Good morning.

My name is Ben Weber.

I'm the Boston City Council for District 6 and the chair of the Boston City Council on Ways and Means.

Today is April 23rd, 2026, and the exact time is 1011.

This hearing is being recorded.

It's also being live streamed at Boston.gov slash city dash council-tv and broadcasts on Xfinity Channel 8, RCN Channel 82, and FIOS Channel 964.

You can do this in several ways.

First, you can attend one of our hearings and give public testimony.

We'll take public testimony after the counselor's first round of questions.gov slash council dash budget.

Our scheduled listening sessions where the public just gives testimony are both in person here at City Hall.

Tuesday, April 28th at 6 p.m.

And again on Thursday, May 26th at 6 p.m.

Again, both right here in this chamber.

You can give testimony in person here in the chamber or virtually via Zoom.

For in-person testimony, come to the chamber and sign up on the sheet near the entrance.

For virtual testimony, you can sign up using our online form on our council budget review website, or by emailing the committee at ccc.wm at Boston.gov, or by emailing uh Karishma Chohan, that's K-A-R-I-SHMA.CHOUHAN at Boston.gov.

When you are called to testify, state your name and affiliation and residence, and please limit your comments to two minutes.

Email your written you can either testify in person or by Zoom, or you can submit written testimony to the committee at ccc.wm at Boston.gov.

A third option is to submit a two-minute video of your testimony through the form on our website.

For more information on the city council budget process and how to testify, please visit the city council's budget website at Boston.gov slash council uh council uh dash budget.

Uh in person public testimony will be taken again here after our first round of questions from counselors.

Uh individuals will be called on in the order in which they've signed up, and we'll have two minutes to testify.

Uh again, uh you know, if you if you're looking if you're watching online and want to testify, email Karishma Choan, that's K-A-R-I-S-H-M-A.C-H-O-U-H-A-N at Boston.gov for the zoom link and your name will be added to the list.

This morning's hearing is on docket numbers 0733 to 0740 and docket number 0748.

An overview of the FY27 operating budgets for the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections, the Law Department, and the Property Damage Revolving Fund.

These matters were sponsored by Mayor Michelle Wu when we're referred to the committee on April 8th, 2026.

I'm joined by my colleagues in our order of arrival, uh, Councillor Murphy, and I've received an order a letter of absence from Councillor Flynn.

Uh no, just kidding, he's here, of course, and he was here first.

Uh uh yep.

Uh I've re um I've received letters of absence from Council President Braden and Councillor Santana.

Um we wave opening remarks at these hearings.

So we're going to go directly to the panel, uh, who I'm going to introduce.

Uh we're joined by uh Mike.

Is it Michael?

Is that Mike?

Okay, Michael Firestone, Corporation Counselor for the City of Boston.

Uh Sam Dinning, uh for the Chief of Staff and Policy for the Law Department, uh, Kristen Coventry, uh, Office Manager for the Law Department, uh, Monique Mitchell, uh Senior Program Manager for the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections, and Jody Shergerman Brazen, Deputy Chief of the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections.

Um I'm gonna hand things over to the panel.

I think I I saw slides or you got a presentation.

So however you want to go about this, uh the floor is now yours.

Great.

Thank you so much.

Um good morning, counselors.

My name is Jody Sugarman Brisan.

Um I have the honor of serving as deputy chief in the worker empowerment cabinet and direct the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections.

We're gonna go through our slides really quickly to give you an update on what we've accomplished over the last year and what our plans are for FY27.

So first, just a little background.

Um, the worker empowerment cabinet includes three departments um the Office of Workforce Development, the Office of Youth Employment and Opportunity, and the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections.

And we're here today just speaking about the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections.

We our budget is 1.8 million.

Um about 64% of that budget is specifically for the Boston Resident Jobs Policy Office, and that is also where 10 of our 13 staff reside.

Our budget this year has seen a 1.4% decrease of about 27,000 dollars.

Um I will go in now to a little bit more about what we do.

Um the Office of Labor Compliance and Worker Protections is a central resource for workers.

We protect and promote labor standards and policies that create fair workplaces for all workers.

And primarily we're charged with enforcing the city's labor policy and worker protections.

That includes the Boston Resident Jobs Policy, the Boston Jobs Living Wage and Prevailing Wage Ordinance, the Boston Wage Theft Executive Order, and now the Heat Illness and Injury Prevention Ordinance.

We also provide free worker health and safety training, and we uh coordinate a workers' safety and rights initiative.

I'm gonna go very quickly through the Boston Resident Jobs policy because that is something that we had a hearing on just last week or the week before.

So we've had a lot of time to talk about this, but Boston Resident Jobs policy was established in 1983 with updates in 2017, and basically it sets goals for private development and projects over 50,000 square feet uh that have to meet certain employment standards, at least 51% of total work hours for Boston residents, 40% for um people of color, and 12% for women.

The ordinance is enforced based on seven administrative compliance measures, which are lifted here, listed here, primarily focused on um submitting on-time payroll, um attending pre-construction meetings and things like that.

And over the last year, and we again just had an opportunity to present on this.

We've done a lot of work.

Um the office has monitored 166 projects in this fiscal year.

We've streamlined compliance uh related to the Boston resident jobs policy and state prevailing wage compliance.

Now, contractors who are covered by BRJP are able to, through our Salesforce database, submit their certified payroll records combined with their BRJP compliance documentation.

Um we also have a full-time staff dedicated to maintaining our Boston Resident Jobs Policy Jobs Bank, which has about 400 workers registered, and the jobs bank has received 11 requests for labor in this fiscal year.

We created a transparent neckle system for sanctions, and we've expanded transparency through upgrades to our real-time dashboard.

Our numbers at the moment from July to March of July 2025 to March of 2026, we 19% of work hours have gone to Boston residents, 42% to people of color, 7% to women.

And this is just a slide showing our dashboard, which I've shared with many counselors before.

We've made many improvements thanks to conversations we've had with the counselors to add different ways that you can track data by year, developer, contractor, subcontractor, now by trade.

And I will hand it off to my colleague.

Good morning, everyone.

Good morning, counselors.

Um, again, my name is Monique Mitchell.

I'm the senior program manager for living wage and wage staffs, and in my role, I primarily oversee the Boston Jobs Living Wage and Prevailing Wage Ordinance.

And so this ordinance has been, in fact, for about 30 years or so, and the primary focus is to ensure that workers who are working on a service contract of a sizable amount are in a living wage.

Um the ordinance stipulates how the living wage can be calculated.

It can be either 110% of the federal minimum wage, 110% of the state minimum wage, or using using the consumer price index percentage to calculate it.

And so for this upcoming July, the living wage will increase in $19.36.

So this past year we monitored about over 500 vendors, about a thousand contracts that meet the ordinance requirements for living wage.

And so that means that they'll be paying their work as at least 1936 cents per hour.

This past year we also worked to implement the prevailing wage section of the ordinance.

