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Collateral damage: Boston’s mayor has cast herself as the defender of underdog homeowners, but her controversial tax plan could devastate small businesses in the city’s struggling downtown
Sure, she hasn’t officially announced yet. But as Boston Mayor Michelle Wu hawks the most controversial tax hike plan in decades, the city’s chief executive and her 2025 reelection campaign are off to the races.
Boston faces a looming, $1.5 billion revenue gap over the coming years as office building values crumble amid the shift to remote work.
Wu’s solution? The Boston mayor wants to double down, hiking tax rates on office buildings and other commercial properties in order to head off a projected, double-digit tax increase to residential taxes.
Wu has cast herself as taking on deep-pocketed corporate interests to spare struggling city homeowners from a surprise in the form of a nasty tax bill.
But it’s a political narrative that doesn’t take into account small business owners and entrepreneurs like David Cheal, who opened Pearl Street Fitness two years ago in what was an old convenience store in Boston’s Financial District.
Cheal put everything on the line to open his boutique personal training business, borrowing heavily to buy the space for $1.3 million and then renovate it.
Business has steadily grown for Cheal and his two partners, who all previously worked as trainers for Equinox, a high-end downtown Boston gym, having built up a following of devoted personal fitness clients.
“It’s important to be convenient for people,” Cheal said of Pearl Street Fitness, which is just across the street from the 125 High St. tower, in an interview with Contrarian Boston. “They can just walk around the corner, take a quick shower, and then it’s back to the office.”
The trio takes a more personalized, relaxed approach to helping the lawyers, bankers, tech company executives and other professionals at nearby International Place and in other towers meet their fitness goals, discussing not just their workouts, but their travels plans and life in general.
Along with all the traditional exercise equipment, there are also coffee, wine, and other libations available, with exposed brick and other design finishes distinguishing the space from your typical, utilitarian gym.
“We just wanted to have a really cool place,” said Justin Sorbo, one of Cheal’s partners. “Most gyms are just a hole in the wall. You are crammed in there like sardines. We decided to make this a really cool, stylish place.”
But it is also clear that downtown Boston continues to face steep challenges amid the exodus of office workers, with a nearby Dunkin’ and Starbucks both closing.
Cheal worries about Wu’s proposal to hike commercial property taxes, which the mayor is now hoping to push through the City Council and then the State House before tax bills go out.
It’s not just big office building owners who would be on the hook, but also their tenants, including restaurants and other small businesses, which often are required to pay their share of the building’s taxes as part of the lease.
For his part, Cheal is directly on the hook as the owner his two-floor, roughly 2,400 square foot fitness studio.
While new businesses like Cheal’s Pearl Street Fitness are popping up, it is also clear that downtown Boston continues to face steep challenges amid the exodus of office workers.
There are still a number of “dead zones” downtown where diners and other businesses that once served downtown workers have shut their doors, he noted.
“I keep crossing my fingers that enough new business keeps coming in,” Cheal said. “What Mayor Wu is proposing will make it harder to compete - it will worsen the dead zones.”
While the mayor has proposed a $45 million program to help small businesses faced with increased taxes, that’s small comfort for Cheal, whose experiences in negotiating the labyrinth of city bureaucracy have been none too reassuring.
The downtown fitness studio owner said it look months - and several trips to city offices in Dorchester - to get a certificate of occupancy.
It felt to Cheal like city officials were used to working with lawyers hired by large companies, as opposed to small business people for whom a denial of a permit could be the end of a dream.
“They are grumpy - they have bigger fish to fry with all the stuff going in the Seaport,” Cheal recalled.
Splitsville: Right-wing duo that uncovered evidence of plagiarism by now former Harvard prez on the outs
Woodward and Bernstein they were not.
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