FALL 2008 BOSTON 101 SERIES Join us on November 17 at 5:30 p.m. in the Allison Dining Room on the 5th floor of the Taubman Building at 15 Eliot Street for a discussion on "Reviewing Chapter 40B: What Gets Proposed, Approved, Appealed, and Built?" with Lynn Fisher, Associate Professor of Real Estate, Department of Urban Studies and Planning and the Center for Real Estate at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Deborah Goddard, Chief Counsel, Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development.

The Boston 101 Fall Season wraps up on Monday, December 1 at 5:30 p.m. in Bell Hall on the 5th floor of the Belfer Building at the corner of JFK and Eliot Streets with a discussion on "Reforming Juvenile Justice: Lessons from Missouri's Award-Winning Program with Tim Decker, Director of the Missouri Division of Youth Services, Gary Stangler, Executive Director of the Jim Casey Youth Opportunities Initiative, Zuline Gray Wilkinson, Vice President for Clinical Multi-Cultural Family Practice at the Home for Little Wanderers and Julie Wilson, Executive Director of the Malcolm Wiener Center for Social Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. (MORE)

RAPPAPORT INSTITUTE SUMMER FELLOWSHIP RECRUITMENT MEETINGS ARE NOW TAKING PLACE Are you a graduate student interested in public policy? Do you want to gain experience in state or local government before you graduate? Are you curious about how state or local government “really” works? Do you want to earn $7000 for the summer? Attend a Rappaport Summmer Public Policy Recruitment Session and learn how you can join an interdisciplinary community of professionals dedicated to improving civic life in the Boston region and earn $7,000 for the summer. Upcoming sessions are at Brandeis University on Thursday, November 20. (MORE)

NEW RAPPAPORT INSTITUTE POLICY BRIEF Reviewing Chapter 40B: What Gets Proposed, Approved, Appealed, and Built?
by Lynn Fisher, Associate Professor of Real Estate, Department of Urban Studies and Planning and the Center for Real Estate, MIT. For almost 40 years, Chapter 40B, a unique Massachusetts law, has allowed the state to overrule local land use decisions for housing projects that include subsidized units in communities that lack such housing. Because Chapter 40B is so important for multi-family housing production and because 40B projects often are controversial, it is critical to understand how the law actually works in practice. In this new Institute Policy Brief, MIT's Lynn Fisher uses a unique survey of officials in 144 Boston-area cities and towns to assess what kinds of projects are built with little controversy, which are substantially delayed, and which never get built.