The ordinance is amended in in July of 2021.

And so with for that for building services, it's particularly cleaning and service security guards.

And so this year we'd be able to implement both building service contracts as well as LISA's tool workers who pay prevailing wage.

And lastly, we've also been working to implement a data tool in order to meet our compliance demands for our vendors to submit their compliance reports online versus submitting via email.

We also oversee the Boston Wage Staff Executive Order, and this has been in effect of about over 10 years or so.

And so one of the key things we've been working on this past year is implementing a data tool.

So we currently look at six different data sets.

And so with this data tool, it brings it all into one area so we can search by uh employer's name and have all the data from the different data sets available to us in one area.

Um we've also received wage death complaints throughout the year, around 22 to be specific, and we refer them to the Massachusetts Attorney Generals for Labor Division.

And so we're grateful for our partnership because any complaints that we receive in our form, we can just send it to them versus having the worker resubmit a new claim.

And so this past year we referred 20 um claims to their office.

Um one was very well resolved, meaning that the worker received their money back for currently open and pending investigation, seven complaints are under review, determining they'll determine if they'll open investigation or they'll issue private value of action letter, and a currently received a private right of action letter, allowing the worker to pursue different methods on their own.

One of the other areas we work on in our office is multilingual health and safety training, and we do this through OSHA 10 and OSHA 30.

Um, by offering this training, we meet two of our ordinances.

One of the ordinances, as mentioned on the slide, is a construction demolition safety ordinance.

The ordinance requires that site safety coordinators for large-scale projects have an OSHA 30, and the OSHA 10 supports the Boston jobs residency policy by allowing workers to have the opportunity to work on public projects.

And so to date we've armed trained over 600 Boston workers through OSHA trainings, which is great to see, and we offered an English, Spanish, Portuguese, and Haitian Creole.

So you'll forgive me for the amount of text on this slide, but I thought the counselors would like an update on the implementation of the heat ordinance that was passed last summer.

We are well underway.

We've worked with the procurement team to develop a list of contract categories that are covered by the ordinance.

We use Bureau of Labor Statistics data to identify those workers most at risk of exposure to excessive heat.

And you can see the list is here.

We've developed the required heat illness prevention plan affidavit that covered contractors will need to sign.

Um the law department is reviewing that for us now.

And we've also contracted with the vendor who will be providing three in-person train the trainer sessions for City of Boston managers to learn how to provide training on heat protections and how to develop a heat illness prevention plan for their department or team.

Massosh is also providing a full scheduled virtual and in-person technical assistance sessions on how to create that heat illness prevention plan.

We've got a draft template for that plan, and we've also already scheduled three webinars for covered contractors and anybody who'd like to attend.

Um the flyer is here.

Those are coming up on May 4th, 27th, and June 2nd.

And we have a new website specifically for workers and heat protections, Boston.gov backslash heat-protection.

So we are well underway and implementing this and very proud to be one of very few municipalities in the country that have an ordinance to protect workers from excessive heat.

Um, and now we're gonna talk a little bit about our workers' rights initiative.

And I just wanted to give a little background.

Um, this initiative was originally founded uh after March of 2023.

Folks may remember the owner of a very popular pizza restaurant in Boston was charged with labor trafficking.

He had assaulted undocumented employees, withheld wages, forced workers to work over 80 hours per week for little or no pay and threatened deportation.

We heard very strongly from our partners that there was an urgent need for immigrant workers' rights training.

So we worked with them and our partners at the mayor's office of immigrant advancement to quickly put together a webinar in five languages, and a hundred and fifty workers attended, and we knew that this was something that we needed to continue to work on.

And I'll pass it back to Monique.

Yeah, so with the worker rights initiative, kind of the backbone of our office.

The backbone of our office.

So we work with the worker centers, and the workers center is a community-based nonprofit organizations that support marginalized communities and including immigrant communities, typically folks who are workers who are not supported by traditional unions.

And so within our first year of offering the worker rights initiative, we work with those four worker senators to offer webinars as well as in-person worker clinics.

So with those clinics, we also have a resource partners and with the resource partners included the Boston Legal Services, Justice of Work, the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination, as well as Attorney General's office.

And so as we continue to figure out how we can meet the needs of our workers, last year we had transition to offering our clinics online.

So we again we had those resource partners join us online where workers can drop in to connect with them to ask their questions in a safe manner.

And we did that through the feed up feedback we received with the federal administration changes.

And again, with those changes, again, we're looking at how can we meet the folks, how can we meet the community?

And this past year we partnered with BCYF to go to the community sites and offer our tabling there so that we where we can capture anyone who's walking through the community center and um distribute information about wage and hour work laws and so forth to best support them.

So we are very proud of the impact of this work.

Um since October of 2024, we've provided 273,375 dollars in funding to worker center and resource partners to in service contracts to provide free in-person multilingual workers' rights training and support.

Um we have provided in-person training to more than 650 workers in Spanish, Chinese, Portuguese, and Asian Creole, with 180 more workers who will receive it by July.

Um we have provided workers' rights support and referrals to 550 workers, 314 in FY25 and 236 so far in FY26 through our 16 workers' rights clinics and office hours that Monique just spoke about.

We have trained 276 workers through nine multilingual webinars on workers' rights topics, ranging from workers with disabilities, Uber and Lyft drivers, and discrimination harassment, and through this outreach and education, we've made 180 case referrals to our enforcement partners on wage wage theft, labor trafficking, discrimination, harassment, and unemployment.

And that is all for our presentation.

Pass it to our colleagues or yeah, thank you.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

Um morning.

I'm Mike Firestone.

I'm the corporation counsel uh with me, Kristen Covani, our department manager, and Sam Dinning, Chief of Staff and Policy Council.

Uh thank you to the chair uh and the entire committee for having us here today.

We look forward to uh your questions and a productive discussion.

I'd like to start uh, if it pleases, with a brief overview of the law department.

Uh so main components to our presentation.

First, some short department background, um, and then a discussion of a sampling of our ongoing work, including our current work in response to federal actions.

The law department, as uh the counselors are aware, is uh is the in-house law firm representing the city of Boston.

Our attorneys and professionals advise providing legal guidance, perform transactional work, and defend the city, its departments and employees in legal disputes.

The law department is involved in almost everything the city does, especially new initiatives, as um our colleagues from labor compliance just mentioned.

When the city is doing new work, that means new work for the law department as well.

We represent the city, its departments, and employees in their official roles and protect taxpayer dollars by helping ensure the effective and efficient delivery of city programs and services.

My colleagues in the department are deeply committed to the ongoing mission of the city to make Boston a great place to grow up, grow old, live, work, visit, and run a business.

We do not provide legal advice and services directly to constituents.

The department's work breaks down into a few major buckets, as I've outlined.

We provide support doing the work that keeps the department going, supporting our attorneys.

Kristen oversees that work.

We prepare for litigation, conduct research to advise clients.

Of course, we have our litigation work.

