Boston City Councilor Ed Flynn was left steaming after a hearing he called to analysis the city’s policy for hiring ex-convicts was abruptly canceled, a decision he says was made to avoid questions about the mayor’s hire of a Level 3 sex offender.
Flynn said he was notified Friday afternoon that a hearing scheduled for Monday on his order to discuss the impact of the city’s Criminal Offender Record Information, or CORI, policy on access to employment, was canceled.
The councilor who chairs the committee that was set to hold the hearing cited a prior family commitment for the cancellation. But Flynn suspects the real reason is due to a desire to shield the Wu administration from answering questions about the revelation that a Level 3 sex offender had been working for the Boston parks and recreation department for the past year, as reported by the Herald on Thursday.
“Administration officials would be present at Monday’s hearing, and city councilors would have the opportunity to ask questions about CORI reform and also about any other relevant subject that’s relating to CORI,” Flynn told the Herald Friday. “I’m sure some councilors would ask about the recent hiring practices and background checks on Level 3 sex offenders.”
Flynn said it’s “definitely not appropriate to hire a Level 3 sex offender that is working with the public and children in a position like the parks department, where you interact with youth in playgrounds throughout the city.”
“Many of these issues are controversial and often challenging and difficult to talk about,” he said. “However, that is not a reason to not have a discussion about them. We can’t pick and choose what difficult subjects we want to talk about. The City Council should be able to discuss topics such as CORI reform and whether or not it’s appropriate to hire Level 3 sex offenders who work in parks and playgrounds.”
The Herald reported Thursday that a registered Level 3 sex offender with multiple convictions for sexually assaulting a child had been working for the city’s parks and recreation department for the past year until his employment ended Tuesday.
Robert M. Claud, 37, of Dorchester, was hired by the city last year as a heavy motor equipment operator and laborer for the parks department, per city payroll records.
Claud has two convictions for indecent assault and battery on a child under 14 years of age and one conviction for open and gross lewdness and lascivious behavior. The convictions are from Feb. 6, 2013, according to the state’s sex offender registry board.
Level 3, which Claud is registered at, is the most dangerous sex offender level. Those registered offenders are considered to have a high risk of reoffending and pose a high degree of danger to the public, according to the state website.
After repeated inquiries, Mayor Michelle Wu’s office confirmed Thursday that Claud was working for the city, but that his employment ended this past Tuesday, Aug. 12. The mayor’s office didn’t say whether he was fired or left voluntarily.
When asked what the city’s policy was for hiring sex offenders, Wu’s office provided the Herald with a copy of its CORI policy.
Flynn said that while his hearing was not set to focus on the Level 3 sex offender hire until it was revealed in a news article, he was intending to pitch questions about whether the CORI policy provided for disclosure for what charges someone had been convicted on upon their hire by the city and whether any types of charges would preclude an ex-convict from being hired.
He said he also planned to ask if a background check had been performed on the Level 3 sex offender, and if so, whether the CORI check flagged the “major” sexual assault convictions.
Of ex-convicts, or returning citizens as they are referred to by city politicians, Flynn said, “I do believe they deserve an opportunity to be hired in appropriate positions, but a Level 3 sex offender working in the parks and playgrounds and schools should certainly disqualify anyone, in my opinion.”
“But it’s important to have those conversations,” the councilor said. “Just because it’s an election year doesn’t mean … we can’t have a conversation on important topics.”
Flynn said he was told the hearing would be rescheduled in late September or early October, after the Sept. 9 mayoral and city council preliminary elections, which he felt was a political decision.
“It sends a signal that politics is more important than actually trying to help returning citizens and having a discussion about potential jobs that would preclude returning citizens from acquiring such as Level 3 sex offenders,” Flynn said. “We’re not going forward with that important discussion because of Boston politics.”
Councilor Benjamin Weber, who chairs the Labor, Workforce and Economic Development Committee that was set to hold Monday’s hearing, said the “hearing was rescheduled due to a scheduling conflict on the administrative side.”
Weber said he requested dates when the Wu administration would be more available before moving the hearing, and both sides settled on Sept. 22.
“Moreover, this hearing was inadvertently scheduled on Monday since I will be out of town while dropping off my son for his freshman year of college,” Weber said in a statement to the Herald. “While the vice chair could have held the hearing without me, I look forward to being on hand for this important discussion.”
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