Mayor Wu says council's budget changes could lead to layoffs

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu is warning the city could face layoffs, particularly in the transportation department, after the city council passed a slew of amendments to the mayor’s proposed budget.

After weeks of infighting and negotiating, councilors voted to reallocate $11.8 million of Wu’s $4.9 billion budget through two amendment packages on Wednesday. Though the proposed changes make up just 0.2% of the total budget, Wu said city workers are likely to be affected.

“This is, again, a deviation from our initial budget proposal, which we believed was balanced and clear,” Wu said in an interview with WBUR. “We have been working right down to the dollar on ensuring that we could protect and preserve what we're doing.”

Wu has seven days to decide whether to accept or reject the council’s amendments — which require cuts in some areas in order to fund the councilors’ priorities. If the mayor accepts them, she said she’d have to begin exploring layoffs when the budget takes effect in July.

While the council has been examining what it can do with modest sums on the edges of the multi-billion-dollar budget, the mayor said there’s little room for changes.

“As we had outlined and shared to the council and publicly through communications from our CFO, any additional cuts beyond a package that had been proposed is going to result in layoffs,” Wu said.

The proposed amendment package to which she referred was developed by council Ways and Means Chair Ben Weber. He said he’d discussed with the mayor’s office restoring $8.2 million for immigrants, housing, seniors, the arts and more.

But Councilor John FitzGerald worked with other members of the body frustrated by how much was left out of Weber’s amendments, and proposed restoring an additional $2.3 million in funding. It was approved in a 10-3 vote.

“This amendment package, while it isn't as strong as many of us would like,” he said after introducing it on Wednesday, “we do understand the constraints with which we are operating.”

FitzGerald’s proposals cut most deeply from the city’s transportation department, which oversees street planning, enforcement management, parking and traffic.

It was not immediately clear how many jobs could be cut.

“ These are not the ideal options and alternatives that we're talking about at this point. But we will look through what's possible through a mix of additional belt-tightening or reducing some service levels,” Wu said, “and ultimately, unfortunately, also looking at layoffs. “

That comes as no surprise to FitzGerald, who worked for the city before getting elected to the council in 2023.

“I think layoffs will be inevitable,” he said in an emailed statement, “given [the] future fiscal outlook of the City.”