Roberta Schaefer’s Testimony before the Worcester City Council Tax Classification hearing, December 21, 2010

Yesterday, The Research Bureau published its annual survey of downtown office occupancy. While the occupancy rate decreased by less than one percent between 2009 and 2010, Table 1 of our report shows that the City has lost 10.6% of its downtown office space in the past five years and the amount of occupied space has decreased by almost 19% during the same time period. That means there are many fewer businesses downtown to pay the ever increasing tax burden than there were five years ago.

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