BOSTON, MA – September 29: Mayor Michelle Wu and Greater Boston Chamber’s President and CEO Jim Rooney during the Chambers Government Affair Forum at the Sheraton Hotel on September 29, 2022 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Staff Photo By Matt Stone/MediaNews Group/Boston Herald)
The business community is urging the City Council to approve millions of dollars in grant funding for the Boston Regional Intelligence Center, saying that the money is needed to “quell recent violence” that has put public safety at a “crisis point.”
James Rooney, president and CEO of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, wrote a letter in support of advancing $3.4 million to fund the BRIC, money that has been earmarked by the state for the past four years, but held up by the council.
The City Council is expected to vote on funding the intelligence arm of the city’s police department on Wednesday, three weeks after rejecting three $850,000 grants set aside for the BRIC. A fourth $850,000 grant was later filed by the mayor.
“The Chamber continues to hear from concerned workers, residents, community leaders, business owners and the broader public about the recent rise in shootings and violent incidents,” Rooney wrote in a letter to the Council. “Funds for appropriate and necessary technology utilized for anti-crime and emergency response will help address the violence in all of Boston’s neighborhoods.”
Rooney said the funding would bolster “data-driven policing that will support the highest quality of life and healthier business climate.” His letter states that crime increased by 7% in downtown Boston for the first half of 2023.
During the previous 19 months, the Boston Police Department was called to the Macy’s department store in Downtown Crossing nearly 150 times for reports of disturbances, threats and acts of violence. In other neighborhoods, shootings and violence continue and remain unsolved, the letter states.
“Community leaders have expressed that the safety and well-being of the public is at a crisis point, and police funding is needed to quell recent violence,” Rooney wrote.
The BRIC grants, from fiscal years 2020-23, would go toward improving technology aimed at fighting crime, gangs and terrorism. It would allow the department to hire eight analysts, Police Commissioner Michael Cox said at a Friday City Council committee hearing.
The Chamber joined Mayor Michelle Wu and City Council President Ed Flynn in posturing ahead of Wednesday’s vote on the BRIC grants, in light of the opposition raised by progressive-leaning councilors and members of the community at last week’s hearing.
Most of the opposition centered around the BRIC’s gang database, which critics say is racially discriminatory, in that it disproportionately tracks people of color.
Rooney’s letter, while sent to the Council last Thursday, was shared via one of the Chamber’s social media pages on Monday. Wu’s office shared a letter the mayor sent to the City Council on Tuesday, explaining why she flipped on her prior opposition to the BRIC, which included voting down an $850,000 grant in 2021.
Flynn’s office also shared a statement, saying that the council president would be voting in favor of the grants on Wednesday. Flynn joined Councilors Frank Baker, Liz Breadon, Michael Flaherty and Erin Murphy in voting in favor last month.
The mayor’s letter reiterates what she stated on a radio appearance last week. Wu wrote that new leadership at the city’s police department and efforts to clear names that were no longer relevant from the BRIC’s gang database caused her to change her earlier view.
As a mayoral candidate, Wu stated support for abolishing the BRIC and dismantling the gang database.
In 2021, the mayor’s letter states, new regulations were put in place that required BPD to remove inactive individuals on a regular basis, which led to 609 names being purged from the database in 2021, and 1,836 in 2022. Wu also pointed to a city ordinance that created the Office of Police Accountability and Transparency.
“In order to most effectively deploy our investments and resources to reduce gun violence and other types of crime within our neighborhoods, we must invest in public safety intelligence and analysis,” Wu wrote.
During Friday’s hearing, Councilor Julia Mejia, who called for abolishing the BRIC in 2021, had requested that the mayor provide an explanation “on the record,” saying that she would not consider voting in favor of the grants otherwise.
“Many of us do not believe that BRIC is operating with the best intentions of Black and brown and Muslims and people of diverse experiences,” Mejia said. “We do not have that data that affirms us, that makes us believe that you have our best interests in mind. This is not about an anti-police situation. This is about people’s civil liberties.”
Councilor Ruthzee Louijeune expressed similar sentiments. Citing prior court rulings made against the gang database, she said, “I don’t see a reason to trust the data the BRIC is collecting.”
Cox said, however, that the data-driven work done by the BRIC “is not about vilifying people of color. It’s really about identifying … the people who are driving the crime, violent crime in our city, and keeping track of that information.”
