City Council to hold emergency hearing on hiring practices following ‘troubling’ incidents

Local News

The move comes after a city employee engaged in a violent struggle with police and the revelation that a sex offender was working for the parks department.

Members of the Boston City Council are pushing for an examination of the city’s hiring practices after a number of high-profile incidents in recent months caused alarm among residents and officials. 

Councilors Ed Flynn, Erin Murphy, and John FitzGerald introduced an emergency hearing order during the City Council meeting on Wednesday. It cites two specific recent incidents: the revelation that a Level 3 sex offender worked for the city’s Parks and Recreation Department and the violent arrest of a city employee at a traffic stop in South Boston. 

Earlier this year, two city employees were arrested and subsequently fired after police responded to a domestic incident that allegedly stemmed from the involvement of a top City Hall official in their relationship. An external investigation later determined that that official did not violate any city policies. 

“These failures highlight unacceptable gaps in background checks, sex offender screening, and continuous monitoring,” Murphy said. 

The pattern of incidents suggests that additional troubling incidents could be going undetected and that “urgent policy reform” is needed. The future hearing will focus on a number of topics, including pre-employment screening, criminal background checks, conditional employment offers, annual rechecks, rapid suspension protocols, and a potential audit of recent hires. Councilors want to hear from officials with the Boston Police Department, the city’s human resources department, the parks department, and others including outside experts. 

Flynn said that he was alarmed by the recent incidents and that residents deserve immediate answers. 

“I’m not comfortable with how we’re conducting CORIs and background checks on new city hires, potential hires. I do believe there’s a system-wide breakdown. We need to address it and provide the residents of Boston with an exceptional workforce,” he said. 

The hearing order was ultimately supported by six other City Council members. 

Councilor Sharon Durkan was one of the councilors who signed on to the hearing order and expressed her support for the measure. But she also cautioned against focusing on “individual instances” during hearings, something that councilors have previously agreed not to do. 

“I think we can zoom out and talk about all of this and continue to have these conversations, I think they’re incredibly important,” Durkan said. 

Durkan has clashed with Murphy and Flynn in recent weeks and drawn criticism over some moves to block resolutions favored by the two frequent critics of the Wu administration. 

The traffic stop incident occurred last month but was recently brought to light by WCVB. After being pulled over and questioned about the contents of his vehicle by a State Police trooper, a 25-year-old property management employee for the city attempted to flee. The trooper dove into the man’s vehicle to stop him, dropping his taser. The man allegedly used the taser on the trooper before being subdued with the help of an off-duty BPD officer. A handgun that had been converted into a fully automatic machine gun was later found in the car. 

Mayor Michelle Wu said that the city was aware that he had a criminal history when he was hired but defended the city’s hiring practices. He is being fired, she told The Boston Herald. 

The sex offender mentioned in the hearing order worked as a heavy motor equipment operator and laborer for the city, according to the Herald. He was fired earlier this month. 

FitzGerald said that that man lives near him and his family. 

“I know that that individual lived down the street from my own house and my own children. So, I know how that made me and my family feel, and I imagine if there are other folks that learn of that news that they might have the same sort of fears,” he said. “We just want to make sure that these processes are always improved and will always continuously be looked at, nothing more than that.”