That's work that the counselors are quite familiar with, defending the city, its departments, policies, and employees acting in their official capacity.

Many of these cases are negligence and property damage cases that might be just a couple hundred dollars, employment matters and civil rights claims.

A big function of our work is government services, advising departments on ordinances, policies, and programs, conducting transactional work.

These lawyers support and facilitate the work of departments.

We review every contract that is advanced by every city department.

And then we have our legal advisors who conduct both litigation and departmental advising on behalf of specific departments that are big enough or specialized enough to warrant a dedicated team of attorneys.

Examples include the Boston Police Department, the Boston Public Schools, Inspectional Services, and Public Facilities.

Our specialized units include workers' compensation, our tax title division, and public records, all service specific important functions that require specialized legal knowledge that our attorneys and staff have.

Kristen.

Sure.

Good morning.

Thank you for having us here today.

This slide is a breakdown of the staffing levels of the team with teams within the law department.

Currently, we have 75 total employees.

At the moment, we have nine vacancies, which we're working towards filling.

You can see the distribution here, which includes both attorneys and the non-staff, which would include support staff, paralegals, clerks, government services, and litigation are our biggest divisions, but then a wide distribution across various other departments and specialized units.

So again, very similar to our budget from last year, 1.4% decrease.

We use outside counsel for matters that propose a potential conflict of interest, require specialized legal expertise that's not housed internally, or for one reason or another, perhaps related to the previous points, require resources beyond what the department has in-house.

Sam.

We also wanted to put these numbers in context.

Excuse me.

We want to put these numbers in context because we understand that personnel numbers and budget numbers don't necessarily mean anything without kind of a context at how other people doing similar work are staffed.

So these charts reflect how Boston's law department compares to other law departments in Massachusetts, whether as a proportion of personnel or a proportion of city budgets.

And as you can see where the column on the left there, the law department has consistently run a very lean operation.

And that's whether you measure it as a percentage of budget or employees.

And I say that to highlight how much our attorneys are doing, how much work they're doing, the diversity of the work that they're doing, and how well they're doing that work.

We are in a profession, the legal profession is one of specialties, and our attorneys are called on to be both generalists and often specialists in specific areas, and they do that work phenomenally well.

And every time the city is leading on policy work, that also creates new complicated, complex legal questions to go along with it.

And so those are the things that our law department is supporting every day.

A huge variety of work, some of it seen and makes it into the newspapers, a lot of it unseen, just a smooth administration of city business on a day-to-day basis.

We advise nearly 80 departments, reviewing hundreds of ordinances, orders, contracts, grant agreements, MOUs, MOAs, real estate transactions, and other legal matters.

Matters that have come to the council's attention include our efforts to support the construction of the new cancer hospital and the work to reimagine Jocelyn Park, the reforms advanced by the elections department for the 2024 elections, launching the Boston Energy Saver Program to save on energy bills for Boston residents, and support on building the Chinatown Library.

We this year successfully defended the city's revised exam school admissions policy and COVID policies that were advanced at that time by the Boston Public Health Commission and the city, and several claims that for upwards of 20 million dollars.

We collected more than $7 million in unpaid taxes.

We recovered 650,000 plus in funds for injured police officers and firefighters.

We recently drafted the contract for the new fire commissioner.

We're so proud to have him in that role.

We issued guidance to school personnel on how to handle immigration enforcement, assisted in construction matters for Court Street, the Irving School, the new Carter School, the North End Community Center, and the EMS Seaport Station.

And we negotiated the lease of City Hall Plaza for the FIFA FANFEST.

Again, an incredible variety of work, not reflecting hundreds of cases in litigation and workers' comp cases, hundreds of enforcement actions by inspectional services and you know financial claims and the review of hundreds of contracts across those 80 departments.

It's an enormous amount of work that we do successfully with approximately 20 staff and fewer than 50 attorneys.

I'll turn it over to Sam to elaborate, but the council knows that our federal response is critical work that is worth tens of millions of dollars to the city and you know, at this moment where cities remain a target for the federal administration.

We appreciate our recent collaboration with the Boston City Council to add your voices in the recent amicus filing of local jurisdictions in our effort to challenge the illegal termination of Haitian TPS at the U.S.

Supreme Court.

We're currently working on issues from the defense of the Boston Trust Act to federal and uh to uh defense of federal funding for science and challenges to the illegal and unconstitutional and deadly ice surges.

We're proud of the work of the department in representing the city and our residents and helping other communities across the country to do so themselves.

Sam, I'll say more about a few specific things on this list, but I do want to emphasize before I go into that, this federal work is largely uh in addition to and on top of the work that the law department is doing every day and has always been doing every day.

That's the work that really makes the city run.

That's the work that the law department does to advance city initiatives.

The federal work is separate from that, but attorneys across the department have been have been working on that this year on top of all of their existing uh the existing things that actually helped the city run.

Uh so the way one of the ways that manifests is obviously daily questions from departments.

When we're in an uncertain landscape, the law department gets a lot of questions.

Um, and we are also trying to understand that uncertain landscape and provide departments with the best advice that we can.

As Mike mentioned, we're also defending the Trust Act in court right now against a lawsuit by the Justice Department.

Um, that case, the court asked for additional briefing on that case.

We've moved to dismiss.

Um, we've now completed our additional briefing and expect a hearing to be scheduled on that at some point soon, but at the court's discretion.

Um, in terms of the litigation that the law department has been involved with, we've been involved, we've been a plaintiff in seven cases.

The city has been a plaintiff in seven cases against the federal administration.

The law department has led, and the city has led six different uh amicus briefs that were multi-city coalitions around the country, often with upwards of 70 different jurisdictions joining that coalition.

Um, so we've done that as part of a collaboration with others nationally.

We've also joined 25 uh amicus briefs and federal rulemaking comments with similar coalitions, and we've supported uh at least two state cases.

Um the state AGs have been leaders in this area as well, and we've supported those cases where that's appropriate.

Um we've also dealt with investigations and defending the city in investigations uh by the federal government, and we've done things like supporting um the drafting of the mayor's executive order that uh was announced in January.

So, through with all of this, this is work that's happening across the law department, and uh unfortunately, unfortunately, we expect this work to continue for uh the next two and a half or three years.

Uh just before moving on, I'll specifically point out that our ongoing multi-jurisdictional work um includes the preservation of more than a hundred million dollars for um the city in federal grants, particularly related to housing, uh port security, um other things, which is of course important to the committee.

Thank you okay, thank you very much.

Uh I appreciate uh both presentations that they were thorough.

Uh I'm gonna hand it over to my colleagues who enjoyed by Councillor Coleta Zapata.

Uh we'll go um six minutes uh and you know so uh counselor Flynn.

So your time is now.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Thank you to the administration team that is here.

Michael, let me start with you.

Um I filed a 17 F relating to um some information I needed to get on Ruth Backley BHA development.

Um haven't received it yet from BHA.

I asked the state if they would help me as well.

Um do you know what the holdup is?

