The Everett City Council spent Monday night doing what local government often does best: postponing a routine utility petition, letting outside speakers flood the room on a labor ordinance, and then passing that ordinance after the usual round of “don’t worry, this definitely won’t affect the people you’re worried about.”
The cleanest item of the night was also the smallest.
National Grid came in seeking permission to install “approximately 30 feet of underground conduits” from an existing pole to serve 313 Elm Street. Moses Okokuro of National Grid said the work was for a customer-requested service conversion, would happen during the day, and “shouldn’t take… more than, say, a week’s worth of work.”
Councilor Holly Garcia asked the basic practical questions. Was it customer-requested? Yes. Daytime work? Yes. About a week? Yes.
Anthony DiPierro then clarified what property this was. He said it was “the building under rehabilitation… the corner of Woodland that is being rebuilt currently.” Okokuro answered, “Correct.” DiPierro added the important part for anybody already spinning up a narrative: “It’s not a new building… It’s rehabilitation of that site.”
Then came public comment from neighboring owner Deborah DeFilippo of 315 Elm Street, Woodland Memorials. The transcript excerpt provided cuts off before her full remarks, but the result was plain enough: the council closed the hearing and then DiPierro moved to postpone the matter to the next meeting. Passed by voice vote. Council President Stephanie Smith said it would be back “in two weeks.”
So the utility work did not get denied. It got parked.
The real action was the wage theft ordinance.
And to be precise, the room was not just Everett people talking about Everett. Jeff Cohen, a Salem resident and former Salem city councilor, came in to tell Everett he wrote Salem’s 2023 ordinance and to sell the model here. He was not shy about it either.
“There are contractors that no longer are willing to work in Salem,” Cohen said. “That’s a good thing.”
That line tells you exactly what this ordinance is meant to do. Not just punish proven bad actors after the fact. Change who is willing to do business with the city in the first place.
Cohen also did what advocates for this kind of measure usually do: bundle together every ugly labor abuse on earth into one package. He said this is not just about prevailing wage. “This is $10.99 cash. This is child labor violations. This is human trafficking. This is sexual physical assault on the job. This is workers not being paid at all.”
That is emotionally effective rhetoric. It also conveniently blurs the line between wage enforcement, procurement rules, criminal conduct, and workplace assault. Those are not all the same thing. If the city is going to legislate in this area, that distinction matters.
State Senator Sal DiDomenico also showed up to support it, despite saying he usually does not intervene in council matters. He said, “Wage theft is my bill at the State House,” and ran through the numbers he has used for years, saying lost wages statewide have gone from roughly $300 million annually to $1.1 billion.
He also made a point worth taking seriously: gateway cities like Everett do get hit by shady operators who think working-class immigrant labor is easy to exploit. That problem is real. Nobody serious denies it.
The question is whether the ordinance Everett passed is targeted tightly enough to hit those actors without becoming one more vague threat hanging over ordinary business activity.
That concern came up directly on the floor.
Councilor Marchese was the one who said out loud what a lot of smaller business owners were likely thinking. He talked about going “up and down Broadway” and seeing “these little stores,” then mocked the broad reading of the ordinance: “So next time you go in and get a sub, just tell the guy… cleaning the stuff in the back, hope he’s on the books or we’re gonna call for him.”
That is crude, but it gets at the real issue. Is this aimed at fly-by-night contractors and dangerous construction sites, or is it a city-created complaint machine that can be weaponized against every small operator with imperfect paperwork?
Stephanie Martins tried to reassure everyone. “As long as the businesses are doing what’s right, then they shouldn’t have anything to worry about,” she said. She also said, “We, as a city, are not inspecting. But if it’s been reported, then we’ll take action.”
That sounds comforting until you think about how politics in 2026 actually works. “If it’s been reported” by whom? Competitors? Disgruntled activists? People with an axe to grind? A complaint-based system is still a system, and systems get used by whoever shows up to use them.
Still, several councilors landed where Everett usually lands on labor issues: if the bad actors are real, give the city another tool.
Councilor Matuszewski, speaking as a 40-year bricklayers union member, said the measure was “focused in on construction corporations,” unsafe sites, and companies that “don’t do the right thing.” He referenced a worker death on a parkway project and said, “This is not only about money. It’s about safety.”
Al Pietrantonio took a similar line: “If they’re doing the right thing, they shouldn’t have a problem.” He said he did not think it was “really gonna affect the small business that much.”
Maybe. Maybe not. Ordinances are always sold as narrow and sensible on passage night. The test comes later, when somebody decides to use one.
In the end, Martins moved favorable action “for ordainment as amended,” Garcia seconded, and the measure passed by roll call, 9-2.
The clerk briefly mangled the announcement as “9 nays, 2 nays,” which, to be fair, would have been an impressive parliamentary achievement. It was quickly clarified: 9 yeas, 2 nays. Ordinance passed.
Also hanging over the public comment period were two familiar Everett obsessions: opposition to data centers in the Docklands and criticism of a recent Washington trip by councilors. Those issues were in the air, but the ordinance vote was the actual business of the night.
So what did the council really do here?
It gave itself leverage. That was the word Matuszewski used, and it is the honest one.
Whether that leverage gets used against genuine labor scofflaws or turns into another political tool will depend on enforcement, definitions, and whether anybody at city hall is willing to say no when the wrong people come demanding action. In Everett, that is never a trivial detail.