Jerry Halberstadt outside his low-income senior housing building in Peabody. He was masked except for this photo taken at a distance. (Robin Lubbock/WBUR)
Jerry Halberstadt, a tenants rights advocate who has fought bullying in low-income housing, is focused on a different concern these days. I’m 84, and unlikely to survive COVID if I get it, so I need to keep myself safe, he said. I’m concerned about the same danger facing 92,000 tenants in public and subsidized housing all over the state.
He worries when neighbors in the building for senior and disabled residents where he lives, in central Peabody on the North Shore, don’t follow rules about wearing masks or maintaining distance in the small elevator or tight hallways. And in the current surge, the risk has grown.
The Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance outlined the pilot project, called A Place to Live, to the Homelessness Advisory Committee on Wednesday. The nonprofit s President Joseph Finn said the organization is working with Mayor Linda Tyer s office to create housing that he says is a cost-effective model of permanent supportive housing that can be replicated across the state. Right now, do we really need people living one, two, three, or four years within a shelter? Finn said. We can do better than this. MHSA is receiving about $150,000 per year for the next five years to help fund this project. A Place To Live is also referred to as the Worcester Model because, in June 2020, Worcester Housing Authority became the first agency in the state to receive permits and state approval for adopting the micro-unit concept. A Place to Live: Worcester will provide permanent supportive housing for adults experiencing long-term homelessness with 24 roo
Worcester police, workers respond to homeless gathering at Green Street underpass
WORCESTER City workers and several police officers responded to the Green Street underpass earlier this week after dozens of people at least some of whom are homeless gathered at the bridge.
The charred remains of an apparent fire lay near cinder blocks and a green tent was set up not far from the bridge Monday morning. Empty pizza boxes, coffee jugs and bags of trash sat not far from a street corner. A single red Christmas stocking hung under the bridge, with two people sleeping in blankets nearby.
A city worker, who declined to be identified, told a Telegram & Gazette photographer it appeared a group had a party.