I did send a letter to your office asking is BHA required to respond to a 17F uh it's been it's been since January.

Uh council, let me uh commit to getting back to you.

I'm not um I think you're asking a I think you're asking a legal question about the council's authority to use 17F to compel a document from the Boston Housing Authority, but just as a general matter, we're happy to work with you to figure out what the documents are.

So let me let me just take that back when I you know when this hearing is done, and we'll we'll get right back to you.

Yeah, I it's it's about elevator situation um at BHA developments, senior development uh persons with disabilities.

I just can't have elevators being broken in persons with disabilities are not able to get up and down on the elevator.

I'm trying to get information from uh BHA, and they're not providing that information to me.

I have to do my due diligence as a district city counselor advocating for my constituents, and I asked the mass architectural access board that oversees some of these issues for their guidance and suggestions, but I'd rather go through the city.

Um but is this something you could ask BHA to work on to get me the answers that I need?

Let us get back to you.

Sure.

Okay.

I just I just don't want to keep waiting for this, though, Michael.

Understood.

Um Michael, you mentioned you you drafted the contracts of the or engaged in the contracts of the FIA commissioner.

Um those contracts public record.

Yes.

Okay.

Um to the chair, could I get a copy of the um the two contracts?

The the most recent one for the new FIA commissioner, the uh commissioner Burke, but also the police commissioner as well.

I'd just like to take a look at them.

Okay, we'll work with the administration to get those.

But those those are public documents, are they?

Uh I I if the you know corporation council says so it must be true.

Uh yeah, I can I'll look into it.

Um Boston Public School Transportation.

Is the city of Boston responsible to um paying out when someone is injured by a BPS bus?

The in the event of uh claim that's brought against the Boston Public Schools.

That uh that claim would be might be handled by uh members of the legal team at the Boston Public Schools, it might be jointly handled with the litigation team, you know, that works here in this building, but the resources to draw upon and the authority to settle are are one entity, yes.

Okay.

Um have we settled paid out to people that were injured, or is it trans dev that's the BPS contracting company, or is it a combination of the two?

It well it would depend on the individual matter, but uh but there are certainly circumstances where both the Boston Public Schools and Transdev uh might be named as might be named in a lawsuit, and then the city would represent the Boston Public Schools, the you know, in our capacity, and then the claim against trans dev would be handled by trans dev attorneys.

And that's not an uncommon arrangement that you might see in uh in a huge uh variety of uh tort and similar claims.

Well, maybe over the last five years, Mr.

Chair, I I'd like to see how much trans dev paid out to um people that were injured um by BPS by by be a BPS transportation related issue, and I'd also like over the same period of time how much Boston is paid out as well.

Um I am concerned about BPS uh transportation issues.

Um is there anything we should be concerned about trans dev and settlements that are safety record, Michael?

Well, the the law department played a role in the uh independent report uh that was uh led by attorney Natasha Tidwell in the aftermath of the um the tragedy last year.

Uh death of a BPS student, Lens Joseph.

The um members of the city law department and the BPS Office of the Legal Advisor have uh been in ongoing conversations with the BPS Transportation Department about implementing on those recommendations and ensuring that we're advancing the reforms that were called for in the independent report.

So I think that was an important area of recent and ongoing focus.

I have lost complete faith in transdev.

I've been a city councilor for eight years.

I follow these issues very closely.

I have lost complete faith in them.

Our BPS students deserve better.

Mr.

Chair, I'll wait for the next round.

Okay, thank you very much, Councilor Murphy.

Um thank you all.

I'll start um just thank you, Jody.

I know we've had several hearings before this budget season started.

The most recent one about the residency program, so just thank you for that.

I don't really have any specific questions for your department, but thank you for always being so available.

And I see Kevin here in the crowd.

I just want to shout out Kevin, thank you.

I know we just had a very successful youth jobs and resource fare, and I know that you put a lot of effort, you and your team, so thank you for that um much needed work.

Um so my questions will be more just to the law department.

The presentation shows that about 25 percent is going to outside council.

What's the exact dollar amount that we've spent on outside council last year?

And if you have the list of the three firms that received the most money, and for what types of cases we spent 2.6 million, 2.623 million with outside counsel the um the largest firms in terms of the um amounts spent in FY26 include Stoneman Chandler, Nixon Peabody, and Kahill Gordon.

I'll have to, but we can get back to you on the specific representations.

Most of these are long-standing uh outside council relationships that uh predate my specific tenure, as do many of the matters, but they're a mix of uh they're a mix of cases.

Okay.

If you could get back, that'd be great.

Under the claims and property damage trends, it says uh we've in page five there was a claims division.

Can you provide the data on the number and cost of property damage claims over the last five years?

Like in which departments or cause generate the highest number of claims?

Sure.

I can we can get back to you on that.

Okay.

You don't have any of that information now.

And are there repeat locations or repeat contractors in any of our driving claims?

The um in many cases, these claims are um because the city is uh effectively a self-insured entity, these are in the style of a claim that you might make against your insurance company in a you know in a fender bender type case.

Um the amount of damage can range significantly, but uh again, I've you know, just in the last several months taken on matters ranging from you know a couple hundred dollars to um several thousands of dollars or more, just depending on the nature of the damage.

Um it is for a large enterprise with the kind of you know ongoing physical footprint out in the world that we have, fire engines and narrow streets and all sorts of things that there is a certain amount of this work that needs to be done and is very much in the interest of residents that we're doing this work effectively, efficiently.

Are there repeat locations or accidents that do you keep that data?

Um the I'll need to get back to you on sort of how uh this is tracked by the by the department versus by the individual sort of department that's the you know entity against which the claim arises, but we can get back to you.

Um Council Flynn touched on it, and you mentioned that when BPS and trans dev are in accidents, it's there's times when we work jointly that BPS does have a legal department, but when how often does the city's law department step in and work alongside BPS's law department?

Just to clarify, there it's only there's only one law department.

The the Office of the Legal Advisor at the Boston Public Schools is is part of the city's law department.

Right.

The um and just to further clarify my earlier comment, um the city would handle claims against the city, um, including claims against the district.

There are um there are statutory caps on the claims that can be brought and um we'll handle the matters as we would um you know professionally, empathetically, um, and expeditiously, uh whether or not there's a claim against transdev is going to be dependent on the facts.

Okay.

The department has defended claims worth tens of millions of dollars.

What is our current total liability exposure from pending cases?

Like how much is tied specifically to property damage and claims.

Our property damage cases uh again fall under, you know, statutory caps established in law, depending on the nature of the claim.

And uh the by and large uh counselor, although perhaps not with some exceptions, the the sort of claims that rise into the millions of dollars that you're referencing are generally um civil rights related claims under federal law where the city doesn't have caps on its liability.

Um the largest uh potential liabilities for the city uh at this moment, with limited exception, are gonna be for wrongful conviction related cases stemming from actions often taken decades ago.

Right.

