Boston Residents Jobs Policy compliance

At a glance

What: Docket No. 0218, an order for a hearing on how effective the Boston Residents Jobs Policy is and on improving equity and employment standards on projects across the city. It sets goals of 51% of construction work hours for Boston residents, 40% for people of color and 12% for women on city projects and private projects over 50,000 square feet. The council reviews it about twice a year.
Where it stands: heard October 15, 2026 by the Labor, Workforce & Economic Development Committee, chaired by Councilor Worrell. No vote. For April 1 to September 30, 2026 residents worked 19% of hours (goal 51%), people of color 44% (goal 40%) and women 7% (goal 12%).
What's next: the next review hearing in April, with the office's annual report on wages lost to missed resident goals.

150 projects (44 private, 106 public) and about 3.76 million work hours. Private: 18% residents, 41% people of color, 8% women. Public: 22%, 58%, 5%.
Public work by department: Mayor's Office of Housing about 454,000 hours (21% residents), Public Facilities about 95,000 (24%), Public Works about 90,000 (28%), Parks about 20,000 (15%).
White Stadium is monitored as two projects (east and west grandstands) and showed better resident and women shares than most projects; the captions garble several percentages. The office wants to study why.

Compliance means completing administrative steps (pre-construction meeting, outreach records, payroll), not meeting the hiring goals.
Tools: Salesforce payroll portal, a public dashboard (filterable by developer, contractor, subcontractor and trade), two written warnings before sanctions go to the Boston Employment Commission, and a late-payroll tracker. Contractors get ten business days for late payroll. One fine (about $11,000) has been issued in the presenter's tenure.
Seven monitors cover about 150 projects a year.

Resident share has fallen over about ten years; presenters cited outreach and residents moving out for cost reasons. Flynn and FitzGerald pressed on this.
The city Jobs Bank is little used (fewer than 20 requests); most candidates are unskilled and younger, while skilled workers are placed through unions.
The city does not choose whom contractors hire; it follows up only on Jobs Bank referrals that were not hired. Weber asked about late payroll; most filers correct after a warning.
Related topics: Boston Residents Jobs Policy building permit enforcement, Skilled trades pipeline for Boston residents, Construction wage data reporting.

About 36 minutes across 1 meeting (from transcript timestamps; approximate).

Meeting	Minutes
2026-10-15 - Labor, Workforce & Economic Development Committee	36

2026-10-15 - Labor, Workforce & Economic Development Committee - Chair Worrell, Flynn, FitzGerald and Weber heard Jody and Chris Brown present six-month results (residents 19%, people of color 44%, women 7%) and questioned resident shares, the Jobs Bank and payroll compliance; no vote.