The City of Boston is investing $40 million to create and preserve 718 units of affordable housing in Jamaica Plain, Dorchester, Chinatown, Hyde Park, and Roxbury, Mayor Michelle Wu announced Tuesday. “[It’s] a huge number that we’re really excited to see make a difference,” Wu said in an interview with Spare Change News. The funded…
MAYOR WU SHARES HOUSING PLANS AND HOPES FOR BOSTON’S FUTURE
As Michelle Wu ran for Mayor she saw first hand the struggles some residents were having finding and maintaining affordable housing in Boston. She met with residents at the 147 unit Forbes apartment complex in Jamaica Plain, which houses mostly low-income seniors and persons with disabilities, who were worried about losing their subsidized housing. She…
Are we going to be able to vaccinate everyone, especially those who are most vulnerable to COVID-19?
Rupal Ramesh Shah People experiencing homelessness often have difficulty accessing basic medical services, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has developed several guidelines to ensure the unhoused are prioritized during vaccine implementation. One of them is to work with Continuum of Care Programs, which promote community-wide efforts to end homelessness and address…
Poetry By Carolyn Gregory
ARM IN ARM (for Oscar Wilde) Oscar, I would have lovedto have a date with youon Valentine’s Day.We would have walkedarm in arm in Dublin,dressed like dandies. Your wit would have floored meas you picked on the cell phone junkiesand girls in stilettos.You might have pointed out a boyor two with promise. You talked about…
Spare Change News
On Thanksgiving 2021, dozens of people gathered near the intersection of Baoston’s “Mass and Cass” in the area often referred to as “Methadone Mile.” They carried with them 230 bags packed with socks, gloves, and other supplies to be distributed to the area’s unhoused people — on the street, local shelters, and the New England…
Thanksgiving, My Wife’s Surgery and Two Books
By Marc D. Goldfinger It was a strange Thanksgiving. The day before the holiday I had to get Mary Esther, my wife, to the hospital by 7 a.m. Originally the operation she needed on her back was scheduled for 2 p.m. but the early person canceled so that moved us up in the queue. It…
A CLARION CALL.
“How about a mother who allows her family to deteriorate, to have no food, to sleep in boxes and in subway stations? Their children would be removed from them immediately, so today we are here to say, we are removing you from the care of our citizens.” That boys and girls were the words spoken…
MICHELLE WU BEATS BPD TO BECOME FIRST WOMAN AND PERSON OF COLOR ELECTED MAYOR OF BOSTON
by Chris Faraone Dig Boston With 100% of the votes from all 255 precincts counted in the City of Boston, the still unofficial but decisive winner of the mayoral race is Councilor Michelle Wu. Her opponent, Councilor Annissa Essaibi George, conceded Tuesday evening. As even those who paid little attention to the race are likely aware, this…
Shelter guests will begin to receive COVID-19 vaccines in late December, early January
Vaccines against COVID-19 produced by Cambridge-based Moderna should start going to shelter guests at Pine Street Inn as early as next week or the first week of January. Pine Street Inn President Lyndia Downie said Massachusetts is one of the few states that is prioritizing shelters for the unhoused in its rollout of a vaccine.…
“They Were Locked In, We Were Locked Out”: A Story of Lockdown and Homelessness in Harvard Square
It was 22 March 2020. There were about 12 of us living in the shelter. Saturday morning was our last day there. We had no place to go. It would be my first day outside with nothing open, no restrooms, no place to sit and have a hot cup of tea, it really was hard…