Generally where there's a and you are aware of this, but oftentimes where there's been a successful motion for a new trial and decision not to come back to us for claim.

What are the top three highest risk cases right now in front of the city?

Um we have a there are a range of matters of this nature that are pending, and uh we'd be happy to discuss the sort of state with you.

We're not um uh we'd be happy to get back to you with the information that we're able to share, although I can't get into specific cases that are in active litigation.

Oh, I'll follow up with you.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you very much.

Counselor Kaleta Zapata.

I'm sorry.

Thank you, Chair.

Good morning, everybody.

I apologize that I was late.

Um, and just thank you for your work.

Lawyers and public service and advocacy spaces are literally holding up democracy right now, so thank you very much.

Um, and just a lot of respect and admiration for everything that you all do.

Um some of my questions have already been asked.

Um we had talked about estimated cost savings.

You mentioned the preservation of federal grants at 120 million.

I'm just wondering uh if you have another number or if it's a larger number through the negotiations or um of of lease agreements or winning litigation or suing the Trump administration, like does it go beyond the 120 number in terms of like cost savings and and what you've been able to save the city?

I mean certainly there's um and I'll defer to my colleagues to weigh in further that the the 100 plus million dollars that we reference really just relates to federal grants that we that the city's position has been that we're entitled to this money um and that it's been uh held up or um you know messed with in one way or another by uh by a lawless federal government, uh and we've intervened successfully multiple times at this point to ensure that that the city and its departments uh receive those funds to deliver necessary services to residents.

But the um you know, consistent with the questions just a moment ago from councillor Murphy, the uh work of the law department on a daily basis involves um uh can contesting or uh settling claims against the city, lawsuits against the city that you know can have impacts of you know tens or more millions of dollars, and how we professionally staff this operation, the way that we're bringing and maintaining uh retaining an expert team that is familiar with the particulars of municipal lawyering and defense in this moment has an impact of tens of millions of dollars on an annual basis, and we're very proud of the team and their work.

Great.

Um public records request.

There was some attention brought to this um matter a couple years ago, and um there were going to be some reforms.

Is there anything that you can talk about that's changed as it relates to public records requests and the timeliness that they're provided to the public?

The our colleagues uh from the um our colleagues uh who recently I think published a report or shared a report with the council on some of these matters, but um the law department plays an important role here in uh aspects of our public records work, including when those matters become matters in litigation.

Uh the the major change that the council is aware of is that in just the last three or four years, we've seen I think a tripling of the number of records requests that are received by the city and its departments, including the Boston Police Department.

We're at I think something like 10,000 records requests per year, which um puts this sort of this work into uh sort of totally unfunded is not maybe quite the right way to put it, but this is a new obligation on cities and towns across the commonwealth with no precedent or expectation at the time that these laws were passed, um, and where the way that we have changed how we work, the number of documents that are produced just in the day-to-day course of normal municipal business, um, the scale of the files, particularly when you add in things like um video, um, just bears almost no relation to the expectations in the 1970s when many of these laws were first originated.

And so it is managing that work, attending to it, staffing it appropriately at the departmental level and uh at the city is a significant strain on resources.

I believe that the work that we have done collectively as a department uh and as a city enterprise to um speed up the timeliness of response, ensure that we're meeting our statutory deadlines, and that we're only availing ourselves of exemptions when lawfully sort of able and appropriate, is work that the city should be proud of.

Um there aren't necessarily going to be people out there in the world saying sort of great job, City of Boston, for increasing the timeliness of your responses or handling those 10,000 records requests in the way that you have, but um I do think it's an area where uh city leadership and the council should be proud of the work that the city has done.

Great, and and thank you.

I'm sorry I only have a little bit of time, so if you can make this like yes or no.

Sorry.

Um, and I appreciate again I appreciate your the thoughtful and comprehensive answer.

Has there been because it's a broad problem I think all municipalities are going through right now with the increase in public records request?

Has there been any sort of guidance or support coming from maybe like the Secretary of State's office or the state on this to help us out a little bit?

I I think there is there are ongoing conversations about how to ensure that we are meeting our obligations, but I think this is a topic where there's uh increasing awareness that the scale of request and the complexity of request um has expanded exponentially in recent years, and it is a worthy topic for further discussion by policymakers.

Thank you.

Um we talked about outside counsel.

You you want you aren't able to talk about like what the broad expertise is of who we brought in through Nixon PBD, Kahill Gordon, like what they've been used for.

Uh it I can speak in some general in with some sort of I can speak a little bit to it and I'll do so briefly.

First, let me say the goal of the department by and large, as an in-house law firm is to manage as much of the legal work of the city as possible in-house, right?

Um there are other in-house councils working at companies and nonprofits that uh where the the person in my function, the general counsel, their their job basically is to outsource everything and then just sort of superintend that work in a limited fashion.

That's not how we're staffed.

We're staffed to manage for the lion's share of the legal work of the city, and that is what we do.

Um we uh have found it necessary to avail ourselves of outside counsel.

We are trying to bring down our spending on outside council as we reduce those vacancies.

Um that's ongoing work that Kristen, Sam, Susan Wisey, Keith Leatherman, and others are deeply involved in, as are our division heads.

Um the just to take uh Stoneman for a moment, they have handled certain complex employment matters in partnership with in-house lawyers for some decades.

Um similarly, uh Nixon Peabody, uh couple of the matters that have driven outside spending or employment matters.

Um Stoneman also uh collaborated with the Office of Legal Advisor in the recent defense of the uh exam school admissions policy and our successful defense of that reform in federal court.

So there's some variation here.

And just really quick follow-up question on that.

Um, have have any has any outside counsel been used for some of these federal response actions that we've taken, or is that all in-house?

The majority of that work is in-house.

We've got some small uh we've done some smaller contracts uh, for example, the uh one of our slides noted uh an unprecedented inquiry by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, basically suggesting that the work that the city has done to advance a fair housing agenda over the last 25 years is itself unconstitutional and unlawful.

Um the department, the mayor's office of housing um has had a collaborative relationship with HUD since the founding of HUD, and so we were unfamiliar with this kind of inquiry, um, although we've had a productive dialogue, but an adversarial posture from HUD was new, and so we consulted with um you know a firm in crafting the city's most recent response.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Okay.

Uh some questions from the chair, and then we'll go for a second round.

Uh just so is there uh other than the response, I think that we got a uh there was a letter from HUD uh and we issued a response.

Has there been anything else on that?

Not as yet.

Okay.

Uh and then you know, so I think like the the uh sort of the contextual data, you know, from how other cities uh in the region and and nationwide, you know, what their law departments look like.

I'm assuming that's you know, to show how we're punching above our weight or our law department is and there this is you know uh please don't look for you know cuts here because we're already way smaller than these other other similarly sized cities.

I'm assuming that's the that's kind of the the how we look at that.

I just was wondering if there's a historical reason for why Boston would have a smaller law department, is it a restrictive home rule here or that you know is it uh this isn't like a recent development?

