The night of Dec. 11 was cold and biting, but didn’t keep Boston’s residents from making their way to City Hall to attend a nearly three hour hearing, where people spoke of accountability, racial and class discrimination, and freedom when debating the governance structure of the Boston School Committee. Two panels spoke in stark opposition…
Ending Youth Homelessness: An Interview With the Associate Director of the Massachusetts Homeless Coalition
Kelly Turley (second from right), Associate Director of the Massachusetts Homeless Coalition, talks to Spare Change News about the challenge of ending youth homelessness in the Commonwealth. On any given night in Massachusetts, hundreds of unaccompanied young adults and youth are homeless for a variety of reasons. According to the 2017 Massachusetts Youth Count conducted by…
Bill Murray chats about his late-career dive into music
Bill Murray and Jan Vogler Bill Murray is on the road. Calling from Charlotte, North Carolina, where it’s well after midnight, he and classical cellist Jan Vogler are winding down after a performance on their unusual tour, which sees the famously quirky movie star singing – yes, singing – and reciting literature with a chamber…
Did ‘Old School Justice’ Catch Up to Whitey Bulger?
When I heard the news about James “Whitey” Bulger being savagely killed in his new prison in West Virginia, it came as no surprise. For years he ratted on the New England Mafia to increase his own crime organization’s control of the Boston area. I grew up in New Jersey and started using cough syrup…
Stagnant Wages and Rising Rents Squeeze the Middle Class Out of Boston
Boston, and Massachusetts overall, have been outpacing the country on low unemployment numbers and providing housing for the poor, but a new report suggests that this growth is largely limited to the wealthy, and that upward mobility is on the decline. A new poverty report from the Boston Foundation’s research center titled “Boston’s Booming…But for…
Parting Ways at the Crossroads
There has been a sadness around me lately. As many of you know, we lost a family member, our long time vendor Fred Boykin. And as I sit here writing this column I’m thinking of his positive spirit despite all the obstacles in his way. I wish I could be more like he was, now…
Protests against Kavanaugh bookend the week in Boston
The week leading up to Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation to the Supreme Court of the United States started and ended with rallies protesting his appointment. On Monday, Oct. 1, hundreds of people gathered on City Hall Plaza next to a Forbes 30 Under 30 event where Senator Jeff Flake was scheduled to speak. Flake had called…
At Rosie’s Place, a legal program helps vulnerable women navigate immigration, debt and everything in between
For over 40 years in Boston’s South End neighborhood, Rosie’s Place has opened its doors to homeless and impoverished women seeking assistance and safety. The bustling lobby rarely — if ever — slows down. A little past the front desk, the office of the legal assistance program has become increasingly in-demand and growing to meet…
Boston Housing Authority employee slights the city in letter to residents
Recently, someone mentioned that perhaps the Boston Housing Authority needs a consumer advocacy group made up of tenants and other partner agencies. This group could advise BHA on problems such as it’s ponderous orientation program and interview process. But after a recent and undoubtedly colossal mistake by the agency, maybe it’s time to just start…
With thousands more projected to live in Boston by 2030, city plans to add affordable housing changes
Census data from 2016 has Boston rethinking its housing goals for 2030, which is projected to see 59,000 more residents than anticipated. City officials released a revised version of their Imagine Boston 2030 plan that includes building an additional 16,000 units by 2030, upping the 2030 projected population of people in Boston from 709,000 by…