What Michelle Wu's tax loss means for 2025
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Illustration: Brendan Lynch/Axios
Now that Mayor Michelle Wu's plan to raise commercial taxes is dead, the themes of the 2025 election year are becoming clearer.
Why it matters: Boston voters almost always rally around an incumbent mayor, but this fresh political loss to fiscally conservative forces shows Wu's not invulnerable.
State of play: The mayor's push to shift more tax burden to commercial properties couldn't get a vote in the Senate after new revenue numbers from the state showed that the 14%-30% homeowners tax increase Wu had warned about would really come in only around 10.5%.
Here's what killed the bill:
- South Boston Sen. Nick Collins blocked multiple votes on the plan and called for more scrutiny of City Hall's revenue numbers.
- New state data showed far less need for tax increases than was initially projected.
- Senate leaders, including President Karen Spilka and Sen. Will Brownsberger, concluded there wasn't enough support and pulled the plug.
Between the lines: The coming tax hike will still be the second-highest annual increase for homeowners since 2010. But the average $573 increase wasn't enough to move the Senate to empower Wu to drastically raise commercial taxes.
The bottom line: Wu's defeat in the Senate has shifted public discourse from tax policy to questions about the mayor's budget management and transparency. Spending went up 8% this year while she was looking for big commercial tax hikes.
- If next year's budget shows similar bloat, a challenger from Wu's right could court fiscally minded voters against her.
What's next: The City Council still has to set 2025 tax rates at its final meeting today so tax bills are printed on time.