MBTA Act update | ?? Scott free (to reopen) | What’s next for Wu’s tax plan

Welcome to the BBJ's LinkedIn Weekly Edition! I'm Managing Editor Don Seiffert and 40 years ago this fall, I learned how to do front flips and handsprings as a freshman high school gymnast. I have recently been inspired by the Paris Olympics and related TikToks to try these moves again, but my wife would prefer I finish my will first. In the meantime, here's the business knowledge you need this week.

MBTA Act aftermath

This week, we checked in on one of the first towns to pass a zoning plan to comply with the MBTA Communities Act. That law, signed into law by former Gov. Charlie Baker in 2021, mandates that 177 communities all over Eastern Massachusetts — those with MBTA or commuter rail stops, as well as adjacent towns — allow multi-family housing to be built “by right.”

While other towns have rebelled, Lexington passed its zoning plan in 2023 — a year and a half early — and its plan allows more multi-family housing than required. Greg Ryan took a look at what’s been the upshot so far for this “canary” in the coal mine of the MBTA Act.

What he found is four proposals so far for apartment and condo buildings in MBTA zones, encompassing 285 new housing units, and more expected in coming weeks. None of the projects have yet been approved, however, and even without facing the hurdle of getting a special permit to built, one developer said, “Lexington has some pretty stiff requirements. Nothing has been a slam dunk.”

In the week’s editorial, the BBJ’s editorial board holds up Lexington as an example suggesting that the worst NIMBY fears of the MBTA Act have not borne out, at least not yet.

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Here's what else happened this week

Boston’s great tax shift controversy is far from over

Mayor Michelle Wu won a victory earlier in the week when the House voted to advance her proposal to shift more of the property tax burden from homeowners to businesses after she agreed to lower the maximum tax hike and to cut the length of the hikes. But the Senate was just not that into it. In the short term, prospects of Wu getting her way appear slim, but as Greg Ryan explains, the battle is far from over.

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Great Scott, season 2

In the early 1990s, I lived above what was once a Pizzeria UNO at the corner of Harvard Avenue and Commonwealth Avenue in the heart of Downtown Allston during the height of its grunge era. From our roof we could watch the people line up to go to Great Scott, a music-and-beer venue for local bands right across the street. So you can imagine my sense of nostalgia to hear the club, which closed in 2020, is coming back, albeit in a new location. Eli Chavez has the details.

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Add it up

Two national accounting firms, both with a significant presence in Boston, are planning to combine. CBIZ Inc. is the 11th largest accounting firm in the U.S. with $1.4 billion in revenue. It will acquire Marcum LLP, the 13th largest accounting firm in the U.S. with $1.3 billion in revenue. Trajan Warren has the timing and details on the potential impact locally.

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Goldman Sach’s latest investment? An Eastie apartment building.

The real estate investment arm of the Wall Street giant Goldman Sachs Ayco bought a 200-unit apartment complex on the East Boston waterfront. The purchase come less than a year after GS bought Hanover North Cambridge, a 294-unit apartment complex next to the MBTA’s Alewife station, for $182 million. Makes you wonder: What do they know they we don't know?

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