Springfield Mayor: co-sheltering homeless families harms the city SPRINGFIELD, Mass. (WWLP) – Springfield Mayor Domenic Sarno said the state is placing too many homeless families in his city, and he’s outraged. Springfield Public Schools Superintendent Dan Warwick said, “We need to share the burden with other cities and towns of Commonwealth and not have everything always occur in Springfield.” “This solution is just not workable,” Springfield Chief Development Officer Kevin Kennedy said. Frustration and anger in Springfield City Hall where city officials discussed homeless housing in Springfield. “You cannot make us a dumping ground, and these are…What we have is hundreds of families right now that are coming in here,” Mayor Sarno said. According to the mayor’s office, 450 homeless families are staying in Springfield. That’s up from 257 last January. About 175 families live in co-shelter units, meaning more than one family lives in an apartment, each family occupying one bedroom. Mayor Sarno told 22News so far the city has identified 86 co-shelter units in Springfield that are being used by the state to house these homeless families, and most of them are in the lower Belmont Avenue neighborhood. 22News asked the Department of Housing and Economic Development about its plan. They’re trying to move families from 3-families-per-unit housing, so they’d live with only one other family. The goal is permanent housing. James Goodwin, President and CEO of Center for Human Development, said, “They don’t stay there very long, and there’s not an attempt create a homeless ghetto or anything like that. The plan is that this would occur for a short period of time.” Below is a statement from Paul McMorrow, the Director of Policy and Communications at the Executive Office of Housing and Economic Development: “This administration continues to believe that homelessness is a human tragedy, and that diverting homeless families to motels is the most disruptive way of addressing this tragedy. We are one Commonwealth, and every member of our Commonwealth deserves to live in stability, safety and dignity. Moving families from motels to congregate housing is a standard practice this administration inherited, and we look forward to the opportunity to review best practices going forward. We also recognize that moving families from motels to shared housing is just one step on the path to long-term, sustainable housing.”
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 04:10:35 +0000
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