Join us to hear from two influential leaders as they discuss how the Commonwealth can lead the AI Revolution.
01/21/2025
9:30am - 11:00am
Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce
Hear from James E. Rooney about the state of the economy, and how it all matters to businesses, residents, and policymakers.
01/22/2025
2:00pm - 2:30pm
Virtual
Join on us on Friday, January 31, as we host our highly anticipated 2025 Pinnacle Awards Luncheon.
01/31/2025
11:00am - 1:30pm
Omni Boston Hotel at the Seaport
Go deeper than basic DEI training to achieve higher productivity, satisfaction, and revenue growth with our new corporate workshop.
Join our Transformational DEI Certificate! Our comprehensive learning & development offerings are designed to connect and grow strong leaders who lead both inside and out of the office.
Our Women’s Leadership Program enables you to take your leadership to the next level by arming you with the most in-demand leadership toolkit.
Our Boston’s Future Leaders (BFL) program provides emerging leaders with a socially conscious and civically engaged leadership toolkit, as well as the opportunity to apply their knowledge through experiential assignments.
City Awake empowers young professionals in a variety of ways that encourages these rising leaders to stay invested in the region’s future success.
We are developing an ecosystem of corporations and partners with the influence and buying power to transform economic inclusion for minority business enterprises (MBEs).
The Fierce Urgency of Now Festival brings Boston’s diverse young professionals together with business leaders, organizations, and their peers to build connection, advance careers and ignite positive change.
09/14/2024 -
09/17/2024
Suffolk University - Sargent Hall
Small businesses are the backbone of the Boston economy. Learn more about the resources available through the Chamber.
BIMA (the Boston Interactive Media Association) serves a vibrant community of like-minded professionals from agencies, brands, publishers, and ad-tech companies with business interests in the New England market.
For 30 years, the Chamber’s Women’s Network has connected female professionals of all background and career levels. Today, our Women’s Network is the largest in New England, strengthening the professional networks of women each year.
The Massachusetts Apprentice Network convenes employers, training providers, and talent sources interested in developing and implementing apprenticeship programs in occupations across industries and statewide in fields such as tech, advanced manufacturing, healthcare, financial services, and more.
Explore our mission and values to better understand how we are leading the business community forward.
Our member directory is your resource to discover, connect, and engage with Boston’s businesses from every industry and sector.
The MBTA is getting mostly passing grades on achieving its own goals, but the agency may struggle to meet major milestones in the future.
That’s the outlook from a coalition that includes the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, the Conservation Law Foundation, and the MBTA Advisory Board, which represents the communities served by the T. The three groups formed a unique partnership last year to issue an annual report card, judging the T’s progress against the goals the agency put on paper as part of a “strategic plan” in 2017.
The coalition issued the first update Wednesday, finding that the T has achieved most of those key objectives or is making progress to meet them. They range from big-picture efforts like installing a new fare collection system and vastly improving the bus system, to less public initiatives like installing better technology to chart projects.
But, the report found, the agency has failed to meet deadlines on other goals, like developing a clear plan to make its infrastructure more resilient against climate change or updating its plan for improving accessibility for riders with disabilities.
The groups also say that the T has made progress on such longer-term goals as better aligning costs and expenses or vastly improving repair spending — but that the agency may have a hard time fully realizing those objectives.
For example, Chamber president James Rooney said that to achieve the long-term goal of fully repairing the system by 2032, the T will need to boost spending significantly in the coming years. He’s not convinced the state has a clear plan or enough funding to do so.
“It does highlight that some element of financial planning for the T and the broader transportation systems of the Commonwealth are necessary,” Rooney said.
He also added that the T is considering a number of initiatives — including boosting commuter rail frequency or shifting to electric buses — that could add even more costs.
Rooney credited the Baker administration with reforming several agency functions and controlling spending but said the time has come to talk about raising new funding for transportation. That perspective mirrors another business group, A Better City, which recently issued a report arguing the overall system will be underfunded by billions of dollars in the next decade.
While state transportation officials have contested that projection, some members of the MBTA’s oversight board have begun calling for the state to find new sources of transportation revenue to help fund the T.
Governor Charlie Baker, however, has said the focus for now should remain on raising MBTA fares, though he is also interested in exploring new fees based on transportation-related fuel distribution.
In a statement, MBTA general manager Steve Poftak said the report card “independently affirms much of the progress the MBTA has made since 2015,” but added that it “does point to areas where the T could improve.
Read this article at BostonGlobe.com.
Popular Resources