Uh do you have is there any you know like uh that now that you've sort of taken the reins of you is there any historical context to that?

It it's certainly true that the department has been of a smaller scale.

Um I don't have a I don't yet have a good understanding of exactly why, but I uh but uh I agree with the counselor's observation that we are uh sort of lean mean fighting machine.

Yeah.

Okay.

There are there if if the federal government prevails, what what happens?

Yeah, uh I'm gonna turn it over to uh Sam Denning, who's actually leading our work in defense of the Boston Trust Act to uh take that question.

Sure.

The federal government is essentially asking us to uh it seeking to have the court invalidate the Trust Act and not allow the city to continue its compliance with the Trust Act.

Um they're specifically taking issue with our detainers, the fact that the city does not honor detainer requests from the federal government as well as information sharing provisions in the Trust Act.

So that's what they're looking for is to essentially invalidate those provisions.

Okay.

Because I know there wasn't there an executive order uh from the president, uh the federal government that any city with a sanctuary city policy would not receive any federal funding.

Is there there's litigation on now about that?

And what's what's the status?

Yeah, there's been similar matter there's been similar efforts uh like the one you've just described, issued several times, efforts to defund our cities entirely, efforts by individual departments to do so, efforts to attach conditions to various grants.

And just to elaborate on one comment from Sam just a moment ago, the the broader effort, of course, is not just about the sort of technicalities of the trust act and the way in which the Boston Police Department operates, because as you know, the uh the police department um cooperates with all levels of law enforcement on a daily basis and has you know has and will continue to do so.

The issue is whether or not the city is willing to turn over the Boston Police Department to uh actively participate in mass deportation, which the um which the city council uh and the police department have uh independently determined is both contrary to our laws and contrary to our public safety policies.

And I'll just add briefly, I other context there.

This this is, as you note, um one of many attacks on so-called sanctuary jurisdictions.

Um the city is a plaintiff in a lawsuit led by the city and county of San Francisco, challenging certain um sanctuary, so-called sanctuary executive orders that the federal government issued early in the administration.

Um what we saw in Minneapolis is another version of this of trying to compel cities, specific attacks on cities and city policies where we have independent rights protected by the Constitution.

Okay, and then uh I'm running out of time for uh for both offices in terms of the both of you are experiencing you know cuts uh or or decreases in your budget.

So uh for the law department, I think it's 150,000.

Is that to the con non-personnel?

Is that contractual services?

Uh and what's the impact?

Or what will the impact be?

I mean, the most immediate impact is that we're we're trying to tighten our belts on outside council spending, so we're having less of an impact on our personnel spending.

And um we're we're sort of we are a part of central services for the city.

Um the city's fiscal position requires belt tightening across the board.

Uh we are um we are going to rise to the occasion to deliver within the sort of uh budget that's been recommended.

Okay, and then for for Jody, I guess uh is I what what's the dollar figure and and where where's that gonna come out?

Is I think it's contractual services, but then what's the impact on your it is um 27,000 dollars is coming from contractual services, largely just impact the number of free health and safety trainings and the amount of multilingual workers' rights training we can provide.

Okay, and I just one quick question before I'm done for Jody.

Uh I guess there was uh article today uh about the uh delivery driver, you know, registration insurance uh ordinance, and I guess one one thing I think I I brought up in in the hearings is if we're requiring insurance.

I don't want to see DoorDash deduct that money or require the delivery drivers to pay for that insurance.

I think it would I think they're misclassified, you know, as as independent contractors, and that would be a deduction from their wages.

It's like you know uh deducting costs for ill illegally from your employees.

So I is there are are are is can the city do anything uh or at least be on the lookout for that.

Um I can I I'll definitely bring this up as we meet regularly with our partners in the Attorney General's office that enforce wage and hour laws.

I'm sure they're taking a close look and I can get back to you with more information as to how we might be supportive.

Because I don't think the intention is to have you know sort of minimum wage earning workers pay for their own insurance.

It's that these large uh delivery companies would foot the bill and and and make sure people are covered.

But um, okay.

Uh counselor Flynn, we're gonna go for a second round.

Uh we'll do five minutes.

Sorry.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um, I I just want to go back to TransDef again and BPS related issues.

We had a hearing on it recently, but need to get some more information.

But Boston and TransDef they pay insurance for for the drivers.

Was there a period of time that that insurance lapsed for any particular reason?

Uh council, not to my knowledge, but I'm I'm afraid I'm not able to speak um expertly on these questions.

I'll do my best.

Okay, who would who would help me on that question?

Oh I'm we're happy to follow up on specific questions on this topic.

Yeah, but who what BPS is the point of contact on that questions about transdev's insurance coverage?

Yeah.

Well if without sort of specifying a particular name, I I think if the counselor has follow-up questions and you're not getting you know answers about the trans contract or the ways in which we're managing for um liability, then I'm happy to have those questions directed my way up or through IGR, and then we can figure out how to best respond.

Okay.

Um so from a legal point, if there's if there's an accident, someone is injured, whether it's a BPS student or the public for BPS bus, um what is the legal requirement Boston needs to do in terms of notifying, certainly they're going to notify the Boston police if there's an accident or or a crash, but who else would be notified besides the Boston police in terms of any type of regulation agency?

Sorry, I just want to make sure I think what you're asking is in the event of a school bus accident?

Yep.

And so the first I should say um that uh I think that there are I believe that there are different protocols depending on the nature of the nature of the accident, if it's a sort of a side mirror swipe issue versus uh you know, something more serious.

But these are questions that I think would be probably best directed to the leadership of BPS transportation.

I know you've met Dan Rosengarden and Jackie Hayes before, um, but I'm happy to take that back.

Okay.

Um but but in terms of that's what I'm getting at, but it but besides if it's a if it's a with the exception of a minor uh fend and vendor or any type of small accident, but if there's a a major accident, knowing that the city law department is going to be involved, is there besides the Boston police, maybe the district attorney, maybe the mass attorney general's office, but do uh do we have a responsibility to inform any type in trans dev, do we have any legal responsibility to inform the state for any particular reason?

Um they may compile data.

Do we have an obligation to file data with the federal government that tracks that track tracks these types of crashes too?

I I know that we've I know from some previous work that we have ongoing data sharing about transportation with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education.

I know that there's um information shared with the registry of motor vehicles, but I again you're asking a very specific question, and I just don't want to answer inaccurate.

Okay.

The one one question I wanted to ask, um, are you familiar with the Boston public market across the street?

I am.

I go there for lunch.

Okay.

Is that does that receive any type of city estate assistance at all?

Uh uh it wouldn't surprise me if the public market has received uh grants of one form or another in the past.

I'm not aware of any existing contracts for the Boston public market.

I know that the market was created in a significant sort of state partnership and that there was uh public dollars that were deployed to create the space that we enjoy today.

Um I know at one time it used to be it used to be BRA property.

I believe it used to be BRA property.

That wouldn't surprise me, but I don't know.

Okay, okay.

