Category: Homelessness & Poverty
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Boston Puts Tech to Use in Ending Homelessness
Green River, a Cambridge-based software company, will build the web application for Mayor Martin Walsh’s action plan to end chronic and veteran homelessness. The application will provide a way to match homeless people with housing opportunities and resources. Currently, every shelter in Boston has its own way of figuring out where the best place is…
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Legislative Action Day 2016: Advocates demand better funding for low-income families and homelessness prevention programs
All Photos: Alena Kuzub Last Thursday morning, around 200 advocates, providers, and homeless people gathered at the State House’s Great Hall for the Massachusetts Coalition for the Homeless’ Legislative Action Day 2016. The six hour event consisted of three hours of testimonies, legislative remarks, advice for lobbying legislators, and a call to declare the homelessness…
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Lieutenant governor opens women’s substance abuse program at Taunton State Hospital
Photo: WikiCommons Lt. Gov. Karyn Polito unveiled a new program to help women who have been civically committed for drug treatments avoid going to prison earlier this month, Governor Charlie Baker’s office said. Polito and Human Services Secretary Marylou Sudders and Department of Mental Health Commissioner Joan Mikula opened the new Women’s Recovery from Addictions…
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Boston shelters expand hours and outreach efforts for winter
Photo: Sushant Bhosale The city of Boston’s emergency shelters are preparing for winter with expanded hours, more overflow spaces and extended outreach efforts. Additionally, shelters will coordinate with private shelters and agencies like the police department and Boston Healthcare for the Homeless. The Boston Public Health Commission, which oversees the city’s homeless services, provided Spare…
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Boston Listed as No. 1 City for Inequality
The Brookings Institution recently released a study examining the increasing level of income inequality in cities and metro areas across the country, with Boston topping the list. Conducted by Alan Berube and Natalie Holmes, the study was released on Jan. 14. Alongside Boston, the study also ranked New York and San Francisco among the top…
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Health workers vaccinate hundreds after homeless man’s death
Three cases of a bacteria-caused illness among Boston’s homeless—including one that proved fatal—occurred in less than two months, prompting the Boston Healthcare for the Homeless Program to vaccinate 990 shelter clients and staff workers. The illness, meningococcemia, is not usually the cause of widespread outbreaks among homeless individuals, but health experts note that shelter conditions…
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Kids These Days: Harvard Square Youth Bridges Gap Between Students and the Homeless
All photos: Alena Kuzub Y2Y is officially open for business. The shelter, founded by Sarah Rosenkrantz and Sam Greenberg, welcomed guests into its 22-bed facility for the first time in January. Y2Y is for the youth and is also run by the youth, relying on a volunteer staff of over 200 Harvard students, making it…
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Legal Center for the Homeless: US Gets D+ on Homeless Policy
A recent report by the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty found that, while the federal government made some progress in securing the right to housing in 2015, government policy remains dangerously inadequate. The group’s annual Human Right to Housing Report card gave overall federal policy a big red D+. The analysis takes into…
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Homeless Bill of Rights Seeks to Lessen Inequality
The state legislature recently moved forward in efforts to legally protect the homeless from discrimination in Massachusetts. On Dec. 15, an act providing for a homeless bill of rights in Massachusetts was voted unanimously out of housing committee and referred to the Committee on House Ways and Means. The rights laid out in the bill…
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A New Point in Time: A more positive narrative surrounds Walsh’s second homeless census as mayor
Last year, Marty Walsh’s first homeless census as the mayor came months after he closed Long Island, an incident that displaced hundreds of homeless folks and recovering addicts in Boston and led to tough criticism of how he handled the event. To recap, the main access route to the island, a rusty 64 year old…