Letter from the Executive Director for April 2025: Thank you for Accurately Reporting

In March we continued our long-term projects. We want to hold Boston accountable to public records law, improve our website speed and grow the Mass Save program. We also rolled out the first of a set of changes to our terms and conditions. I will start with this, since it is actually the most important. First, some background.

MassLandlords competes with other advocacy organizations for Beacon Hill’s political consideration. Unlike other groups with insider influence, we pay the retail rate. We don’t take tax or grant money, we do disclose our lobbying, and we do pay taxes on it. It is much more expensive for us to be heard than for the typical renter nonprofit. Where do we get our funding?

When a new member signs up for dues on our site, or when an existing member renews, we collect (and keep private) information about the total number of units owned and managed across that person’s real estate empire. One membership payment gives their entire team access to our benefits. We scale dues by region and unit count. There’s a big difference in economic “oomph” between an owner-occupied duplex in Pittsfield and a 60-unit syndicated business in MetroWest. Each can support our work at different levels.

It has come to our attention that not all members are signing up or renewing with fully accurate unit counts. We use public records to know this for a fact. So we’ve updated our terms and conditions to make it more clear that accurate disclosure is a condition of membership. We’re now going to start billing members the difference between reported dues and correct dues, plus a verification fee. You can read the detailed terms online. Thank you for accurately reporting.

Switching gears, many of us need help managing cashflow. This is why we continue to work toward an option to pay dues monthly. This is going well. I thought monthly dues would be out this past winter. It will be ready soon. Also, we are still working on understanding why our site is slow.

A lot of time and attention has gone into our Boston public records case. The latest problem is they have tried to bury us in an avalanche of paper. They have produced over 8,500 pages of repetitive and non-responsive documents. We have distilled these down to just 25 unique and responsive pages. Our basic public records request remains unfulfilled. We asked the court for third-party verification. Our latest motion was denied. We are appealing.

Finally, I have given a lot of time to Mass Save the last 18 months. As you know, Mass Save is how Massachusetts fights climate change by decarbonizing buildings. We all pay a little on our utility bills. The new three-year, $5 billion Mass Save plan was supposed to be approved in March. Instead, a number of grossly uninformed representatives and senators led a populist revolt against corporate utility rates just as the plan was being approved. They maimed Mass Save by $500 million, or 10% of budget. We therefore still don’t have a 2025 to 2027 Mass Save plan. I hope we will have a new, smaller one by May 1.

Thank you for supporting our mission to create better rental housing. We've got your back only because you've got ours. Please join as a member, encourage others to join, become a property rights supporter or increase your level of support.

Sincerely,

Douglas Quattrochi

Executive Director

MassLandlords, Inc.