I'm just trying to do a little bit of I just want to be more knowledgeable on that.

Um how much have we spent, Michael, in terms of Boston paying out to victims or or to or to a someone that sued the city um over the last four or five years in terms of um settlements so I can or by or by order of a judge Councilor Murphy uh uh earlier in the round asked a similar question just about sort of a five-year look back on payouts of claims uh and settlements.

Again, I think what you would find is that on an annual basis, the total has ranged from sort of between 10 million and 25 million, but it's worth noting that one or two cases that are those wrongful convictions, civil rights related cases that I mentioned, where the fact pattern generally speaking is uh follows a successful motion for a new trial, a decision uh a non-prosecution decision by the district attorney's office, and then a specific claim brought by an individual who may have spent uh you know a long period of time incarcerated.

Those cases are gonna shift that number significantly, just one or two cases.

The claims for property damage, you know, employment related claims, things like that are much more stable and at a significantly lower scale.

Mr.

Chair, I know I'm out of time.

May I may I ask one more question?

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Um so just as an example, say Boston pays out 10 to 25 million dollars a year.

Does the city pay that out, or is the insurance company responsible for paying it out?

Is it c is it a combination of both, or is there any other organization that is involved in it?

And maybe if I could have that on the record also, that answer, but it do you have anything you could say publicly at this meeting?

Yeah, the the city doesn't have insurance for these claims.

We don't have an insurer.

We're self-insured.

So we pay the we we pay 25 million dollars um pretty much every year for settlements?

Well, no, there's a there's a significant variation, and again, stemming from just a couple of cases, these it's again without getting sort of too in the weeds on the sort of specific nature of wrongful conviction cases, so-called.

Um they are in a category by themselves that has a that uh uh really dwarfs the entirety of all claims otherwise brought against the city.

And so the the they alone, the sort of are they harassment cases in there?

Um you know, private settlements, sexual harassment or or some other type of harassment.

Well, I'm including everything.

So so uh you know, uh uh a sort of but I don't want to downplay the downplay um sexual harassment cases um in in promoting cases that have happened a long time ago.

I'd rather deal with some issues that we've that are more recent.

If there's settlements for any type of harassment, are those public?

Are you able to are you able to let us know about those?

The um or just the or just the funds?

Uh again, happy to get back to you with the the set settled claims against the city um uh which councillor Murphy also requested, so we'll make sure to get those back to you.

Um we'll provide it at the level of transparency that is you know that is uh you know ex that is lawful.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Okay, yeah, just uh a couple follow-ups before we go to Councillor Murphy.

Um so in terms of like non-disclosure agreements, uh and is it is there a rule in place?

Can we have a non-disclosure agreement as part of a settlement from our end?

Could a victim ask for a non-disclosure agreement?

How do those work in uh in your context?

I mean, generally no.

I mean, we're the I can't speak to sort of past practices, but the um now it let's say there's a let's say there's a settlement.

Um that settlement might um, you know, that that's gonna be what it is, and so there may or may not be lots of detail in the you know in the settlement whether it's court entered or not, uh, but again, we're happy to provide this to the council.

We are we're trying to do uh we're trying to do this for kind of transparent fashion.

That's the best interest of the taxpayer.

You know, I'm just raising the sort of counter factual where uh victims advocates sometimes want uh non-disclosure agreements for various reasons, but I I don't know what the what the rules are that you know, and generally I feel like I mean there is a public proceeding and um we we read about it, and they're you know it is public record, I think, when we're paying out uh funds.

Um but uh you know it's just a general question.

Sorry, Councilor Murphy, uh you have five minutes.

Thank you.

Um a few questions, but I'm gonna just stay on the 17F and the RFI request.

So it seems to me that we've been saying for a few years now that we're just getting more you know requests for information and more of these um you know records requests.

Do we have conversations that we need to increase that staff and the budget for that, knowing that we just can't keep up with it?

Because I've said it many times here in um asking for your help that even say during our hearings and we put RFIs on the record last year.

We had hundreds, hundreds, not just a few, hundreds of the counselors' RFIs were unanswered, and many of our 17Fs are unanswered.

And to follow up on Councilor Flynn's specific question, he was asking about transdev on April 1st.

We had a city council hearing with the transportation department, and I had asked several specific questions about their insurance, and at that hearing they did um raise the non-renewal regarding the non-renewal of the transportation liability insurance, and so I did file a 17F after RFIs were put on the record, neither one has been answered, and that was I switched, you know, I put in a 17F, and as a counselor back on April 8th, still waiting for the answers to that.

And those would give the answers that I know counselor Flynn was just there.

So I get it's you know frustrating for the public when they know that there's you know, we have a small department, and I know they work hard up there, but if the public's waiting for thousands of unanswered public records requests, and then we on the council still have outstanding RFIs, and you know what they say we do have the power through the 17F, but they're just not answered.

So, how do we get those to be answered?

At least have the counselors be prioritized.

At what point does the law department step in to make sure that happens?

Um the arrangement for uh the the arrangement sort of outlined in our charter for transmitting information from the mayor and city departments to the council is well established as counselor knows and it's often though not followed.

Yes, I think the um it's um I can't speak specifically to the transportation issue there.

Um I know that uh I my experience on this topic, you know, both in my previous role and then as corporation counsel has seems to be that where there's dialogue with the counselor or the counselor's office about what the you know what you're trying to learn, and we can make sure that we're sort of pinpointing it to the best of our ability, that often aids city departments.

There have been conversations.

And also in this specific case with all of my outstanding ones with the council president who had assured me she would work directly with the IGR and get these answers, and still nothing.

And there's several, so we can follow up after on the specifics, but but it's not just specific to me, like when I shared last year on the council floor that hundreds of RFIs are going unanswered.

That's just unacceptable, especially when you take the time to come prepared to answer us questions and we need this information before the June vote, right?

I mean, all these questions are tied around making sure we have answers to vote on a budget that will deliver the services.

So hoping we could talk after about getting very happy to, and we share the I think we share a common call.

Awesome.

Um, thank you.

So the specifics um we talked about the cost in trying to maybe shift more in-house so we could spend less on outside council.

What specific positions would be added to reduce the need for outside counsel?

I know you did say that there are times when there's like a very specific case, like the redistricting, like you reached out to a firm that was expertise in certain very specific, but what does that look like?

Like what more staff would we add?

Because I'm all for adding a department's budget if it means overall the city's you know spending less.

Yeah, I think we're where we are right now is we're focused within the recommended budget uh to bring down our outside council spending by filling the vacancies in our legal advisors' offices and in litigation.

Can you share?

Because you did mention, Kristen, that there are nine outstanding positions right now?

Yes.

And which ones are those?

Are these just general attorneys or specific roles?

There's specific positions, the sort of you know, at this immediate moment, uh we have a couple of litigation positions.

Uh that's important for sort of mitigating against our outside council spending.

We have an open position in public facilities, an open position with inspectional services, an open position with the police department.

