One of the joys of living in an ‘old’ city like Boston is when it reveals a hidden, seemingly unknown piece of itself. Having traveled enough to fear the growing homogenization of the American streetscape by chain stores, but having lived in and around Boston for most of my life, I was suprised and thrilled to discover the Mattapan Line. Its a small spur off the terminal point of southbound Ashmont Red Line that runs only three miles, stops at 8 stations, and carries about 4,500 passengers on a given weekday. As careful readers will note, I’ve got a thing for transit and its the railcars on the Mattapan Line that are the real treat. Take a look at the […]

What do we get? And who will come? Those are the questions that have not been properly answered despite reams of powerpoints and consultants reports. In its presentation “Case for Expansion“, The Convention Center Authority makes the case that we “lost” out on a number of conventions because of our small size, availability or cost. (Note that expansion only addresses the first cause.) It is not clearly stated anywhere whether we ‘lost’ these shows (as in the contract would absolutely, positively been signed) or whether we were unable to compete for these shows against other cities. The Authority then extrapolates from these losses a large amount of forgone economic impact, making the case for expanding the BCEC. The problem with […]

The Boston Convention Center has long been a topic of interest for this space, dating back to its original construction. To be fair, its done ok, although far less successful than its original projections. Now, the Convention Center Authority has presented the citizens of Massachusetts with an intriguing chicken-and-egg proposition. It needs to expand its size and build a large hotel, as it can’t attract larger conventions without a ‘headquarters’ hotel but it also needs to be larger to attract the largest conventions (which it can’t do without a bigger hotel, got it?). So, what’s the public interest here? A public subsidy (taxes, fees and/or bond funding) will be needed to support the two projects, whose combined price tag may […]

In general, good manners are to be respected. But our dear friends in the business community are overdoing it. In the ongoing debate over municipal healthcare costs, there are now three competing proposals on the table, the Governor’s, the House, and the Senate. The Governor’s effort is largely a bunt — signaling a desire to get communities into GIC or give them control over plan design but pushing the details off onto the regulatory process. The House is much clearer — communities can adjust plan design up to the equivalent of the biggest plan for state workers or enter GIC, so long as 10% of first year savings is returned to workers. The Senate takes a different approach — communities […]

– Holub out? I haven’t followed it closely but the Globe suggests that UMASS-Amherst Chancellor Holub is on his way out after just three years. One of the data points the article refers to is a survey of professors that shows dissatisfaction with the Chancellor. Its not entirely clear but the survey appears to be one of those on-line, opt-in surveys, not a scientific sampling. So that means approximately 100 (self-selected?) respondents (out of 1000+ faculty members) are responsible for the failing grade given to Holub. – Referee Needed. The Patrick Administration is claiming big $$$ savings from the opening of the automobile insurance market to competition. (A view I agree with and a stance for which the Governor does […]

During last year’s gubernatorial campaign, CNBC ranked Massachusetts #5 as one of the best places to do business. The ranking (and some of the subindexes that weren’t quite so positive) got bandied around by the campaigns as evidence and counterevidence of the state of our business climate. (Even some of my fellow bloggers have referenced it.) If you look at the subindexes for that ranking, you can quickly figure out our strengths and weaknesses – on productivity/quality of life measures, we are very strong; and on business cost/tax policy issues, we are pretty weak. And that gets replicated in lots of similar surveys – depending on which measures are chosen, Massachusetts does very well or quite poorly. So what matters? […]

This space has raised questions in the past about the staffing levels and performance at the Department of Public Safety. Several years ago, then Auditor DeNucci found that 30% of elevators in the state had expired inspection stickers. Following the death of a child at a mall due to an accident on an escalator, there has been increased scrutiny of the department. Now, after a review of escalators across the state, there comes news that the two inspectors who certified that mall escalator are to be fired, six will be suspended for five days, and 26 will be reprimanded. Depending on whose numbers you believe, there are either 51 or 57 inspectors in the department. That means that between 60% […]

Pioneer has long been part of a broader chorus calling for reform to municipal healthcare costs. We’ve examined how GIC’s cost increases have been far below those of our Middle Cities, and repeatedly (here, here, and here) called for reform. We even went so far as to build an on-line decision support tool for several communities that would allow individual employees to determine how switching to the GIC would impact them personally. Last night, the House convincingly passed a reform amendment that would allow municipal managers greater control over plan design and also easier entry into the GIC (the state employees’ insurance pool) if need be. Big Labor has reacted (once again) with what is seemingly its single bargaining tactic: […]

In response to Mayor Menino’s pledge to create a “one-stop shop” for permitting, we’ll be examining what factors need to be addressed in order to spur job creation in Boston. On Day One, we looked at the leadership issues that would need to be resolved. Day Two – changing an organizational culture of highly personalized, uneven customer service – is harder. To make the permitting process easier for entrepreneurs, the culture of the bureaucracy that’s involved has to change from a process orientation to results. That means viewing business owners as customers, not obstacles. Talk to people trying to start businesses in Boston and you quickly hear about uneven experiences with the staff at the Inspectional Services Division at 1010 […]

I would never underestimate the negotiating guile of the major labor unions, but it does appear we are reaching the endgame stage of the municipal healthcare debate. After a negotiated consensus reform several years ago to put municipal workers into the GIC failed to get a strong level of acceptance, it was clear that something more had to be done. A number of Mayors (including Menino) advocated for control over plan design, even threatening a ballot referendum (hope Denise Provost can stop them!) The Governor’s budget (see Section 6, here) put in place a somewhat vague process to (eventually) force workers into the GIC. The House Ways and Means Budget was much more explicit (see section 46, here), providing clear […]

Those with long memories will recall the days of the campaign when CNBC’s ranking of Massachusetts as the 5th best state to do business in was widely touted. To be sure, all these rankings are highly dependent on the underlying methodology — CNBC emphasized education and quality of life strongly, so Massachusetts did well. Well, another ranking has come down the pike, from the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Council. They emphasize tax policy and regulation heavily. And Massachusetts does not do so well — ranking 43rd out of 51 states (and DC). Roll that in with the CEO magazine ranking (47th!) and the Tax Foundation ranking (32nd), and there may be a message there.

The Convention Center Authority convened a panel of the city’s great and the good some months ago to determine if it should go forward with an expansion plan that included a publicly subsidized 1,000 room hotel. It floated a trial balloon over the weekend regarding that hotel and the response has not been great. The BBJ’s Craig Douglas does a back-of-the-envelope calculation and comes up with 1,350 privately-supplied hotel rooms in various states of planning and development. He notes that these projects, all under the leadership of various well-connected developers, are experiencing some sort of delay and questions how an additional 1,000 rooms (all benefiting from a public subsidy) improves the situation. I take a different tack in examining the […]

UPDATE: His TED talk just went up. Well done overall and worth watching. But its not really his fault. Mr. Gates is getting a lot of press for some recent comments about state spending at TED. In conjunction with the presentation, his foundation has set up a nifty budget analysis tool. If you look at MA, we look pretty bad – 47th in nation on K-12 spending, etc. But our poor showing is driven by the underlying data source, NASBO’s state expenditure guide. In it, we’ve got a $47b state budget (versus a roughly $30b operating budget) while other states’ are reporting numbers much closer to their operating budget numbers. I think we reported a gross number while other state’s […]