Municipal Workers Struggle to Stay in City Limits
Before real estate prices jumped in many American cities, municipalities often required police officers, firefighters and other city workers to live in city limits. Ideally, these workers would become an integral part of the communities they serve. But some city employees in Boston are questioning whether the policy is still economically feasible.
LINDA WERTHEIMER, host:
For decades, many municipalities have required police officers, firefighters or other city workers to live within the city limits. The idea is that people who work for the city will have more of a stake in its neighborhoods and services if they live there, too. But where real estate prices have been surging, city employees say they can no longer afford to live where they work. NPR's Chris Arnold reports from Boston.
CHRIS ARNOLD reporting:
Thirty years ago, the city of Boston was in turmoil. Large tracts of the city had fallen into neglect and disrepair. The federal courts had found racial segregation in the public schools and the resulting desegregation was marred by protests that sometimes turned violent. Larry DiCara was on the Boston City Council at the time.
Mr. LARRY DiCARA (Former Boston City Council Member): The city population had declined precipitously. The school population declined some 20 percent in two or three years. People were often abandoning properties in the city and large numbers of public employees were living elsewhere.
ARNOLD: So back then, DiCara co-sponsored legislation that required city workers to live inside the city, mainly to help stabilize things.
Mr. DiCARA: The goal was to keep those solid middle-class people in the city who were public employees, the kinds of folks who are Little League coaches and Sunday school teachers and Girl Scout leaders.
ARNOLD: Fast forward three decades, though, and Boston is a very different place. Residential real estate prices have nearly tripled since 1997. Developers have been eagerly buying up run-down houses and apartment buildings and transforming them into remodeled condos with granite kitchen counter tops and hefty price tags. Mike Sullivan is a 28-year-old firefighter standing in the truck bay at his firehouse in Dorchester.
Mr. MIKE SULLIVAN (Firefighter): Around here is usually about 400,000. Might get a little less, little more, but actually a lot more if it goes up. Around this area, this house is going for six, 700,000 now.
ARNOLD: Sullivan's actually off duty at the moment. He's walked over to the fire house with his youngest daughter under his arm.
Mr. SULLIVAN: This is Meagan(ph). She's four months old and she's a character.
(Soundbite of baby crying)
Mr. SULLIVAN: Oh. My middle one's four years old and my oldest is 11.
ARNOLD: Sullivan says it's getting a little tight for the family renting a two-bedroom apartment in the city and even his kids have been asking lately about buying a house.
Mr. SULLIVAN: My oldest one especially, she sees a house, `Oh, look at that house,' you know, `it's for sale' or `Look at that one there.' We're like, `Yeah, yeah, it's for sale.'
ARNOLD: But Sullivan says with three kids, he knows he just can't afford anything in the city on his $55,000 a year salary.
Mr. SULLIVAN: You know, I would love to give them that house that they want or that back yard that they want, but it's not within our means. And when it comes down to it, my wife and I got to be realistic, you know. So, you know, we just say, `Oh, yeah, it's for sale, but it's not our time.'
ARNOLD: Sullivan's union has been asking legislators to allow city workers to move to the suburbs. Edward Kelly is president of Boston Firefighters Local 718.
Mr. EDWARD KELLY (President, Boston Firefighters Local 718): Our membership needs relief. We need to be able to take care of our families, and this residency requirement is impeding that. It should be illegal. It's America.
ARNOLD: Sullivan says the city shouldn't have the right to tell people where they can live for their entire career. Various unions over the years have already won exemptions for some workers in Boston. Teachers are exempt, as are many senior police and firefighters hired before a certain date. Overall, only about a third of city workers are required to live here. Residency requirement advocates, though, say police will know the city and its neighborhoods better if they live here, and they argue that other city workers can bring pressure to fix problems in schools and elsewhere. So former city councilman Larry DiCara thinks the requirement should stay.
Mr. DiCARA: We don't have a lack of people that want to be firefighters in Boston or police officers, so we have a supply-and-demand situation where because the wages are, relatively speaking, high compared to the suburban communities, people want those jobs. And I think we want to have as many of those people living in the city as possible. And if, hypothetically, Joe or Jane doesn't want to live in Boston and doesn't want to accept a job as a Boston firefighter, they can go work someplace else. That's their choice.
ARNOLD: Other local government experts, though, are skeptical that forcing city workers to live in the city makes much of an economic or social difference. Here, they're less than 4 percent of the adult population.
Chris Arnold, NPR News, Boston.
WERTHEIMER: This is MORNING EDITION from NPR News. I'm Linda Wertheimer.
STEVE INSKEEP (Host): And I'm Steve Inskeep.
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