BOSTON MAYOR MICHELLE WU and the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce are cruising toward another political fight that could strain their sometimes-friendly, sometimes-cool relationship. And this time, neither one of them started it.
Over the course of the past week, Wu came out in support of a ballot question that would impose one of the nation’s strictest rent control policies on most residential properties across the state, while the major Boston business group — and its counterpart in Central Mass., the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce — joined the real estate-led campaign seeking to defeat the question.
Jim Rooney, the head of the Boston chamber, claimed that there are already housing construction projects that have been delayed because financial backers are “hesitant” about the prospect of rent-capped apartment units. “It does not make financial sense for investors to build the amount of housing we need in Massachusetts under these circumstances,” Rooney said in a statement circulated by the real estate-led opposition campaign. “Rent control is a terrible idea.”
Wu has long been a backer of the idea of rent control, but she spent months hesitating to get on board with the ballot initiative. Even now, she’s framed her support with a bit of qualification. “If this is still on the ballot by this fall, I am a ‘yes,’ voting for it,” Wu said during an interview on GBH News’s Boston Public Radio, emphasizing that her attempts to bring rent control back to the capital city took a different approach. (Boston instead sought state approval to reinstitute the policy solely within its limits, not statewide as the ballot question proposes, and with a notably higher cap on rent increases than the campaign surging toward voters.)
It puts Wu and Rooney on a collision course for the second time over a major real estate issue. In 2024, when the mayor first launched an ill-fated effort to temporarily shift a greater share of the property tax burden from residents to businesses, the Boston chamber initially backed a version of Wu’s plan. Once new data emerged a few months later, however, Rooney’s group changed course and instead urged lawmakers not to approve the tax shift.
The rent control campaign has also prompted a policy fracture between Wu and another key power player: Gov. Maura Healey, who in December declared that she opposes the measure.
Business confidence stuck in historic rut
Four months ago, one of the state’s largest business groups reported a dour milestone: its members had been feeling down on economic prospects for the longest continuous stretch since the COVID-19 pandemic. Now, the latest monthly update notches an even worse superlative.
The Associated Industries of Massachusetts announced on February 5 that business confidence among surveyed members remained in pessimistic territory in January for the 11th straight month, the longest such stretch since the start of the Great Recession in 2008 and 2009.
Respondents told AIM they’re worried about policies at the federal level that are out of Beacon Hill’s control, including tariffs and aggressive immigration enforcement that could shrink the workforce for many businesses. More concerningly for state policymakers, skeptical employers don’t think Washington, DC, is the only place to blame for their negative outlook. They’re also downbeat about the high cost of living and doing business in Massachusetts, and what that means for economic growth.
AIM and its members are mostly playing nice and not directly blaming Gov. Maura Healey or her administration. But the Republicans who want to unseat her in the corner office this fall, who are already chirping about unemployment and stagnant job growth, will almost certainly view the worst stretch of business confidence since a historic recession as an anti-Healey slam dunk.
State House union leader hopes to join the other side of the equation
House and Senate staffers on Beacon Hill who want to unionize are still having no success getting their bosses to clear the way, but the November election could put one of their own on the other side of the equation. Ravi Simon, an aide to Rep. Carmine Gentile of Sudbury and one of the organizers of the unionization effort, launched a campaign to succeed Gentile, who will not seek reelection after six terms.
Simon has spent three years on the Lincoln-Sudbury School Committee, two as its chair, and co-chairs the Sudbury Democratic Town Committee. He’s also a member of the Democratic State Committee, and helped lead the effort at the party’s 2025 convention to express support for legislative staff unionization in the official MassDems platform.
Although the Democrats who control the House and Senate often pitch themselves as labor allies, they have declined to support staff unionization efforts, and legislation that would clear the way for a union vote — which Gentile cosponsored — remains stalled. Simon told CommonWealth Beacon that he thinks a unionized workforce would boost quality of life for legislative staffers, and in turn help lawmakers retain more experienced aides. “I have always viewed collective bargaining as a win-win for legislators and staff,” he said.
