Page 14 - Michael Flaherty News Today

The Boston City Council is split on releasing $3.4 million in grant funding to the investigative arm of the city’s police department. 

The City Council voted to fund a $27.35 million collective bargaining agreement with the Boston firefighters union that includes a roughly 10.6% bump in pay over a three-year period.

The City Council approved a labor agreement reached between the Wu administration and the city’s firefighters union, Local 718. The sign-off, which came at Wednesday’s Council meeting and sent the agreement to Mayor Wu’s desk, was unanimous. The agreement, which Wu announced at the Greater Boston Labor Council’s Labor Day breakfast earlier this month, runs from July 2021

Anthony Hellis, at the time the youngest officer on the Muncie Police Department, was fatally shot while searching for a suspect on Sept. 30, 1923.

Administration officials were peppered with questions about the efficacy of Mayor Michelle Wu’s proposal, which is aimed at giving police increased authority to clear tents and ramshackle street shelters.

Four city councilors seeking a state of emergency declaration in the Mass and Cass zone were incensed when the Wu administration blew off a Tuesday City Council hearing on the matter. 

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu said new leadership at the city’s police department and efforts to clear names that were no longer relevant from its gang database caused her to change her earlier view, and support funding for BPD’s investigative arm.

The Wu administration may not support a state of emergency declaration request for Mass and Cass from the City Council this week, given the Board of Health’s decision against taking such action earlier this month, the Herald has learned.

A highly-publicized overdose death that occurred in a public housing unit with four children present didn’t really cause much of a stir at the Boston Housing Authority, where management says unresponsive person reports are “pretty common.”

Tasking police with tracking firearms sales in a bid to keep our communities safe - a worthy ask. But isn't this the same city council that passed an operating budget in June that would have cut roughly $31 million from the police department?