Mayor Wu Appoints Kairos Shen New Chief of Planning

 Today, Mayor Michelle Wu announced she has appointed Kairos Shen to be the City’s new Chief of Planning. In this role, Shen will lead the City of Boston Planning Department, which was established by Mayor Wu in July of 2024 to restore planning as a core function of City government. Shen will build on the work launched under former Chief Arthur Jemison, moving the city to a consistent and modernized zoning code, comprehensive short and long term planning, inclusive design standards, and streamlined and predictable development review. 

“I’m thrilled to welcome Kairos into leadership of Boston’s Planning Department and all the critical functions shaping the built environment for affordability, equity, and resilience,” said Mayor Michelle Wu. “As a longtime friend and advisor, Kairos brings an unparalleled knowledge and expertise of this work and our communities. His decades of public, private, and institutional experience in Boston, and the relationships he has built across the City, will help the new Planning Department advance our ambitious work to grow Boston and make our City a place everyone can call home.” 

Over the last two years, Mayor Wu has taken significant steps to change and improve the culture of planning and development in Boston, reforming the structure of the department and launching the first citywide rezoning and development review reforms in many decades. Mayor Wu has counted Kairos as a mentor and trusted advisor since her early days working under the Menino administration nearly 15 years ago. For the last two years, he has served as a member of the Article 80 Modernization Steering Committee, which will release consensus recommendations for public feedback this week.

“I’m excited to return to City Hall with a fresh perspective after a decade of teaching, research, and mentoring the next generation of urban planners and designers,” said Kairos Shen. “Boston is a different City than it was ten years ago, and I’m inspired by the incredible strides Mayor Wu has taken in just two and a half years. I’m looking forward to advancing the significant work that has already begun including zoning reform and making development review more predictable and transparent.

Shen will begin transitioning into the role in early October and will begin serving as the Chief of Planning on October 15. He will maintain an affiliation with MIT while working for the City. Shen currently teaches “City Making” at the MIT Center for Real Estate, drawing on knowledge, research, and practice across the fields of planning, design, public policy, finance, and real estate. Shen was Executive Director of the MIT Center for Real Estate from 2020-2024. In that role, he oversaw the Master of Science Real Estate Development degree program as well as the Center’s relationships and partnerships with the development, architecture, and design industries. Shen’s passion for teaching was to guide, mentor, and prepare students for solving complex challenges within urban planning such as social equity, housing affordability, and climate resiliency.

Prior to his career in academia, Shen worked in City Hall in a number of different roles in planning and design over the course of two decades under Mayor Thomas Menino and Mayor Martin Walsh. Shen had a hand in shaping the City’s most pivotal planning initiatives and development projects from 1993-2015, a period of substantial growth and investment in the City. Shen is a graduate of Swarthmore College and has a Master of Architecture from MIT.

Devin Quirk, who has been serving as Interim Chief of Planning, will resume his role as Deputy Chief of the Planning Department. Quirk will continue overseeing all aspects of day-to-day operations of the Planning Department and serving as advisor to Shen and Mayor Wu. Quirk has 14 years experience working in the City of Boston, recently leading efforts to create and launch the City’s Planning Department, and has served in roles leading real estate development, affordable housing creation, and community planning across multiple cabinets within City Hall.  

“Kairos brings a rare set of expertise to this role – exceptional professional experience of all aspects of our work, deep knowledge of Boston’s neighborhoods, and relationships across the real estate industry and community,” said Deputy Chief Devin Quirk. “He is the right leader to advance the Mayor’s agenda for a more predictable and transparent development environment and I’m excited to work with him in this new capacity.”