Anna Maria Rest Home

When I first heard about 850 angry people denouncing the moving of a triage center for homeless people to their neighborhood my first reaction was: “Stop complaining. Stop being so selfish. We all have to sacrifice and now it’s your turn.” My first reaction was that the City Council should stick to its decision and shove the Homeless Triage Center down their 850 collective thoughts. Vocal selfishness and mob mentality cannot rule. Period. Main South has already had its turn taking care of the mentally ill, unmotivated or bad luck homeless people. Now it’s your turn.

Then I went to the two areas to see for myself the neighborhood proposed near Anna Maria Rest Home and the old People in Peril Pip Shelter. It is undeniable that the Anna Maria Rest Home is an area with small single family homes and middle class businesses. It’s also undeniable that the number of people moving in would not be like a group home or foster care family. Lots of people who were down and out, beggars, perhaps petty crime and other distasteful actions would likely increase and change the nature of the neighborhood. I feel more sorry for families raising children than businesses trying to make money, but both count. I thought also about the City of Worcester trying to retain its middle class, who already live in the neighborhoods like that surrounding Anna Maria Rest Home.

Others who I spoke with gave their opinions that the homeless people themselves would face opposition from the new people around them; maybe vocal, maybe worse. And that the change for both the homeless people and the people living around this newly identified area was not worth the disruption.

So I looked again at the former PIP shelter in Main South and said to myself that for better or worse, the businesses and families who have moved to this area already knew what they were getting when they moved into Main South. That the Homeless Triage Center is only up the hill now and that the homeless have been in this area for - well - it seems like forever. And the new facility to be built on Jacques Ave is a couple blocks away. This seems like a better temporary solution until the new facility is built than some faraway place.

Main South, especially around the Triage Center – both the temporary and new one – deserve a very heightened police presence, which is proposed. More cameras, more law and order should be forthcoming. But the old location just makes more sense than a far away new temporary location. In this instance – probably only in this instance – the residents around Anna Maria Rest Home were right. And the City did right in leaving needy down and out folks where they already are.

Now maybe the City should rebuild Jacques Ave where the new triage center will go – so that the street doesn’t look like Afghanistan or the moon – or feel that way in one’s car driving on the streets of the poor neighborhood. Maybe more City personnel and infrastructure resources is a fair quid pro quo for the status quo.

This is Randy Feldman on WCRN’s Midday Report. Catch me Fridays from 11-1pm right here or on my website and accompanying blog – Bigmouthmanifesto .com