Emails reveal course to TIF; Cancer center almost moved.

• Position: NEWS

Byline: Shaun Sutner

WORCESTER - Mayor Joseph C. O'Brien, city councilors and the top aide to U.S. Rep. James P. McGovern jockeyed behind the scenes to tie a lucrative tax break for the new St. Vincent Hospital cancer center to a pro-union labor agreement, public records show.

Critics say the public officials circumvented what should have been a public debate about the merits of a tax break, instead pressuring the hospital in private to accept a labor deal that would boost the cost of the partially taxpayer-subsidized project.

Several dozen email messages obtained under a public records request by the Merit Construction Alliance, a trade group that lobbies for non-union construction firms, depict a flurry of activity last May after St. Vincent executives indicated they would move the $22 million downtown complex to the suburbs unless they got tax relief in the form of a tax-increment financing incentive.

Mr. O'Brien, a longtime advocate for organized labor, moved quickly, along with Central Massachusetts union leaders, to obtain concessions from the hospital and line up votes on the council for a $9 million-plus tax break if the hospital's parent company, Vanguard Health Systems, agreed to a memorandum of understanding with trade unions.

Ronald N. Cogliano, executive director of the Merit Construction Alliance, charged that this approach subverted the democratic process and resulted in a favorable deal for a special interest group.

"It was done behind the scenes, behind closed doors, without public knowledge," Mr. Cogliano said. "City councilors were ready to watch a development project go to the suburbs unless the developer capitulated to union demands."

Those involved, though, maintain that the back-and-forth between elected officials, hospital executives and labor union leaders was nothing more than the usual negotiations that accompany major economic development projects.

"It's a normal part of the legislative process to have conversations on the floor of the City Council, or to have different discussions," Mayor O'Brien said in an interview. "I can't say to someone: `I can't talk to you now, I have to be on the floor of the City Council.'"

As for union labor driving up the cost of the project, Mr. O'Brien said he has always argued that using union and local labor ultimately is a better value than employing non-union workers because money stays in the local economy and injury claims are reliably covered by health and worker's...