11.13.2024

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Misplaced priorities? Boston City Council determined to root out bedbugs in Boston hotels, even as housing starts plummet and prices and rents go haywire

If only Boston’s pols would tackle the housing crisis with the same zeal.

The Boston City Council has used its legislative powers and public platform as a stick this fall to beat up on the city’s hotel industry, one of the few economic bright spots of its beleaguered downtown.

Yet there has been nary a peep from the council about the plunge in new apartment, condo and home construction in Boston and the upward pressure it is putting on already insane prices and rents.

Instead, the council has targeted the city’s hotel industry with a controversial “Safe & Healthy Hotels” ordinance that was - surprise, surprise - clearly timed to coincide with a push by the city’s hotel workers union for a new contract.

The proposal, which the council held a hearing on back in September, gave union officials and other critics a chance to paint Boston hotels as a bed-bug ridden den of iniquity where drug overdoses are common and human traffickers ply their trade.

One of Boston’s oldest hotels was also caught up in the recent strike

But now that the strike has been settled, the proposed city ordinance has done a disappearing act.

And that should raise questions as to whether the whole proposal was simply a charade, an effort by city councilors to aid their union allies in the hotel sector during contentious contract negotiations.

For their part, local hotel execs are certainly hoping that is the case.

The proposal would heap new expenses on an industry, that, while it has made great strides, has not yet fully recovered from the pandemic and is dealing with a host of rising costs, from high food prices to surging insurance premiums, Chris Pappas, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Lodging Association, told Contrarian Boston.

Chris Pappas, president and CEO of the Massachusetts Lodging Association

The ordinance would also require, among other things, training for hotel workers in dealing with human traffickers and drug overdoses - training that hotels already provide, she contends.

“That is something hotels do all the time,” Pappas said. “The City Council is very concerned about keeping employees safe. They are keeping their employees and keeping their guests safe - that is their job.”

There are also plans for a panel to oversee the industry, which, tellingly, would include union officials but no hotel managers or owners.

City Councilors Gabriella Coletta Zapata, Henry Santana, and Sharon Durkan, are the lead sponsors on the bill.

Boston City Councilor Gabriella Coletta Zapata

While no further working sessions are scheduled, the proposal remains very much alive, Coletta Zapata insisted in a email responding to Contrarian Boston’s questions.

“I remain committed to working collaboratively to develop a final version that ensures the safety of both hotel staff and patrons,” the East Boston city councilor writes.

When Boston Mayor Michelle Wu first proposed raising commercial tax rates, Coletta Zapata brought some much-needed skepticism to the table on what it might mean for downtown business owners.

Here’s hoping for a repeat performance from Coletta Zapata, who chairs the council’s government operations committee.

Danger ahead or just more hyperventilation? Mainstream media fuels fears of a rampaging Trump going after enemies and acting like a dictator, with little or no analysis to separate bluster from reality