BOSTON – Boston Mayor Michelle Wu reached an agreement with business leaders last week on a temporary tax rate increase on commercial properties. But those same business leaders voiced frustration that Wu was not open to cutting the city’s spending instead.
“We’ve been very clear that we’re entering times of economic challenge,” Wu said in an interview on WBZ-TV’s Sunday morning edition of “Keller At Large.”
Temporary tax hike on commercial properties
Just last week, key Boston business leaders grudgingly agreed to support a Wu proposal for a temporary hike in the tax rate on commercial properties to make up for a drop in the value of many of those properties caused by the emergence of the pandemic-era work-from-home phenomenon, which has persisted and taken a severe toll on downtown office building valuations.
Wu calls it “a short-term solution for a very specific problem.”
Even as they agreed to back her plan, those business leaders complained publicly about the mayor’s unwillingness to commit to cuts in the city’s spending, with this year’s budget including a 7% increase (close to double that of the state budget) and hundreds of new hires.