Category: Opinion
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We’ll be missing you, Nancy
When I was a kid, I loved watching old black-and-white movies with my mom and dad in the winter and doing a 1,000-piece puzzle. We’d sit in front of the fireplace just having fun until around 11, 12 or 1 o’clock in the morning. One person I liked to watch was Ronald Reagan. The one thing I…
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SCN teams up with Student Journalists
Back in 1992, the founders of Spare Change spoke earnestly of “Building a Bridge between the Haves and Have Nots.” This social justice newspaper was conceived of as more than an economic opportunity for vendors to have an alternative to panhandling for a living. The original purpose was to create a space for dialogue to…
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Flipping the Sheet: Reflections on the 2016 National Conference on Ending Family and Youth Homelessness
All photos: Andrew Giampa “We’re going to do some ice breakers to help us get to know each other better.” The leader told our group of 17 to all get up, stand on a flat bed sheet on the ground, and flip the sheet without anyone stepping off of it. If someone’s foot touched any…
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Winter in Boston
I’m tired of winter in Boston this year because it seems like it’s a totally different season from the ones we endured when I was a child growing up in Avon, Massachusetts. Back when I was a kid, winter was fun, but now it’s lost it’s flavor. It’s no longer fun to build snowmen, snow…
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General Electric Boston Deal: The Missing Manual
The saga of General Election’s flight from Connecticut began with the June 2015 passage of a very much needed package of state tax increases aimed at raising an extra $1.1 billion over the next two years. By extending a temporary 20 percent surcharge on its corporate profits tax and by implementing a more straightforward way of calculating corporate taxes,…
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The Valentine’s Day Freeze
I was one of the people out in the cold on Valentine’s Day. I’d hoped the Harvard Square Homeless Shelter would stay open, but it didn’t. Dawn, a former founder of the company, called some other shelters for us to see if we could stay there, but they said we couldn’t: they were already full…
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A Cold Weather Message from C.O.P.E.
Photo: Sushant Bhosale This weekend’s weather forecast looks bleak, especially for those who call the streets their home. Expected windchill factors could be as low as -23 degrees. I’m feeling a sense of anxiety and urgency. Not for me, but for our friends who will not have a safe and warm place to go as…
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Big Talk: Walsh functionally ends veteran homelessness, brags to Obama
This article comes courtesy of Boston Institute from Nonprofit Journalism. “I am so proud to announce: we have ended chronic veterans’ homelessness in Boston.” So said Mayor Marty Walsh in last week’s State of the City address, and in a follow-up tweet copying @WhiteHouse, @FLOTUS, @POTUS, and @SecretaryCastro for good measure. It’s a bold claim,…
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Treatment on Demand
Photo: Zengzheng Wang More and more, we see the opiate epidemic dominating the conversation in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. What was once thought to be only an inner-city issue is now affecting every social class in every corner of the state, in every community, whether rich or poor, high, middle or lower class. The need for treatment…
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VOICES FROM THE STREETS: Opioids for pain: the best idea
It astounds me how much controversy exists about prescribing opiates for pain. The fact is that opium-based prescriptions are by far the best painkillers around. When pharmaceutical companies make opiates, they make regulated doses. There are no surprise overdoses, unless the patient takes more than is prescribed. Does this happen? Well, human nature being what…