Twitter revolt comes to Boston | Wu’s big development shakeup | Going slow on rent control | Quick hits | About Contrarian Boston |
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Amid recession fears and surging construction prices, Boston looks more cautiously at its budding rent control proposal
Mayor Michelle Wu would appear to be a true believer when it comes to rent control, having made it a centerpiece of her election campaign.
But with apartment and condo developers facing fierce economic headwinds, the Wu administration has begun to take a quieter and more cautious approach on the hot button issue.
Boston won’t be unveiling a rent control proposal with the start of the legislative session on Beacon Hill in early January, city officials say. That had been the plan last spring when Wu convened a panel of tenants, academic experts, housing advocates and a few developer types to craft a proposal.
The Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee, which supposedly held its final meeting in August, now plans to reconvene in the beginning of the new year, with a plan to continue working on a proposal in the first quarter, said Arthur Jemison, the city’s chief planner and head of the Boston Planning & Development Agency.
Asked by Contrarian Boston about the delay, Jemison cited the deteriorating business and market conditions that developers have been reporting.
“We are taking our time to make sure that the proposal is right,” Jemison said.
Arthur Jemison, Boston’s chief planner and director of the Boston Planning & Development Agency
So what tweaks or more substantial revisions to its fledgling rent control plan will the city panel be considering? One possibility is exempting new apartment and condo buildings for “a long time,” noted one person familiar with the discussions.
But would the panel consider something short of a proposal capping rents - such as a plan that would help protect vulnerable tenants from abusive landlords?
That’s not clear, though maybe not out of the realm of possibility, either, though, to be clear, that’s just conjecture on our part.
Stay tuned.
Part II of a big news day: Boston boosts affordable housing requirements for developers
With rents and home prices at record levels, the Wu administration announced Thursday it will boost the number of affordable apartments and condos that housing developers have to include in new towers and buildings.
Developers with plans for new housing in Boston will now have to set aside 20 percent of the apartments or condos in any given project at below market rents or prices. That’s up from 13 percent now.
As they say, timing is everything, and the timing of Mayor Michelle Wu’s decision is poor, some developers are grumbling privately.
Their lament? The city’s additional requirements will increase the cost to build at the same time that construction costs have gone through the roof and banks and other lenders are getting cold feet.
And the head of one prominent organization that represents developers is stating those concerns publicly.
“We are concerned with the timing of the decision,” said Tamara Small, CEO of NAIOP Massachusetts. “The market is far different than it was one year ago and due to construction costs and interest rates, it is very difficult to finance and build housing in Boston right now.”
However, city officials contend they hear the concerns of the development industry and are doing everything they can to offset any additional costs.
Photo by Brandon Griggs on Unsplash
For starters, the new housing proposals that are now coming before the city for approval are already close to meeting the new 20 percent affordable requirements, with the number of affordable units averaging 17 percent.
The remaining 3 percent of the units needed to get to that 20 percent mark would be covered by tenants paying market rents with federal housing vouchers, taking developers off the hook for the cost, city officials say.
For proposed projects that go above and beyond meeting various goals set by the city, there is also the possibility of tax abatement agreements, said Arthur Jemison, the city’s chief planner and BPDA director.
And Jemison and other city officials are looking at ways of streamlining the project review process and reducing the amount of time developers have to spend pitching their plans at City Hall.
Jemison said he reached out to as many as 20 different top developers in the city to tap their thoughts.
“We are keenly aware of the environment we are working in right now and the uncertainty,” Jemison said.
Sheila Dillon, the city’s housing chief, said she and other officials have worked on the affordable housing proposals for months, looking to minimize any impact on developers and keep the construction of new housing moving forward.
“Housing production is very important for us,” Dillon said. “It’s top of mind.”
But whether the new affordable housing requirements are a wash or not for developers, city officials also plan to hike the linkage fees builders pay on office, lab and other commercial development projects.
The increases would take place over a number of years, with the money going to job training programs and other initiatives.
Still, some worry that could have a negative impact on new lab development, which is already starting to falter as life sciences companies are hit by falling stock prices and a pull back by investors.
One top development executive, noting he had just come back from a holiday party filled with real estate and business people, indicated the Wu administration has a tough hill to climb selling the new requirements.
“The talk in the room was how tone deaf this administration is at a tough time in the market when they should be doing everything possible to stimulate development. Hello suburbs!”
Twitter exodus: Media critic Dan Kennedy the latest to leave embattled social media platform
Kennedy, the region’s top media critic and one of the best in the country as well, has decided to call it quits on Twitter.
Kennedy, author of the Media Nation blog and a Northeastern University journalism professor, had 19,000 followers on Twitter, so it clearly wasn’t an easy decision to make.
“When making ethical decisions, we all have to decide where we’re going to draw the line,” Kennedy writes. “I’ve been watching Elon Musk’s behavior closely since he purchased Twitter in late October and thinking about where I ought to draw my own line.”
Photo by Souvik Banerjee on Unsplash
Here’s Kennedy’s post at Media Nation on his decision. Apparently, a couple final straws for Kennedy were Elon Musk’s attempt to smear Twitter’s former head of trust and safety as a pedophile, and his unhinged attacks on Anthony Fauci.
You can find Kennedy on Mastodon, a Twitter alternative, and Post, another startup in the same vein.
From politics to college sports: Charlie Baker’s next act
Speaking of departures, Gov. Charlie Baker will soon be running the NCAA.
The announcement was a bit of a bolt from the blue and a refreshing change from the usual pattern for top elected officials, who typically wind up as old show horses and rainmakers at high-powered law firms.
It seems like a great match, with Baker, who played basketball at Harvard, having long had an interest in college sports.
But here’s betting we have yet to see the last of Baker when it comes to Massachusetts politics.
At some point, Ed Markey, our state’s senior senator in Washington, D.C., will call it quits.
And Baker, his profile burnished by a stint as NCAA president, would make a powerful contender on the Republican side. Who knows, maybe we’ll finally get a Baker-Healey race, or even a Baker-Wu showdown.
Sen. Baker, anyone?
Quick hits:
Social media’s tin-pot dictator strikes again: “Twitter suspends journalists who wrote about owner Elon Musk Boston Globe/Associated Press
Too fast? Really? “DPU orders MBTA to address speeding on Green Line” Boston Herald
Parting shot: “CLT chief accuses Baker of cowardice on Amirault pardons” CommonWealth Magazine
About Contrarian Boston
I have fielded emails over the past couple of months asking what Contrarian Boston is about.
Here’s a link to our mission statement – you can find it in the “about” section.
For a more prosaic, nuts-and-bolts description, read on.
An online newsletter, Contrarian Boston publishes every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. In Contrarian Boston you’ll find analysis of the day’s news, and original reporting as well.
Our focus is:
· Politics and all levels of governance, good and bad, with an emphasis on state and local, with some national mixed in;
· Economic growth and business, especially real estate, housing and new development projects;
· The media and why it does what it does;
· Education, from school board spats to the doings of multibillion-dollar university endowments;
· And whatever else catches our fancy.