant Administrators Association, and it runs just for FY27. The contract only requires $40k to settle. This union is important to the damning OIG report because this union represents the area managers and the building service managers in BPS, who serve as the bridge between principals and headmasters on one hand and BPS Facilities on the other. Docket #1837 (p. 26-27) & #1838 (p. 28-29) is 5 of 5 settled contracts, this one between BPS and the AFL-CIO, Council 39, Local 2814 (Storekeepers and Stores Deliverymen Union): it runs just for FY27 and costs only $10k to settle. According to the presentation from the district, members of this union “manage the receipt, inventory, and distribution of educational, janitorial, and nutritional supplies across the district.” That means that these employees are on the front lines of the overarching issue identified by the OIG report: BPS procurement. Docket #1839 (p. 30-31) is a request for the Council to accept a small grant, just $4,350, from the National Alliance of Preservation Commissions, which would be managed by the Office of Historic Preservation and would fund “the cost of historical and historic district commission members, and municipal staff attending the National Alliance of Preservation Commissions (NAPC) FORUM conference.” The Office of Historic Preservation, which manages the various landmark, architectural, and historic districts in Boston, has not appeared before the Council for any budget hearings since being created just a few years ago. Requiring that the office appear before the Council to testify about this grant - instead of suspending and passing, as Councilors have done repeatedly for grants over the last few meetings - would allow the Council to provide some measure of budget oversight to this important office. Next up is “REPORTS OF PUBLIC OFFICERS AND OTHERS,” which are items the Council is being informed about, but is not able to vote on. Docket #1840 (p. 32-34) is a letter from Councilor Murphy making the case that the Wu administration is failing to respond to 17F requests from the Council and describing how her office is now filing FOIA requests in order to get information because of City Hall’s lack of response. As part of her evidence, she points to the Boston Globe’s August 2025 editorial “The Boston City Council isn’t doing its job by dodging tough issues: It’s been a hot, dry summer, but does the City Council really need to carry this much water for Mayor Wu?” Murphy ends by making the point that without adequate information, it is impossible for the Council to provide meaningful oversight of City Hall. Docket #1841 (p. 35-44) is a letter from Councilor Coletta Zapata providing a comprehensive response, including a lot of criticisms and proposed changes, to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Boston Coastal Storm Risk Management Draft Integrated Feasibility Report and Programmatic Environmental Assessment, which proposes a $9 to $10.5B set of coastal defenses, 65% of which would be paid by the federal government. This is the second such letter a Councilor has included in this section: last week Councilor Flynn sent a similar, but much shorter, letter that he co-signed with his State Senator, Nick Collins. Coletta Zapata’s letter is only from the Councilor: her State Senator, Lydia Edwards, is not a co-signer. Docket #1842 (p. 45-48) is a letter from Councilor Culpepper which introduces a letter from the owner of Multicultural Book, Clarrissa Cropper, who is a constituent of his, both of which are about the same thing: pushing back on the OIG report that came out in August, which found BPS misused sole source contracts to buy books through Multicultural Book World, and the vendor then overcharged for shipping. Rather strangely, both letters push back via a circuitous route: by taking issue with a 17F filed by Councilor Murphy in response to the OIG’s report - Docket #1851, later in this post. That is strange because the OIG report spent significant amount of the report on Multicultural Book World: pages 38 to 47 details the investigation, and the word “multicultural” appears 47 times in the report. The OIG also used really strong language to describe the relationship between BPS and Multicultural Book World. Here is how the OIG’s report first introduces the vendor:
The OIG report is clear that it believes the issues with Multicultural Book World’s sole source contract is not limited just to them: rather it is a BPS-wide issue. The OIG writes:
While this docket from Culpepper is the first public push-back against the actual conclusions of the report, it is important to note that this push-back is strictly rhetorical. Neither Cropper or Culpepper’s letters address any specific issue raised in the OIG’s report with the relationship between BPS and Multicultural Book World. There is no “REPORTS OF COMMITTEES” which are hearings that were held prior to 9 AM the Monday prior to the regular meeting. That means next up is “MATTERS RECENTLY HEARD-FOR POSSIBLE ACTION,” which are dockets that had hearing between 9 AM on Monday and the beginning of this regular meeting. Dockets #1671 to #1674 (p. 49-56) are unusual: they request $3.3M from the Reserve for Collective Bargaining in order to pay for 2 contracts with public sector unions that have already expired. The 2 collective bargaining agreements were just for FY26 and were with the Boston Police Detectives Benevolent Society and the Boston Police Detective Benevolent Society - Superior Officers Unit were just for FY26. However, because these 2 contracts were settled in May, after Mayor Wu had already offered her FY27 budget, the increased costs imposed by this budget were not included in that budget. It is not clear why the Wu administration did not simply request an adjustment of the amount in the FY27 budget, and the hearing held on Monday, September 28, at 10 AM did not shed any light on that decision - read the transcript. While Ways & Means Committee Chair Ben Weber did not address this strange budgetary dance at that hearing, he did explain that he felt the committee had already held a hearing on the contracts that drove these costs back in May. Those dockets were written about