Um those are just is it common to have this many open positions?

Well, it's interesting.

I was as I was reviewing our budget testimony.

I did look at the notes from my predecessor, Adam Cederbaum's notes from last year, and our vacancy levels were comparable.

Um we've been making a particular effort to address them within the context of the existing sort of fiscal situation, and that conversation is very active with the you know, and and we're we're pleased to be able to move forward with those with those.

Could you just quickly describe if say ISD you mentioned is down an attorney, what does that mean?

Someone else picks up the work if needed and just works harder or shifts other work aside, like what happens?

As you're as you're aware from your own, you know, office um we we do a combination of things.

We we stretch to meet the workload.

There's a huge amount of non-discretionary work that needs to be attended to, so that's going to be prioritized.

It makes it harder to handle what I would call you know, anything that's you know can be pushed off or is non-discretionary, um, and where we uh where we're sort of unable to manage it, given that we're dealing with litigation that has deadlines that are imposed by courts and others, um, that's where we sometimes find ourselves spending with outside counsel.

Again, I think it is a it is a core priority for the department to maintain um to do two things simultaneously, which is first to live within our means and to bring down our outside council spending consistent with the budget request.

Thank you.

Okay, uh thanks.

I guess just um before we move on to Councilor Claire's upon a just uh in terms of the 17F and the transdev, and I'm not asking for how those cases play out in in other contexts, like in the past.

I guess like the assumption is that I think is that transdev is liable for you know accidents, but uh you know I I think transdev is like a administrator.

I think we employ the drivers.

I do is transdev liable in the past have they been have they paid out in the past for accidents?

Um I'm just and and is is there a dispute is without making a without making a legal conclusion about liability, let me say the following.

Um in the in the recent tragedy that we're all referencing, and I too have a had a kindergartner in the Boston Public Schools at the same time.

So the city has resolved its claims stemming from that matter.

Um there are I believe still active claims against transdev, which is as our contracted transportation provider, the employer in that case.

That's an unusual arrangement within the context of city services, given that the just it is not exactly unique, but the employment relationship of our school bus drivers as employed by trans dev is distinct from many core city services.

Okay.

Thanks.

That that helps.

Okay, Counselor Coletta Zapado.

Thank you so much.

I just have two additional questions that I believe would be quick.

The property damage revolving fund.

Sorry, this is really silly.

Yep, but what funds that uh the revolving fund takes in uh recoveries for where the city pursues claims against entities that damage city property.

So just uh you know, to again go back to a question Councilor Murphy and Councillor Flynn raised earlier.

Um let's say a city um tow uh damages somebody's vehicle inadvertently, right?

There might be a claim brought against the city for the damage, right?

Either directly by the individual resident or by the insurance company for the individual, whoever's you know, their geico or what have you.

Um the uh in the reverse case, where it's a city vehicle that's damaged through the fault of a third party or city property, a fence, a tree, a building that's damaged, the city can pursue recoveries, and when those recoveries are pursued successfully, they come into this revolving fund and then they're redeployed to support those departments.

Okay.

And we have enough to sustain the amount of claims that come in per year?

Our claims department, and you know, there's some variation depending on the facts and circumstances, but we're prepared to pursue what we would call affirmative claims by the city as well as to defend claims against the city.

Okay, thank you.

Um let's see.

Um for execution of courts at this point uh in the fiscal year, have we needed to provide a supplemental appropriation to that?

That is a that's a better question for our budget office, which is to say I'm not prepared to I'm not able to speak expertly on this, but I know that they are managing for our settlements consistent with the ongoing sort of fiscal management at the fourth quarter of the fiscal year.

Okay.

Thank you.

And last question um for Jody.

You ready to pass the wage stuff ordinance?

We're ready.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Thank you to Chair Weber for his uh leadership on that, and we're really looking forward to it.

Thank you, everyone, for your collaboration and partnership.

Appreciate it.

Thanks.

Okay.

Uh for um for all of our sakes, I hope this baby is patient and waits till it's due date.

Uh um okay.

Uh uh do we have uh third round uh counselor for um I just so in terms of vacancies, we we briefly mentioned, I guess Joe Jody, what w how many vacancies are there?

Uh any?

None?

None in Libra compliance.

Okay.

Tell us your secret, Jody.

Yeah, yeah.

Our secret is that we have just the Boston Resident Jobs policy.

We have sixteen staff.

So yeah.

Okay, and then uh for law department, you how many uh positions are vacant?

Nine currently.

Nine out of how many?

75.

75, okay.

Uh and then so what what's what steps uh are we taking to fill those uh I think there's some law schools around here.

Um for every single position, we post very actively to um you know, to different listservs, we work with affinity bar associations, we've worked with law schools that have sort of public interest advising offices, um, we're in active conversation with the Boston Bar Association and legal, you know, um legal organizations, and we have a broad network of um outside council and alumni, and we're sort of constantly on the lookout for new talent.

We think it's a great place to work.

We really uh our our colleagues in the law department are fantastic, public servants, they do expert legal work.

It's a great place to to be for a stage of a career.

Well, yeah, I mean as an attorney you worked in the attorney general's office, uh how rewarding government work can be.

Uh I think I think we have talked about uh, you know, uh the Boston law department's like reputation or sort of not, you know, maybe it's partly because we're a small uh department, uh, how to sort of you know sort of burnish that reputation or you know, uh increase the stature.

Uh I don't think, you know, um I think some law grads might be looking at other places like New York or you know, I don't know, for some reason Denver seems to have half of the municipal lawyers in the country, but um, you know, how we can be that sort of like place where people are looking to come to work.

Um I don't know if you had any thoughts.

It's an ongoing effort for the department.

I think in this moment where um where cities are seen as a level of government, um, and I think this reflects our collaboration with the council where um work that impacts people's lives is actually happening where where there is a greater trust in government.

Uh the attorneys that are interested in building a career in uh in public service are increasingly looking and we're hoping to take advantage of that.

And I think we're seeing how important it is to you know win these uh fights with like the Trump administration and things like that, things you can fight for.

Um just uh uh Jody, in terms of the the budget for FY27, I think uh the heat uh oh no, so when we codified the uh the office, there's an advisory council that is supposed to be formed, and I I think uh uh that we're looking to do that uh after uh you know, hopefully we can pass uh the wage theft ordinance um and get that going.

Is there anything in the budget that concerns you about your ability to convene that advisory council?

No, in fact, we've been working already, um, Monique and I to lay out the process, identify potential members.

So as soon as the wage theft ordinance moves forward, we'll be ready to start putting pulling the advisory committee together, and we have uh prepare uh we have a plan for staffing.

Okay.

Uh just one second.

A thousand.

No, I'm just kidding.

Uh nobody's signed up.

Uh no follow-up questions, no, Councilor Murphy, Councillor Flynn.

Okay, well, I I really thank you very much for for coming in this morning and answering questions and your presentation.

Uh this morning's hearing is now adjourned.

Thank you.

Thank you.