There is no greater privilege than to toil in service of others. For 1,515 days, I had the honor of leading the economic advancement of the city that raised me. After being vacant for more than six months since my departure, it is clear that City Hall has struggled to fill what I considered the greatest job in the world. This is, in part, because there is no clear vision for what the person in this role should do. Since none has been publicly articulated by the administration, I would like to offer one.
When I was pressed into service by Mayor Wu in 2022, we changed our cabinet name to “Economic Opportunity and Inclusion” because it was understood that the development of some communities cannot coexist with the underdevelopment of others. Emerging from the pandemic, we understood that making opportunities available required building the on-ramps that would give every community equal access to reaching them.
For four years, we delivered more than $35 million in grants to over 1,500 small businesses across every neighborhood and demographic, with the majority being awarded to Black and other diverse businesses. The percentage of contracts awarded to local and diverse firms more than doubled, with over $474 million worth of contracts being awarded to non-white firms over three years, compared to just $225 million in the previous four. We welcomed LEGO, Hasbro, Qblox and other major employers to Boston, and we invested heavily in bringing foot traffic and businesses back to downtown.
Statistics were never the point, though. The point was to bring every neighborhood closer to City Hall and weave an economic development lens into every department. This moment calls for someone outside of City Hall who is rooted in Boston’s neighborhoods, reflective of our diversity, fluent in what an equitable economy requires and ready to listen and lead from day one.
The public data explain why. Less than a third of people who work in Boston actually live in the city. The recent Boston Fed report shows the median white family in Greater Boston holds $158,000 in wealth outside the home compared to zero dollars for the Black family. Half of Boston’s renters are cost burdened and more than 1 in 6 residents lives in poverty. Unemployment rose in 2025, job postings remain below their 2022 peak and hiring has flattened. You’re inheriting a slowing economy, which is usually when this work gets cut first and needed most. Those disparities should guide Boston’s growth agenda, not sit apart from it, for they are a threat to Boston’s competitiveness. Reject the false choice between a thriving downtown and strong neighborhoods. Each depends on the other. Companies are not choosing Boston because it is cheaper, warmer or easier to get around. Rather, it is because Boston is, as the mayor has said, the “human capital capital.”
Companies need people, and people choose places where they can build meaningful lives. Those who live or learn here need pathways into family-sustaining careers. Those who move here need housing they can afford in vibrant neighborhoods. Favor one side over another and companies will live mostly in press releases: one announcing their arrival, another mourning their departure.
Wealth creation should be the main priority with equity at the center. Your first opportunity sits along Blue Hill Avenue. Treat this corridor — from Mattapan Square to Nubian Square — as one economy. Nubian is finally on the rise, and the road to Mattapan is facing two major projects — the Blue Hill Avenue redesign and renovation of White Stadium — that, without a plan, will lead to the gentrification that residents are right to fear. Your charge is to quickly develop a framework for protecting residents, supporting local businesses and preventing the displacement that will undoubtedly follow. Work with fellow departments, city councilors and other elected officials of substance, and community leaders who already have the answers and simply need a champion.
I encourage you to treat supplier diversity as the economic imperative that it is, not as charity. Understand that our institutions are more than employers or taxpayers; enlist them to hire residents, purchase locally and invest in our neighborhoods. Remember that economic development is not a department, but a way of governing.
I love Boston. I was raised on the second pew of Roxbury’s Twelfth Baptist Church; taught by our best educators in the North End and Dorchester; scraped my knees roughhousing in Roslindale; and cooled down with Ron’s frappes in Hyde Park. The rhythm and energy of our city — from the philanthropy of our small businesses to the rich display of authentic democracy in neighborhood meetings to the engaged stewardship of our business and civic leaders — prove David McCord right. He wrote in his love note, About Boston: “You have not really seen this city anywhere before.”
Nor has there been a greater privilege than serving it.
Segun Idowu served as Boston’s Chief of Economic Opportunity and Inclusion from January 2022 to February 2026.