a few times back in May - they were introduced at the Council’s regular meeting on May 6 - read BPI’s preview - and approved at the May 13 regular meeting - read BPI’s preview. Docket #0695 (p. 57-58) is a hearing order that was offered by Councilor Worrell back in March “on the status of the implementation of the City of Boston’s Assessment of Fair Housing,” and which the Council held a hearing for yesterday at 10:30 AM before the Housing Committee - read the transcript. Next up is “MOTIONS, ORDERS AND RESOLUTIONS,” which are legislative actions from City Councilors. This week there are 21 dockets total, and there are 7 worth watching. Docket #1843 (p. 59-82) is an ordinance from Councilor Worrell “amending and formalizing the Neighborhood Impact Commission,” which proposes major changes to Boston’s development process: it is a whole new body to oversee a new, parallel development process. While this ordinance is separate from Article 80, the goals are very similar to the proposed but unrealized changes to that process laid out by Mayor Wu’s own years-long effort - read BPI’s 2024 analysis of Wu’s Article 80 reform proposals and 2025 op-ed in the Banker & Tradesman, which is still being pursued based on the most recent material from City Hall. BPI draws that conclusion because the docket explains the need for this ordinance by laying out the short-comings of Impact Advisory Groups. IAGs are a major part of the current Article 80 process, and replacing IAGs is a major component of Mayor Wu’s on-going Article 80 reform process, which she started early in her first term. One of the major parts of Mayor Wu’s reform envisions replacing IAGs with “Community Advisory Teams” which would have an expansive (& expensive) set of new supports compared to IAGs, including staff support, childcare, translation services, and stipends for community members who served on CATs. It is important to note that even if approved, Worrell’s ordinance would not legally affect Article 80. That is because that process was created by, and is run by, the Boston Planning and Development Agency, not the City of Boston, and the City Council doesn’t have a formal role in making changes to Article 80. Despite the lack of legal power, Worrell and Mejia’s new ordinance appears to create a direct competitor to Wu’s CATs. Here is how the BPDA describes CATs:
Compare that to how the docket describes the goal in creating the Neighborhood Impact Commission:
The last thing to watch for this is venue. This docket is an ordinance, so it will not go to Planning Committee, the typical landing place for planning-related dockets, where the Chair is Sharon Durkan, Mayor Wu’s former long-time campaign consultant and now top Council ally. Instead it will go to the Government Operations Committee, whose Chair, Gabriela Coletta Zapata, has shown less deference to the Mayor. That change of venue may have been a motivating factor for Worrell in filing this docket: many of the ideas in this ordinance are also in a text amendment that the Councilor filed back in March. Docket #0594, “Order regarding a text amendment to the Boston Zoning Code to establish Boston Investment Zones: An Anti-Displacement Tool,” was sent to the Planning Committee, where no hearing has yet been scheduled. Docket #1846 (p. 85-86) is a hearing order from Council President Breadon “regarding the status of combined sewer overflow long-term control planning.” This is an important docket because it shows the Council President taking the side of activists and advocates against City Hall - in this case the Boston Conservation Commission - and with her involvement promises to get the Council more involved in one of the highest profile regional governance that isn’t housing: sewage in the Charles River. This has been a dynamic issue over the last year. Back in November 2025, WBUR ran an article headlined “Mass. authorities want to give up on solving the Charles River’s sewage problem,” and the backlash to that plan forced a new plan. The new plan wasn’t much better though, as seen by a May 2026 article the Boston Globe ran headlined “New plan would dump sewage into the Charles River for decades to come.” That Globe article captured the numbers driving this issue:
That new plan released in March is called the “Draft Updated Combined Sewer Overflow Long-Term Control Plan (LTCP)” and Breadon’s docket does not address the issue of its cost, instead focusing on process. According to the docket, activists and advocates:
Boston has been pretty absent from the debate, which focused on communities north of the Charles River, but the City has a huge role in running the Massachusetts Water Resource Authority: on the 11 person board, the Mayor of Boston appoints 3. Based on the list of organization that will be invited to testify, Breadon’s docket is aimed at leveraging that role to hold a very informative, and high-profile, hearing. This docket highlights one of the facts that motivated BPI’s founding: the Mayor of Boston is the Governor’s junior partner in running the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Mayor of Boston appoints as many MWRA board members as the Governor of Massachusetts. That joins a long list of other important boards, for example the MBTA and the MA Convention Center Authority, where the Mayor is the only elected official outside the Governor entitled to directly appoint members. Dockets #1851 to #1855 (p. 94-126) are 5 17F requests, 4 are from Councilor Murphy and 1 is from Councilor Culpepper, on a variety of issues: the OIG report, street safety, and the Reparations Task Force. The first 4 are all from Councilor Murphy:
Docket #1851 is the one that prompted the communication from Culpepper and the owner of Multicultural Book World, so that is a particular one to watch. The last 17F is from Councilor Culpepper, and seeks more information about the Reparations Task Force after recent setbacks that Chair Joe Feaster told the Boston Globe “could prove fatal”:
The remaining sections are “PERSONNEL ORDERS” which is legislative action required to keep Council staff on payroll and “CONSENT AGENDA” which are for recognition from the Council of events like birthdays and anniversaries. |
