The Boston City Council saw a 5% pay hike this month that boosted salaries to $120,000 for the 13 councilors, half of whom skipped out on a state ethics training session held Friday amid the feds’ pursuit of a corruption case against one councilor.
It’s the second straight year city councilors have received a raise, after seeing their pay increase by 11%, from $103,500 to $115,000. Councilors, who are up for reelection this year, are set to see another pay hike in 2026, to $125,000.
While pay hikes were previously approved by the City Council in November 2022, this month’s salary boost comes as one city councilor, Tania Fernandes Anderson, is facing six public corruption charges stemming from a federal indictment that alleges she ripped off thousands of dollars from taxpayers in a kickback scheme.
The federal scrutiny that’s tarred the 13-member body since Fernandes Anderson’s arrest last month had one councilor calling for this month’s nearly 5% pay hike for councilors to be delayed — though the request seems to have fallen on deaf ears.
“I advocated publicly for the mayor and City Council raises to be suspended,” Councilor Ed Flynn told the Herald. “I did not take any formal steps to do that though.”
The Council’s prior vote also boosted the mayor’s salary from $207,000 to $250,000. The pay hike, per the ordinance, only goes into effect after the next mayoral election, however, which will be held this November, the mayor’s office said. Mayor Michelle Wu, who is paid $207,000, is seeking reelection.
Fernandes Anderson is alleged to have doled out a $13,000 bonus to one of her Council staffers, a relative, contingent upon $7,000 being kicked back to her. The handoff, the feds said, took place in a City Hall bathroom in June 2023.
She was absent from this week’s Wednesday City Council meeting, and did not attend Friday’s State Ethics Commission training session for councilors, which was called by Council President Ruthzee Louijeune, the Herald has learned.
Fernandes Anderson, who is due in federal court an hour before the Council’s next meeting on Jan. 29, was hit with a state ethics violation in July 2023 and ordered to pay a $5,000 fine for hiring two immediate family members to salaried positions on her Council staff, and giving them raises.
The Ethics Commission ruled she violated the state’s conflict of interest law, which per a commission official, was the main focus of this week’s training session. Although no specific situations or prior violations were mentioned during the session, the federal corruption charges leveled against a sitting city councilor were the “elephant in the room,” a source told the Herald.
One slide, for instance, noted that the conflict of interest law prohibits bribes, described as “corrupt gifts, offers, and promises given to influence official acts.”
More than half of the city councilors did not attend the ethics training session, however, Flynn said, which was held a little more than a week after the Council overwhelmingly voted, 8-3, to defeat a measure that sought to establish an ethics committee for internal oversight of the body.
“It was disappointing that more than half of the city councilors did not even attend today’s important training,” Flynn said, “even though they previously voted against establishing an ethics committee.”
Several councilors, when voting against a potential Council ethics committee, mentioned that it would be duplicative of the role of the State Ethics Commission, which provides independent oversight of the body. The current structure was also preferable to some who cautioned against the potential “weaponization” of a committee that allows councilors to investigate and take action against colleagues.
Louijeune said at last week’s meeting that she had requested that the State Ethics Commission give two presentations to the City Council this year on the conflict of interest law.
Her office did not respond to a request for comment on whether Friday’s session was mandatory for councilors, who was in attendance, and what was discussed. Another councilor who attended the session, however, said she was told, after asking, that it was optional.
“Even though the ethics training is voluntary I would have hoped that all of us would have made every effort to attend,” Councilor Erin Murphy said.
Compliance with the state’s conflict of interest law was the main focus of the day’s training session, according to David Giannotti, public education and communications division chief of the State Ethics Commission, though he clarified that no prior violations by councilors were mentioned.
“I presented a 2-hour conflict of interest law seminar this afternoon to Boston City Council members and staff,” Giannotti said in a statement to the Herald. “Seminars provide general information on the requirements of the conflict of interest law.”
“During seminars,” he added, “I do not comment on actual situations but inform attendees to contact the Commission’s Legal Division to obtain specific advice about the law’s requirements or contact the Commission’s Enforcement Division if they wish to make a complaint.”
While in-person training isn’t mandatory, public employees must complete an online state ethics training program within 30 days of election to a state, county or municipal position, and then every two years after, according to the state website.
