Breaking News/08.01.2024

Double whammy for Wu: Boston Mayor Michelle Wu loses her development chief just hours after suffering a major legislative defeat

Arthur Jemison, Boston’s chief planner and development chief, is stepping down after a little more than two years on the job.

One of Boston Mayor Michelle Wu’s more visible and prominent lieutenants, Jemison will be cycling off the city payroll come Sept. 13 in order to spend more time with his family, who live in Detroit, city officials said Tuesday afternoon.

The impending departure of Boston’s widely respected and liked development chief comes on the heels of a major setback for Wu at the State House as she scrambles to head off a looming, $1 billion-plus shortfall in city revenue.

Arthur Jemison, Boston’s planning chief, set to step down on Sept. 13

The Massachusetts Legislature effectively gave a thumbs down to Wu’s home rule petition seeking a green light to shift more of the city’s tax burden - and to jack up rates - on office buildings and other commercial properties.

Wu argued the increases were needed to help plug a major leak in city finances, with downtown office buildings having seen their market and taxable value plunge amid the shift to remote work.

But business leaders pushed back hard, arguing that squeezing more revenue out of already struggling office buildings would backfire badly with foreclosures and an exodus of jobs from downtown.

Meanwhile, with Wu’s toxic tax plan having just expired on Beacon Hill, news that the mayor’s development chief is calling it a day broke early Thursday afternoon in The Boston Globe.

Globe columnist Renée Loth was the first to report the news of Jemison’s impending departure, but to call it a scoop would be misleading.

Rather, it was a clear handoff from the mayor’s press staff, part of a long and dubious tradition of government officials feeding stories to friendly news sources, in the hopes of getting an easier ride.